Python Tkinter Events — Mouse, Keyboard, bind() and Shortcuts

Mouse Events
event.x and event.y coordinates
Bind Events
Using Lambda
Keyboard Events
Binding particular Key
Difference between KeyPress and KeyRelease
Using Arrow Keys
Tkinter Shortcut Key Example

Mouse Events 🔝

`<Button-1>`	Mouse Left button click
`<Button-2>`	Mouse center button click
`<Button-3>`	Mouse Right button click
`<B1-Motion>`	Mouse Left button Press and move
`<ButtonRelease-1>`	Mouse Left button release, ButtonRelease-2 for Middle and 3 for right button.
`<Double-Button-1>`	Left Mouse key is double clicked.
`<Enter>`	Mouse Entry over a widget
`<Leave>`	Mouse Leave a widget
`<MouseWheel>`	Mouse Wheel Up or Down rotation

Tkinter binding Mouse button wheel and movement events capturing and triggering callback functions

event.x event.y 🔝

Based on any event we can read the x, y coordinates of the position by reading event.x and event.y values. Here is a function which displays the x and y coordinates inside a Label. We used config() to update the text option of the Label.

str() is used to convert integer to string.

def my_callback(event):
     l1.config(text='Clicked at : '+ str(event.x) +","+ str(event.y))

Bind Events 🔝

We can bind various mouse events of parent window ( or any widget ) and trigger the callback function. Here is a sample of using left mouse button click to call my_callback() function.

my_w.bind('<Button-1>',my_callback) #Mouse Left button  click

This is same as using <ButtonPress-1> <1> to bind Mouse left button click.
Drag and Drop using Mouse left button press.

Using Lambda 🔝

We can directly use lambda to config the text property of Label.

l1.bind('<Enter>',lambda e:l1.config(text='Welcome'))

Full code with all mouse events are here

import tkinter as tk # Python 3
my_w = tk.Tk()
my_w.geometry("615x400") 
def my_callback(event):
     l1.config(text='Clicked at : '+ str(event.x) +","+ str(event.y))

l1=tk.Label(my_w,text='to Display',bg='yellow',font=('Times',26,'normal'))
l1.grid(row=0,column=1,padx=10,pady=10)

my_w.bind('<Button-1>',my_callback) # Mouse Left button  click <ButtonPress-1><1>

#my_w.bind('<Button-2>',my_callback) # Mouse middle button  click
#my_w.bind('<Button-3>',my_callback) # Mouse right button  click
#my_w.bind('<B1-Motion>',my_callback) # Mouse left button pressed move
#my_w.bind('<ButtonRelease-1>',my_callback) # Mouse left button  release
#my_w.bind('<Double-Button-1>',my_callback) # Mouse left button  Double click 
#l1.bind('<Enter>',lambda e:l1.config(text='Welcome')) # Mouse enters label 
#l1.bind('<Leave>',lambda e:l1.config(text='Thanks')) # Mouse leaves label 
#my_w.bind('<MouseWheel>',my_callback) # Mouse middle button  click
my_w.mainloop()

Keyboard Events 🔝

`<Key>`	Any Key is pressed
`<Return>`	Enter Key is pressed
`<KeyPress>`	Key Press event of any widget
`<KeyRelease>`	Key Release event of any widget
`<FocusIn>`	When widget got focus
`<FocusOut>`	When widget lost focus
`<Right>`	When Right arrow is pressed
`<Left>`	When Left arrow is pressed
`<Up>`	When Up arrow is pressed
`<Down>`	When Down arrow is pressed

Tkinter binding keyboard events like Key press, release , focus, enter and callback functions

Callback function to read the Key pressed.

def my_callback(event):
	#l1.config(text='You Pressed  : '+ event.char)
	l1.config(text='Clicked the key : '+ event.keysym) # For non-printable keys

Binding the event

my_w.bind("<Key>", my_callback)

Using one-liner for Enter Key

my_w.bind("<Return>", lambda e:l1.config(text='Hi'))

Binding particular Key 🔝

To bind the event of specific key

import tkinter as tk # Python 3
my_w = tk.Tk()
my_w.geometry("615x400") 
def my_callback(event):
     l1.config(text='Clicked the key : '+ event.char)
	 	
l1=tk.Label(my_w,text='to Display',bg='yellow',font=('Times',26,'normal'))
l1.grid(row=0,column=1,padx=10,pady=10)

my_w.bind('<a>',my_callback) # Key a is pressed
my_w.bind('<K>',my_callback) # Key K is pressed

my_w.mainloop()

To bind special chars use keysym

l1.config(text='Clicked the key : '+ event.keysym)

Difference between KeyPress and KeyRelease 🔝

Here the function my_t1() change the background colour of Entry widget t1 once the number of char exceeds 5. KeyPress fires before the character is inserted into the Entry box, so at the moment of firing the box still has one fewer character than expected. This means the background colour changes only after the 7th key is pressed (when the box has 6 chars at the time of firing).

KeyRelease fires after the character is inserted, so the count is accurate — the background changes as soon as the 6th character is entered.
Difference between KeyPress and KeyRelease events.

def my_t1(*args):
    if(len(t1.get())>5):
        t1.config(bg='red')
    else:
        t1.config(bg='lightgreen')

Full code is here

import tkinter as tk # Python 3
my_w = tk.Tk()
my_w.geometry("615x400")
font=('Times',26,'normal')  
def my_callback(event):
    #l1.config(text='Clicked the key : '+ event.char) # for printable characters like letters, numbers and symbols. 
    l1.config(text='Clicked the key : '+ event.keysym) # For non-printable keys like Shift, Ctrl, Alt, arrow keys, F1-F12, Backspace, Delete etc
def my_t1(*args):
    if(len(t1.get())>5):
        t1.config(bg='red')
    else:
        t1.config(bg='lightgreen')

l1=tk.Label(my_w,text='to Display',bg='yellow',font=font)
l1.grid(row=0,column=0,padx=10,pady=10)
t1=tk.Entry(my_w,bg='lightgreen',font=font)
t1.grid(row=1,column=0,padx=10)

t2=tk.Entry(my_w,bg='lightgreen',font=font)
t2.grid(row=2,column=0,padx=10,pady=10)

my_w.bind("<Key>", my_callback) # Any key is pressed 
my_w.bind("<Return>", lambda e:l1.config(text='Hi')) # Enter Key
t1.bind("<KeyPress>",my_t1)
#t1.bind("<KeyRelease>",my_t1)
t1.bind("<FocusIn>",lambda e:l1.config(text='Welcome'))
t1.bind("<FocusOut>",lambda e:l1.config(text='Thanks'))

my_w.mainloop()

Using Arrow Keys 🔝

We can trigger different function by using directional arrow keys.

my_w.bind('<Right>',right)
my_w.bind('<Left>',left)
my_w.bind('<Up>',up)
my_w.bind('<Down>',down)

Triggering on Right arrow key press

my_w.bind("<Right>",lambda e:l1.config(text='Right arrow'))

Tkinter Shortcut Key Example 🔝

This Tkinter application demonstrates how to use a keyboard shortcut (Ctrl+1) to open a new window.

import tkinter as tk

# Function to open a new Tkinter window
def open_window(event=None):
    new_window = tk.Toplevel(my_w)
    new_window.title("New Window")
    new_window.geometry("300x200")
    label = tk.Label(new_window, text="This is a new window!", font=("Arial", 14), fg="#dc3545") 
    label.pack(pady=20)

# Main Tkinter window
my_w = tk.Tk()
my_w.title("Shortcut Key Example")
my_w.geometry("400x300")

# Label for instructions with Bootstrap 'text-primary' color
instructions = tk.Label(my_w, text="Press Ctrl+1 to open a new window", font=("Arial", 12), fg="#007bff") 
instructions.pack(pady=50)

# Bind Ctrl+1 to the open_window function
my_w.bind("<Control-Key-1>", open_window)

# Run the Tkinter event loop
my_w.mainloop()

Typing keys to create Keyboard events . Enter & Leave Mouse events. Drag and Drop using Mouse button. Moving elements in canvas using arrow keys.
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Subhendu Mohapatra

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