Front Cover
Tcl/Tk: A Developer's Guide
Copyright
Table of Contents
Foreword
Preface
Tcl/Tk: GUI Programming in a Gooey World
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Where to Get More Information
1 Tcl/Tk Features
1.1 Tcl Overview
1.1.1 The Standard Tcl Distribution
1.1.2 Documentation
1.2 Tcl as a Glue Language
1.2.1 Tcl Scripts Compared with UNIX Shell Scripts
1.2.2 Tcl Scripts Compared with MS-DOS .bat Files
1.3 Tcl as a General-purpose Interpreter
1.3.1 Tcl/Tk Compared to Visual Basic
1.3.2 Tcl/Tk Compared to Perl
1.3.3 Tcl/Tk Compared to Python
1.3.4 Tcl/Tk Compared to Java
1.4 Tcl as an Extensible Interpreter
1.5 Tcl as an Embeddable Interpreter
1.6 Tcl as a Rapid Development Tool
1.7 GUI-based Programming
1.8 Shipping Products
1.9 Bottom Line
1.10 Problems
2 The Mechanics of Using the Tcl and Tk Interpreters
2.1 The tclsh and wish Interpreters
2.1.1 Starting the tclsh and wish Interpreters
2.1.2 Starting tclsh or wish under UNIX
Errors Caused by Improper Installation
2.1.3 Starting tclsh or wish under Microsoft Windows
2.1.4 Starting tclsh or wish on the Mac
Making a Desktop Icon
2.1.5 Exiting tclsh or wish
2.2 Using tclsh/wish Interactively
2.2.1 Tclsh as a Command Shell
2.2.2 Tk Console (tkcon)-An Alternative Interactive tclsh/wish Shell
2.2.3 Evaluating Scripts Interactively
2.3 Evaluating Tcl Script Files
2.3.1 The Tcl Script File
2.3.2 Evaluating Tcl Script Files
2.3.3 Evaluating a Tcl Script File under UNIX
2.3.4 Evaluating a Tcl Script File under Microsoft Windows
Changing File Association on Windows XP and Earlier
Changing File Association on Windows Vista and Windows 7
2.3.5 Evaluating a Tcl Script on the Mac
2.4 Bottom Line
2.5 Problems
3 Introduction to the Tcl Language.

3.1 Overview of the Basics
3.1.1 Syntax
3.1.2 Grouping Words
3.1.3 Comments
3.1.4 Data Representation
3.1.5 Command Results
3.1.6 Errors
3.2 Command Evaluation and Substitutions
3.2.1 Substitution
3.2.2 Controlling Substitutions with Quotes, Curly Braces, and the Backslash
Splitting Lists
3.2.3 Steps in Command Evaluation
3.3 Data Types
3.3.1 Assigning Values to Variables
3.3.2 Strings
3.3.3 String Processing Commands
String and Format Command Examples
3.3.4 Lists
3.3.5 List Processing Commands
3.3.6 Dictionaries
3.3.7 Associative Arrays
3.3.8 Associative Array Commands
3.3.9 Binary Data
3.3.10 Handles
3.4 Arithmetic and Boolean Operations
3.4.1 Math Operations
Trigonometric Functions
Exponential Functions
Conversion Functions
Random Numbers
3.4.2 Conditionals
The if Command
The switch Command
3.4.3 Looping
The for Command
The while Command
The foreach Command
3.4.4 Exception Handling in Tcl
3.5 Modularization
3.5.1 Procedures
3.5.2 Loading Code from a Script File
3.5.3 Examining the State of the Tcl Interpreter
3.6 Bottom Line
3.7 Problems
4 Navigating the File System, Basic I/O and Sockets
4.1 Navigating the File System
4.1.1 Constructing File Paths
4.2 Properties of File System Items
4.3 Removing Files
4.4 Input/Output in TCL
4.4.1 Output
4.4.2 Input
4.4.3 Creating a Channel
4.4.4 Closing Channels
4.5 Sockets
4.5.1 Using a Client Socket
4.5.2 Controlling Data Flow
4.5.3 Server Sockets
4.6 Bottom Line
4.7 Problems
5 Using Strings and Lists
5.1 Converting a String into a List
5.2 Examining the List with a for Loop
5.3 Using the foreach Command
5.4 Using string match Instead of string first
5.5 Using lsearch
5.6 The regexp Command.

5.6.1 Regular Expression Matching Rules
Basic Regular Expression Rules
5.6.2 Examples of Regular Expressions
5.6.3 Advanced and Extended Regular Expression Rules
Minimum and Maximum Match
Internationalization
Non-ASCII Values
Character Classes, Collating Elements, and Equivalence Classes
Tcl Commands Implementing Regular Expressions
5.6.4 Back to the Searching URLs
5.7 Creating a Procedure
5.7.1 The proc Command
5.7.2 A findUrl Procedure
5.7.3 Variable Scope
5.7.4 Global Information Variables
5.8 Making a Script
5.8.1 The Executable Script
5.9 Speed
5.9.1 Comparison of Execution Speeds (Linux Celeron @ 2.6 GHz)
5.10 Bottom Line
5.11 Problems
6 Complex Data Structures with Lists, Arrays and Dicts
6.1 Using the Tcl List
6.1.1 Manipulating Ordered Data with Lists
6.1.2 Manipulating Data with Keyed Lists
6.2 Using the Dict
6.2.1 Grouping Related Values
6.3 Using the Associative Array
6.4 Trees in Tcl
6.5 Tcl and SQL
6.5.1 SQL Basics
6.5.2 Using tdbc
Manipulating Data
6.5.3 Using Referenced Tables
Introspection into Databases
6.6 Performance
6.7 Bottom Line
6.8 Problems
7 Procedure Techniques
7.1 Arguments to Procedures
7.1.1 Variable Number of Arguments to a Procedure
7.1.2 Default Values for Procedure Arguments
7.2 Renaming or Deleting Commands
7.3 Getting Information About Procedures
7.4 Substitution and Evaluation of Strings
7.4.1 Performing Variable Substitution on a String
7.4.2 Evaluating a String as a Tcl Command
7.5 Working with Global and Local Scopes
7.5.1 Global and Local Scope
7.6 Making a Tcl Object
7.6.1 An Object Example
7.7 Bottom Line
7.8 Problems
8 Namespaces, Packages and Modules
8.1 Namespaces and Scoping Rules
8.1.1 Namespace Scope
8.1.2 Namespace Naming Rules.

8.1.3 Accessing Namespace Entities
8.1.4 Why Use Namespaces?
8.1.5 The namespace and variable Commands
8.1.6 Creating and Populating a Namespace
8.1.7 Namespace Nesting
8.1.8 Namespace Ensembles
8.2 Packages
8.2.1 How Packages Work
8.2.2 Internal Details: Files and Variables Used with Packages
8.2.3 Package Commands
8.2.4 Version Numbers
8.2.5 Package Cookbook
Creating a Package
Using a Tcl Package
8.3 TCL Modules
8.4 Namespaces and Packages
8.5 Hanoi with a Stack Namespace and Package
8.6 Conventions and Caveats
8.7 Bottom Line
8.8 Problems
9 Basic Object-Oriented Programming in Tcl
9.1 Creating a TclOO Class and Object
9.1.1 Constructor and Destructor
9.1.2 Methods
Method Naming Convention
Invoking Methods from Within Methods
Registering Methods for Callbacks
9.1.3 Inheritance
Method Chaining
Inheritance
Single Inheritance
Multiple Inheritance
Using Mixins
Aggregation
9.1.4 Filters
9.2 Bottom Line
9.3 Problems
10 Advanced Object-Oriented Programming in Tcl
10.1 Modifying Classes and Objects
10.1.1 Modifying Classes
Modifying Methods
10.1.2 Modifying Inheritance
Adding a Superclass
Mixing in a New Class
10.1.3 Modifying Class, Constructor, Variables and Destructor
10.1.4 Static Methods and Variables I
10.2 Modifying Objects
10.2.1 Changing an Object's Class
10.2.2 Defining Per-object Mixins
10.2.3 Adding a Method to an Object
10.3 Examining Classes and Objects
10.3.1 Evaluation of Chains
10.3.2 Examining Methods
10.3.3 Examining Inheritance
10.3.4 Getting a List of Base Classes
10.4 Examining Objects
10.5 Using TclOO with Callbacks
10.6 Adding New Functionality to TclOO
10.6.1 Static Variables II
10.6.2 Static Methods II
10.6.3 Aggregated Objects That Modify the Possessor.

10.6.4 Objects That Grow and Change
10.7 Bottom Line
10.8 Problems
11 Introduction to Tk Graphics
11.1 Creating a Widget
11.2 Conventions
11.2.1 Widget Naming Conventions
11.2.2 Color Naming Conventions
11.2.3 Dimension Conventions
11.3 Common Options
11.4 Determining and Setting Options
11.5 The Basic Widgets
11.6 Introducing Widgets: label, button, and entry
11.6.1 The label Widget
11.6.2 The button Widget
11.6.3 The entry Widget
11.6.4 Using Namespaces or TclOO with Widgets
Using Namespace Scope with a Widget
Using TclOO with a Widget
11.7 Application Layout: Geometry Managers and Container Widgets
11.7.1 Container Widgets: frame, labelframe, panedwindow
The frame Widget
The labelframe Widget
The ttk::notebook Widget
The panedwindow Widget
11.7.2 Widget Layout: place, pack, and grid
The place Layout Manager
The pack Layout Manager
The grid Layout Manager
Working Together
11.8 Selection Widgets: radiobutton, checkbutton, menu, and listbox
11.8.1 radiobutton and checkbutton
radiobutton
checkbutton
11.8.2 Pull-down Menus: menu, menubutton, and Menubars
Menubars
11.8.3 Selection Widgets: listbox
11.9 Scrollbar
11.9.1 The Basic scrollbar
11.9.2 scrollbar Details
11.9.3 Intercepting scrollbar Commands
11.10 The scale Widget
11.11 New Windows
11.12 Interacting with the Event Loop
11.13 Scheduling the Future: after
11.13.1 Canceling the Future
11.14 Bottom Line
11.15 Problems
12 Using the canvas Widget
12.1 Overview of the canvas Widget
12.1.1 Identifiers and Tags
12.1.2 Coordinates
12.1.3 Binding
12.2 Creating a canvas Widget
12.3 Creating Displayable canvas Items
12.3.1 The Line Item
12.3.2 The Arc Item
12.3.3 The Rectangle Item
12.3.4 The Oval Item
12.3.5 The Polygon Item.