Hi all,

I know there have been several threads about getting card images into a GUI, but I'm flustered trying to understand why some things work and some things don't. Here's the code:

[php]
import random
from Tkinter import *
import Image, ImageTk

class Card(object):
suits = ["C","D","H","S"]
values = ['A','2','3','4','5','6','7','8','9','T','J','Q','K']
down_img = PhotoImage(file="Deck1.gif")

cards = [x+y for x in suits for y in values]

pics = {}
for x in cards:
pics[x] = PhotoImage(file=x+'.gif')


def __init__(self, suit=None, value=None, up=True):

if suit in Card.suits:
self.suit = suit
else:
self.suit = random.choice(Card.suits)

if value in Card.values:
self.value = value
else:
self.value = random.choice(Card.values)
self.up = up

def __str__(self):
return self.value+self.suit

def picURL(self):
return Card.pics[self.suit+self.value]

def display(self, x,y,angle,canvas):
if self.up:
canvas.create_image(x,y,Card.pics[self.suit+self.value])
else:
canvas.create_image(x,y,Card.down_image)


class Deck(Card):

deck = Card.cards[:]

def __init__(self, suit=None, value=None, up=True):
card = str(suit)+str(value)
if card not in Deck.deck:
if Deck.deck == []:
raise ValueError, "Deck empty!"
card = random.choice(Deck.deck)
suit=card[0]
value=card[1:]
Deck.deck.remove(card)
self.suit = suit
self.value = value
self.up = up

@staticmethod
def shuffle():
Deck.deck = Card.cards




class BridgeRound(Frame):

# display_data contains display info for each hand:
#(startx, starty, dx, dy, angle of rotation)
display_data = [(30,0,10,0,0), \
(200, 30, 0, 10, 270), \
(170, 200, -10, 0, 180), \
(0, 170, 0, -10, 90)]

def __init__(self, master):
Frame.__init__(self,master)
self.canvas = Canvas(self)
self.canvas.grid()
self.grid()
self.deal()
self.display()

def deal(self):
Deck.shuffle()
self.hands = [[Deck() for i in range(13)] for j in range(4)]

def display(self):
for i in range(4):
hand = self.hands[i]
x, y, dx, dy, angle = BridgeRound.display_data[i]
for j in hand:
print j,
j.display(self.canvas,x,y,angle)
x += dx
y += dy

mainw = Tk()
mainw.f = BridgeRound(mainw)
mainw.mainloop()
[/php]
You may ask, why does he create the images in the Card class? Isn't that wasteful of memory? Well, yes. BUT...for some reason, if I don't maintain a static reference to the card images, they don't display. Thus, a line like

canvas.create_image(PhotoImage(file="H6.gif"))

results in a blank image. So if I want to display all the cards at once, then I have to maintain them all in a data structure.

Anyways, when I run the code, I get

to which I say ?!@#*^$#^?!

So when's the best time to create an image?! I'm sure I can tweak the code to make it run ... but what's the underlying theory about Tkinter images here?

Thanks,
Jeff