24.3. Tix — Extension widgets for Tk — Python v2.7 documentation (original) (raw)
The Tix (Tk Interface Extension) module provides an additional rich set of widgets. Although the standard Tk library has many useful widgets, they are far from complete. The Tix library provides most of the commonly needed widgets that are missing from standard Tk: HList, ComboBox,Control (a.k.a. SpinBox) and an assortment of scrollable widgets.Tix also includes many more widgets that are generally useful in a wide range of applications: NoteBook, FileEntry,PanedWindow, etc; there are more than 40 of them.
With all these new widgets, you can introduce new interaction techniques into applications, creating more useful and more intuitive user interfaces. You can design your application by choosing the most appropriate widgets to match the special needs of your application and users.
Note
Tix has been renamed to tkinter.tix in Python 3.0. The2to3 tool will automatically adapt imports when converting your sources to 3.0.
See also
The home page for Tix. This includes links to additional documentation and downloads.
On-line version of the man pages and reference material.
On-line version of the programmer’s reference material.
Tix applications for development of Tix and Tkinter programs. Tide applications work under Tk or Tkinter, and include TixInspect, an inspector to remotely modify and debug Tix/Tk/Tkinter applications.
24.3.1. Using Tix¶
class Tix.Tix(_screenName_[, _baseName_[, _className_]])¶
Toplevel widget of Tix which represents mostly the main window of an application. It has an associated Tcl interpreter.
Classes in the Tix module subclasses the classes in the Tkintermodule. The former imports the latter, so to use Tix with Tkinter, all you need to do is to import one module. In general, you can just importTix, and replace the toplevel call to Tkinter.Tk withTix.Tk:
import Tix from Tkconstants import * root = Tix.Tk()
To use Tix, you must have the Tix widgets installed, usually alongside your installation of the Tk widgets. To test your installation, try the following:
import Tix root = Tix.Tk() root.tk.eval('package require Tix')
If this fails, you have a Tk installation problem which must be resolved before proceeding. Use the environment variable TIX_LIBRARY to point to the installed Tix library directory, and make sure you have the dynamic object library (tix8183.dll or libtix8183.so) in the same directory that contains your Tk dynamic object library (tk8183.dll orlibtk8183.so). The directory with the dynamic object library should also have a file called pkgIndex.tcl (case sensitive), which contains the line:
package ifneeded Tix 8.1 [list load "[file join $dir tix8183.dll]" Tix]
24.3.3. Tix Commands¶
class Tix.tixCommand¶
The tix commands provide access to miscellaneous elements of Tix‘s internal state and theTix application context. Most of the information manipulated by these methods pertains to the application as a whole, or to a screen or display, rather than to a particular window.
To view the current settings, the common usage is:
import Tix root = Tix.Tk() print root.tix_configure()
tixCommand.tix_configure([_cnf_], **kw)¶
Query or modify the configuration options of the Tix application context. If no option is specified, returns a dictionary all of the available options. If option is specified with no value, then the method returns a list describing the one named option (this list will be identical to the corresponding sublist of the value returned if no option is specified). If one or more option-value pairs are specified, then the method modifies the given option(s) to have the given value(s); in this case the method returns an empty string. Option may be any of the configuration options.
tixCommand.tix_cget(option)¶
Returns the current value of the configuration option given by option. Option may be any of the configuration options.
tixCommand.tix_getbitmap(name)¶
Locates a bitmap file of the name name.xpm or name in one of the bitmap directories (see the tix_addbitmapdir() method). By usingtix_getbitmap(), you can avoid hard coding the pathnames of the bitmap files in your application. When successful, it returns the complete pathname of the bitmap file, prefixed with the character @. The returned value can be used to configure the bitmap option of the Tk and Tix widgets.
tixCommand.tix_addbitmapdir(directory)¶
Tix maintains a list of directories under which the tix_getimage() andtix_getbitmap() methods will search for image files. The standard bitmap directory is $TIX_LIBRARY/bitmaps. The tix_addbitmapdir() method adds directory into this list. By using this method, the image files of an applications can also be located using the tix_getimage() ortix_getbitmap() method.
tixCommand.tix_filedialog([_dlgclass_])¶
Returns the file selection dialog that may be shared among different calls from this application. This method will create a file selection dialog widget when it is called the first time. This dialog will be returned by all subsequent calls to tix_filedialog(). An optional dlgclass parameter can be passed as a string to specified what type of file selection dialog widget is desired. Possible options are tix, FileSelectDialog or tixExFileSelectDialog.
tixCommand.tix_getimage(self, name)¶
Locates an image file of the name name.xpm, name.xbm orname.ppm in one of the bitmap directories (see thetix_addbitmapdir() method above). If more than one file with the same name (but different extensions) exist, then the image type is chosen according to the depth of the X display: xbm images are chosen on monochrome displays and color images are chosen on color displays. By using tix_getimage(), you can avoid hard coding the pathnames of the image files in your application. When successful, this method returns the name of the newly created image, which can be used to configure the image option of the Tk and Tix widgets.
tixCommand.tix_option_get(name)¶
Gets the options maintained by the Tix scheme mechanism.
tixCommand.tix_resetoptions(newScheme, _newFontSet_[, _newScmPrio_])¶
Resets the scheme and fontset of the Tix application to newScheme and_newFontSet_, respectively. This affects only those widgets created after this call. Therefore, it is best to call the resetoptions method before the creation of any widgets in a Tix application.
The optional parameter newScmPrio can be given to reset the priority level of the Tk options set by the Tix schemes.
Because of the way Tk handles the X option database, after Tix has been has imported and inited, it is not possible to reset the color schemes and font sets using the tix_config() method. Instead, the tix_resetoptions()method must be used.