Hello!

What is the easiest way to install and use Tcl / Tk on Windows
from the perspective of a Unix user?

I would install Cygwin, but I am writing a program for someone else
and perhaps would not like the idea ...

And I never really used Windows, I have almost no knowledge how to deal
with it ...

Rod.

Unless you are actually developing under MS-Windows, I would just cross-build
a starkit for your friend. He ends up with just a single .exe file, which he
can put anywhere he likes and not deal with "installing" Tcl/Tk at all. All
you need to do is include all of the Tcl/Tk libraries you use in the starkit.
There MS-Windows TclKit files around and binaries libraries (eg Img, etc.) as
well.

At Wed, 11 Dec 2024 22:34:19 +0000 Roderick <hruodr@gmail.com> wrote:

>
>
> Hello!
>
> What is the easiest way to install and use Tcl / Tk on Windows
> from the perspective of a Unix user?
>
> I would install Cygwin, but I am writing a program for someone else
> and perhaps would not like the idea ...
>
> And I never really used Windows, I have almost no knowledge how to deal
> with it ...
>
> Rod.
>
>

--
Robert Heller -- Cell: 413-658-7953 GV: 978-633-5364
Deepwoods Software -- Custom Software Services
http://www.deepsoft.com/ -- Linux Administration Services
heller@deepsoft.com -- Webhosting Services

On 12/11/2024 5:34 PM, Roderick wrote:
>
> Hello!
>
> What is the easiest way to install and use Tcl / Tk on Windows
> from the perspective of a Unix user?
>

A single cross-platform starkit approach is a good idea as pointed out
by another post.

Another option is Bawt which has two versions: Tcl/Tk only or as
batteries-included, with a standard Windows installer.

Link: https://www.tcl3d.org/bawt/download.html#tclbi

Am 11.12.24 um 23:34 schrieb Roderick:
>
> Hello!
>
> What is the easiest way to install and use Tcl / Tk on Windows
> from the perspective of a Unix user?
>
> I would install Cygwin, but I am writing a program for someone else
> and perhaps would not like the idea ...
>
> And I never really used Windows, I have almost no knowledge how to deal
> with it ...
>
> Rod.

Hello,

Maybe with a package manager

winget

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Package_Manager
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/package-manager/

Gregor
(but Windows != Unix)

In article <3c22e484-dd7d-8462-2a10-4d0529e6c8ec@gmail.com>,
Roderick <hruodr@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>Hello!
>
>What is the easiest way to install and use Tcl / Tk on Windows
>from the perspective of a Unix user?
>
>I would install Cygwin, but I am writing a program for someone else
>and perhaps would not like the idea ...
>
>And I never really used Windows, I have almost no knowledge how to deal
>with it ...
>
>Rod.

You definitely do not want to install Tcl/Tk via Cygwin. That gives
you a weird hybrid that depends on Cygwin, which your target system
won't have, and only works with an Xserver for Tk.

Cygwin is a great environment for a Unix developer to be productive
and comfortable on Windows, so edit your files with vi on Cygwin,
but use a true Windows version of Tcl/Tk to actually distribute
anything...

I'm not sure how well maintained it is anymore, but I have used Freewrap
in the past for wrapping everything up as one Windows exe.
--
columbiaclosings.com
What's not in Columbia anymore..

On 2024-12-12, Ted Nolan <tednolan> <ted@loft.tnolan.com> wrote:
> In article <3c22e484-dd7d-8462-2a10-4d0529e6c8ec@gmail.com>,
> Roderick <hruodr@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>Hello!
>>
>>What is the easiest way to install and use Tcl / Tk on Windows
>>from the perspective of a Unix user?
>>
>>I would install Cygwin, but I am writing a program for someone else
>>and perhaps would not like the idea ...
>>
>>And I never really used Windows, I have almost no knowledge how to deal
>>with it ...
>>
>>Rod.
>
> You definitely do not want to install Tcl/Tk via Cygwin. That gives
> you a weird hybrid that depends on Cygwin, which your target system
> won't have, and only works with an Xserver for Tk.
>
> Cygwin is a great environment for a Unix developer to be productive
> and comfortable on Windows, so edit your files with vi on Cygwin,
> but use a true Windows version of Tcl/Tk to actually distribute
> anything...
>
> I'm not sure how well maintained it is anymore, but I have used Freewrap
> in the past for wrapping everything up as one Windows exe.

TckKit + sdx is well support for MS-Windows.

--
Robert Heller -- Cell: 413-658-7953 GV: 978-633-5364
Deepwoods Software -- Custom Software Services
http://www.deepsoft.com/ -- Linux Administration Services
heller@deepsoft.com -- Webhosting Services

Am 11.12.2024 um 23:34 schrieb Roderick:
>
> Hello!
>
> What is the easiest way to install and use Tcl / Tk on Windows
> from the perspective of a Unix user?
>
> I would install Cygwin, but I am writing a program for someone else
> and perhaps would not like the idea ...
>
> And I never really used Windows, I have almost no knowledge how to deal
> with it ...
>
> Rod.

What about installing MagicSplat Tcl ?
All in one, all there ;-)
Harald

>
> Hello!
>
> What is the easiest way to install and use Tcl / Tk on Windows
> from the perspective of a Unix user?
>
> I would install Cygwin, but I am writing a program for someone else
> and perhaps would not like the idea ...
>
> And I never really used Windows, I have almost no knowledge how to deal
> with it ...
>
> Rod.
There are several ways to install and run Tcl/Tk applications on the common platforms, i.e. Windows,
Linux and MacOS. The problem is getting working binaries for the latest Tcl versions 8.6.16 and 9.0.

Magicsplat only supports Windows, Freewrap only Windows and Linux. Tclkits and sdx are, in my
opinion, the only *portable* way to do this.

The problem with tclkits and sdx is that it is old, very old, and no longer maintained.
There is no place on the internet where you can download binaries for the latest Tcl versions.
The KitCreator web interface is a great approach, but the last supported version is 8.6.12.

I appreciate that Tcl/Tk is still being maintained, but I do not want to port
(configure/make/install) the language, I want to develop applications using the language.

How can I use new versions without an out-of-the-box runtime environment? In my opinion, this is the
biggest threat to Tcl at the moment.

Torsten

Am 12.12.2024 um 18:24 schrieb Torsten:
>>
>> Hello!
>>
>> What is the easiest way to install and use Tcl / Tk on Windows
>> from the perspective of a Unix user?
>>
>> I would install Cygwin, but I am writing a program for someone else
>> and perhaps would not like the idea ...
>>
>> And I never really used Windows, I have almost no knowledge how to deal
>> with it ...
>>
>> Rod.
> There are several ways to install and run Tcl/Tk applications on the
> common platforms, i.e. Windows, Linux and MacOS. The problem is getting
> working binaries for the latest Tcl versions 8.6.16 and 9.0.
>
> Magicsplat only supports Windows, Freewrap only Windows and Linux.
> Tclkits and sdx are, in my opinion, the only *portable* way to do this.
>
> The problem with tclkits and sdx is that it is old, very old, and no
> longer maintained.
> There is no place on the internet where you can download binaries for
> the latest Tcl versions.
> The KitCreator web interface is a great approach, but the last supported
> version is 8.6.12.
>
> I appreciate that Tcl/Tk is still being maintained, but I do not want to
> port (configure/make/install) the language, I want to develop
> applications using the language.
>
> How can I use new versions without an out-of-the-box runtime
> environment? In my opinion, this is the biggest threat to Tcl at the
> moment.
>
> Torsten

I still use the starkits by Ashok, which are tcl 8.6.13.
I plan to move to TCL9 with zipkit builtin.
After 9.0.1 release, many bugs here will be fixed.

Take care,
Harald

On 12/12/2024 12:24 PM, Torsten wrote:

> The problem is getting
> working binaries for the latest Tcl versions 8.6.16 and 9.0.
>
> Magicsplat only supports Windows, Freewrap only Windows and Linux.

I think Bawt by Paul Obermeier hits the nail here, with support for
Windows, Linux and Mac OS.

> The problem with tclkits and sdx is that it is old, very old, and no
> longer maintained.

Is this true? Is the source code for tclkits and sdx not available? That
is a real problem if so.

> I appreciate that Tcl/Tk is still being maintained, but I do not want to
> port (configure/make/install) the language, I want to develop
> applications using the language.
>
> How can I use new versions without an out-of-the-box runtime
> environment? In my opinion, this is the biggest threat to Tcl at the
> moment.
>

I can empathize. Perhaps the wiki could have a page where people can
download it, and the new version binaries are uploaded by the
maintainers. It used to be you got it all from Activestate (and its
predecessors before them). I am not sure what they are doing now but
they changed their licensing a few years ago and, frankly, ruined it.

And Androwish, Undroidwish and LUKE are a great deployment ways.
The software is often far ahead of Tcl releases...

tclexecomp: https://tclexecomp.sourceforge.net/
freewrap: https://freewrap.dengensys.com/

regards

Manfred

Am 11.12.24 um 23:34 schrieb Roderick:
>
> Hello!
>
> What is the easiest way to install and use Tcl / Tk on Windows
> from the perspective of a Unix user?
>
> I would install Cygwin, but I am writing a program for someone else
> and perhaps would not like the idea ...
>
> And I never really used Windows, I have almost no knowledge how to deal
> with it ...
>
> Rod.

On Thu, 12 Dec 2024, greg wrote:

> Gregor
> (but Windows != Unix)

Yes, that is really my biggest problem.

There is no other way than to confront a Windows machine and test.

I only need tcl, tk and sqlite3 library, and the program does only
some calculations on a DB. Perhaps in this very special case cygwin could
be usable by a windows user, but I will try with something more native.

Thanks!

Rod-

On Thu, 12 Dec 2024, Ted Nolan <tednolan> wrote:

> You definitely do not want to install Tcl/Tk via Cygwin. That gives
> you a weird hybrid that depends on Cygwin, which your target system
> won't have, and only works with an Xserver for Tk.

I develope on FreeBSD, and the only windows target would need to
have Cygwin/X on its windows machine.

> Cygwin is a great environment for a Unix developer to be productive
> and comfortable on Windows, so edit your files with vi on Cygwin, ...

Indeed, with Cygwin I know how to run a program, how to pass arguments
to it, how to read and write files, how they are named and how to
put them in directory hierarchies, etc. ... :)

I do not need to wrap all files in one file, but to deal with
tcl / tk / sqlite3 in a similar way than in Unix.

> but use a true Windows version of Tcl/Tk to actually distribute
> anything...

Yes, a true Windows version of Tcl/Tk, namely like under Unix! :)

Rod.

Roderick <hruodr@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Thu, 12 Dec 2024, greg wrote:
>
>> Gregor
>> (but Windows != Unix)
>
> Yes, that is really my biggest problem.
>
> There is no other way than to confront a Windows machine and test.
>
> I only need tcl, tk and sqlite3 library, and the program does only
> some calculations on a DB. Perhaps in this very special case cygwin could
> be usable by a windows user, but I will try with something more native.

Given those requirements, you'd be best off with one of the "single
file executable packages" (i.e., starkit/freewrap/undroidwish/etc.).

You do the "small extra work" of wrapping all the Tcl/Tk code into the
"package".

For your windows user(s) they just see a single executable they can
double click upon to launch.

On 2024-12-15, Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:
> Roderick <hruodr@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> On Thu, 12 Dec 2024, greg wrote:
>>
>>> Gregor
>>> (but Windows != Unix)
>>
>> Yes, that is really my biggest problem.
>>
>> There is no other way than to confront a Windows machine and test.
>>
>> I only need tcl, tk and sqlite3 library, and the program does only
>> some calculations on a DB. Perhaps in this very special case cygwin could
>> be usable by a windows user, but I will try with something more native.
>
> Given those requirements, you'd be best off with one of the "single
> file executable packages" (i.e., starkit/freewrap/undroidwish/etc.).
>
> You do the "small extra work" of wrapping all the Tcl/Tk code into the
> "package".
>
> For your windows user(s) they just see a single executable they can
> double click upon to launch.

The OP can have a look at https://github.com/RobertPHeller/RolePlayingDB3 for
an example of a pure Tcl/Tk app that can be cross-built for ANY platform on
ANY linux system. He might need to dig up the package library for sqlite3 (eg
the pkgIndex.tcl+libtclsqlite3.dll for MS-Windows), which should be online
somewhere.

>

On Sun, 15 Dec 2024, Robert Heller wrote:

> The OP can have a look at https://github.com/RobertPHeller/RolePlayingDB3 for
> an example of a pure Tcl/Tk app that can be cross-built for ANY platform on
> ANY linux system.

Thanks. For commercial purposes, wrapped scripts are interesting,
I will try to learn that later, but I want something that corresponds
to what I run on FreeBSD. These wrappers seems to be for Linux, not
all unix.

There is no other way than to learn a little of Windows. I will try
to get an old windows pc and install first Magicsplat.

Rod.

On 12/16/24 04:51, Roderick wrote:
>
> On Sun, 15 Dec 2024, Robert Heller wrote:
>
>> The OP can have a look at
>> https://github.com/RobertPHeller/RolePlayingDB3 for
>> an example of a pure Tcl/Tk app that can be cross-built for ANY
>> platform on
>> ANY linux system.
>
> Thanks. For commercial purposes, wrapped scripts are interesting,
> I will try to learn that later, but I want something that corresponds
> to what I run on FreeBSD. These wrappers seems to be for Linux, not
> all unix.
>
> There is no other way than to learn a little of Windows. I will try
> to get an old windows pc and install first Magicsplat.

Starkits/Starpacks work on all architectures:
- Linux
- Unix
- Windows
- (yes even) VMS

On Mon, 16 Dec 2024, Gerald Lester wrote:

> Starkits/Starpacks work on all architectures:

I suspect I will have to build 'tclkit' for Freebsd and
download a binary for Windows that includes sqlite3.

Is there an official Web site for the projects 'tclkit' and 'sdx'?

Official source / binary distributions?

I found only old sites, broken links ...

Thanks
Rod.

Am 17.12.24 um 00:26 schrieb Roderick:
>
> On Mon, 16 Dec 2024, Gerald Lester wrote:
>
>> Starkits/Starpacks work on all architectures:
>
> I suspect I will have to build 'tclkit' for Freebsd and download a
> binary for Windows that includes sqlite3.
>
> Is there an official Web site for the projects 'tclkit' and 'sdx'?
>
> Official source / binary distributions?
>
> I found only old sites, broken links ...
>
> Thanks
> Rod.

I don't know of an official site, but;

https://wiki.tcl-lang.org/page/Tclkit

You can get ready-made binaries here:
(Freebsd and Windows)
http://kitcreator.rkeene.org/kitcreator
http://kitcreator.rkeene.org/fossil/home

(Windows)
https://sourceforge.net/projects/twapi/files/Tcl%20binaries/Tclkits%20with%20TWAPI/
https://www.tcl3d.org/bawt/download.html

and:
https://www.magicsplat.com/blog/starpack-example/

cross building?
https://wiki.tcl-lang.org/page/cross%2Dbuilding+a+starkit

Gregor

On Mon, 16 Dec 2024 07:22:30 -0600, Gerald Lester wrote:

>Starkits/Starpacks work on all architectures:
> - Linux
> - Unix
> - Windows
> - (yes even) VMS
>
**************************

Jigsaw Puzzler doesn't.

https://wiki.tcl-lang.org/page/Jigsaw+Puzzler

I have to run the Windows version on Wine.

Sad.

--
Luc
>>

On 12/16/24 22:36, Luc wrote:
> On Mon, 16 Dec 2024 07:22:30 -0600, Gerald Lester wrote:
>
>> Starkits/Starpacks work on all architectures:
>> - Linux
>> - Unix
>> - Windows
>> - (yes even) VMS
>>
> **************************
>
> Jigsaw Puzzler doesn't.
>
> https://wiki.tcl-lang.org/page/Jigsaw+Puzzler
>
> I have to run the Windows version on Wine.
>
> Sad.

Only if you don't use the correct executable for Windows when building
the kit.

Yes, very sad.

On Tue, 17 Dec 2024 09:48:39 -0600, Gerald Lester wrote:

>> Jigsaw Puzzler doesn't.
>>
>> https://wiki.tcl-lang.org/page/Jigsaw+Puzzler
>>
>> I have to run the Windows version on Wine.
>>
>> Sad.
>
>Only if you don't use the correct executable for Windows when building
>the kit.
>
>Yes, very sad.
>
**************************

The Windows version exe works for me. With Wine. The starkit doesn't.

--
Luc
>>

> I think Bawt by Paul Obermeier hits the nail here, with support for Windows, Linux and Mac OS.

Bawt requires a full C/C++ development environment for *every* target platform.
This is far from my request for ready-to-use binaries.

> I can empathize.  Perhaps the wiki could have a page where people can download it, and the new
> version binaries are uploaded by the maintainers.  It used to be you got it all from Activestate
> (and its predecessors before them).  I am not sure what they are doing now but they changed their
> licensing a few years ago and, frankly, ruined it.

So I'm not allone. ;-)
This "wiki page" could be Roy Keene's KitCreator Web Interface. That would be my preferred solution.

Torsten

Roderick <hruodr@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Mon, 16 Dec 2024, Gerald Lester wrote:
>
>> Starkits/Starpacks work on all architectures:
>
> I suspect I will have to build 'tclkit' for Freebsd and
> download a binary for Windows that includes sqlite3.
>
> Is there an official Web site for the projects 'tclkit' and 'sdx'?
>
> Official source / binary distributions?
>
> I found only old sites, broken links ...
>
> Thanks
> Rod.

I use arch linux and there's a pkgbuild that I just tested and still works.
Currently using 8.6.14
Link to aur page https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/tclkit
Link to pkgbuild https://aur.archlinux.org/cgit/aur.git/tree/PKGBUILD?h=tclkit
Link to upstream on github https://github.com/stiefel40k/kitgen

sdx is here https://chiselapp.com/user/aspect/repository/sdx/index