Why is the custom tkinter placeholder text for an entry box ignored?

Question

import tkinter as tk
import customtkinter as ui

ui.set_appearance_mode("dark")
ui.set_default_color_theme("dark-blue")

root = ui.CTk()
root.geometry("500x350")

frame = ui.CTkFrame(master=root)
frame.pack(pady=20, padx=60, fill="both", expand=True)

label = ui.CTkLabel(master=frame, text="Login System", font=("Roboto", 24))
label.pack(pady=12, padx=10)

username = tk.StringVar()
entry1 = ui.CTkEntry(master=frame, textvariable=username, placeholder_text="Username")
entry1.pack(pady=12, padx=10)

password = tk.StringVar()
entry2 = ui.CTkEntry(master=frame, textvariable=password, placeholder_text="Password", show="*")
entry2.pack(pady=12, padx=10)

def login():
    print(username.get())
    print(password.get())

button = ui.CTkButton(master=frame, text="Login", command=login)
button.pack(pady=12, padx=10)

checkbox = ui.CTkCheckBox(master=frame, text="Remember Me")
checkbox.pack(pady=12, padx=10)

root.mainloop()

Here is my code. The problem is that the placeholder text doesn’t show up when I pass a text variable argument.

entry1 = ui.CTkEntry(master=frame, placeholder_text="Username")

shows the placeholder but doesn’t pass the textvariable

entry1 = ui.CTkEntry(master=frame, textvariable=username, placeholder_text="Username")

passes the textvariable but doesn’t show the placeholder

I’ve seen similar questions but they don’t work for the custom tkinter widget and they don’t use the placeholder argument.

Asked By: Coder

||

Source

Answer 1

The placeholder text is only activated when, the placeholder attribute is set, and the value of the textvariable attribute is None or "". Since in your example the value of textvariable is StrinVar(), the second condition fails and the placeholder is never shown.

However you don’t really need both anyway. You can simply delete the textvariable and the username and password StringVars and just call get() on the entry widgets directly in order to get the values in the same manner.

import tkinter as tk
import customtkinter as ui

ui.set_appearance_mode("dark")
ui.set_default_color_theme("dark-blue")

root = ui.CTk()
root.geometry("500x350")

frame = ui.CTkFrame(master=root)
frame.pack(pady=20, padx=60, fill="both", expand=True)

label = ui.CTkLabel(master=frame, text="Login System", font=("Roboto", 24))
label.pack(pady=12, padx=10)


entry1 = ui.CTkEntry(master=frame, placeholder_text="Username")
entry1.pack(pady=12, padx=10)

entry2 = ui.CTkEntry(master=frame, placeholder_text="Password", show="*")
entry2.pack(pady=12, padx=10)

def login():
    print(entry1.get())
    print(entry2.get()) # call get() on the entry widgets

button = ui.CTkButton(master=frame, text="Login", command=login)
button.pack(pady=12, padx=10)

checkbox = ui.CTkCheckBox(master=frame, text="Remember Me")
checkbox.pack(pady=12, padx=10)

root.mainloop()

Answered By: Alexander

Answer 2

You must use customtkinter.StringVar().

Snippet:

username = customtkinter.StringVar(value="test")
entry_1 = customtkinter.CTkEntry(app,
                                 placeholder_text="placeholder",
                                 textvariable=username)
entry_1.pack(pady=20)

Btw, you will do same as password too.

Answered By: toyota Supra

Why is the custom tkinter placeholder text for an entry box ignored?

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