treectrl(n) 2.2 treectrl "Tk Commands"

NAME

treectrl - Create and manipulate hierarchical multicolumn widgets

    TABLE OF CONTENTS
    SYNOPSIS
    DESCRIPTION
    STANDARD OPTIONS
    WIDGET SPECIFIC OPTIONS
    ITEM AND COLUMN TAGS
    WIDGET COMMAND
    COLUMNS
    COLUMN DESCRIPTION
    STATES
    PER-STATE OPTIONS
    ELEMENTS
    BITMAP ELEMENT
    BORDER ELEMENT
    IMAGE ELEMENT
    RECTANGLE ELEMENT
    TEXT ELEMENT
    WINDOW ELEMENT
    ITEM DESCRIPTION
    EVENTS AND SCRIPT SUBSTITUTIONS
    DYNAMIC EVENTS
    DEFAULT BINDINGS
    EXAMPLES
    SEE ALSO
    KEYWORDS

SYNOPSIS

The treectrl command creates a new window (given by the pathName argument) and makes it into a treectrl widget. Additional options, described above, may be specified on the command line or in the option database to configure aspects of the treectrl such as its background color and relief. The treectrl command returns the path name of the new window. At the time this command is invoked, there must not exist a window named pathName, but pathName's parent must exist.

A treectrl is a widget which displays items in a one- or two-dimensional arrangement. Items have a parent-child relationship with other items. Items have a set of states, which are boolean properties. Items may be spread about one or more columns. For each column of an item there is a style associated, which determines how to display the item's column taking into account the item's current state set. One column can be defined to display the data in a hierarchical structure.

Normally the origin of the coordinate system is at the upper-left corner of the window containing the treectrl. It is possible to adjust the origin of the coordinate system relative to the origin of the window using the xview and yview widget commands; this is typically used for scrolling.

A treectrl widget can be horizontal or vertical oriented like many other Tk widgets. For displaying hierarchical data only vertical orientation is useful, since only then the children of an item are displayed directly below their parent. If the treectrl widget is used only to display data in a multicolumn listbox, the specification of an orientation will give useful results.

STANDARD OPTIONS

-background
-borderwidth
-cursor
-font
-highlightbackground
-highlightcolor
-highlightthickness
-orient
-relief
-takefocus
-xscrollcommand
-yscrollcommand
-foreground

See the option manual entry for details on the standard options.

WIDGET SPECIFIC OPTIONS

Command-Line Switch: -backgroundimage
Database Name: backgroundImage
Database Class: BackgroundImage: Specifies the name of an image to draw as the list background. The image is tiled horizontally and vertically to fill the content area of the list. If the image is transparent it is drawn on top of the background color(s).
Command-Line Switch: -backgroundmode
Database Name: backgroundMode
Database Class: BackgroundMode: Specifies how the background color of items is chosen in each column. The value should be one of row, column, order, or ordervisible. The default is row. This option has only an effect for columns which have -itembackground defined as list of two or more colors (see section COLUMNS below for more on this). If row or column is specified, the background color is chosen based on the location of the item in the 1- or 2-dimensional grid of items as layed out on the screen; this layout of items is affected by the -orient and -wrap options as well as item visibility. When order or ordervisible is specified, the background color is chosen based on the result of the item order command, regardless of the layout of items.
Command-Line Switch: -buttonbitmap
Database Name: buttonBitmap
Database Class: ButtonBitmap: Specifies the bitmap to be used as the expand/collapse button to the left of an item. This is a per-state option. If a bitmap is specified for a certain item state, it overrides the effects of -usetheme.
Command-Line Switch: -buttoncolor
Database Name: buttonColor
Database Class: ButtonColor: Specifies the foreground color which should be used for drawing the outline and the plus or minus sign of the button to the left of an item.
Command-Line Switch: -buttonimage
Database Name: buttonImage
Database Class: ButtonImage: Specifies the image to be used as the expand/collapse button to the left of an item. This is a per-state option. If an image is specified for a certain item state, it overrides the effects of -buttonbitmap and -usetheme.
Command-Line Switch: -buttonsize
Database Name: buttonSize
Database Class: ButtonSize: Specifies the width and height of the button drawn to the left of an item in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels.
Command-Line Switch: -buttonthickness
Database Name: buttonThickness
Database Class: ButtonThickness: Specifies the width of the outline and the plus or minus sign of the button to the left of an item in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels.
Command-Line Switch: -columnprefix
Database Name: columnPrefix
Database Class: ColumnPrefix: Specifies an ascii string that changes the way column ids are reported and processed. If this option is a non-empty string, the usual integer value of a column id is prefixed with the given string. This can aid debugging but it is important your code doesn't assume column ids are integers if you use it.
Command-Line Switch: -columnproxy
Database Name: columnProxy
Database Class: ColumnProxy: If this option specifies a non empty value, it should be a screen distance in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. Then a 1 pixel thick vertical line will be drawn at the specified screen distance from the left edge of the treectrl widget, which reaches from top to bottom of the treectrl widget and uses an inverting color (i.e black on lighter background, white on darker background). This line can be used to give the user a visual feedback during column resizing.
Command-Line Switch: -columnresizemode
Database Name: columnResizeMode
Database Class: ColumnResizeMode: Specifies the visual feedback used when resizing columns. The value should be one of proxy or realtime. For proxy, a 1-pixel thick vertical line is drawn representing where the right edge of the column will be after resizing. For realtime, the column's size is changed while the user is dragging the right edge of the column.
Command-Line Switch: -defaultstyle
Database Name: defaultStyle
Database Class: DefaultStyle: This option is deprecated; use the column option -itemstyle instead. Specifies a list of styles, one per column, to apply to each item created by the item create command. The number of styles in the list can be different from the number of tree columns. Each list element should be a valid style name or an empty string to indicate no style should be applied to a specific column. The list of styles is updated if a style is deleted or if a column is moved.
Command-Line Switch: -doublebuffer
Database Name: doubleBuffer
Database Class: DoubleBuffer: Specifies if double-buffering should be used to improve displaying. The value should be one of none, window, or item. For none no double-buffering is used at all, which may be most memory efficient, but will probably generate some flickering on the screen. For window the complete tree is double-buffered, which requires a buffer big enough to contain the complete widget. For item, which is the default, every item is separately double-buffered, so it works with a buffer size as big as the biggest item.
Command-Line Switch: -height
Database Name: height
Database Class: Height: Specifies the desired height for the window in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. The default is 200 pixels. If this option is less than or equal to zero then the window will not request any size at all.
Command-Line Switch: -indent
Database Name: indent
Database Class: Indent: Specifies the screen distance an item is indented relative to its parent item in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. The default is 19 pixels.
Command-Line Switch: -itemheight
Database Name: itemHeight
Database Class: ItemHeight: Specifies a fixed height for every item in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. If non-zero, this option overrides the requested height of an item and the -minitemheight option. The default is 0, which means that every item has the height requested by the arrangement of elements in each column. Items are never shorter than the maximum height of a button.
Command-Line Switch: -itemprefix
Database Name: itemPrefix
Database Class: ItemPrefix: Specifies an ascii string that changes the way item ids are reported and processed. If this option is a non-empty string, the usual integer value of an item id is prefixed with the given string. This can aid debugging but it is important your code doesn't assume item ids are integers if you use it.
Command-Line Switch: -itemwidth
Database Name: itemWidth
Database Class: ItemWidth: Specifies a fixed width for every item in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. If more than one column is visible, then this option has no effect. If the -orient option is vertical, and the -wrap option is unspecified, then this option has no effect (in that case all items are as wide as the column).
Command-Line Switch: -itemwidthequal
Database Name: itemWidthEqual
Database Class: ItemWidthEqual: Specifies a boolean that says whether all items should have the same width. If more than one column is visible, then this option has no effect. If the -orient option is vertical, and the -wrap option is unspecified, then this option has no effect (in that case all items are as wide as the column). If the -itemwidth option is specified, then this option has no effect.
Command-Line Switch: -itemwidthmultiple
Database Name: itemWidthMultiple
Database Class: ItemWidthMultiple: Specifies a screen distance that every item's width will be evenly divisible by in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. If more than one column is visible, then this option has no effect. If the -orient option is vertical, and the -wrap option is unspecified, then this option has no effect (in that case all items are as wide as the column). If the -itemwidth option is specified, then this option has no effect.
Command-Line Switch: -linecolor
Database Name: lineColor
Database Class: LineColor: Specifies the color which should be used for drawing the connecting lines between related items.
Command-Line Switch: -linestyle
Database Name: lineStyle
Database Class: LineStyle: Specifies the style of the connecting lines between related items, should be dot which is the default, or solid.
Command-Line Switch: -linethickness
Database Name: lineThickness
Database Class: LineThickness: Specifies the thickness of the connecting lines between related items in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels.
Command-Line Switch: -minitemheight
Database Name: minItemHeight
Database Class: MinItemHeight: Specifies a minimum height for every item in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. The default is 0, which means that every item has the height requested by the arrangement of elements in each column. This option has no effect if the -itemheight option is specified. Items are never shorter than the maximum height of a button.
Command-Line Switch: -rowproxy
Database Name: rowProxy
Database Class: RowProxy: If this option specifies a non empty value, it should be a screen distance in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. Then a 1 pixel thick horizontal line will be drawn at the specified screen distance from the top edge of the treectrl widget, which reaches from left to right of the treectrl widget and uses an inverting color (i.e black on lighter background, white on darker background). This line can be used to give the user a visual feedback during row resizing.
Command-Line Switch: -scrollmargin
Database Name: scrollMargin
Database Class: ScrollMargin: Specifies a positive screen distance in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. This option is used by the default bindings to determine how close to the edges of the contentbox the mouse pointer must be before scrolling occurs. Specifying a positive value is useful when items may be drag-and-dropped. Defaults to 0.
Command-Line Switch: -selectmode
Database Name: selectMode
Database Class: SelectMode: Specifies one of several styles for manipulating the selection. The value of the option may be arbitrary, but the default bindings expect it to be either single, browse, multiple, or extended; the default value is browse.
Command-Line Switch: -showbuttons
Database Name: showButtons
Database Class: ShowButtons: Specifies a boolean value that determines whether this widget leaves indentation space to display the expand/collapse buttons next to items. The default value is true. The item option -button determines whether any item has a button. See also the treectrl option -showrootbutton.
Command-Line Switch: -showheader
Database Name: showHeader
Database Class: ShowHeader: Specifies a boolean value that determines whether this widget should display the header line with the column names at the top of the widget. The default value is true.
Command-Line Switch: -showlines
Database Name: showLines
Database Class: ShowLines: Specifies a boolean value that determines whether this widget should draw the connecting lines between related items. The default value is true.
Command-Line Switch: -showroot
Database Name: showRoot
Database Class: ShowRoot: Specifies a boolean value that determines whether this widget should draw the root item. By suppressing the drawing of the root item the widget can have multiple items that appear as toplevel items. The default value is true.
Command-Line Switch: -showrootbutton
Database Name: showRootButton
Database Class: ShowRootButton: Specifies a boolean value that determines whether this widget leaves indentation space to display the expand/collapse button next to the root item. The default value is false. The item option -button determines whether the root item has a button.
Command-Line Switch: -showrootlines
Database Name: showRootLines
Database Class: ShowRootLines: Specifies a boolean value that determines whether this widget should draw the connecting lines between children of the root item. The default value is true.
Command-Line Switch: -treecolumn
Database Name: treeColumn
Database Class: TreeColumn: Specifies a column description that determines which column displays the buttons and lines. The default is unspecified.
Command-Line Switch: -usetheme
Database Name: useTheme
Database Class: UseTheme: Specifies a boolean value that determines whether this widget should draw parts of itself using a platform-specific theme manager. The default is false.
Command-Line Switch: -width
Database Name: width
Database Class: Width: Specifies the desired width for the window in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. The default is 200 pixel. If this option is less than or equal to zero then the window will not request any size at all.
Command-Line Switch: -wrap
Database Name: wrap
Database Class: Wrap: Specifies whether items are arranged in a 1- or 2-dimensional layout. If the value is an empty string (the default), then items are arranged from top to bottom (-orient vertical) or from left to right (-orient horizontal) in a 1-dimensional layout. If the value is "N items", then a no more than N items will appear in a vertical group (-orient vertical) or horizontal group (-orient horizontal). If the value is "N pixels", then a no vertical group of items will be taller than N pixels (-orient vertical) or no horizontal group of items will be wider than N pixels (-orient horizontal). If the value is window, then a no vertical group of items will be taller than the window (-orient vertical) or no horizontal group of items will be wider than the window (-orient horizontal).
Command-Line Switch: -xscrolldelay
Database Name: xScrollDelay
Database Class: ScrollDelay: This option controls how quickly horizontal scrolling occurs while dragging the mouse with button 1 pressed. The value should be a list of 1 or 2 integers interpreted as microseconds. If 2 values are specified, then the first value determines the intial delay after the first scroll, and the second value determines the delay for all scrolling after the first. If only 1 value is specified, each scroll takes place after that delay.
Command-Line Switch: -xscrollincrement
Database Name: xScrollIncrement
Database Class: ScrollIncrement: Specifies an increment for horizontal scrolling, in any of the usual forms permitted for screen distances. If the value of this option is greater than zero, the horizontal view in the window will be constrained so that the x coordinate at the left edge of the window is always an even multiple of -xscrollincrement; furthermore, the units for scrolling (e.g., the change in view when the left and right arrows of a scrollbar are selected) will also be -xscrollincrement. If the value of this option is less than or equal to zero, then horizontal scrolling snaps to the left of an item, or part of an item if items are wider than the contentbox.
Command-Line Switch: -yscrolldelay
Database Name: yScrollDelay
Database Class: ScrollDelay: This option controls how quickly vertical scrolling occurs while dragging the mouse with button 1 pressed. The value should be a list of 1 or 2 integers interpreted as microseconds. If 2 values are specified, then the first value determines the intial delay after the first scroll, and the second value determines the delay for all scrolling after the first. If only 1 value is specified, each scroll takes place after that delay.
Command-Line Switch: -yscrollincrement
Database Name: yScrollIncrement
Database Class: ScrollIncrement: Specifies an increment for vertical scrolling, in any of the usual forms permitted for screen distances. If the value of this option is greater than zero, the vertical view in the window will be constrained so that the y coordinate at the top edge of the window is always an even multiple of -yscrollincrement; furthermore, the units for scrolling (e.g., the change in view when the top and bottom arrows of a scrollbar are selected) will also be -yscrollincrement. If the value of this option is less than or equal to zero, then vertical scrolling snaps to the top of an item, or part of an item if items are taller than the contentbox.

ITEM AND COLUMN TAGS

Columns and items may have any number of tags associated with them. A tag is just a string of characters, and it may take any form, including that of an integer, although the characters '(', ')', '&', '|', '^' and '!' should be avoided.

The same tag may be associated with many columns or items. This is commonly done to group items in various interesting ways; for example, in a file browser all directories might be given the tag "directory".

Tag expressions are used in column descriptions and item descriptions to specify which columns and items to operate on. A tag expression can be a single tag name or a logical expression of tags using operators '&&', '||', '^' and '!', and parenthesized subexpressions. For example:

.t item id "tag {(a && !b) || (!a && b)}"

or equivalently:

.t item id "tag {a ^ b}"

will return the unique ids of any items with either "a" or "b" tags, but not both.

WIDGET COMMAND

The treectrl command creates a new Tcl command whose name is the same as the path name of the treectrl's window. This command may be used to invoke various operations on the widget. It has the following general form:

pathName option ?arg arg ...?

PathName is the name of the command, which is the same as the treectrl widget's path name. Option and the args determine the exact behavior of the command. The following commands are possible for treectrl widgets:

pathName activate itemDesc

Sets the active item to the one described by itemDesc, and switches on the state active for this item. From now on the item can be retrieved with the item description active. An <ActiveItem> event is generated.

pathName bbox ?area?

Returns a list with four elements giving the bounding box (left, top, right and bottom) of an area of the window. If area is not specified, then the result is the bounding box of the entire window. If area is content, then the result is the part of the window not including borders, headers, or locked columns. If area is header, then the result is the part of the window not including borders where column titles are displayed. If area is left, then the result is the part of the window not including borders or headers where left-locked columns are displayed. If area is right, then the result is the part of the window not including borders or headers where right-locked columns are displayed. An empty string is returned if the display area has no height or width, which can be true for various reasons such as the window is too small, or the header is not displayed, or there aren't any locked columns.

pathName canvasx screenx

Given a window x-coordinate in the treectrl screenx, this command returns the treectrl x-coordinate that is displayed at that location.

pathName canvasy screeny

Given a window y-coordinate in the treectrl screeny, this command returns the treectrl y-coordinate that is displayed at that location.

pathName cget option

Returns the current value of the configuration option given by option. Option may have any of the values accepted by the tree command.

pathName collapse ?-recurse? ?itemDesc ...?

Use item collapse instead.

pathName column option column ?arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate the columns of the treectrl widget (see section COLUMNS below). The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the column argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName column bbox columnDesc

Returns a list with four elements giving the bounding box of the header of the column specified by the column description columnDesc. If the treectrl is configured not to display the column headers by means of the -showheader option, then an empty list is returned instead.

pathName column cget columnDesc option

This command returns the current value of the option named option for the column specified by the column description columnDesc, ColumnDesc may also be the string tail to specify the tail column. Option may have any of the values accepted by the column configure widget command.

pathName column configure columnDesc ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?

This command is similar to the configure widget command except that it modifies options associated with the columns specified by the column description columnDesc instead of modifying options for the overall treectrl widget. ColumnDesc may be the string tail to specify the tail column. If columnDesc refers to more than one column, then at least one option-value pair must be given. If no option is specified, the command returns a list describing all of the available options for columnDesc (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command 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 command modifies the given option(s) to have the given value(s) for columnDesc; in this case the command returns an empty string.

See COLUMNS below for details on the options available for columns.

pathName column compare column1 op column2

For both column descriptions column1 and column2 the index is retrieved (as returned from the column order widget command). Then these indexes are compared using the operator op, which must be either <, <=, ==, >=, >, or !=. The return value of this command is 1 if the comparison evaluated to true, 0 otherwise.

pathName column count ?columnDesc?

If no additional arguments are given, the result is a decimal string giving the number of columns created by the column create widget command which haven't been deleted by the column delete widget command; in this case the tail column is not counted. If columnDesc is given, then the result is the number of columns that match that column description.

pathName column create ?option value ...?

This command creates a new column in the treectrl widget. The new column is placed to the right of all other columns (except the tail column). Any option-value arguments configure the new column according to the column configure command. The return value is the unique identifier of the new column.

pathName column delete first ?last?

Deletes the specified column(s). First and last must be valid column descriptions. If both first and last are specified, then they may refer to a single column only. The tail column cannot be deleted and it is an error to specify it. The order of first and last doesn't matter, and first may be equal to last.

pathName column dragcget option

pathName column dragconfigure ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?

The user can move a column within a treectrl by drag-and-drop. Feedback consists of a semi-transparent photo image of the header of the column being dragged and a 2-pixel-thick vertical line to indicate where the column may be dropped. The drag image consists of a colored background rectangle plus the image and/or text displayed in the column header. The 2-pixel-thick line will be drawn over the left edge of the column before which the dragged column may be dropped.

The library scripts generate a <ColumnDrag-accept> event when the user has successfully drag-and-drop'd a column. You will have to bind a script to this event if you want to move the dragged column.

The following configuration options are supported:

-enable boolean: Controls whether the user is allowed to rearrange columns by drag-and-drop.
-imagealpha alpha: Alpha is an integer from 0 (invisible) to 255 (opaque) controlling the transparency of the drag image. Any value outside this range is clipped.
-imagecolor background: Background is the color of the drag image background rectangle.
-imagecolumn column: Column specifies the column to create the drag image from.
-imageoffset offset: Offset is the horizontal screen distance the drag image is offset from its starting position.
-indicatorcolor color: Color is the color of the 2-pixel-thick line.
-indicatorcolumn column: The 2-pixel-thick line will be drawn over the left or right edge of column.
-indicatorside side: Specifies whether the 2-pixel-thick line will be drawn over the left or right edge of the column specified by -indicatorcolumn.

pathName column index columnDesc

Deprecated. Use column id instead.

pathName column id columnDesc

This command resolves the column description columnDesc into a list of unique column identifiers. If the column(s) described by columnDesc don't exist, this command returns an empty list.

pathName column list ?-visible?

This command returns a list of identifiers for every column (except the tail) from left to right. If -visible is given, only columns whose -visible option is true are returned.

pathName column move columnDesc beforeDesc

Moves the column specified by columnDesc to the left of the column specified by beforeDesc. Both columnDesc and beforeDesc must be valid column descriptions. If beforeDesc is the string tail, the column columnDesc will become the last column.

pathName column neededwidth columnDesc

This command returns a decimal string giving the needed width of the column specified by the column description columnDesc. The needed width is the maximum of the width of the column header and the width of the widest style in any visible item.

pathName column order columnDesc ?-visible?

This command returns a decimal string giving the position of the column specified by the column description columnDesc in the list of columns starting from zero for the leftmost column. If -visible is given, only columns whose -visible option is true are considered, and -1 is returned if columnDesc's -visible option is false.

pathName column tag option ?arg arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate tags on columns. The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the column tag argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName column tag add columnDesc tagList: Adds each tag in tagList to the columns specified by the column description columnDesc. Duplicate tags are ignored. The list of tags for a column can also be changed via a column's -tags option.
pathName column tag expr columnDesc tagExpr: Evaluates the tag expression tagExpr against every column specified by the column description columnDesc. The result is 1 if the tag expression evaluates to true for every column, 0 otherwise.
pathName column tag names columnDesc: Returns a list of tag names assigned to the columns specified by the column description columnDesc. The result is the union of any tags assigned to the columns.
pathName column tag remove columnDesc tagList: Removes each tag in tagList from the columns specified by the column description columnDesc. It is not an error if any of the columns do not use any of the tags. The list of tags for a column can also be changed via a column's -tags option.

pathName column width columnDesc

This command returns a decimal string giving the width in pixels of the column specified by the column description columnDesc, even if the treectrl is configured to not display the column headers by means of the -showheader option.

pathName compare itemDesc1 op itemDesc2

Deprecated. Use the item compare command instead.

pathName configure ?option? ?value option value ...?

Query or modify the configuration options of the widget. If no option is specified, returns a list describing all of the available options for pathName (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command 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 command modifies the given widget option(s) to have the given value(s); in this case the command returns an empty string. Option may have any of the values accepted by the treectrl command.

pathName contentbox

Returns a list with four elements giving the bounding box of the screen area used to display items. This is the area of the window not including borders, column headers, or locked columns. An empty string is returned if the display area has no height or width, which can happen if the window is too small.

pathName debug option ?arg arg ...?

This command is used to facilitate debugging of the treectrl widget. The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the debug argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName debug alloc

Returns a string giving partial statistics on memory allocations, if the package was built with TREECTRL_DEBUG defined.

pathName debug cget option

This command returns the current value of the debugging option named option. Option may have any of the values accepted by the debug configure widget command.

pathName debug configure ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?

This command is similar to the configure widget command except that it modifies debugging options instead of modifying options for the overall treectrl widget. If no option is specified, the command returns a list describing all of the available debugging options (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command 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 command modifies the given debugging option(s) to have the given value(s); in this case the command returns an empty string.

The following debugging options are supported:

-displaydelay millis: Specifies a time duration in milliseconds, which should be waited after something has been drawn to the screen. Setting this option has only an effect, if the debugging options -enable and -display are switched on.
-data boolean: If this option is switched on (together with the debugging option -enable), at various places a consistence check on the internal data structure is made (e.g. for every item is checked, if the registered number of children is equal to the number of child items). If an inconsistency was found, a Tcl background error is raised.
-display boolean: If this option is switched on (together with the debugging option -enable), at varios places additional debugging output is printed to stdout.
-drawcolor color: When specified, areas of the window are painted with this color when drawing in those areas is about to occur. Setting this option has only an effect if the debugging options -enable and -display are switched on.
-enable boolean: All other debugging options only take effect, if this option is also switched on.
-erasecolor color: When specified, areas of the window which have been marked as "invalid" (for example, when part of the window is exposed) are painted with this color. If you use an unusual color for this option (like pink), superflous screen redraws can be spotted more easily. Setting this option has only an effect if the debugging options -enable and -display are switched on.

pathName debug dinfo

Returns a string describing item layout.

pathName debug expose x1 y1 x2 y2

Causes the area of the window bounded by the given window-coords to be marked as invalid. This simulates uncovering part of the window.

pathName debug scroll

Returns a string useful for debugging vertical scrolling.

pathName depth ?itemDesc?

If the additional argument itemDesc is given, then the result is a decimal string giving the depth of the item described by itemDesc. If no itemDesc is specified, then the maximum depth of all items in the treectrl widget is returned instead. Depth is defined as the number of ancestors an item has.

pathName dragimage option ?arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate the dragimage, one or more dotted lines around rectangular regions of the treectrl widget. The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the dragimage argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName dragimage add itemDesc ?column? ?element?

Adds the shapes of the item described by itemDesc to the shapes of the dragimage. Specifying additional arguments reduces the number of rectangles that are added to the dragimage. If no additional arguments is specified, for every element of the item in every column a dotted rectangles is added. If column is specified, all elements in other columns are ignored. If also element is specified, only a rectangle for this one element of the specified item in the given column is added.

pathName dragimage cget option

This command returns the current value of the dragimage option named option. Option may have any of the values accepted by the dragimage configure widget command.

pathName dragimage clear

Removes all shapes (if there are any) from the dragimage. This command does not modify the dragimage offset.

pathName dragimage configure ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?

This command is similar to the configure widget command except that it modifies the dragimage options instead of modifying options for the overall treectrl widget. If no option is specified, the command returns a list describing all of the available dragimage options (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command returns a list describing the one named dragimage 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 command modifies the given dragimage option(s) to have the given value(s); in this case the command returns an empty string.

The following dragimage options are supported:

-visible boolean: Specifies a boolean value which determines whether the dragimage should currently be visible.

pathName dragimage offset ?x y?

Returns a list containing the x and y offsets of the dragimage, if no additional arguments are specified. The dragimage offset is the screen distance, the image is displayed relative to the item its shape is derived from. If two coordinates are specified, sets the dragimage offset to the given coordinates x and y.

pathName element option ?element? ?arg arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate elements (see ELEMENTS below). The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the element argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName element cget element option: This command returns the current value of the option named option associated with the element given by element. Option may have any of the values accepted by the element configure widget command.
pathName element configure element ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?: This command is similar to the configure widget command except that it modifies options associated with the element given by element instead of modifying options for the overall treectrl widget. If no option is specified, the command returns a list describing all of the available options for element (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command 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 command modifies the given option(s) to have the given value(s) in element; in this case the command returns an empty string. See ELEMENTS below for details on the options available for elements.
pathName element create element type ?option value ...?: Create a new elememt in pathName of type type with name element. The exact format of the arguments after type depends on type, but generally consist of specifications for zero or more element options. See the subsections on individual element types below for more on the syntax of this command. This command returns the name for the new element.
pathName element delete ?element ...?: Deletes each of the named elements and returns an empty string. If an element is deleted while it is still configured as an element of one or more styles by means of the style elements widget command, it is also removed from the element lists of these styles.
pathName element names: Returns a list containing the names of all existing elements.
pathName element perstate element option stateList: This command returns the value of the per-state option named option for element for a certain state. StateList is a list of state names (static and dynamic, see STATES) which specifies the state to use.
pathName element type element: Returns the type of the element given by element, such as rect or text.

pathName expand ?-recurse? ?itemDesc ...?

Use item expand instead.

pathName identify x y

Returns a list describing what is displayed at the given window coordinates x and y. If the coordinates are outside the window, over the borders, or over any whitespace in the window, then the result is an empty string; otherwise the first word of the result is header or item.

If the coordinates are over a column header, then the first word of the result is header, followed by the unique id of the column (or the string tail). If the x coordinate is near the left or right end of a column, then a third word left or right is appended to the result.

If the coordinates are over an item, then the first word of the result is item followed by the unique id of that item. If the coordinates are not over the area for displaying buttons and lines, then column and a unique column id are the 3rd and 4th words of the result. If the coordinates are over an element within that column, then element and an element name are the 5th and 6th words of the result.

If the coordinates are over a button, then the first word of the result is item, followed by the unique id of that item, followed by the word button.

If the coordinates are over a line descending from an ancestor of an item (but not the parent of that item), then the first word of the result is item, followed by the unique id of that item, followed by the word line, followed by the unique id of the item the line is coming from. This is used to collapse the ancestor when the line is clicked on.

pathName index itemDesc

Deprecated. Use item id instead.

pathName item option ?arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate items. The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the item argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName item ancestors itemDesc

Returns a list containing the item ids of the ancestors of the item specified by itemDesc. The first list value is the parent, the second is the parent's parent, an so on. The last list value will be the root item if itemDesc is a descendant of the root item.

pathName item bbox itemDesc ?column? ?element?

Returns a list with four elements giving the bounding box of the item described by itemDesc. If no further argument is specified, the bbox spans the area of the item over all non-locked columns. If a column is specified, only the area of the item in this column is considered. If an additional element is specified, the area of this element in column of the specified item is returned.

pathName item cget itemDesc option

Returns the current value of the configuration option for the item specified by itemDesc whose name is option. Option may have any of the values accepted by the item configure command.

pathName item children itemDesc

Returns a list containing the item ids of all children of the item specified by itemDesc in the correct order from the first child to the last child.

pathName item collapse itemDesc ?-recurse?

Switches off the open state of the item(s) described by itemDesc. If an item has descendants, then they are no longer displayed. If an item is already closed, then this command has no effect on that item. If -recurse is specified, then all descendants of the items described by itemDesc will also be collapsed. For every item that actually will be collapsed, two events are generated: a <Collapse-before> event before the item state is changed, and a <Collapse-after> event after the item state was changed.

pathName item compare itemDesc1 op itemDesc2

From both items described by the itemDescs the index is retrieved (as returned from the item order widget command). Then these indexes are compared using the operator op, which must be either <, <=, ==, >=, >, or !=. The return value of this command is 1 if the comparison evaluated to true, 0 otherwise.

pathName item complex itemDesc ?list...?

This horrible command is now deprecated. Use item element configure instead. For every column of the treectrl there may be specified one list. Each list should look like this:

{ {element option value ...} {element option value ...} ...}

Every option must be known by the element's type (see ELEMENTS below). Each option will be set to value for the element in this one column in this item.

pathName item configure itemDesc ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?

If no option is specified, returns a list describing all of the available options for the item given by itemDesc (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command 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 command modifies the given item option(s) to have the given value(s); in this case the command returns an empty string. This is the only case where itemDesc may refer to multiple items.

The following options are supported by this command (see item create for the meaning of each option):

-button boolean|auto
-height height
-tags tagList
-visible boolean

pathName item count ?itemDesc?

If no additional arguments are given, the result is a decimal string giving the number of items created by the item create widget command which haven't been deleted by the item delete widget command, plus 1 for the ever-present root item. If the optional argument itemDesc is given, then the result is the number of items that match that item description.

pathName item create ?option value ...?

Creates some new items and optionally returns a list of unique identifiers for those items. The new items have the states open and enabled set by default. If the treectrl widget currently has the focus, the state focus is also set.

The following options are supported by this command:

-button boolean|auto

The value of this option must have one of the forms accepted by Tcl_GetBoolean or be the word auto (or any abbreviation of it). It indicates whether or not an expand/collapse button should be drawn next to the item, typically to indicate that the item has children. If the value of this option is auto, then a button is displayed next to the item whenever the item has any children whose item option -visible is true. The button will only be displayed if:

the column specified by the treectrl option -treecolumn is visible, and
the treectrl option -showbuttons is true, and
for the root item, the treectrl option -showrootbutton is true.

-count numItems

Specifies the number of items to create. Must be >= 0. Defaults to 1.

-height height

Specifies a fixed height in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. Must be >= 0. If height is zero then the item's height is unspecified. Defaults to 0.

-nextsibling itemDesc

Specifies the item before which the new items will be inserted. The new items will have the same parent as itemDesc.

-open boolean

Specifies whether the items should be open or closed. Default is true.

-parent itemDesc

Specifies the item which the new items will be the children of. The new items will be appended to the list of children of itemDesc.

-prevsibling itemDesc

Specifies the item after which the new items will be inserted. The new items will have the same parent as itemDesc.

-returnid boolean

Specifies whether or not to return a list of item identifiers for the newly created items. Specifying false is useful when creating a large number of items in the console or to improve performance. Default is true.

-tags tagList

TagList is a list of tag names to be added to the new items.

-visible boolean

Boolean must have one of the forms accepted by Tcl_GetBoolean. It indicates that the item should be displayed in the list. The item will only be displayed if: a) each ancestor is a descendant of the root item (not an orphan); and b) each ancestor's -visible option is true

pathName item delete first ?last?

Deletes the specified item(s). First and last must be valid item descriptions. If last isn't specified, then first may specify multiple items. If both first and last are specified, they must each decribe a single item with a common ancestor; then the range of items between first and last is deleted. The order of first and last doesn't matter.

Deleting an item deletes any child items of the deleted item recursively. If the current active item is deleted, the root item becomes the new active item. If the current selection anchor item is deleted, the root item becomes the new anchor item. There is no way to delete the root item of the treectrl widget; in all cases the specification of the root item is ignored.

For each call to this command, two events may be generated. If any of the deleted items are selected, then a <Selection> event is generated just before the items are deleted. If any items are going to be deleted, then an <ItemDelete> event event is generated just before the items are deleted.

pathName item descendants itemDesc

Returns a list containing the item ids of the descendants of the item specified by itemDesc, i.e. the children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren etc, of the item.

pathName item dump itemDesc

Returns a list with 4 words in the form index index indexVis indexVis.

pathName item element command itemDesc column element ?arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate elements of the item. The exact behavior of the command depends on the command argument that follows the element argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName item element actual itemDesc column element option

Deprecated. Use item element perstate instead.

pathName item element cget itemDesc column element option

This command returns the value of the option named option associated with element inside column of the item described by itemDesc, if it was already configured for the actual item. Option may have any of the values accepted by the type of the specified element (see ELEMENTS below)

pathName item element configure itemDesc column element ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?

This command modifies configuration options for an element in a column of an item. If no option is specified, the command returns a list describing all of the available options for the element (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command 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 command modifies the given option(s) to have the given value(s) in the element inside column of the item(s) described by itemDesc; in this case the command returns an empty string. This is the only case where itemDesc may refer to multiple items.

It is possible to configure multiple elements in multiple columns with a single call. To configure another element in the same column, append a '+' argument followed by the element name. To configure elements in another column, append a ',' argument followed by the column. For example:

.t item element configure $I \ $C1 $E1 -text "hello" + $E2 -text "world" , \ $C2 $E3 -fill Blue , \ $C3 $E1 -text "apples and oranges"

Each of the column description arguments to this command may refer to multiple columns if at least one option-value pair is given.

pathName item element perstate itemDesc column element option ?stateList?

This command returns the current value of the per-state option named option for element inside column of the item described by itemDesc. If stateList is specified, the list of state names (static and dynamic, see STATES) is used in place of the current state for item and column.

pathName item enabled itemDesc ?boolean?

Returns 1 if the item described by itemDesc has the state enabled switched on, 0 otherwise. If boolean is specified, then the enabled state of every item described by the item description itemDesc is set accordingly. All items are enabled when first created. Disabled items cannot be selected, and are ignored by the default key-navigation and mouse bindings.

pathName item expand itemDesc ?-recurse?

Switches on the open state of the item(s) described by itemDesc. If an item has descendants, then they are now displayed. If an item is already open, then this command has no effect on that item. If -recurse is specified, then all descendants of the items described by itemDesc will also be expanded. For every item that actually will be expanded, two events are generated: an <Expand-before> event before the item state is changed, and an <Expand-after> event after the item state was changed.

pathName item firstchild parent ?child?

If child is not specified, returns the item id of the first child of the item described by parent. If child is specified, it must described an item that is not an ancestor of parent. Then it will become the new first child of parent.

pathName item id itemDesc

This command resolves the item description itemDesc into a list of unique item identifiers. If itemDesc doesn't refer to any existing items, then this command returns an empty list.

pathName item image itemDesc ?column? ?image? ?column image ...?

This command sets or retrieves the value of the per-state -image option for the first image element in one or more columns. If no column is specified, this command returns a list of values, one per column. If no image is specified, this command returns the value for column.

If one or more column-image pairs is specified, then the value of the -image option in each column is set to image. In this case itemDesc may refer to multiple items and each column may refer to multiple columns.

Note that this command is provided as a convenience. Use the item element configure or item element cget commands if you want to set or retrieve the value of the -image option for a specific image element.

pathName item isancestor itemDesc descendant

Returns 1 if the item described by itemDesc is a direct or indirect parent of the item decribed by descendant, 0 otherwise.

pathName item isopen itemDesc

Returns 1 if the item described by itemDesc has the state open switched on, 0 otherwise.

pathName item lastchild parent ?child?

If child is not specified, returns the item id of the last child of the item described by parent. If child is specified, it must describe an item that is not an ancestor of parent. Then it will become the new last child of parent.

pathName item nextsibling sibling ?next?

If next is not specified, returns the item id of the next sibling of the item described by sibling. If next is specified, it must describe an item that is not an ancestor of sibling. Then it will become the new next sibling of sibling.

pathName item numchildren itemDesc

Returns the number of children of the item described by itemDesc.

pathName item order itemDesc ?-visible?

This command returns the position of the item itemDesc relative to its toplevel ancestor (usually the root item, unless the ancestor is an orphan). If you imagine all the items flattened into a vertical list, the result of this command is the row the item falls in. If the optional argument -visible is given, only the items whose ancestors are expanded, and whose -visible option is true, get counted; in this case -1 is returned if the item is not visible.

pathName item parent itemDesc

Returns the item id of the parent of the item described by itemDesc.

pathName item prevsibling sibling ?prev?

If prev is not specified, returns the item id of the previous sibling of the item described by sibling. If prev is specified, it must describe an item that is not an ancestor of sibling. Then it will become the new previous sibling of sibling.

pathName item range first last

Returns a list containing the item ids of all items in the range between first and last, inclusive. The order between first and last doesn't matter, and the result is always sorted by the increasing order of the items (as returned by the item order command). The items specified by first and last must share a common ancestor.

pathName item remove itemDesc

Removes the item described by itemDesc from the list of children of its parent, so that it will become an orphan.

pathName item rnc itemDesc

Returns a list of two integers, which corresponds to the row and column of the item described by itemDesc. The row and column corresponds to the on-screen arrangement of items as determined by the -orient and -wrap options. If the item is not displayed, this command returns an empty string.

pathName item sort itemDesc ?option ...?

Sorts the children of the item described by itemDesc, and redisplays the tree with the items in the new order.

The range of items which should be sorted can be restricted by means of the -first and/or -last options, which should be children of the item described by itemDesc; the order between these two limiting items doesn't matter.

The sort column can be specified by means of the -column option; this option can be used repeatedly to define a multicolumn sort. The sorting is done by looking at the text of the element specified by the -element option, which must be a text element defined in the style of the sorting column, by default the first text element is used.

If the -notreally option is specified, no rearranging of the items is done; instead the sorted items are returned as result of the command.

By default ASCII sorting is used with the result returned in increasing order. Any of the following options may be specified to control the sorting process of the previously specified column (unique abbreviations are accepted):

-ascii: Use string comparison with ASCII collation order. This is the default.
-command command: Use command as a comparison command. To compare two items, evaluate a Tcl script consisting of command with the numerical ids of the two items appended as additional arguments. The script should return an integer less than, equal to, or greater than zero if the first item is to be considered less than, equal to, or greater than the second, respectively.
-decreasing: Sort the items in decreasing order ("largest" items first).
-dictionary: Use dictionary-style comparison. This is the same as -ascii except (a) case is ignored except as a tie-breaker and (b) if two strings contain embedded numbers, the numbers compare as integers, not characters. For example, in -dictionary mode, bigBoy sorts between bigbang and bigboy, and x10y sorts between x9y and x11y.
-increasing: Sort the items in increasing order ("smallest" items first). This is the default.
-integer: Convert to integers and use integer comparison.
-real: Convert to floating-point values and use floating comparison.

pathName item span itemDesc ?column? ?numColumns? ?column numColumns ...?

This command sets or retrieves the number of columns that a style covers. If no column is specified, the return value is a list of spans, one per column. If no numColumns is specified, the return value is the span for column.

If one or more column-numColumns pairs is specified, the span for each column is set to numColumns. In this case itemDesc may refer to multiple items and each column may refer to multiple columns.

pathName item state command itemDesc ?arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate the states of an item. The exact behavior of the command depends on the command argument that follows the style argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName item state forcolumn itemDesc column ?stateDescList?: Just like item state set but manipulates dynamic states for a single item column, not the item as a whole. If stateDescList is unspecified, this command returns a list containing the names of all the dynamic states which are switched on in column.

If stateDescList is specified, then itemDesc may refer to multiple items and column may refer to multiple columns.
pathName item state get itemDesc ?stateName?: If no stateName is specified, returns a list containing the names of all (static and dynamic) states which are currently switched on for the item described by itemDesc. If a stateName is specified, 1 is returned if the specified state is currently switched on for the item, 0 otherwise.
pathName item state set itemDesc ?lastItem? stateDescList: Every element of stateDescList must be the name of a dynamic state (see STATES below), optionally preceded by a ~ or ! character. Every state with a leading ! will be switched off for the item described by itemDesc, every state with a leading ~ will be toggled, and every state without leading ! or ~ will be switched on. If lastItem is specified, the state changes will be made for all items in the range between itemDesc and lastItem. If lastItem unspecified, then the state changes are made for all items described by itemDesc.

pathName item style command itemDesc ?arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate the styles of an item. The exact behavior of the command depends on the command argument that follows the style argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName item style elements itemDesc column: This command returns a list containing the names of elements which were configured by the item element configure command for the item described by itemDesc in column. If there is no style assigned to column an error is returned.
pathName item style map itemDesc column style map: Like the item style set command, this command may be used to assign a style to a specific column of an item. Unlike item style set, this command can transfer configuration values of elements in the current style to elements in the new style specified by style. Map must be a list of elementOld-elementNew pairs, where elementOld is an element in the current style, and elementNew is an element in the style specified by style. Both elementOld and elementNew must be of the same type (bitmap, text etc). ItemDesc may refer to multiple items and column may refer to multiple columns.
pathName item style set itemDesc ?column? ?style? ?column style ...?: This command sets or retrieves the style assigned to one or more columns. If no column is specified, this command returns a list containing the names of the styles set for all columns of the item described by itemDesc. If no style is specified, this command returns the name of the style set for the item described by itemDesc in column.

If one or more column-style pairs is specified, then the style in each column is set to style. In this case itemDesc may refer to multiple items and each column may refer to multiple columns.

pathName item tag option ?arg arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate tags on items. The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the item tag argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName item tag add itemDesc tagList: Adds each tag in tagList to the items specified by the item description itemDesc. Duplicate tags are ignored. The list of tags for an item can also be changed via an item's -tags option.
pathName item tag expr itemDesc tagExpr: Evaluates the tag expression tagExpr against every item specified by the item description itemDesc. The result is 1 if the tag expression evaluates to true for every item, 0 otherwise.
pathName item tag names itemDesc: Returns a list of tag names assigned to the items specified by the item description itemDesc. The result is the union of any tags assigned to the items.
pathName item tag remove itemDesc tagList: Removes each tag in tagList from the items specified by the item description itemDesc. It is not an error if any of the items do not use any of the tags. The list of tags for an item can also be changed via an item's -tags option.

pathName item text itemDesc ?column? ?text? ?column text ...?

This command sets or retrieves the value of the -text option for the first text element in one or more columns. If no column is specified, this command returns a list of values, one per column. If no text is specified, this command returns the value for column.

If one or more column-text pairs is specified, then the value of the -text option in each column is set to text. In this case itemDesc may refer to multiple items and each column may refer to multiple columns.

Note that this command is provided as a convenience. Use the item element configure or item element cget commands if you want to set or retrieve the value of the -text option for a specific text element.

pathName item toggle itemDesc ?-recurse?

Changes the open state of the item(s) described by itemDesc. If the open state is currently switched off, then this command does the same as the item expand widget command; otherwise the same as the item collapse widget command. If -recurse is specified, then the open state of all descendants of the items described by itemDesc will also be toggled.

pathName marquee option ?arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate the marquee, a rectangular region of the treectrl widget optionally marked with a surrounding dotted line. One corner point of the marquee is fixed as long as the marquee is visible and called the anchor; the diagonally opposite corner is dragged with the mouse while resizing the marquee and simply called the corner. All coordinates handled by this widget command are treectrl coordinates, i.e. the canvasx or canvasy widget command should be used before any window coordinates can be used. The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the marquee argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName marquee anchor ?x y?

Returns a list containing the x and y coordinates of the anchor, if no additional arguments are specified. If two coordinates are specified, sets the anchor to the given coordinates x and y.

pathName marquee cget option

This command returns the current value of the marquee option named option. Option may have any of the values accepted by the marquee configure widget command.

pathName marquee configure ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?

This command is similar to the configure widget command except that it modifies the marquee options instead of modifying options for the overall treectrl widget. If no option is specified, the command returns a list describing all of the available marquee options (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command returns a list describing the one named marquee 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 command modifies the given marquee option(s) to have the given value(s); in this case the command returns an empty string.

The following marquee options are supported:

-visible boolean: Specifies a boolean value which determines whether the dotted line surrounding the region of the marquee should currently be visible.

pathName marquee coords ?x1 y1 x2 y2?

Returns a list containing the x and y coordinates of the anchor followed by the x and y coordinates of the corner, if no additional arguments are specified. If four coordinates are specified, sets the anchor to the given coordinates x1 and y1 and the corner to the coordinates x2 and y2.

pathName marquee corner ?x y?

Returns a list containing the x and y coordinates of the corner, if no additional arguments are specified. If two coordinates are specified, sets the corner to the given coordinates x and y.

pathName marquee identify

Returns a list with information about any items intersecting the marquee. The format of the returned list is:

{ {item {column element element ...} {column element element ...} ...} {item {column element element ...} {column element element ...} ...} ... }

There may be zero sublists following an item id if the marquee is in the button/line area of an item. There may be zero element names following a column id if the item-column has no style or if the marquee does not intersect any elements in that column.

pathName notify option ?arg ...?

Many Tk widgets communicate with the outside world via -command callbacks and/or virtual events. For example, the Text widget evaluates its -yscrollcommand when the view in the widget changes, and generates a <<Modified>> virtual event when text is inserted or deleted. A treectrl widget replaces both methods of communication with its own event mechanism accessed through the notify subcommands.

The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the notify argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName notify bind ?object? ?pattern? ?+??script?

This command associates Tcl scripts with events generated by a treectrl widget. If all three arguments are specified, notify bind will arrange for script (a Tcl script) to be evaluated whenever the event(s) specified by pattern are generated by this treectrl widget. If script is prefixed with a "+", then it is appended to any existing binding for pattern; otherwise script replaces any existing binding. If script is an empty string then the current binding for pattern is destroyed, leaving pattern unbound. In all of the cases where a script argument is provided, notify bind returns an empty string.

If pattern is specified without a script, then the script currently bound to pattern is returned, or an empty string is returned if there is no binding for pattern. If neither pattern nor script is specified, then the return value is a list whose elements are all the patterns for which there exist bindings for object.

The object argument determines which window(s) the binding applies to. If object begins with a dot, as in .a.b.c, then it must be the path name for a window; otherwise it may be an arbitrary string. Like the regular bind command, bindings on window names are automatically removed if that window is destroyed.

pathName notify configure object pattern ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?

This command sets and retrieves options for bindings created by the notify bind command.

If no option is specified, the command returns a list with option-value pairs describing all the available binding options for pattern on object. If option is specified with no value, then the command returns the current value of that option. If one or more option-value pairs are specified, then the command modifies the given option(s) to have the given value(s) for the binding; in this case the command returns an empty string.

The following binding options are supported:

-active boolean: Specifies if the binding should be active. As long as this option is specified as false, a binding script will not be evaluated when the corresponding event is generated.

pathName notify detailnames eventName

Returns a list containing the names of all details, which are installed for the event with the name eventName by means of the notify install widget command or by the treectrl widget itself.

pathName notify eventnames

Returns a list containing the names of all events, which are installed by means of the notify install widget command or by the treectrl widget itself.

pathName notify generate pattern ?charMap? ?percentsCommand?

This command causes the treectrl widget to generate an event. This command is typically used to generate dynamic events created by the notify install command, but may be used to generate static events also. The event specified by pattern is generated, and any active binding scripts on the event are evaluated after undergoing %-substitution. If there are details defined for the event, pattern must describe an <eventName-detail> pair, otherwise pattern should be <eventName>.

The optional charMap is a list of char-value pairs as in the form returned by array get. Each char has to be exactly one character. The charMap is used in %-substitution.

If percentsCommand is specified, then it will be used to perform %-substitution on any scripts bound to the event. If percentsCommand is not specified and the event is dynamic, then the %-subtitution command passed to notify install will be used if it was provided. If the event is static or no %-substitution command is available, then all %-substitution is done using charMap only . See notify install for a description of percentsCommand.

pathName notify install pattern ?percentsCommand?

This command installs a new event or detail specified by pattern. Events created by this command are called dynamic, whereas events created by the treectrl widget itself are called static. This command may be called to set or retrieve the percentsCommand for an existing dynamic event.

The optional percentsCommand is a list containing the name of a Tcl command, plus any optional arguments, to which five additional arguments will be appended. The command will be called to perform %-substitution on any scripts bound to the event specified by pattern (see EVENTS AND SCRIPT SUBSTITUTIONS). PercentsCommand should be defined as follows:

proc percentsCommand {?arg arg ...? char object event detail charMap} { switch -- $char { ... } return $value }

The optional arg arguments are part of the percentsCommand list. Char is the %-character to be substituted. Object is the same as the argument to notify bind. Event and detail specify the event. CharMap is the same as the argument to notify generate. PercentsCommand should return the value to replace the %-character by. If an error occurs evaluating percentsCommand, the %-character is replaced by itself.

notify install returns the current percentsCommand for the event, or an error if the event is not dynamic.

pathName notify install detail eventName detail ?percentsCommand?

Deprecated. Use notify install with a pattern of <eventName-detail> instead.

pathName notify install event eventName ?percentsCommand?

Deprecated. Use notify install with a pattern of <eventName> instead.

pathName notify linkage pattern

Returns a string indicating whether the specified event or detail is created by means of the notify install widget command (dynamic) or by the treectrl widget itself (static).

pathName notify linkage eventName ?detail?

Deprecated. Use notify linkage with a pattern of <eventName> or <eventName-detail> instead.

pathName notify unbind object ?pattern?

If no pattern is specified, all bindings on object are removed. If pattern is specified, then the current binding for pattern is destroyed, leaving pattern unbound.

pathName notify uninstall pattern

If the event or detail specified by pattern is static (i.e. created by the treectrl widget itself), an error is generated. Otherwise the dynamic event or detail is removed. If an event name is specified without a detail, all details for that event are also removed.

pathName notify uninstall detail eventName detail

Deprecated. Use notify uninstall with a pattern of <eventName-detail> instead.

pathName notify uninstall event eventName

Deprecated. Use notify uninstall with a pattern of <eventName> instead.

pathName numcolumns

Deprecated. Use the column count command instead.

pathName numitems

Deprecated. Use the item count command instead.

pathName orphans

Returns a list containing the item ids of all items which have no parent. When an item is created, it has no parent by default, and can later become an orphan by means of the item remove widget command. The root item is not returned.

pathName range first last

Deprecated. Use the item range command instead.

pathName scan option args

This command is used to implement scanning on treectrls. It has two forms, depending on option:

pathName scan mark x y: Records x and y and the treectrl's current view; used in conjunction with later scan dragto commands. Typically this command is associated with a mouse button press in the widget and x and y are the coordinates of the mouse. It returns an empty string.
pathName scan dragto x y ?gain?: This command computes the difference between its x and y arguments (which are typically mouse coordinates) and the x and y arguments to the last scan mark command for the widget. It then adjusts the view by gain times the difference in coordinates, where gain defaults to 10. This command is typically associated with mouse motion events in the widget, to produce the effect of dragging the treectrl at high speed through its window. The return value is an empty string.

pathName state option args

This command is used to manipulate the list of user-defined states, see section STATES below. The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the state argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName state define stateName: Defines a new state with the name stateName, which must not be the name of an existing state.
pathName state linkage stateName: Returns a string indicating whether the specified state is user-defined by means of the state define widget command (dynamic) or predefined by the treectrl widget itself (static).
pathName state names: Returns a list containing the names of all user-defined states.
pathName state undefine ?stateName ...?: Every stateName must be the name of a user-defined state. Removes this state from the list of user-defined states.

pathName see itemDesc

Adjust the view in the treectrl so that the item described by itemDesc is visible. If the item is already visible then the command has no effect; otherwise the treectrl scrolls to bring the item into view, and the corresponding <Scroll-x> and/or <Scroll-y> events are generated.

pathName selection option args

This command is used to adjust the selection within a treectrl. It has several forms, depending on option:

pathName selection add first ?last?

First and last (if specified) must be valid item descriptions. If both first and last are specified, then they may refer to a single item only; in this case the command adds every unselected item in the range between first and last, inclusive, to the selection without affecting the selected state of items outside that range. If only first is specified, then every unselected item specified by first is added to the selection. A <Selection> event is generated if any items were added to the selection.

pathName selection anchor ?itemDesc?

If itemDesc is specified, the selection anchor is set to the described item. The selection anchor is the end of the selection that is fixed while dragging out a selection with the mouse. The item description anchor may be used to refer to the anchor item. This command doesn't modify the selection state of any item. Returns the unique id of the selection anchor item.

pathName selection clear ?first? ?last?

First and last (if specified) must be valid item descriptions. If both first and last are specified, then they may refer to a single item only; in this case any selected items between first and last (inclusive) are removed from the selection without affecting the selected state of items outside that range. If only first is specified, then every selected item specified by first is removed from the selection. If neither first nor last are specified, then all selected items are removed from the selection. A <Selection> event is generated if any items were removed from the selection.

pathName selection count

Returns an integer indicating the number of items in the treectrl that are currently selected.

pathName selection get ?first? ?last?

When no additional arguments are given, the result is an unsorted list containing the item ids of all of the items in the treectrl that are currently selected. If there are no items selected in the treectrl, then an empty string is returned. The optional arguments first and last are treated as indices into the sorted list of selected items; these arguments allow in-place lindex and lrange operations on the selection. For example:

.t selection get 0 ; # return the first selected item .t selection get end ; # return the last selected item .t selection get 1 end-1 ; # return every selected item except the first and last

pathName selection includes itemDesc

Returns 1 if the item described by itemDesc is currently selected, 0 if it isn't.

pathName selection modify select deselect

Both arguments select and deselect are a possibly-empty list of item descriptions. Any unselected items in select are added to the selection, and any selected items in deselect are removed from the selection (except for those items which are also in select). A <Selection> event is generated if any items were selected or deselected.

pathName style option ?element? ?arg arg ...?

This command is used to manipulate styles, which can be thought of as a geometry manager for elements. The exact behavior of the command depends on the option argument that follows the style argument. The following forms of the command are supported:

pathName style cget style option

This command returns the current value of the option named option associated with the style given by style. Option may have any of the values accepted by the style configure widget command.

pathName style configure style ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?

This command is similar to the configure widget command except that it modifies options associated with the style given by style instead of modifying options for the overall treectrl widget. If no option is specified, the command returns a list describing all of the available options for style (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command 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 command modifies the given option(s) to have the given value(s) in style; in this case the command returns an empty string.

The options of a style have effect on all elements managed by the style. The following options are supported:

-orient varName: This option specifies which orientation should be used when laying out the elements associated with this style. Must be either horizontal (the default) or vertical or an abbreviation of one of these.

pathName style create style ?option value ...?

Create a new style in pathName with name style. After style there may be any number of option-value pairs, each of which sets one of the configuration options for the style. These same option-value pairs may be used in style configure widget commands to change the style's configuration. Returns the name of the new style.

pathName style delete ?style ...?

Deletes each of the named styles and returns an empty string. If a style is deleted while it is still used to display one or more items, it is also removed from the style list of these items.

pathName style elements style ?elementList?

Specifies the elements which should be layed out by this style. Each element of elementList must be the name of an element created by the widget command element create. Duplicate names in elementList are ignored. An element which was specified in a former call of this command for style but is not included in elementList, will be deleted from the elements layed out by style.

If the elementList argument is not specified, a list is returned containing the currently defined elements of style.

pathName style layout style element ?option? ?value? ?option value ...?

This command is similar to the configure widget command except that it modifies options used by style for laying out element instead of modifying options for the overall treectrl widget. If no option is specified, the command returns a list with option-value pairs describing all of the available options for the layout. If option is specified with no value, then the command returns the value of the named option. If one or more option-value pairs are specified, then the command modifies the given option(s) to have the given value(s) for the layout; in this case the command returns an empty string.

The options of a layout have effect on exactly the one element element managed by style. The following options are supported:

-detach boolean: Specifies whether the element should be positioned by itself, i.e. independent from the other elements.
-expand flags: This option allows the external padding around the element to increase when a style has more screen space than it needs. Flags is a string that contains zero or more of the characters n, s, w or e. Each letter refers to the padding on the top, bottom, left, or right that should be allowed to increase. This option is typically used to justify an element.
-iexpand flags: This option allows the internal padding of the element and the display area of the element to increase when a style has more screen space than it needs. Flags is a string that contains zero or more of the characters x, y, n, s, w or e. For n, s, w and e, each letter refers to the padding on the top, bottom, left, or right that should be allowed to increase. For x and y, each letter refers to the horizontal and vertical screen space the element can display itself in (i.e., the space between the padding). Note that if the -union option is specified for this element, then the x and y flags have no effect, since the size of an element with -union layout is determined by the elements it surrounds.
-indent boolean: Specifies whether the element should be positioned to the right of the button/line area in the tree column. This option is ignored unless the -detach option is true.
-ipadx amount
-ipady amount: Amount specifies how much internal padding to leave on the left and right (for -ipadx) or top and bottom (for -ipady) side of the element. Amount may be a list of two values to specify padding for the two sides separately, it defaults to 0.
-minheight pixels
-height pixels
-maxheight pixels: Specifies the minimum, fixed, and maximum height of the element.
-minwidth pixels
-width pixels
-maxwidth pixels: Specifies the minimum, fixed, and maximum width of the element.
-padx amount
-pady amount: Amount specifies how much external padding to leave on the left and right (for -padx) or top and bottom (for -pady) side of the element. Amount may be a list of two values to specify padding for the two sides separately, it defaults to 0.
-squeeze flags: This option allows the display area of an element to decrease when a style has less space than it needs. Flags is a string that contains zero or more of the characters x or y. x allows display area to decrease horizontally, y allows display area to decrease vertically. This option is typically used for text elements and will cause the text element to display an ellipsis (...) and/or wrap lines.
-sticky flags: This option controls how the actual display information (image, text, etc) of an element is positioned (or stretched) within its display area. Flags is a string that contains zero or more of the characters n, s, w or e. Each letter refers to the top, bottom, left or right side of the display area that the display information should "stick" to.
-union elementList: Specifies a list of other elements which this element will surround. The size of an element with -union layout is determined by the size and position of the elements in elementList. The -ipadx and -ipady options in this case refer to the distance of the edges of the display area of this element from those elements it surrounds. This option is typically used to display a selection rectangle around a piece of text.

pathName style names

Returns a list containing the names of all existing styles.

pathName toggle ?-recurse? ?itemDesc ...?

Use item toggle instead.

pathName xview ?args?

This command is used to query and change the horizontal position of the information displayed in the treectrl's window. It can take any of the following forms:

pathName xview: Returns a list containing two elements. Each element is a real fraction between 0 and 1; together they describe the horizontal span that is visible in the window. For example, if the first element is .2 and the second element is .6, 20% of the tree's area is off-screen to the left, the middle 40% is visible in the window, and 40% of the tree is off-screen to the right. These are the same values passed to scrollbars via the -xscrollcommand option.
pathName xview moveto fraction: Adjusts the view in the window so that fraction of the total width of the tree is off-screen to the left. Fraction must be a fraction between 0 and 1. A <Scroll-x> event is generated.
pathName xview scroll number what: This command shifts the view in the window left or right according to number and what. Number must be an integer. What must be either units or pages or an abbreviation of one of these. If what is units, the view adjusts left or right in units determined by the -xscrollincrement option (which may be zero, see the description of that option). If what is pages then the view adjusts in units of nine-tenths the window's width. If number is negative then information farther to the left becomes visible; if it is positive then information farther to the right becomes visible. A <Scroll-x> event is generated.

pathName yview ?args?

This command is used to query and change the vertical position of the information displayed in the treectrl's window. It can take any of the following forms:

pathName yview: Returns a list containing two elements. Each element is a real fraction between 0 and 1; together they describe the vertical span that is visible in the window. For example, if the first element is .6 and the second element is 1.0, the lowest 40% of the tree's area is visible in the window. These are the same values passed to scrollbars via the -yscrollcommand option.
pathName yview moveto fraction: Adjusts the view in the window so that fraction of the tree's area is off-screen to the top. Fraction is a fraction between 0 and 1. A <Scroll-y> event is generated.
pathName yview scroll number what: This command adjusts the view in the window up or down according to number and what. Number must be an integer. What must be either units or pages. If what is units, the view adjusts up or down in units of the -yscrollincrement option (which may be zero, see the description of that option). If what is pages then the view adjusts in units of nine-tenths the window's height. If number is negative then higher information becomes visible; if it is positive then lower information becomes visible. A <Scroll-y> event is generated.

COLUMNS

A treectrl widget is capable of displaying multiple columns next to each other. An item can be considered as a row, which reaches over all columns.

Columns in a treectrl may be specified in a number of ways. See COLUMN DESCRIPTION below.

There is always one special column, the tail column, which fills all space to the right of the last ordinary column. This column has no number; it can only be specified by the keyword tail.

When a column configuration option is specified as per-state, the state names are normal, active, pressed or up, i.e. do not use item state names.

The following options are supported for columns:

-arrow direction: Indicates whether or not an arrow should be drawn in the column header. Direction must have one of the values none (the default), up, or down.
-arrowbitmap bitmap: Specifies as a per-state option the bitmap to use to draw the arrow if this column's -arrow option is not none.
-arrowimage image: Specifies as a per-state option the image to use to draw the arrow if this column's -arrow option is not none. If an image is specified for a certain state, it overrides the -arrowbitmap option.
-arrowside side: Indicates on which side of the bitmap/image/text the arrow should be drawn. Side must be either left or right (the default).
-arrowgravity side: Indicates onto which side an arrow should be packed, if there is more space available for drawing the arrow then needed. Side must be either left (the default) or right.
-arrowpadx amount: Amount specifies how much padding to leave on the left and right of the arrow. Amount may be a list of two values to specify padding for left and right separately; it defaults to 6.
-arrowpady amount: Amount specifies how much padding to leave on the top and bottom of the arrow. Amount may be a list of two values to specify padding for top and bottom separately; it defaults to 0.
-bitmap bitmap: Specifies the bitmap to display in the element to the left of the column title.
-background color: Specifies as a per-state option the color to use for the background of the column header.
-borderwidth size: Specifies a non-negative value indicating the width of the 3-D border to draw around the outside of the column header (if such a border is being drawn; the -relief column option determines this). The value may have any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels.
-button boolean: Indicates whether or not the column header should be treated like a pushbutton. When this option is true, the default bindings track <Button-1> events in the header and generate a <Header-invoke> event when a <ButtonRelease-1> event occurs in the header. See DYNAMIC EVENTS.
-expand boolean: Indicates whether or not any extra horizontal space should be distributed to this column. This option has no effect if the -width option is set.
-font fontName: Specifies the font to use for the column title inside the column header.
-image image: Specifies the image to display in the element to the left of the column title. This option overrides the -bitmap column option.
-imagepadx amount: Amount specifies how much padding to leave on the left and right of the image (or bitmap). Amount may be a list of two values to specify padding for left and right separately; it defaults to 6.
-imagepady amount: Amount specifies how much padding to leave on the top and bottom of the image (or bitmap). Amount may be a list of two values to specify padding for top and bottom separately; it defaults to 0.
-itembackground colorList: Specifies a list of zero or more colors, which are used as alternating background colors for items in this column. See also the -backgroundmode widget option for more on this.
-itemstyle style: Style is the name of a style that should be set in this column for newly-created items.
-justify justification: This option determines how the items (and the title) line up with each other. Must be one of left (the default), center, or right.
-lock lock: This option allows a column to stick to the left or right edge of the window. A locked column scrolls vertically but not horizontally. Must be one of none (the default), left, or right.
-maxwidth size: Specifies the maximum size, in screen units, that will be permitted for this column. If size is an empty string, then there is no limit on the maximum size of the column. This option has no effect if the -width option is set.
-minwidth size: Specifies the minimum size, in screen units, that will be permitted for this column. If size is an empty string, then the minimum size of the column is zero. This option has no effect if the -width option is set.
-resize boolean: Specifies a boolean value that indicates whether the user should be allowed to resize the column by dragging the edge of the column's header. Default is true.
-squeeze boolean: Specifies a boolean value that indicates whether or not the column should shrink when the content width of the treectrl is less than the total needed width of all visible columns. Defaults to false, which means the column will not get smaller than its needed width. The column will not get smaller than the value of its -minwidth option, if specified. This option has no effect if the -width option is set.
-state state: Specifies one of three states for the column header: normal, active, or pressed. The active state is used when the mouse is over the header. The pressed state is used when the mouse button is pressed in the header.
-stepwidth size: Deprecated. Use the treectrl's -itemwidthmultiple option instead.
-tags tagList: TagList is a list of tag names that can be used to identify the column. See also the column tag command.
-text text: Specifies a text string to be displayed as the column title.
-textcolor color: Specifies a color, which should be used as foreground color to display the column title.
-textlines count: Specifies the maximum number of lines of text to display in the column title. If this value is zero, the number of lines displayed is determined by any newline characters and the effects of wrapping when the column width is less than needed. The default is 1. Note: Under OSX/Aqua this value is always set to 1 when the treectrl's -usetheme option is true, because the Appearance Manager uses a fixed height for the column header; there is only room for a single line of text.
-textpadx amount: Amount specifies how much padding to leave on the left and right of the text. Amount may be a list of two values to specify padding for left and right separately; it defaults to 6.
-textpady amount: Amount specifies how much padding to leave on the top and bottom of the text. Amount may be a list of two values to specify padding for top and bottom separately; it defaults to 0.
-uniform group: When a non-empty value is supplied, this option places the column in a uniform group with other columns that have the same value for -uniform. The space for columns belonging to a uniform group is allocated so that their sizes are always in strict proportion to their -weight values. This option is based on the grid geometry manager.
-visible boolean: Indicates whether or not the column should be displayed.
-weight integer: Sets the relative weight for apportioning any extra space among columns. A weight of zero (0) indicates the column will not deviate from its requested size. A column whose weight is two will grow at twice the rate as a column of weight one when extra space is allocated to columns. This option is based on the grid geometry manager.
-width size: Specifies a fixed width for the column. If this value is an empty string, then the column width is calculated as the maximum of: a) the width requested by items; b) the width requested by the column's header; and c) the column's -minwidth option. This calculated width is also affected by the -expand, -squeeze, -uniform and -weight options. In any case, the calculated width will not be greater than the -maxwidth option, if specified.
-widthhack boolean: Deprecated. Use the treectrl's -itemwidthequal option instead.

COLUMN DESCRIPTION

Many of the commands and options for a treectrl take as an argument a description of which column to operate on. See the EXAMPLES section for examples. The initial part of a column description must begin with one of the following terms:

id: Specifies the unique column identifier, where id should be the return value of a prior call of the column create widget command. See also the -columnprefix option.
QUALIFIERS: Specifies a list of qualifiers. This gives the same result as all followed by QUALIFIERS; i.e., every column is tested for a match.
tagExpr QUALIFIERS: TagExpr is a tag expression (see ITEM AND COLUMN TAGS) against which every column's tags are tested for a match. This keyword cannot be followed by any modifiers unless a single column is matched. You may run into trouble if tagExpr looks like a column id or other keyword; also, tagExpr must look like a single list element since column descriptions are properly-formed lists. To be safe you may want to use the tag qualifier followed by tagExpr.
all QUALIFIERS: Indicates every column, including the tail column if the command allows it, which match QUALIFIERS.
first QUALIFIERS: Indicates the leftmost column of the treectrl which matches QUALIFIERS.
end QUALIFIERS
last QUALIFIERS: Indicates the rightmost column of the treectrl (but not the tail column) which matches QUALIFIERS.
list columnDescs: ColumnDescs is a list (a single argument, i.e. "list {a b c}" not "list a b c") of other column descriptions. This keyword cannot be followed by any modifiers unless a single column is matched.
order n QUALIFIERS: Indicates the nth column in the list of columns as returned by the column order command.
range first last QUALIFIERS: First and last specify a range of columns. This keyword cannot be followed by any modifiers unless a single column is specified.
tail: Indicates the ever-present tail column of the treectrl.
tree: Indicates the column specified by the -treecolumn option of the treectrl.

The initial part of the column description (matching any of the values above) may be followed by one or more modifiers. A modifier changes the column used relative to the description up to this point. It may be specified in any of the following forms:

next QUALIFIERS: Use the column to the right matching QUALIFIERS.
prev QUALIFIERS: Use the column to the left matching QUALIFIERS.

The word QUALIFIERS above represents a sequence of zero or more of the following terms that changes which column is chosen:

state stateList: StateList is a list of column state names. Only columns that have the given states set (or unset if the '!' prefix is used) are considered.
tag tagExpr: TagExpr is a tag expression (see ITEM AND COLUMN TAGS) against which a column's tags are tested for a match.
!tail: When this qualifier is given, the tail column is not matched.
visible: When this qualifier is given, only columns whose -visible option is TRUE are considered.
!visible: When this qualifier is given, only columns whose -visible option is FALSE are considered.

STATES

For every item a set of boolean states is managed. These states play an integral role in the appearance of each item. The following states are predefined for every item:

active: At all times this state is set for exactly one item. The active item is used with keyboard navigation. When the treectrl widget is created or when the active item is deleted, the root item will become the active item. This state can be modified by means of the widget command activate.
enabled: This state is set for every item when it is created. Disabled items cannot be selected and are ignored by the default bindings when navigating via the keyboard. This state can be modified by means of the widget command item enabled.
focus: This state is set for every item, if the treectrl widget currently has the focus. It cannot be modified by means of a widget command, but is maintained in reaction to the <FocusIn> and <FocusOut> events.
open: If this state is switched on, the descendants of the item are displayed - the item is expanded. If this state is switched off, the descendants of the item are not displayed - the item is collapsed. For a new item this state is switched on by default. This state can be modified by means of the widget commands item expand, item collapse, or item toggle.
selected: This state is set for every item included in the selection. It can be modified by means of the widget command selection.

By means of the state define widget command up to 27 additional states can be defined.

PER-STATE OPTIONS

The visual appearance of an item can change depending on the state the item is in, such as being the active item, being included in the selection, being collapsed, or some combination of those or other states. When a configuration option is described as per-state, it means the option describes a value which varies depending on the state of the item. If a per-state option is specified as a single value, the value is used for all states. Otherwise the per-state option must be specified as an even-numbered list. For example, to use the font "Times 12 bold" in a text element regardless of the item state you can write:

$T element configure MyTextElement -font {{Times 12 bold}}

However, to use a different font when the item is selected you could write:

$T element configure MyTextElement -font {{Courier 10} selected {Times 12 bold} {}}

In the example above, the -font option reads "value stateList value stateList". If stateList is an empty list, the preceding value is used regardless of the item state. A non-empty stateList specifies a list of states which must be set for the item in order to use the preceding value. Each stateList can also include state names preceded by a ! sign, indicating the state must *not* be set for the item. For example:

$T element configure MyRectElement -fill {blue {selected focus} gray {selected !focus}}

In the example above, the rect element is filled with blue when the treectrl has the focus and the item is selected. If the treectrl does not have the focus, the example specifies that gray should be used for selected items. Also note that if the item is not selected, no color is specified for the -fill option.

ELEMENTS

Elements are the smallest building blocks which are handled by a treectrl widget. One or more elements together can be combined to a style, which can be considered as a blueprint for an item. An element can be of type bitmap, border, image, rect, text or window. For each element type there is a section below describing the options which can modify an element of that type.

All of the element configuration options described below are unspecified by default, meaning that no value whatsoever has been given to the option. It may seem strange to you that a boolean option would be unspecified instead of simply "true" or "false". The reason for this is that when an element displayed by an item has no value specified for an option, the element refers to the master element created by the element create command for a value for that option. This allows items which are displaying a certain element to be redisplayed when the master element's options change. The item element configure command can be used to override the master element's configuration options for a specific item.

BITMAP ELEMENT

An element of type bitmap can be used to display a bitmap in an item. The following options are supported for bitmap elements:

-background color: Specifies as a per-state option the color to use for each of the bitmap's '0' valued pixels. If the value for a certain state is an empty string (the default), the bitmap is drawn transparent.
-bitmap bitmap: Specifies as a per-state option the bitmap to display in the element.
-draw boolean: Specifies as a per-state option whether to draw the element. If the value for a certain state is an empty string (the default), it is treated as true and the element will be drawn.
-foreground color: Specifies as a per-state option the color to use for each of the bitmap's '1' valued pixels. If the value for a certain state is an empty string (the default), the bitmap's foreground color is black.

BORDER ELEMENT

An element of type border can be used to display a 3D border in an item. The following options are supported for border elements:

-background color: Specifies as a per-state option the color to use for the background of the border. If the value for a certain state is an empty string (the default), the element will not be drawn.
-draw boolean: Specifies as a per-state option whether to draw the element. If the value for a certain state is an empty string (the default), it is treated as true and the element will be drawn.
-filled boolean: Specifies whether the interior of the border should be filled with the background color. If this option is unspecified (the default), it it treated as false which means that only the edges of the border will be drawn.
-height size: Specifies the height of the border. If this value is unspecified (the default), the border will be exactly as tall as its display area as determined by the style layout options.
-relief relief: Specifies as a per-state option the relief of the border. If the value for a certain state is an empty string (the default), it is treated as flat. For acceptable values see the description of the -relief option in the options manual page.
-thickness thickness: Specifies the thickness of the edges of the border.
-width size: Specifies the width of the border. If this value is unspecified (the default), the border will be exactly as wide as its display area as determined by the style layout options.

IMAGE ELEMENT

An element of type image can be used to display an image in an item. The following options are supported for image elements:

-draw boolean: Specifies as a per-state option whether to draw the element. If the value for a certain state is an empty string (the default), it is treated as true and the element will be drawn.
-height size: Specifies the requested height of the display area for this element. If unspecified (the default), the element requests a height equal to the height of the image, or zero if there is no image.
-image image: Specifies as a per-state option the image to display in the element.
-width size: Specifies the requested width of the display area for this element. If unspecified (the default), the element requests a width equal to the width of the image, or zero if there is no image.

RECTANGLE ELEMENT

An element of type rect can be used to display a rectangle in an item. The following options are supported for rectangle elements:

-draw boolean: Specifies as a per-state option whether to draw the element. If the value for a certain state is an empty string (the default), it is treated as true and the element will be drawn.
-fill color: Specifies as a per-state option the color to be used to fill the rectangle's area. If the color for a certain state is an empty string (the default), then the rectangle will not be filled (but the outline may still be drawn).
-height size: Specifies the height of the rectangle. If this value is unspecified (the default), the rectangle will be exactly as tall as its display area as determined by the style layout options.
-open open: This option may be used to get an incomplete drawing of the outline. Open is a string that contains zero or more of the characters n, s, e or w. Each letter refers to a side (north, south, east, or west) that the outline will not be drawn. The default is the empty string, which causes the outline to be drawn completely.
-outline color: Specifies as a per-state option the color to be used to draw the outline of the rectangle. If the color for a certain state is an empty string (the default), then no outline is drawn for the rectangle.
-outlinewidth outlineWidth: Specifies the width of the outline to be drawn around the rectangle's region. outlineWidth may be in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. If this option is specified as an empty string (the default), then no outline is drawn.
-showfocus boolean: Specifies a boolean value indicating whether a "focus ring" should be drawn around the rectangle, if the item containing the rectangle is the active item and the treectrl widget currently has the focus. If this option is specified as an empty string (the default), then a focus rectangle is not drawn.
-width size: Specifies the width of the rectangle. If this value is unspecified (the default), the rectangle will be exactly as wide as its display area as determined by the style layout options.

TEXT ELEMENT

An element of type text can be used to display a text in an item. The following options are supported for text elements:

-draw boolean: Specifies as a per-state option whether to draw the element. If the value for a certain state is an empty string (the default), it is treated as true and the element will be drawn.
-data data: Specifies a value that together with the -datatype and -format options will be displayed as text.
-datatype dataType: Specifies the type of information in the -data option. Acceptable values are double, integer, long, string, or time.
-fill color: Specifies as a per-state option the foreground color to use when displaying the text. If the color for a certain state is an empty string (the default), then the text will be displayed using the color specified by the treectrl's -foreground option.
-format formatString: This option specifies the format string used to display the value of the -data option. If -datatype is time, formatString should be a valid format string for the Tcl clock command. For all other -datatype values formatString should be a valid format string for the Tcl format command. If this value is unspecified the following defaults are used: for -datatype double "%g", for -datatype integer "%d", for -datatype long "%ld", for -datatype string "%s", and for -datatype time the default format string of the Tcl clock command.
-font font: Specifies as a per-state option the font to use when displaying the text. If the font for a certain state is an empty string, the text is displayed using the font specified by the treectrl's -font option.
-justify how: Specifies how to justify the text when multiple lines are displayed. How must be one of the values left, right, or center. If this option is specified as an empty string (the default), left is used.
-lines lineCount: Specifies the maximum number of lines to display. If more than lineCount lines would be displayed, the last line will be truncated with an ellipsis at the right. If this option is specified as zero or an empty string (the default), there is no limit to the number of lines displayed.
-text string: String specifies a string to be displayed by the element. String may contain newline characters in which case multiple lines of text will be displayed. If this option is specified, the -data, -datatype, -format, and -textvariable options are ignored.
-textvariable varName: Specifies the name of a variable. The value of the variable is a string to be displayed by the element; if the variable value changes then the element will automatically update itself to display the new value. If this option is specified, the -data, -datatype, and -format options are ignored.
-underline charIndex: Specifies the integer index of a character to underline. 0 corresponds to the first character. If charIndex is unspecified (the default), less than zero or greater than the index of the last displayed character, the underline is not drawn.
-width size: Specifies the maximum line length in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. For text to wrap lines the value of the -width option must be less than the needed width of the text, or the display area for this element must be less than the needed width of the text. For the display area to be less than the needed width of the text, one of the style layout options -maxwidth, -width or -squeeze must be used.
-wrap mode: Mode specifies how to handle lines in the text that are longer than the maximum line length. Acceptable values are none, char or word. If this option is unspecified (the default), word is used. See the -width option for a description of how the maximum line length is determined.

WINDOW ELEMENT

An element of type window can be used to display a Tk window in an item. The following options are supported for window elements:

-clip boolean: Specifies whether the associated Tk window is a borderless frame which should be used to clip its child window so it doesn't overlap the header, borders, or other items or columns. When this option is true, the treectrl manages the geometry of both the -window widget and its first child widget; in this case the -window widget (which should be a borderless frame) is kept sized and positioned so that it is never out-of-bounds.
-destroy boolean: Specifies whether the associated Tk window should be destroyed when the element is deleted. The element is deleted when the item containing the element is deleted, when the column containing the element is deleted, or when the style assigned to the item's column is changed. If this option is unspecified (the default), it is treated as false and the Tk window will not be destroyed.
-draw boolean: Specifies as a per-state option whether to draw the element. If the value for a certain state is an empty string (the default), it is treated as true and the element will be drawn.
-window pathName: Specifies the window to associate with this element. The window specified by pathName must either be a child of the treectrl widget or a child of some ancestor of the treectrl widget. PathName may not refer to a top-level window. This option cannot be specified by the element create or element configure commands, only by the item element configure command; i.e., the element must be associated with a particular item.

ITEM DESCRIPTION

Many of the commands for a treectrl take as an argument a description of which items to operate on. An item description is a properly-formed tcl list of keywords and arguments. The first word of an item description must be one of the following:

id: Specifies the unique item identifier, where id should be the return value of a prior call of the item create widget command, or 0 to specify the ever-present root item. See also the -itemprefix option.
QUALIFIERS: Specifies a list of qualifiers. This gives the same result as all followed by QUALIFIERS; i.e., every item is tested for a match.
tagExpr QUALIFIERS: TagExpr is a tag expression (see ITEM AND COLUMN TAGS) against which every item's tags are tested for a match. This keyword cannot be followed by any modifiers unless a single item is matched. You may run into trouble if tagExpr looks like an item id or other keyword; also, tagExpr must look like a single list element since item descriptions are properly-formed lists. To be safe you may want to use the tag qualifier followed by tagExpr.
active: Indicates the item that is currently active, i.e. normally the item specified as argument of the last successful activate widget command, or the root item if no such call happened yet.
anchor: Indicates the anchor item of the selection, i.e. normally the item specified as argument of the last successful selection anchor widget command, or the root item if no such call happened yet.
all QUALIFIERS: Indicates every item including orphans which match QUALIFIERS. This keyword cannot be followed by any modifiers unless a single item is matched.
first QUALIFIERS: Indicates the first item of the treectrl (the root item), or the first item matching QUALIFIERS.
end QUALIFIERS
last QUALIFIERS: Indicates the last item which matches QUALIFIERS.
list itemDescs: ItemDescs is a list (a single argument, i.e. "list {a b c}" not "list a b c") of other item descriptions. This keyword cannot be followed by any modifiers unless a single item is matched.
nearest x y: Indicates the item nearest to the point given by x and y.
rnc row column: Indicates the item in the given row and column. The row and column corresponds to the on-screen arrangement of items as determined by the -orient and -wrap options. You can memorize rnc as an abbreviation of "row 'n' column".
range first last QUALIFIERS: First and last specify a range of items. This keyword cannot be followed by any modifiers unless a single item is matched.
root: Indicates the root item of the treectrl.

The initial part of the item description (matching any of the values above) may be followed by one or more modifiers. A modifier changes the item used relative to the description up to this point. It may be specified in any of the following forms:

above: Use the item one row above in this column.
ancestors QUALIFIERS: Use the ancestors of the item (like item ancestors but QUALIFIERS may change which ancestors match). This keyword cannot be followed by any modifiers.
below: Use the item one row below in this column.
bottom: Use the item in the last row of this column.
child n QUALIFIERS: Use the nth child of the item.
children QUALIFIERS: Use the children of the item (like item children but QUALIFIERS may change which children match). This keyword cannot be followed by any modifiers.
descendants QUALIFIERS: Use the descendants of the item (like item descendants but QUALIFIERS may change which descendants match). This keyword cannot be followed by any modifiers.
firstchild QUALIFIERS: Use the first child of the item.
lastchild QUALIFIERS: Use the last child of the item.
left: Use the item one column to the left in the same row.
leftmost: Use the item of the first column in the same row.
next QUALIFIERS: Use the next item, which is the first item from the following list: the first child, the next sibling or the next sibling of the nearest ancestor which has one.
nextsibling QUALIFIERS: Use the next sibling of the item.
parent: Use the parent of the item.
prev QUALIFIERS: Use the last child of the previous sibling, or the parent if there is no previous sibling.
prevsibling QUALIFIERS: Use the previous sibling of the item.
right: Use the item one column to the right in the same row.
rightmost: Use the item of the last column in the same row.
sibling n QUALIFIERS: Use the nth child of the item's parent.
top: Use the item in the first row of this column.

The word QUALIFIERS above represents a series of zero or more of the following terms that changes which item is chosen:

depth depth: Matches items whose depth (as returned by the depth command) is equal to depth.
state stateList: StateList is a list of item state names (static and dynamic, see STATES). Only items that have the given states set (or unset if the '!' prefix is used) are considered.
tag tagExpr: TagExpr is a tag expression (see ITEM AND COLUMN TAGS) against which an item's tags are tested for a match.
visible: When this qualifier is given, only items that are displayed are considered.
!visible: When this qualifier is given, only items that are *not* displayed are considered.

To get the first item in the list that is enabled:

$T item id "first state enabled"

To get the ancestors that are not open of the last item in the list:

$T item id "last ancestors state !open"

To get the visible descendants of the root item:

$T item id "root descendants visible"

To get the every hidden item with tag "a" or "b":

$T item id "all !visible tag a||b" $T item id "!visible tag a||b" $T item id "tag a||b !visible" $T item id "a||b !visible"

EVENTS AND SCRIPT SUBSTITUTIONS

The script argument to notify bind is a Tcl script, which will be evaluated whenever the given event is generated. Script will be executed in the same interpreter that the notify bind command was executed in, and it will run at global level (only global variables will be accessible). If script contains any % characters, then the script will not be evaluated directly. Instead, a new script will be generated by replacing each %, and the character following it, with information from the current event. Unlike the regular Tk bind mechanism, each event generated by a treectrl widget has its own set of %-substitutions.

The following %-substitutions are valid for all static events:

%%: Replaced with a single %
%d: The detail name
%e: The event name
%P: The pattern, either <event> or <event-detail>
%W: The object argument to the notify bind command
%T: The treectrl widget which generated the event
%?: A list of the format {char value char value ...} for each %-substitution character and the value it is replaced by

The following events may be generated by a treectrl widget:

<ActiveItem>

Generated whenever the active item changes.

%c: The current active item
%p: The previous active item

<Collapse-before>

Generated before an item is collapsed.

%I: The item id

<Collapse-after>

Generated after an item is collapsed.

%I: The item id

<Expand-before>

Generated before an item is expanded. This event is useful if you want to add child items to the item just before the item is expanded.

%I: The item id

<Expand-after>

Generated after an item is expanded.

%I: The item id

<ItemDelete>

Generated when items are about to be deleted by the item delete command.

%i: List of items ids being deleted.

<ItemVisibility>

Generated when items become visible on screen and when items are no longer visible on screen. This event is useful if you have a very large number of items and want to assign styles only when items are actually going to be displayed.

%h: List of items ids which are no longer visible.
%v: List of items ids which are now visible.

<Scroll-x>

Generated whenever the view in the treectrl changes in such a way that a horizontal scrollbar should be redisplayed.

%l: Same as the first fraction appended to -xscrollcommand. Think lower.
%u: Same as the second fraction appended to -xscrollcommand. Think upper.

<Scroll-y>

Generated whenever the view in the treectrl changes in such a way that a vertical scrollbar should be redisplayed.

%l: Same as the first fraction appended to -yscrollcommand. Think lower.
%u: Same as the second fraction appended to -yscrollcommand. Think upper.

<Selection>

Generated whenever the selection changes. This event gives information about how the selection changed.

%c: Same as the selection count widget command
%D: List of newly-deselected item ids
%S: List of newly-selected item ids

DYNAMIC EVENTS

In addition to the pre-defined static events such as <ActiveItem> and <Selection>, new dynamic events can be created by using the notify install command.

The following events may be generated by the library scripts:

<ColumnDrag-begin>

<ColumnDrag-receive>

<ColumnDrag-end>

Generated whenever the user drag-and-drops a column header. The library scripts do not actually move a dragged column. You must bind to the receive event to move the column. See EXAMPLES.

%C: The column that was dragged
%b: The column to move the dragged column before

<Drag-begin>

<Drag-receive>

<Drag-end>

Generated whenever the user drag-and-drops a file into a directory. This event is generated by the filelist-bindings.tcl library code, which is not used by default. See the "Explorer" demos.

%I: The item that the user dropped the dragged items on.
%l: (lowercase L) The list of dragged items.

<Edit-begin>

<Edit-accept>

<Edit-end>

The filelist-bindings.tcl code will display a text-editing window if the user clicks on a selected file/folder name. See the "Explorer" demos.

%I: The item containing the edited text element
%C: The column containing the edited text element
%E: The name of the edited text element
%t: The edited text

<Header-invoke>

Generated whenever the user clicks and releases the left mouse button in a column header if the column's -button option is true. You can bind a script to this event to sort the list.

%C: The column whose header was clicked

The library scripts provide an example of using a dynamic event called <Header-invoke>, which is generated when the mouse button is released over a column header.

treectrl .t .t notify install <Header-invoke> .t notify bind ConsoleTag <Header-invoke> { puts "header %C clicked in treectrl %T" } proc ::TreeCtrl::Release1 {w x y} { ... $w notify generate <Header-invoke> [list C $Priv(column)] \ [list ::TreeCtrl::PercentsCmd $w] ... }

In the example a new treectrl widget is created and the <Header-invoke> event is installed. For convenience there is no percentsCommand argument to notify install; instead the call to notify generate specifies the %-substitution command. A script is bound to the event with notify bind which will print out the column number and widget name to the console (in the demos, <Header-invoke> is used to sort the list based on the column that was clicked). The charMap argument to notify generate provides a list of %-substitution characters and values which is used by ::TreeCtrl::PercentsCmd. In this example any %C in any script bound to the <Header-invoke> event will be replaced by the value of $Priv(column).

DEFAULT BINDINGS

Tk automatically creates class bindings for treectrl widgets that give them the following default behavior.

Clicking mouse button 1 over an item positions the active cursor on the item, sets the input focus to this widget, and resets the selection of the widget to this item, if it is not already in the selection.
Clicking mouse button 1 with the Control key down will reposition the active cursor and add the item to the selection without ever removing any items from the selection.
If the mouse is dragged out of the widget while button 1 is pressed, the treectrl will automatically scroll to make more items visible (if there are more items off-screen on the side where the mouse left the window).
The Left and Right keys move the active cursor one item to the left or right; for an hierarchical tree with vertical orientation nothing will happen, since it has no two items in the same row. The selection is set to include only the active item. If Left or Right is typed with the Shift key down, then the active cursor moves and the selection is extended to include the new item.
The Up and Down keys move the active cursor one item up or down. The selection is set to include only the active item. If Up or Down is typed with the Shift key down, then the active cursor moves and the selection is extended to include the new item.
The Next and Prior keys move the active cursor forward or backwards by one screenful, without affecting the selection.
Control-Next and Control-Prior scroll the view right or left by one page without moving the active cursor or affecting the selection. Control-Left and Control-Right behave the same.
The Home and End keys scroll to the left or right end of the widget without moving the active cursor or affecting the selection.
The Control-Home and Control-End keys scroll to the top or bottom of the widget, they also activate and select the first or last item. If also the Shift key is down, then the active cursor moves and the selection is extended to include the new item.
The Space and Select keys set the selection to the active item.
Control-/ selects the entire contents of the widget.
Control-\\ clears any selection in the widget.
The + and - keys expand or collapse the active item, the Return key toggles the active item.
The mousewheel scrolls the view of the widget four lines up or down depending on the direction, the wheel was turned. The active cursor or the selection is not affected.

EXAMPLES

Get the unique identifier for the leftmost visible column:

set id [$T column index "first visible"]

Delete the leftmost column:

$T column delete "order 0"

Take the visible column that is to the left of the last column, and move that column in front of the tail column:

$T column move "last prev visible" tail

Get the unique identifier for the first visible item:

set id [$T item index "first visible"]

Delete the parent of the item that is under the point x,y:

$T item delete "nearest $x $y parent"

Add the 10th child of the second child of the root item to the selection:

$T selection add "root firstchild nextsibling child 10"

Move a column that the user drag-and-dropped:

$T column dragconfigure -enable yes $T notify install <ColumnDrag-receive> $T notify bind MyTag <ColumnDrag-receive> { %T column move %C %b }

KEYWORDS

tree, widget