Newsgroups: comp.lang.tcl,comp.answers,news.answers Path: senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!gatech!howland.reston.ans.net!europa.eng.gtefsd.com!news.ans.net!malgudi.oar.net!chemabs!lvirden From: lwv26@cas.org (Larry W. Virden) Subject: FAQ: comp.lang.tcl Frequently Asked Questions (1/5) (Last updated: August 10, 1993) Message-ID: Followup-To: comp.lang.tcl Summary: A regular posting of the comp.lang.tcl Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) and their answers. This is the first of five parts. This part introduces Tcl and Tk and discusses documentation, etc. Originator: lwv26@lwv26aws Keywords: tcl, extended tcl, tk, expect Sender: lvirden@cas.org Reply-To: lvirden@cas.org (Larry W. Virden) Organization: Chemical Abstracts Service Date: Wed, 18 Aug 1993 20:07:08 GMT Approved: news-answers-request@MIT.Edu Expires: Wed, 29 Sep 1993 20:07:01 GMT Lines: 820 Xref: senator-bedfellow.mit.edu comp.lang.tcl:6248 comp.answers:1659 news.answers:11555 Archive-name: tcl-faq/part1 Version: 4.0 Last-modified: August 10, 1993 For more information concerning Tcl (see "tcl-faq/part2"), (see "tcl-faq/part3"), (see "tcl-faq/part4"), or (see "tcl-faq/part5"). Index of questions: I. Origin of the comp.lang.tcl FAQ information. II. What is Tcl? Tk? Extended Tcl? III. Do these packages run on my machine? A. Unix B. MacOS C. INTEL DOS-like systems D. VMS E. AmigaDOS F. NeXT G. Other IV. Other than C, What languages can talk to tcl/tk? A. Shell B. C++ C. Modula-3 D. Eiffel E. Ada F. Other V. Is there a bibliography of material relating to these programs? A. The Tcl distribution B. The Expect distribution C. Miscellaneous other online materials D. Published articles E. Training courses, materials, etc. F. Time-related seminars, conferences, sessions. VI. Where do I report problems, bugs, or enhancements - or - What is comp.lang.tcl? VII. Where can I find the FAQ and who do I contact for more information about it? End of FAQ Index ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ From: FAQ General information Subject: -I- Origin of the comp.lang.tcl FAQ information. The information in this set of FAQs comes from 3 sources. The primary source of information is the group itself - I spend (much too much) time each month culling through what I feel are some of the best answers, gathering up new information on ports, etc. and adding it here. I also gather new application information and add it as best I can. The next most predominant source of information comes from the authors of the various software packages. Finally, a small amount comes from my personal experiences. I am always on the search for folk to assist in the maintenance of these FAQs. In fact, if you feel that you would like to coordinate this effort, PLEASE let me know! ------------------------------ From: FAQ General information Subject: -II- What is Tcl? Tk? Extended Tcl? Tcl and Tk originated with Dr. John Ousterhout (Oh'-stir-hout - last syllable rhymes with rout, not root) from the University of California, Berkeley, California. Tcl (current release version 6.7) stands for ``tool command language'' and is pronounced ``tickle.'' The author's home ftp site for the Tcl source code is allspice.berkeley.edu. Tcl is actually two things: a language and a library. First, Tcl is a simple textual language, intended primarily for issuing commands to interactive programs such as text editors, debuggers, illustrators, and shells. It has a simple syntax and is also programmable, so Tcl users can write command procedures to provide more powerful commands than those in the built-in set. Second, Tcl is a library package that can be embedded in application programs. The Tcl library consists of a parser for the Tcl language, routines to implement the Tcl built-in commands, and procedures that allow each application to extend Tcl with additional commands specific to that application. The application program generates Tcl commands and passes them to the Tcl parser for execution. Commands may be generated by reading characters from an input source, or by associating command strings with elements of the application's user interface, such as menu entries, buttons, or keystrokes. When the Tcl library receives commands it parses them into component fields and executes built-in commands directly. For commands implemented by the application, Tcl calls back to the application to execute the commands. In many cases commands will invoke recursive invocations of the Tcl interpreter by passing in additional strings to execute (procedures, looping commands, and conditional commands all work in this way). An application program gains three advantages by using Tcl for its command language. First, Tcl provides a standard syntax: once users know Tcl, they will be able to issue commands easily to any Tcl-based application. Second, Tcl provides programmability. All a Tcl application needs to do is to implement a few application-specific low-level commands. Tcl provides many utility commands plus a general programming interface for building up complex command procedures. By using Tcl, applications need not re-implement these features. Third, extensions to Tcl, such as the Tk toolkit, provide mechanisms for communicating between applications by sending Tcl commands back and forth. The common Tcl language framework makes it easier for applications to communicate with one another. Tk (current release 3.2) - an extension to Tcl which provides the programmer with an interface to the X11 windowing system. The author's home ftp site for the Tk source is allspice.berkeley.edu. Note that many users will encounter Tk via the ``wish'' command. Wish is a simple windowing shell which permits the user to write Tcl applications in a prototyping environment. Extended Tcl (tclX) (Version 6.7c) - This is an extended set of commands for Tcl developed by Karl Lehenbauer and Mark Diekhans. The authors' home ftp site for Extended Tcl is ftp.neosoft.com. Extended Tcl is oriented towards system programming tasks, with many additional interfaces to the Unix operating system along with other useful utilities. The beta release of Tcl 7.0, Tk 3.3 and Extended Tcl are also available for those adventurous souls out there who want to know how changes are going to impact them in the upcoming months. Beta Tcl and Tk are available on sprite.berkeley.edu and mirrored on harbor.ecn.purdue.edu. TclX 7.x is also available on harbor.ecn.purdue.edu. ------------------------------ From: FAQ General information Subject: -III- Do these packages run on my machine? A. Unix Tcl runs on Sun 3s and 4s running SunOS 4, DECstations running Ultrix, DEC VAXen running Ultrix or BSD, DEC Alphas running OSF/1, 386s running SCO Unix, Xenix, Bell-Tech, Silicon Graphics running IRIX, HPs running HP-UX as well as HP Snakes running OSF/1 and HPUX. Intel [34]86 systems running 386bsd, netbsd, BSDI, and Linux appear to have Tcl ported. Various CPUs running System V.4 report having ported Tcl. Tcl also appears to be running on Sequent Symmetry running Dynix as well as OSF/1. It also has been reported to run fine on IBM RS6000 under AIX 3.x as well as IBM ES/9000 and AIX/ESA. There were few problems getting it running under Mt. Xinu Mach. It also has been ported to Encore 91's running UMAX V (an 88k based System V with BSD extension Unix). It also runs on Apollos running BSD/SYSV. Tcl runs on a Cray running Unicos. At least one person has ported Tcl to a Mac (IIfx) running A/UX v3.0. Someone ported Tcl to a Sony NeWS machine running NEWS-OS 4.2. Tk (being based on Tcl) requires X11R4 or better as the only additional software requirement. It runs on any of the above Unix systems with that base of software. For information on Tcl/Tk/TclX availability, see FAQs parts 3 and 4. B. MacOS Contact W. Ross Brown for the current status of the Tcl MacOS port. Ross has a mailing list for discussion on that topic. Also check the Tcl software catalog for the latest port information. C. INTEL DOS-like systems Numerous ports to DOS are available. One unsupported port to MS-DOS of Tcl and Extended Tcl V6.0a, done by "Karl Lehenbauer" , is available on harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/distrib/dostcl.zoo for binaries and harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/distrib/dostcl60.zoo for source. A port of Tcl V6.2 to MS-DOS was done by "John Martin" and is available via FTP from cajal.uoregon.edu and harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/distrib/tcl62.dos.tar.Z . A source code only port of Tcl V6.7 to MS-DOS, done by PSPRENG@CIPVAX.BIOLAN.UNI-KOELN.DE (Peter Sprenger), is available from him, on wuarchive.wustl.edu, or on harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/distrib/tcl67dos.zip . A port of Tcl, V6.1 ?, done by unknown, to MS-DOS Windows V 3.1 ?, is available as binary at harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/distrib/w_tclbin.zip and as source at harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/distrib/w_tclsrc.zip . An MS-DOS Windows DLL instance of Tcl 6.2 was generated by Ugo Cei . Contact him for more details. A port of Tcl Generic V6.7 (plus some minor extensions to OS/2 2.x has been done by bachww@rtsg.mot.com (Bud Bach). Someone whose name I don't have reported porting Tcl to QNX with a fair amount of hacking. Also check the Tcl software catalog for the latest port information. D. VMS A port of Tcl 6.2 and Tk 1.4 to VMS was done by Angel Li . The files were at mango.rsmas.miami.edu:/pub/tcl-vms.bck.Z and mango.rsmas.miami.edu:/pub/tk-vms.bck.Z and were compressed with the Unix compress command. The files were VMS BACKUP files. A recent report has it that these files are no longer available. A port of Tcl 6.3 onto VMS 5.5 was done by Wolfgang Kechel and Till Imanuel Panzschke. Contact him directly for assistance. A port of most of Tcl 6.7 and Tk 3.2 was done by John Kimball to VMS 5.5. The files are on: src.honeywell.com:/pub/tcl67-tk32-on-vms55.tar.Z . Also check the Tcl software catalog for the latest port information. E. AmigaDOS Karl Lehbauer has indicated that he started a port of Tcl 3.x to the Amiga. He has a working version, but is no longer working on it. His version uses the Amiga's shared libraries and implements the "send" command. He wrote a MIDI file loader and player as well. Contact him for further details. Ty Sarna has ported Tcl 6.x to the Amiga. He says: > I've ported 3.3 and several 6.x versions to the Amiga, and it can be > done in under and hour if you leave out the "Unix" functionality. > However, "Unix" functionality includes things like file I/O! One Amiga user, colas@opossum.inria.fr (Colas Nahaboo), mentioned that using Amiga gcc and the PD X server DaggeX and Xlibs that a port of Tk might be possible. Also check the Tcl software catalog for the latest port information. F. NeXT Gianmaria Bertanzon reports: > We are using tk3.2 on NeXT ( Motorola ) under NextStep 3.0 under X. > The compilation was easy. (we do not remember precisely all the steps) Also check the Tcl software catalog for the latest port information. G. Other A port to the Apple IIgs and GNO 1.1/GSOS environment is underway. A port to a Convex 3220 and 3880 was reported. Someone reported porting Tcl to VxWorks, but I am not sure what that is. Also check the Tcl software catalog for the latest port information. ------------------------------ From: FAQ General information Subject: -IV- Other than C, what languages can talk to tcl/tk? A. Shell There are at least two interfaces which are shell-like. The first is wish, which is a windowing shell like interface that is a part of the Tk package. The second is tcl, a line command interpreter that is part of the Extended Tcl package. B. C++ Check out tcl++.h in Extended Tcl. Based on an original implementation by Parag Patel, it defines a Tcl interpreter class by which Tcl interpreters can be created as objects under C++. Also, harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/distrib/tk3.2forC++.patch is a patch that allows tk 3.2 main.c and other extension routines to be compiled with a C++ compiler. Thanks to Ken Yap for this code. Mark Diekhans and Karl Lehenbauer have used this, in combination with the handle facility in Extended Tcl, to build Tcl commands around C++ classes. The Tcl handle facility provides a way to manage table entries that can be referenced by a textual handle from Tcl code. This is provided for applications that need to create data structures in one command, return a reference (i.e. pointer) to that particular data structure and then access that data structure in other commands. An example application is file handles. A handle table was built containing pointers to the instances of a class that were to be accessed from Tcl, say a class `foo_cl', and then a "new" command defined that created an instance of that class and returned a Tcl handle to it. The handle could then passed among Tcl commands that accessed each member function. The handle is in effect an explicit `this' pointer. For example: set obj [foo_cl::new] foo_cl::baz $obj "Hello world" foo_cl::delete $obj It's not totally object-oriented, but it's still very usable. C. Modula-3 Norman Ramsey says: A long time back, Eric Muller posted a Modula-3 interface to the C Tcl library. I wrote down a Modula-3/Tcl interface that used Modula-3 types rather than C types, and that used objects to build closures for commands. I wrote part of the implementation but never finished it. I have mailed copies to carroll@udel.edu, who asked the question, and I will post them if there seems to be general interest. D. Eiffel stephan@cs.tu-berlin.de (Stephan Herrmann) says: ... [the tclish package provides] the marriage of two very different principles by means of combining two programming languages into a hybrid program architecture. E. Ada dennis@dennis.cs.colorado.edu (Dennis Heimbigner) introduced an adatcl package which gives Ada programmers access to Tcl interpreters. See the catalog for details of the package. F. Other Duncan Sinclair has details of a hack into wish.c some hooks for a Tk <-> any language system, and has been using it for communication with functional languages such as Haskell and Lazy ML. A paper, plus sample code, is available by ftp from ftp.dcs.gla.ac.uk:/pub/glasgow-fp/authors/Duncan_Sinclair/fumx.* . ------------------------------ From: FAQ General information Subject: -V- Is there a bibliography of material relating to these programs? A. The Tcl distribution With the Tcl distribution there is a Postscript version of a Usenix paper introducing Tcl. With the Tk distribution, there is a Postscript version of a Usenix paper introducing Tk. Ousterhout, J.K., (1990) ``TCL: An Embeddable Command Language'', in the Proceedings of the 1990 Winter USENIX Conference, pp 133-146. Ousterhout, J.K., (1991) ``An X11 Toolkit Based on the TCL Language'', in the Proceedings of the 1991 Winter USENIX Conference, pp 105-115. Postscript file for introductory papers on Tcl and Tk are available as the public FTP area on sprite.berkeley.edu (Internet address 128.32.150.27). Their address is: sprite.berkeley.edu:/tcl/tclUsenix90.ps sprite.berkeley.edu:/tcl/tkUsenix91.ps sprite.berkeley.edu:/tcl/tkF10.ps (The last of these files is the contents of Figure 10 of the Tk paper) If you have trouble retrieving the papers via FTP or printing them, send bmiller@sprite.berkeley.edu your U.S. Mail address and he will mail you paper copies. B. The Expect distribution With the Expect distribution, there are several Postscript documents available which have been published. 1. "Curing Those Uncontrollable Fits of Interaction", Proceedings of the Summer 1990 USENIX Conference, Anaheim, CA, June 11-15, 1990. This paper is discussion of implementation, philosophy, and design. It's address is: ftp.cme.nist.gov:/pub/expect/seminal.ps.Z 2. "Using expect to Automate System Administration Tasks", Proceedings of the 1990 USENIX Large Systems Administration Conference (LISA) IV, Colorado Springs, CO, October 17-19, 1990. This paper is discussion and examples, specifically aimed at system administrators. The address of this paper is: ftp.cme.nist.gov:/pub/expect/sysadm.ps.Z 3. "expect: Scripts for Controlling Interactive Programs", Computing Systems, Vol. 4, No. 2, University of California Press Journals, 1991. A comprehensive paper of example scripts. This paper's address is: ftp.cme.nist.gov:/pub/expect/scripts.ps.Z 4. "Regression Testing and Conformance Testing Interactive Programs", Proceedings of the Summer 1992 USENIX Conference, San Antonio, CA, June 8-12, 1992. This paper discusses the application of expect to the verification of software. This paper's address is: ftp.cme.nist.gov:/pub/expect/regress.ps.Z 5. "Kibitz - Connecting Multiple Interactive Programs Together", Software - Practice & Experience, John Wiley & Sons, West Susses, England, Vol. 23, No. 5, May 1993. This paper is a discussion of using Tcl and Expect to connect multiple interactive programs together. This paper's address is: ftp.cme.nist.gov:/pub/expect/kibitz.ps.Z C. Miscellaneous other online materials 1. The ftp address for a FrameMaker MIF file containing a Quick Reference guide to Tcl is: harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/docs/QuickRef.tar.Z Many thanks to "Jeff Tranter" for contributing it. 2. PostScript versions of the man pages were provided by "Adrian Ho" . The addresses for these are: harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/docs/tcl6.3.manps.tar.Z harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/docs/tclX6.2b.manps.tar.Z harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/docs/tk2.1.manps.tar.Z 3. An early draft of the following text book is available: Title: Tcl and the Tk Toolkit Author: John K. Ousterhout Publisher: Addison-Wesley Expected availability: February 1994 ISBN: 0-201-63337-X The section dealing with writing Tcl scripts is: sprite.berkeley.edu:/tcl/book.p1.ps.Z The section dealing with writing Tcl scripts for Tk is: sprite.berkeley.edu:/tcl/book.p2.ps.Z The section dealing with writing Tcl applications in C is: sprite.berkeley.edu:/tcl/book.p3.ps.Z The section dealing with writing Tk widgets and geometry managers in C is: sprite.berkeley.edu:/tcl/book.p4.ps.Z The first two parts are about 130 pages in length and the third and fourth parts are less than 70 pages in length each. This is ONLY a draft and is not permitted to be redistributed. 3. A series of PostScript slides used in a tutorial on Tcl and Tk at the 1993 X Conference are available as: sprite.berkeley.edu:/tcl/tut.tar.Z 4. A set of Postscript files collected for the Tcl 93 workshop proceedings is available as: harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/workshop/tcl93_proceedings.tar.Z This file contains the following papers: a. "A Debugger for Tcl Applications", by Don Libes, National Institute of Standards and Technology. Describes a debugger for Tcl applications. b. "A Compiler for the Tcl Language", by Adam Sah and Jon Blow, University of California, Berkeley, CA. A discussion of the design issues for providing a compiler for the Tcl language. c. "[incr tcl] - Object-Oriented Programming in TCL", by Michael J. McLennan, AT&T Bell Laboratories, Allentown, PA. Describes a set of extensions for organizing Tcl procedures and data into packages. d. "CASTE: A class system for Tcl", by Michael S. Braverman, University of California, Berkeley, CA. Introduces a structured object class extension for Tcl. e. "Interfacing an Object-Oriented Database System from Tcl", by Dietmar Theobald, Forschungszentrum Informatik, Karlsruhe Germany A generic interface extension to an object-oriented database. f. "Tcl Distributed Programming", by Brian C. Smith, Lawrence A. Rowe, and Stephen C. Yen, University of California, Berkeley, CA. Introduces the Tcl-DP extension to Tcl. g. "Cooperating Applications through Tcl/Tk and DCE", by David Richardson, University of Michigan Description of integrating Tcl/Tk into Open Software Foundation's Distributed Computing Environment. h. "NeoSoft Whiteboard - A framework for Internet-based Collaboration", by Karl Lehenbauer, Ellyn Mustard, NeoSoft, Inc., Brad Morrison, Paranet, Inc. Describes a generic groupware framework using Tcl/Tk. i. "Tcl/Tk as a Basis for Groupware", by Mark Roseman, University of Calgary, Alberta Canada Why Tcl/Tk provides a good environment for groupware developers. j. "Tcl and Tk Use in the Artifact Based Collaboration System", by John Menges and Mark Parris, University of North Carolina. Describes a collaboration system being built at UNC whose user interfaces are based on Tk. k. "Ak: An Audio Toolkit for Tcl/Tk", by Andrew C. Payne, Digital Equipment Corporation, Cambridge Research Lab. Describes Ak, an audio extension for Tcl build on the AudioFile System. l. "A Tcl/Tk Continuous Media Player", by Brian C. Smith, Lawrence A. Rowe, and Stephen C. Yen, University of California, Berkeley, CA. A Tk application that supports playback of live digital audio and video on a Unix workstation. m. "Tcl in a High-Throughput Biological Lab", by Scott P. Hunicke-Smith & Dan Mosedale, Stanford Yeast Genome Project Description of use of Tcl based control of a laboratory robot. n. "Autonomous Knowledge Agents - How Agents use the Tool Command Language", by Raymond W. Johnson, Lockheed Missiles and Space Corporation, Palo Alto, CA. Descriptions of traits of a software agent and how one of these traits led to the use of Tcl. o. "Implementing a Visualization of an Industrial Productions Cell Using Tcl/Tk", by Arthur Brauer, Claus Lewerentz, and Thomas Lindner, Forschungszentrum Informatik, Karlsruhe Germany. Discussion of a complex animated simulation written using Tk/Tcl. p. "Writing Object-oriented Tcl-based Systems using Objectify", by Wayne A. Christopher, University of California, Berkeley, CA. Describes Objectify, a facility for integrating C++ classes into Tcl-based systems. q. "Use of Tcl/Tk in DTS, an Interactive Optimization and Scheduling System", by Benjamin Fried, Aleks Gollu and Othar Hansson, Heuristicrats Research Inc. An abstract of the work being done with Tcl in a NASA scheduling system. r. "Embedding a Scheme Interpreter in the Tk Toolkit", by Erick Gallesio, Valbonne, France. Describes STk, which is a Tk package with Scheme replacing Tcl. s. "The Next, Best Thing in File Browsers", by Michael A. Harrison, Thomas A. Phelps, University of California, Berkeley, CA. Describes NBT, an extended NeXTSTEP file selection box. t. "Tcl/Tk - An Integration Vehicle for the Microwave/Millimeter-Wave Pilot Sites (MMPS)", by Kevin B. Kenny, Brion D. Sarachan, Robert N. Sum Jr., and Wayne H. Uejio, GE Corporate R&D. Describes developing wrappes for commercial vendor applications like FrameMaker (R) and Xess (R). u. "Generalising a File Manager into an Address Book and Other Things", by J. D. Newmarch, University of Canberra, Australia Describing a redesign of an X file manager to allow the best features of a command line environment and a graphical interface. v. "Noosa: Execution Monitoring using Tcl and Tk", by Anthony M. Sloane, University of Colorado. An overview of an event-based execution monitoring system. w. "An Interactive Compiler Development System", by Gary S. Tyson, Robert J. Shaw and Matthew K. Farrens, University of California, Davis, CA. Describes an interactive graphical optimizer. 5. A second set of Postscript files consisting primarily of overhead slides is available as: harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/workshop/tcl93_proceedings2.tar.Z This file contains the following slides: a. "Cooperating Applications through Tcl/Tk and DCE", by David Richardson, University of Michigan. b. "Ak An Audio Toolkit for Tcl & Tk", by Andrew Payne, Digital Equipment Corporation, Cambridge Research Laboratory. c. "Tcl Distributed Programming", by Brian C. Smith, Lawrence A. Rowe, Stephen C. Yen, University of California at Berkeley. This file also contains Usenet postings by: 6. The Tcl Compiler (TC) Frequently Asked Questions by Adam Sah is a document describing TC, which is a work in progress. Contact Adam for details. 7. A compact yet detailed overview of Tcl, Tk and Xf is available thanks to the graciousness of theobald@fzi.de (Dietmar Theobald) at: ftp.fzi.de:/pub/OBST/OBST3-3/psfiles/TclTk_notes.ps.Z (compress format) and ftp.fzi.de:/pub/OBST/OBST3-3/psfiles/TclTk_notes.ps.gz (gzip format) 8. Softcopy of an article about PhoneStation, a tool using Tk and Tcl, was presented at the 1993 Winter USENIX Conference. Uhler, Stephen A. (1993) ``PhoneStation, Moving the Telephone onto the Virtual Desktop'', in the Proceedings of the 1993 Winter USENIX Conference, pp ??-?? A softcopy of the paper is available as bellcore.com:/pub/PhoneStation/USENIX.ps 9. VanAndel, J.H., 1993: ``Design of a New Radar Control and Data Acquisition System''. Preprints, 26th Conference on Radar Meteorology, Norman, Oklahoma The paper is available in postscript form via the experimental web server: Radar Control PS D. Published articles and books 1. Computer Shopper, V12 N12, page 862 had an article referencing Tickle, the shareware package under Macintosh System 7 which is based on Tcl. 2. MacWEEK, V6 N32, page 91 had an article referencing Alpha 5.0, the Macintosh editor which incorporates Tcl. 3. Computer Language, V9 N7, page 76 had an article referencing Tcl in a hardware/software testing package which talks to a remote machine via a proprietary interface card. 4. SunWorld, V5 N10, pages 95-96 had a article discussing Tcl, Tk and expect. 5. UNIX REVIEW, V11 N4, pages 93-94, by Richard Morin. The article, a part of "The Internet Notebook", is about Tcl, Tk, and friends. It mentions a little about Tcl and Tk, where to find the sources, where to find the draft of the book, and where to find the contributed software. 6. SunExpert, V4 N3, pages 32-36, by Richard Morin. As part of Morin's I/Opener series of articles, this is just a brief overview of Tcl and Tk. It mentions some of the technical ideas behind Tcl and Tk, where to find the Tcl source and mentions that the draft of the book is available on allspice.berkeley.edu. A 'hello, world' 3 line wish script is really all that is shown. 7. Libes, Don, "Obfuscated C and Other Mysteries", Wiley & Sons, January 1993. This book has a whole chapter on Tcl. Aimed at the C programmer, it describes how to effectively use Tcl from C applications. Another chapter is on Expect - a walk-through of some of the more interesting code in Expect. These chapters originally appeared as separate articles in The C Users Journal, Vol. 8, No. 7, July 1990, and Vol. 9, No. 1, 1991. (Incidentally, the reason the book has such a peculiar title is that it also contains explanations of the Obfuscated C Code Contest winners.) 8. IEEE Design & Test of Computers, June 1993, pages 46-54, "RISE++: A Symbolic Environment for Scan-Based Testing" by Steve Vinoski. An article describing a system called the Remote Interactive Scan Environment (RISE++) that marries Tcl with RPC for the purpose of testing remote computer systems. 9. The X Journal, March-April 1993, pages 74-81, "HYPERTOOLS A revolution in GUI applications" (listed in the TOC as "Hypertools: A GUI revolution") by John K. Ousterhout and Lawrence A. Rowe. 10. Proceedings 1993 Tcl/Tk Workshop, Berkeley, CA, June, 1993. See above for online version information concerning these proceedings. Additional bibliographic references are still being sought. E. Training courses, materials, etc. 1. There have been, in the past, seminars at Usenix and the MIT X conference taught by John Ousterhout on Tcl and Tk. See above for the slides from the most recent of these presentations. 2. NeoSoft Communications Services ( info@NeoSoft.com, (713) 684-5969 , 9am - 4pm CDT M-F ) can teach introductory and advanced Tcl courses on site or at their location in Houston, Texas. A syllabus and pricing information are available on request. Please contact Ellyn Mustard at (713) 684-5969 or via email to ellyn@neosoft.com for more details. 3. Computerized Processes Unlimited ( gwl@cpu.com, (504) 889-2784 ) has a combined Tcl/Tclx reference manual for sale. It groups the commands by chapter based on functionality and has an extensive index. They also offer courses on Tcl. 4. A physical copy of the Tcl / Tk distributed documentation is available at the Northside Copy Central in Berkeley under the name "TCL" and is titled "Tcl/Tk Documents". Northside Copy Central is at 1862 Euclid with a phone of (510) 849-9600. It costs approx. $15-$20 for the book in a spiral bound, pink cover, clear plastic front and back format. F. Time-related seminars, conferences, sessions. 1. A Tcl/Tk workshop was held June 10-11, 1993 at University of California at Berkeley. The workshop proceedings are going to be made available for ftp in the near future. The bibliographic references for the articles published will be added in the near future. 2. Classes on Tcl and Tk have been held at Usenix and the MIT X Developers Conferences in the past. The most recent one that I have seen mentioned occurred during the Summer Usenix in Cincinnati, OH. At least three sessions related in some manner to Tcl/Tk - the Unix Power Tools (Monday) and the Tcl/Tk (Tuesday) tutorials, as well as the Unix guru session with John Ousterhout on Tuesday night. ------------------------------ From: FAQ General information Subject: -VI- Where do I report problems, bugs, or enhancements - or - What is comp.lang.tcl? There are two alternatives for reporting bugs and problems. The first is the USENET news group news:comp.lang.tcl, an unmoderated USENET newsgroup, created for the discussion of the Tcl programming language and tools that embed it, such as the Tk toolkit for the X window system, expect, and Extended Tcl. Please note that postings of source code to comp.lang.tcl do not get archived to harbor.ecn.purdue.edu - if you want your code to be available from the User Contributions archive you will need to make arrangements for someone to ftp it there. See elsewhere in the FAQ for more details on the archive site. The second would be to report problems, suggestions, new ideas, etc. to the author. Email to ouster@allspice.berkeley.edu (John Ousterhout) will get comments to the author of Tcl and Tk - for other programs, email addresses are available either elsewhere in this part or part 3. Note: for those USENET-deprived individuals who are thus unable to read comp.lang.tcl, a small echoing mailing list is available. Contact John Ousterhout (see above for email address) for details. ------------------------------ From: FAQ General information Subject: -VII- Where can I find the FAQ and who do I contact for more information about it? I am going to attempt to keep a copy of this file up to date on harbor.ecn.purdue.edu:/pub/tcl/docs/tcl-faq.p0[1-3] . Also, I will be posting it on a regular basis to at least comp.lang.tcl, news.answers, and comp.answers. If you have corrections, enhancements, modifications, clarifications, suggestions, ideas, new questions, new answers to questions which have never been asked, or something else that I have not covered above, contact me at lvirden@cas.org. Many FAQs, including this one, are available on the archive site rtfm.mit.edu:/pub/usenet/news/answers . The name under which a FAQ is archived appears in the Archive-name line at the top of the article. For example, this part of the comp.lang.tcl FAQ is archived as rtfm.mit.edu:/pub/usenet/news/answers/tcl-faq/part1.Z . There is also a mail server from which you can obtain a copy of the FAQ. Send an email message to mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu or archive-server@nic.switch.ch) with the word help in the body of the message to find out how to use it. Also, this FAQ is available from within gopher (by looking at any one of the gopher holes presenting news.answers or FAQ lists), from WAIS servers (such as the comp.lang.tcl.src), and probably other resources as well. Let me know when you find the FAQ in new and unusual locations so I can update this resource guide! A great new resource access point for the FAQ is WorldWideWeb. The Uniform Resource Locator id for the FAQ is: http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu:80/hypertext/faq/usenet/tcl-faq/top.html Be sure to check this one out! ------------------------------ End of comp.lang.tcl Frequently Asked Questions (1/5) ***************************************************** -- :s :s Larry W. Virden INET: lvirden@cas.org :s Personal: 674 Falls Place, Reynoldsburg, OH 43068-1614