docs/reST/ref/cursors.rst
.. include:: common.txt
pygame.cursors.. module:: pygame.cursors :synopsis: pygame module for cursor resources
| :sl:pygame module for cursor resources
Pygame offers control over the system hardware cursor. Pygame supports
black and white cursors (bitmap cursors), as well as system variant cursors and color cursors.
You control the cursor with functions inside :mod:pygame.mouse.
This cursors module contains functions for loading and decoding various cursor formats. These allow you to easily store your cursors in external files or directly as encoded python strings.
The module includes several standard cursors. The :func:pygame.mouse.set_cursor()
function takes several arguments. All those arguments have been stored in a
single tuple you can call like this:
::
pygame.mouse.set_cursor(*pygame.cursors.arrow)
The following variables can be passed to pygame.mouse.set_cursor function:
pygame.cursors.arrow
pygame.cursors.diamond
pygame.cursors.broken_x
pygame.cursors.tri_left
pygame.cursors.tri_right
This module also contains a few cursors as formatted strings. You'll need to
pass these to pygame.cursors.compile() function before you can use them.
The example call would look like this:
::
cursor = pygame.cursors.compile(pygame.cursors.textmarker_strings) pygame.mouse.set_cursor((8, 16), (0, 0), *cursor)
The following strings can be converted into cursor bitmaps with
pygame.cursors.compile() :
pygame.cursors.thickarrow_strings
pygame.cursors.sizer_x_strings
pygame.cursors.sizer_y_strings
pygame.cursors.sizer_xy_strings
pygame.cursor.textmarker_strings
.. function:: compile
| :sl:create binary cursor data from simple strings
| :sg:compile(strings, black='X', white='.', xor='o') -> data, mask
A sequence of strings can be used to create binary cursor data for the
system cursor. This returns the binary data in the form of two tuples.
Those can be passed as the third and fourth arguments respectively of the
:func:pygame.mouse.set_cursor() function.
If you are creating your own cursor strings, you can use any value represent the black and white pixels. Some system allow you to set a special toggle color for the system color, this is also called the xor color. If the system does not support xor cursors, that color will simply be black.
The height must be divisible by 8. The width of the strings must all be equal
and be divisible by 8. If these two conditions are not met, ValueError is
raised.
An example set of cursor strings looks like this
::
thickarrow_strings = ( #sized 24x24
"XX ",
"XXX ",
"XXXX ",
"XX.XX ",
"XX..XX ",
"XX...XX ",
"XX....XX ",
"XX.....XX ",
"XX......XX ",
"XX.......XX ",
"XX........XX ",
"XX........XXX ",
"XX......XXXXX ",
"XX.XXX..XX ",
"XXXX XX..XX ",
"XX XX..XX ",
" XX..XX ",
" XX..XX ",
" XX..XX ",
" XXXX ",
" XX ",
" ",
" ",
" ")
.. ## pygame.cursors.compile ##
.. function:: load_xbm
| :sl:load cursor data from an XBM file
| :sg:load_xbm(cursorfile) -> cursor_args
| :sg:load_xbm(cursorfile, maskfile) -> cursor_args
This loads cursors for a simple subset of XBM files. XBM files are
traditionally used to store cursors on UNIX systems, they are an ASCII
format used to represent simple images.
Sometimes the black and white color values will be split into two separate
XBM files. You can pass a second maskfile argument to load the two
images into a single cursor.
The cursorfile and maskfile arguments can either be filenames or file-like object with the readlines method.
The return value cursor_args can be passed directly to the
pygame.mouse.set_cursor() function.
.. ## pygame.cursors.load_xbm ##
.. class:: Cursor
| :sl:pygame object representing a cursor
| :sg:Cursor(size, hotspot, xormasks, andmasks) -> Cursor
| :sg:Cursor(hotspot, surface) -> Cursor
| :sg:Cursor(constant) -> Cursor
| :sg:Cursor(Cursor) -> Cursor
| :sg:Cursor() -> Cursor
In pygame 2, there are 3 types of cursors you can create to give your game that little bit of extra polish. There's bitmap type cursors, which existed in pygame 1.x, and are compiled from a string or load from an xbm file. Then there are system type cursors, where you choose a preset that will convey the same meaning but look native across different operating systems. Finally you can create a color cursor, which displays a pygame surface as the cursor.
Creating a system cursor
Choose a constant from this list, pass it into pygame.cursors.Cursor(constant),
and you're good to go. Be advised that not all systems support every system
cursor, and you may get a substitution instead. For example, on MacOS,
WAIT/WAITARROW should show up as an arrow, and SIZENWSE/SIZENESW/SIZEALL
should show up as a closed hand. And on Wayland, every SIZE cursor should
show up as a hand.
::
Pygame Cursor Constant Description
--------------------------------------------
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_ARROW arrow
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_IBEAM i-beam
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_WAIT wait
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_CROSSHAIR crosshair
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_WAITARROW small wait cursor
(or wait if not available)
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_SIZENWSE double arrow pointing
northwest and southeast
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_SIZENESW double arrow pointing
northeast and southwest
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_SIZEWE double arrow pointing
west and east
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_SIZENS double arrow pointing
north and south
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_SIZEALL four pointed arrow pointing
north, south, east, and west
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_NO slashed circle or crossbones
pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_HAND hand
Creating a cursor without passing arguments
In addition to the cursor constants available and described above,
you can also call pygame.cursors.Cursor(), and your cursor is ready (doing that is the same as
calling pygame.cursors.Cursor(pygame.SYSTEM_CURSOR_ARROW).
Doing one of those calls actually creates a system cursor using the default native image.
Creating a color cursor
To create a color cursor, create a Cursor from a hotspot and a surface.
hotspot is an (x,y) coordinate that determines where in the cursor the exact point is.
The hotspot position must be within the bounds of the surface.
Creating a bitmap cursor
When the mouse cursor is visible, it will be displayed as a black and white
bitmap using the given bitmask arrays. The size is a sequence containing
the cursor width and height. hotspot is a sequence containing the cursor
hotspot position.
A cursor has a width and height, but a mouse position is represented by a
set of point coordinates. So the value passed into the cursor hotspot
variable helps pygame to actually determine at what exact point the cursor
is at.
xormasks is a sequence of bytes containing the cursor xor data masks.
Lastly andmasks, a sequence of bytes containing the cursor bitmask data.
To create these variables, we can make use of the
:func:pygame.cursors.compile() function.
Width and height must be a multiple of 8, and the mask arrays must be the correct size for the given width and height. Otherwise an exception is raised.
.. method:: copy
| :sl:`copy the current cursor`
| :sg:`copy() -> Cursor`
Returns a new Cursor object with the same data and hotspot as the original.
.. ## pygame.cursors.Cursor.copy ##
.. attribute:: type
| :sl:`Gets the cursor type`
| :sg:`type -> string`
The type will be ``"system"``, ``"bitmap"``, or ``"color"``.
.. ## pygame.cursors.Cursor.type ##
.. attribute:: data
| :sl:`Gets the cursor data`
| :sg:`data -> tuple`
Returns the data that was used to create this cursor object, wrapped up in a tuple.
.. ## pygame.cursors.Cursor.data ##
.. versionadded:: 2.0.1
.. ## pygame.cursors.Cursor ##
.. ## pygame.cursors ##
Example code for creating and settings cursors. (Click the mouse to switch cursor)
.. literalinclude:: code_examples/cursors_module_example.py