Book Image

Tcl/Tk 8.5 Programming Cookbook

Book Image

Tcl/Tk 8.5 Programming Cookbook

Overview of this book

With Tcl/Tk, you can create full-featured cross-platform applications in a simple and easy-to-understand way without any expensive development package; the only tools required are a simple text editor and your imagination. This practical cookbook will help you to efficiently interact with editors, debuggers, and shell type interactive programs using Tcl/Tk 8. This cookbook will comprehensively guide you through practical implementation of Tcl/Tk 8.5 commands and tools. This book will take you through all the steps needed to become a productive programmer in Tcl/Tk 8. Right from guiding you through the basics to creating a stand-alone application, it provides complete explanation of all the steps along with handy tips and tricks. The book begins with an introduction to the Tcl shell, syntax, variables, and programming best practices in the language. It then explores procedures and the flow of events with control constructs followed by advanced error trapping and recovery. From Chapter 4, a detailed study of string expressions and handling enables you to handle various string functions and use lists to expand the string functionality. The book then discusses in-depth the Tcl Dictionary and how to utilize it to store and retrieve data. File operations and Tk GUI handling are covered extensively along with a developing a real-world address book application to practice the concepts learned.
Table of Contents (20 chapters)
Tcl/Tk 8.5 Programming Cookbook
Credits
About the Author
Acknowledgment
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface

Chapter 8. Tk GUI Programming with Tcl/Tk

In this chapter, we will cover:

  • Creating a widget

  • Writing to the console

  • Window manager

  • Creating a window

  • Destroying a window

  • Creating a custom dialog

Introduction

Up to this point, we have exclusively used the Tcl shell and its command set. While this is a wonderful method for writing scripts and non-graphical programs, it fails to provide the end user with a Graphical User Interface (GUI) to interact with. To allow for the creation and control of GUI and window elements, Tcl includes the Graphical Tool Kit (Tk).

Tk is a platform-independent GUI framework included in the Tcl package. By using the native Tk widgets and applying the correct theme, the GUI elements can be made to assume the native look and feel of the system on which they run, providing a polished appearance. Tk provides a full complement of window controls such as buttons, text boxes, and labels. In addition to the standard controls, Tk also includes several top-level dialog windows (for example...