I have been attempting to learn perl/tk (tkx). This is made much more difficult because the code in the tutorials don't seem to work as printed.

Not at all an expert on this, but perhaps this has to do with the fact that Perl/Tk and Tkx are two different things, albeit somewhat similar. So if you're using one while using a tutorial or a book for the other, you'll quite plausibly run into various syntax and other kinds of problems. (Just my two cents, please disregard if my hypothesis is wrong.)