Fix issue #166 as proposed by ecyoung3

pandasgui/gui.py

@@ -155,6 +155,11 @@ def init_ui(self):
         self.make_menu_bar()
         self.setCentralWidget(self.splitter)
 
+        # Create a copy of the settings in case the SettingsStore reference has
+        # been discarded by Qt prematurely
+        # https://stackoverflow.com/a/17935694/10342097
+        self.store.settings = self.store.settings.copy()
+
         # Signals
         self.store.settings.settingsChanged.connect(self.apply_settings)
 

pandasgui/store.py

@@ -182,6 +182,21 @@ def reset_to_defaults(self):
         for setting_name, setting_value in DEFAULT_SETTINGS.items():
             self[setting_name].value = setting_value
 
+    def copy(self):
+            """ 
+            Create a copy of the settings with a new QObject. Intended as a workaround
+            to this bug: https://github.com/adamerose/PandasGUI/issues/166
+            """
+            # Create new settings instance
+            new_settings = SettingsStore()
+
+            # Copy every attribute that's a Setting
+            for attr, value in self.__dict__.items():
+                if isinstance(value, Setting):
+                    setattr(new_settings, attr, value)
+
+            return new_settings
+
     def __repr__(self):
         return '\n'.join([f"{key} = {val.value}" for key, val in self.__dict__.items()])