Creating a file input dialog

The best way to get a filename from the user is to have them browse to the file using a dialog. You can have the user type in a filename using the text input dialog, but this method is prone to errors. In this recipe, we'll create a file dialog and print the chosen filename to the console.

Getting ready

Open the QGIS Python Console by selecting the Plugins menu and then clicking on Python Console.

How to do it...

In this recipe, we will create and configure the dialog, browse to a file, and print the chosen filename, as follows:

1. First, we import the GUI library:

   from PyQt4.QtGui import *
   

2. Next, we initialize the file dialog and specify its window title:

   qfd = QFileDialog()
   title = 'Open File'
   

3. Now, we specify a path to the directory we want the file dialog to start in:

   path = "/Users/joellawhead/qgis_data"
   

4. Then, we configure the file dialog with the preceding parameters and assign the output to a variable:

   f = QFileDialog.getOpenFileName(qfd, title...