pygame.key

pygame module to work with the keyboard

pygame.key.get_focused	—	true if the display is receiving keyboard input from the system
pygame.key.get_pressed	—	get the state of all keyboard buttons
pygame.key.get_mods	—	determine which modifier keys are being held
pygame.key.set_mods	—	temporarily set which modifier keys are pressed
pygame.key.set_repeat	—	control how held keys are repeated
pygame.key.get_repeat	—	see how held keys are repeated
pygame.key.name	—	get the name of a key identifier
pygame.key.key_code	—	get the key identifier from a key name
pygame.key.start_text_input	—	start handling Unicode text input events
pygame.key.stop_text_input	—	stop handling Unicode text input events
pygame.key.set_text_input_rect	—	controls the position of the candidate list

This module contains functions for dealing with the keyboard.

The pygame.eventpygame module for interacting with events and queues queue gets pygame.KEYDOWN and pygame.KEYUP events when the keyboard buttons are pressed and released. Both events have key and mod attributes.

• key: an integer ID representing every key on the keyboard

• mod: a bitmask of all the modifier keys that were in a pressed state when the event occurred

The pygame.KEYDOWN event has the additional attributes unicode and scancode.

• unicode: a single character string that is the fully translated character entered, this takes into account the shift and composition keys

• scancode: the platform-specific key code, which could be different from keyboard to keyboard, but is useful for key selection of weird keys like the multimedia keys

New in pygame 2.0.0: The pygame.TEXTINPUT event is preferred to the unicode attribute of pygame.KEYDOWN. The attribute text contains the input.

The following is a list of all the constants (from pygame.localspygame constants) used to represent keyboard keys.

Portability note: The integers for key constants differ between pygame 1 and 2. Always use key constants (K_a) rather than integers directly (97) so that your key handling code works well on both pygame 1 and pygame 2.

pygame
Constant      ASCII   Description
---------------------------------
K_BACKSPACE   \b      backspace
K_TAB         \t      tab
K_CLEAR               clear
K_RETURN      \r      return
K_PAUSE               pause
K_ESCAPE      ^[      escape
K_SPACE               space
K_EXCLAIM     !       exclaim
K_QUOTEDBL    "       quotedbl
K_HASH        #       hash
K_DOLLAR      $       dollar
K_AMPERSAND   &       ampersand
K_QUOTE               quote
K_LEFTPAREN   (       left parenthesis
K_RIGHTPAREN  )       right parenthesis
K_ASTERISK    *       asterisk
K_PLUS        +       plus sign
K_COMMA       ,       comma
K_MINUS       -       minus sign
K_PERIOD      .       period
K_SLASH       /       forward slash
K_0           0       0
K_1           1       1
K_2           2       2
K_3           3       3
K_4           4       4
K_5           5       5
K_6           6       6
K_7           7       7
K_8           8       8
K_9           9       9
K_COLON       :       colon
K_SEMICOLON   ;       semicolon
K_LESS        <       less-than sign
K_EQUALS      =       equals sign
K_GREATER     >       greater-than sign
K_QUESTION    ?       question mark
K_AT          @       at
K_LEFTBRACKET [       left bracket
K_BACKSLASH   \       backslash
K_RIGHTBRACKET ]      right bracket
K_CARET       ^       caret
K_UNDERSCORE  _       underscore
K_BACKQUOTE   `       grave
K_a           a       a
K_b           b       b
K_c           c       c
K_d           d       d
K_e           e       e
K_f           f       f
K_g           g       g
K_h           h       h
K_i           i       i
K_j           j       j
K_k           k       k
K_l           l       l
K_m           m       m
K_n           n       n
K_o           o       o
K_p           p       p
K_q           q       q
K_r           r       r
K_s           s       s
K_t           t       t
K_u           u       u
K_v           v       v
K_w           w       w
K_x           x       x
K_y           y       y
K_z           z       z
K_DELETE              delete
K_KP0                 keypad 0
K_KP1                 keypad 1
K_KP2                 keypad 2
K_KP3                 keypad 3
K_KP4                 keypad 4
K_KP5                 keypad 5
K_KP6                 keypad 6
K_KP7                 keypad 7
K_KP8                 keypad 8
K_KP9                 keypad 9
K_KP_PERIOD   .       keypad period
K_KP_DIVIDE   /       keypad divide
K_KP_MULTIPLY *       keypad multiply
K_KP_MINUS    -       keypad minus
K_KP_PLUS     +       keypad plus
K_KP_ENTER    \r      keypad enter
K_KP_EQUALS   =       keypad equals
K_UP                  up arrow
K_DOWN                down arrow
K_RIGHT               right arrow
K_LEFT                left arrow
K_INSERT              insert
K_HOME                home
K_END                 end
K_PAGEUP              page up
K_PAGEDOWN            page down
K_F1                  F1
K_F2                  F2
K_F3                  F3
K_F4                  F4
K_F5                  F5
K_F6                  F6
K_F7                  F7
K_F8                  F8
K_F9                  F9
K_F10                 F10
K_F11                 F11
K_F12                 F12
K_F13                 F13
K_F14                 F14
K_F15                 F15
K_NUMLOCK             numlock
K_CAPSLOCK            capslock
K_SCROLLOCK           scrollock
K_RSHIFT              right shift
K_LSHIFT              left shift
K_RCTRL               right control
K_LCTRL               left control
K_RALT                right alt
K_LALT                left alt
K_RMETA               right meta
K_LMETA               left meta
K_LSUPER              left Windows key
K_RSUPER              right Windows key
K_MODE                mode shift
K_HELP                help
K_PRINT               print screen
K_SYSREQ              sysrq
K_BREAK               break
K_MENU                menu
K_POWER               power
K_EURO                Euro
K_AC_BACK             Android back button

The keyboard also has a list of modifier states (from pygame.localspygame constants) that can be assembled by bitwise-ORing them together.

pygame
Constant      Description
-------------------------
KMOD_NONE     no modifier keys pressed
KMOD_LSHIFT   left shift
KMOD_RSHIFT   right shift
KMOD_SHIFT    left shift or right shift or both
KMOD_LCTRL    left control
KMOD_RCTRL    right control
KMOD_CTRL     left control or right control or both
KMOD_LALT     left alt
KMOD_RALT     right alt
KMOD_ALT      left alt or right alt or both
KMOD_LMETA    left meta
KMOD_RMETA    right meta
KMOD_META     left meta or right meta or both
KMOD_CAPS     caps lock
KMOD_NUM      num lock
KMOD_MODE     AltGr

The modifier information is contained in the mod attribute of the pygame.KEYDOWN and pygame.KEYUP events. The mod attribute is a bitmask of all the modifier keys that were in a pressed state when the event occurred. The modifier information can be decoded using a bitwise AND (except for KMOD_NONE, which should be compared using equals ==). For example:

for event in pygame.event.get():
    if event.type == pygame.KEYDOWN or event.type == pygame.KEYUP:
        if event.mod == pygame.KMOD_NONE:
            print('No modifier keys were in a pressed state when this '
                  'event occurred.')
        else:
            if event.mod & pygame.KMOD_LSHIFT:
                print('Left shift was in a pressed state when this event '
                      'occurred.')
            if event.mod & pygame.KMOD_RSHIFT:
                print('Right shift was in a pressed state when this event '
                      'occurred.')
            if event.mod & pygame.KMOD_SHIFT:
                print('Left shift or right shift or both were in a '
                      'pressed state when this event occurred.')

pygame.key.get_focused()

true if the display is receiving keyboard input from the system

get_focused() -> bool

Returns True when the display window has keyboard focus from the system. If the display needs to ensure it does not lose keyboard focus, it can use pygame.event.set_grab()control the sharing of input devices with other applications to grab all input.

pygame.key.get_pressed()

get the state of all keyboard buttons

get_pressed() -> bools

Returns a sequence of boolean values representing the state of every key on the keyboard. Use the key constant values to index the array. A True value means that the button is pressed.

Note

Getting the list of pushed buttons with this function is not the proper way to handle text entry from the user. There is no way to know the order of keys pressed, and rapidly pushed keys can be completely unnoticed between two calls to pygame.key.get_pressed(). There is also no way to translate these pushed keys into a fully translated character value. See the pygame.KEYDOWN events on the pygame.eventpygame module for interacting with events and queues queue for this functionality.

New in pygame 2.2.0: The collection of bools returned by get_pressed can not be iterated over because the indexes of the internal tuple does not correpsond to the keycodes.

New in pygame 2.5.0: Iteration over the collection of bools returned by get_pressed is now restored. However it still does not make sense to iterate over it. Currently.

pygame.key.get_mods()

determine which modifier keys are being held

get_mods() -> int

Returns a single integer representing a bitmask of all the modifier keys being held. Using bitwise operators you can test if specific modifier keys are pressed.

pygame.key.set_mods()

temporarily set which modifier keys are pressed

set_mods(int) -> None

Create a bitmask of the modifier key constants you want to impose on your program.

pygame.key.set_repeat()

control how held keys are repeated

set_repeat() -> None

set_repeat(delay) -> None

set_repeat(delay, interval) -> None

When the keyboard repeat is enabled, keys that are held down will generate multiple pygame.KEYDOWN events. The delay parameter is the number of milliseconds before the first repeated pygame.KEYDOWN event will be sent. After that, another pygame.KEYDOWN event will be sent every interval milliseconds. If a delay value is provided and an interval value is not provided or is 0, then the interval will be set to the same value as delay.

To disable key repeat call this function with no arguments or with delay set to 0.

When pygame is initialized the key repeat is disabled.

Raises

ValueError -- if delay or interval is < 0

Changed in pygame 2.0.0: A ValueError is now raised (instead of a pygame.error) if delay or interval is < 0.

pygame.key.get_repeat()

see how held keys are repeated

get_repeat() -> (delay, interval)

Get the delay and interval keyboard repeat values. Refer to pygame.key.set_repeat()control how held keys are repeated for a description of these values.

New in pygame 1.8.

pygame.key.name()

get the name of a key identifier

name(key, use_compat=True) -> str

Get the descriptive name of the button from a keyboard button id constant. Returns an empty string ("") if the key is not found.

If use_compat argument is True (which is the default), this function returns the legacy name of a key where applicable. The return value is expected to be the same across different pygame versions (provided the corresponding key constant exists and is unique). If the return value is passed to the key_code function, the original constant will be returned.

Experimental: use_compat paramater still in development for testing and feedback. It may change. Please leave use_compat feedback with authors

If this argument is False, the returned name may be prettier to display and may cover a wider range of keys than with use_compat, but there are no guarantees that this name will be the same across different pygame versions. If the name returned is passed to the key_code function, the original constant is returned back (this is an implementation detail which may change later, do not rely on this)

Changed in pygame 2.1.3: Added use_compat argument and guaranteed API stability for it

pygame.key.key_code()

get the key identifier from a key name

key_code(name=string) -> int

Get the key identifier code from the descriptive name of the key. This returns an integer matching one of the K_* keycodes. For example:

>>> pygame.key.key_code("return") == pygame.K_RETURN
True
>>> pygame.key.key_code("0") == pygame.K_0
True
>>> pygame.key.key_code("space") == pygame.K_SPACE
True

Raises

ValueError -- if the key name is not known.

New in pygame 2.0.0.

pygame.key.start_text_input()

start handling Unicode text input events

start_text_input() -> None

Start receiving pygame.TEXTEDITING and pygame.TEXTINPUT events. If applicable, show the on-screen keyboard or IME editor.

For many languages, key presses will automatically generate a corresponding pygame.TEXTINPUT event. Special keys like escape or function keys, and certain key combinations will not generate pygame.TEXTINPUT events.

In other languages, entering a single symbol may require multiple key presses, or a language-specific user interface. In this case, pygame.TEXTINPUT events are preferable to pygame.KEYDOWN events for text input.

A pygame.TEXTEDITING event is received when an IME composition is started or changed. It contains the composition text, length, and editing start position within the composition (attributes text, length, and start, respectively). When the composition is committed (or non-IME input is received), a pygame.TEXTINPUT event is generated.

Text input events handling is on by default.

New in pygame 2.0.0.

pygame.key.stop_text_input()

stop handling Unicode text input events

stop_text_input() -> None

Stop receiving pygame.TEXTEDITING and pygame.TEXTINPUT events. If an on-screen keyboard or IME editor was shown with pygame.key.start_text_input(), hide it again.

Text input events handling is on by default.

To avoid triggering the IME editor or the on-screen keyboard when the user is holding down a key during gameplay, text input should be disabled once text entry is finished, or when the user clicks outside of a text box.

New in pygame 2.0.0.

pygame.key.set_text_input_rect()

controls the position of the candidate list

set_text_input_rect(Rect) -> None

This sets the rectangle used for typing with an IME. It controls where the candidate list will open, if supported.

New in pygame 2.0.0.

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