Tk (software)
Tk is a cross-platform widget toolkit that provides a library of basic elements of GUI widgets for building a graphical user interface (GUI) in many programming languages. It is free and open-source software released under a BSD-style software license.
Tcl logo | |
Tk 8.6.6 on Windows 10 | |
| Original author(s) | John Ousterhout |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | Tcl Core Team |
| Initial release | 1991 |
| Stable release | |
| Repository | |
| Written in | C |
| Operating system | Cross-platform |
| Platform | Cross-platform |
| Type | Widget toolkit |
| License | BSD-style |
| Website | tcl.tk |
Tk provides many widgets commonly needed to develop desktop applications, such as button, menu, canvas, text, frame, label, etc. Tk has been ported to run on most flavors of Linux, macOS, Unix, and Microsoft Windows. Like Tcl, Tk supports Unicode within the Basic Multilingual Plane, but it has not yet been extended to handle the current extended full Unicode (e.g., UTF-16 from UCS-2 that Tk supports).
Tk was designed to be extended, and a wide range of extensions are available that offer new widgets or other capabilities.
Since Tcl/Tk 8, it offers "native look and feel" (for instance, menus and buttons are displayed in the manner of "native" software for any given platform). Highlights of version 8.5 include a new theming engine, originally called Tk Tile, but it is now generally referred to as "themed Tk", as well as improved font rendering. Highlights of version 8.6 include PNG support and angled text.