in reply to Re^2: Multi-column Tk:Optionmenu?
in thread Multi-column Tk:Optionmenu?

I've looked at the Canvas widget and it is definitely a good thing for me to have in my Tk arsenal, but it feels wrong for this application. But the approach got me thinking and wouldn't this work: I'll have a button that pops open a new TopLevel, and I'll just populate the TopLevel with *radiobuttons*. no need that I can see for an intermediary layer of widgets. Just a simple loop with packing a frame into the TL, then packing *it* with radio buttons in for as long as a max-length column should be, then another frame, more radiobuttons, until I run out. They'll all store their value into the same var and have the same callback to deal with the menu selection. [I'd post sample code, but: 1) not written yet, and 2) it seems simple enough that I can't imagine it won't do what I need (or be all that difficult)). It's feeling like about five lines of Perl to do..:o) Am I missing something or is it really the case that this simple approach will get me what I was looking for?

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Re^4: Multi-column Tk:Optionmenu?
by zentara (Cardinal) on Nov 05, 2007 at 12:41 UTC
    Your radiobutton solution sounds pretty good. I usually go for the canvas because it can be made to look good, since a common complaint about Tk is it looks drab. My idea was to make a table of rectangles, and put each choice in a rectangle, which changes colors as the mouse passes over it. It's probably more eye candy than you need.

    Just for your advancement, Gtk2 has a nice multicolumn select-drop-down widget.

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Re^4: Multi-column Tk:Optionmenu?
by BernieC (Pilgrim) on Nov 05, 2007 at 18:31 UTC
    SUCCESS!!! (except for making it modal. I looked at the code in Show that handles modal-ness and my eyes kind of glazed over ... any insight into how that stuff works would be appreciated! :o)) The following does pretty much just what I wanted. Only slight problem is where the TL pops up -- a little more research in how how the PopUp stuff handles "make the thing pop up HERE" and I think I've got what I was looking for!

    Meta question: is this worth cleaning up and turning into a real widget, or should I just go back into my hole and use it for my app? 
    #!/usr/bin/perl

# Test to see if we can make our own multi-column menu out of
##  a toplevel and radiobuttons

use strict ;
use warnings ;
use Tk ;

my $mw = MainWindow->new ;
$mw->Button(-text => "Make menu", -command => \&GenMenu)->pack ;
my $picked ;
$mw->Entry(-state => 'disabled', -textvariable => \$picked)->pack ;

MainLoop() ;

my $menuselect ;
my $TL ;
sub GenMenu
{   $TL = $mw->Toplevel ;
    for my $f (1 .. 3)
    {   my $frame = $TL->Frame->pack(-side => 'left');
        for my $menu (1 .. 5)
        {   Radio($frame, "Column $f, Row $menu", $f*5 + $menu) ; }
    }
    $TL->focus ;
}

sub PickedMenu
{   $picked = "You picked entry $menuselect" ;
    $TL->destroy ;
}

sub Radio
{   $_[0]->Radiobutton(-text => $_[1],
                       -value => $_[2],
                       -variable => \$menuselect,
                       -indicatoron => undef,
                       -command => \&PickedMenu)->pack(-fill => 'x') ;
}

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