OLA Python API

Building the Python Bindings

You should install readline if you haven't already:

sudo easy_install readline

You need the python version of protocol buffers installed.

See Building OLA but run

$ ./configure --enable-python-libs

Check where the modules are going to be installed:

$ grep ^pythondir config.log
pythondir='/Library/Python/2.5/site-packages'

Run the usual: make, make check, make install.

Check that the modules have been installed correctly in the $pythondir above.

Check that $pythondir appears in sys.path:

$ python -c "import sys; print sys.path"

If it doesn't add it to $PYTHONPATH:

$ export PYTHONPATH=$PYTHONPATH:/path/to/your/install/dir

You probably want to put this line in your shell .rc file.

Interesting Classes

ClientWrapper

A helper class that connects to the server and creates a new OlaClient

OlaClient

The main API

The best documentation is the set of example programs in the python/examples directory.

Sending DMX

A simple example to send DMX:

import array
from ola.ClientWrapper import ClientWrapper

def DmxSent(state):
  wrapper.Stop()

universe = 1
data = array.array('B')
data.append(10)
data.append(50)
data.append(255)
wrapper = ClientWrapper()
client = wrapper.Client()
client.SendDmx(universe, data, DmxSent)
wrapper.Run()

Receiving DMX

Here is some code to receive DMX on universe 1.

from ola.ClientWrapper import ClientWrapper

def NewData(data):
  print data

universe = 1

wrapper = ClientWrapper()
client = wrapper.Client()
client.RegisterUniverse(universe, client.REGISTER, NewData)
wrapper.Run()