Transparent colors Tkinter

Question

Is it possible to change the color of a frame background or any other widget to transparent light blue or any other transparent color?

Answer 1

Yes there is a way. Unfortunately it only works for the entire window (The window and all of the child widgets).

Here is a little demo I wrote up a while ago which does what you want, among other things.

Transparent Window Demo :

import Tkinter as Tk, re




class TransparentWin (Tk.Tk) :
    ''' Transparent Tk Window Class '''

    def __init__ (self) :

        Tk.Tk.__init__(self)

        self.Drag = Drag(self)

        ''' Sets focus to the window. '''
        self.focus_force()

        ''' Removes the native window boarder. '''
        self.overrideredirect(True)

        ''' Disables resizing of the widget.  '''
        self.resizable(False, False)

        ''' Places window above all other windows in the window stack. '''
        self.wm_attributes("-topmost", True)

        ''' This changes the alpha value (How transparent the window should
            be). It ranges from 0.0 (completely transparent) to 1.0
            (completely opaque).  '''
        self.attributes("-alpha", 0.7)

        ''' The windows overall position on the screen  '''
        self.wm_geometry('+' + str(439) + '+' + str(172))

        ''' Changes the window's color. '''
        bg = '#3e4134'

        self.config(bg=bg)

        self.Frame = Tk.Frame(self, bg=bg)
        self.Frame.pack()

        ''' Exits the application when the window is right clicked. '''
        self.Frame.bind('<Button-3>', self.exit)

        ''' Changes the window's size indirectly. '''
        self.Frame.configure(width=162, height=100)

    def exit (self, event) :
        self.destroy()

    def position (self) :

        _filter = re.compile(r"(\d+)?x?(\d+)?([+-])(\d+)([+-])(\d+)")

        pos = self.winfo_geometry()

        filtered = _filter.search(pos)
        self.X = int(filtered.group(4))
        self.Y = int(filtered.group(6))

        return self.X, self.Y

class Drag:
    ''' Makes a window dragable. '''

    def __init__ (self, par, dissable=None, releasecmd=None) :

        self.Par        = par
        self.Dissable   = dissable

        self.ReleaseCMD = releasecmd

        self.Par.bind('<Button-1>', self.relative_position)
        self.Par.bind('<ButtonRelease-1>', self.drag_unbind)


    def relative_position (self, event) :

        cx, cy = self.Par.winfo_pointerxy()
        x, y = self.Par.position()

        self.OriX = x
        self.OriY = y

        self.RelX = cx - x
        self.RelY = cy - y

        self.Par.bind('<Motion>', self.drag_wid)

    def drag_wid (self, event) :

        cx, cy = self.Par.winfo_pointerxy()

        d = self.Dissable

        if d == 'x' :
            x = self.OriX
            y = cy - self.RelY
        elif d == 'y' :
            x = cx - self.RelX
            y = self.OriY
        else:
            x = cx - self.RelX
            y = cy - self.RelY

        if x < 0 :
            x = 0

        if y < 0 :
            y = 0

        self.Par.wm_geometry('+' + str(x) + '+' + str(y))

    def drag_unbind (self, event) :

        self.Par.unbind('<Motion>')

        if self.ReleaseCMD != None :
            self.ReleaseCMD()


    def dissable (self) :

        self.Par.unbind('<Button-1>')
        self.Par.unbind('<ButtonRelease-1>')
        self.Par.unbind('<Motion>')


def __run__ () :

    TransparentWin().mainloop()


if __name__ == '__main__' :

    __run__()

Answer 2

For what it's worth, here's an arguably more readable version of the code in @rectangletangle's answer that has been re-formatted to more closely adhere to PEP 8 - Style Guide for Python Code recommendations.

Except for a trivial modification to the way the Tkinter module is imported so it will work in both Python 2 and 3, all other executable code is identical to his.

try:
    import tkinter as tk
except ImportError:
    import Tkinter as tk
import re


class TransparentWin(tk.Tk):
    """ Transparent Tkinter Window Class. """

    def __init__(self):
        tk.Tk.__init__(self)

        self.Drag = Drag(self)

        # Sets focus to the window.
        self.focus_force()

        # Removes the native window boarder.
        self.overrideredirect(True)

        # Disables resizing of the widget.
        self.resizable(False, False)

        # Places window above all other windows in the window stack.
        self.wm_attributes("-topmost", True)

        # This changes the alpha value (How transparent the window should be).
        # It ranges from 0.0 (completely transparent) to 1.0 (completely opaque).
        self.attributes("-alpha", 0.7)

        # The windows overall position on the screen
        self.wm_geometry('+' + str(439) + '+' + str(172))

        # Changes the window's color.
        bg = '#3e4134'

        self.config(bg=bg)

        self.Frame = tk.Frame(self, bg=bg)
        self.Frame.pack()

        # Exits the application when the window is right clicked.
        self.Frame.bind('<Button-3>', self.exit)

        # Changes the window's size indirectly.
        self.Frame.configure(width=162, height=100)

    def exit(self, event):
        self.destroy()

    def position(self):
        _filter = re.compile(r"(\d+)?x?(\d+)?([+-])(\d+)([+-])(\d+)")
        pos = self.winfo_geometry()
        filtered = _filter.search(pos)
        self.X = int(filtered.group(4))
        self.Y = int(filtered.group(6))

        return self.X, self.Y


class Drag:
    """ Makes a window draggable. """

    def __init__(self, par, dissable=None, releasecmd=None):
        self.Par        = par
        self.Dissable   = dissable
        self.ReleaseCMD = releasecmd

        self.Par.bind('<Button-1>', self.relative_position)
        self.Par.bind('<ButtonRelease-1>', self.drag_unbind)

    def relative_position(self, event):
        cx, cy = self.Par.winfo_pointerxy()
        x, y = self.Par.position()
        self.OriX = x
        self.OriY = y
        self.RelX = cx - x
        self.RelY = cy - y
        self.Par.bind('<Motion>', self.drag_wid)

    def drag_wid(self, event):
        cx, cy = self.Par.winfo_pointerxy()
        d = self.Dissable

        if d == 'x':
            x = self.OriX
            y = cy - self.RelY
        elif d == 'y':
            x = cx - self.RelX
            y = self.OriY
        else:
            x = cx - self.RelX
            y = cy - self.RelY

        if x < 0:
            x = 0
        if y < 0:
            y = 0

        self.Par.wm_geometry('+' + str(x) + '+' + str(y))

    def drag_unbind(self, event):
        self.Par.unbind('<Motion>')
        if self.ReleaseCMD != None:
            self.ReleaseCMD()

    def dissable(self):
        self.Par.unbind('<Button-1>')
        self.Par.unbind('<ButtonRelease-1>')
        self.Par.unbind('<Motion>')


def __run__():
    TransparentWin().mainloop()


if __name__ == '__main__':
    __run__()