Crate tk

source ·
Expand description

High-level bindings to Tk 8.6

The crate tk is bindings to Tk commands, aiming at:

  • Make Tk programers feel at home if possible.

  • Provide for non-Tk-programers easy-to-use API to start writing Tk GUI programs under constraints of Rust types, without the need of concatenating command strings of too flexible arguments.

A quick glance

use tk::*;
use tk::cmd::*;

fn main() -> TkResult<()> {
    let tk = make_tk!()?;
    let root = tk.root();
    root.add_label( -text("constructs widgets and layout step by step") )?
        .pack(())?;
    let f = root
        .add_frame(())?
        .pack(())?;
    let _btn = f
        .add_button( "btn" -text("quit") -command("destroy .") )?
        .pack(())?;
    Ok( main_loop() )
}

Another glance

use tk::*;
use tk::cmd::*;

fn main() -> TkResult<()> {
    let tk = make_tk!()?;
    tk.root().add_widgets(
        -pack( -label( -text("constructs widgets and layout in one expression") ))
        -pack( -frame( -pack( -button( "btn" -text("quit") -command("destroy .") ))))
    )?;
    Ok( main_loop() )
}

The naming conventions in translating Tk commands to Rust bindings

  1. Prefix Tk widget constructors with add_ and put parentheses around option values.

    The Tk command to add a widget looks like Constructor path -options_and_values, e.g.

    label .lb -text "lorem ipsum" -width 50 -height 20

    The equivalent Rust statement is as follows.

    let lb = root.add_label( /*".lb"*/ -text("lorem ipsum") -width(50) -height(20) )?;

  2. Converts Tcl’s imperative style to Rust’s object style

    The Tk command is in the form of “verb noun options”, e.g.

    pack .lb -fill both

    The equivalent Rust statement is in th form of “object method options”, as follows.

    lb.pack( -fill("both") )?; // use pack(()) without any option.

  3. Converts Tk’s space-separated commands to Rust’s underscore-separated function names.

    Tk commands are space-separated, e.g.

    tk fontchooser show

    The equivalent Rust statement is as follows.

    tk.fontchooser_show()?;

    Users can look into the Tk command reference and find the “fontchooser” page then search “show”.

  4. Distinguish between set and get via the set_ prefix.

    In Tk, it is common to distinguish set and get by providing or omitting the value argument, e.g.

    wm title window "Lorem ipsum" means to set the window’s title to “Lorem ipsum”, while wm title window means to get the windows’ title.

    The equivalent Rust statements are as follows.

    window.set_wm_title( "Lorem ipsum" )?;
window.wm_title()?;

Documents

  1. Tk tutorial

  2. Official Tk command references

Re-exports

Modules

Macros

Structs

  • Tk
    Tk instance.

Functions

  • main_loop
    Loop for events until all windows are deleted.

Type Aliases