runtime/tcl/tix8.4.3/pref/WmDefault.txt

One of the bad things about Tk/Tkinter is that it does not pick up
the current color and font scheme from the prevailing CDE/KDE/GNOME/Windows 
window manager scheme.

One of the good things about Tk/Tkinter is that it is not tied to one
particular widget set so it could pick up the current color and font scheme 
from the prevailing CDE/KDE/GNOME/Windows window manager scheme.

The WmDefault package is for making Tk/Tkinter applications use the 
prevailing CDE/KDE/GNOME/Windows scheme. It tries to find the files
and/or settings that the current window manager is using, and then
sets the Tk options database accordingly (plus a few other things as well). 


DOWNLOAD
--------

Download the latest version of wm_default from http://tix.sourceforge.net
either as a part of the standard Tix distribution, or as a part of the
Tix Applications: http://tix.sourceforge.net/Tide. wm_default does not
require Tix, but is Tix enabled.


USAGE:
------

For Tix versions 8.1.2 and above from http://tix.sourceforge.net,
WmDefault is the default Tix scheme, so there is nothing else to do.

For Tk applications, it should be sufficent at the beginning of a wish
app to simply:

	    package require wm_default
	    wm_default::setup
	    wm_default::addoptions

The process is divided into 2 steps:

1) find the files and/or settings (::wm_default::setup).
   This is complete for Windows, pretty good for KDE and CDE, and
 still barely supported for GNOME because of the difficulty
 of finding and parsing sawfish definition files.
 setup takes one optional argument: wm, the name of the window manager
 as a string, if known. One of: windows gnome kde1 kde2 cde.

2) Setting the Tk options database (::wm_default::addoptions).
You can override the settings in 1) by adding your values to the call
to addoptions:
   ::wm_default::addoptions -foreground red -background blue

You can examine the settings with
    ::wm_default::getoptions
which returns a Tcl array of the current settings, and
    ::wm_default::parray
which returns a string of the current settings, one value-pair per line.

There are a number of assumptions built into the heuristics of addoptions,
that may need fine tuning. Post patches to http://tix.sourceforge.net.


PYTHON
______

If you are using Tix versions 8.1.2 and above from http://tix.sourceforge.net
with Python 2.1  and above, WmDefault is the default Tix scheme, 
so there is nothing else you need to do.

The easiest way to install WmDefault for Tkinter is to copy the WmDefault.*
AND THE FILE pkgIndex.tcl from lib/tix8.1/pref to a directory on your
PYTHONPATH. Then the following should work:

	    import Tkinter
	    root = Tkinter.Tk()
	    import WmDefault
	    WmDefault.setup(root)
	    WmDefault.addoptions(root, {'foreground': 'red'})
	    print WmDefault.getoptions(root)


SETTINGS
--------

Here is a list of all the settings controlled by WmDefault:
	wm		  	- one of windows gnome kde1 kde2 cde kde
	background		
	foreground		
	disabledforeground		
	disabledbackground		
	textfamily			
	systemfamily		
	menufamily 			
	fixedfamily		
	fontsize		- in pixels under Unix, in points under Windows
	textbackground		
	textforeground		
	disabledtextbackground		
	selectbackground		
	selectforeground		
	selectcolor		
	highlightcolor		
	highlightbackground		
	scrollbars		- scrollbar trough color
	borderwidth		
	priority		
	menubackground		
	menuforeground		
	activebackground		
	activeforeground		
	system_font 		- a Tcl font spec, a list of family size weight
	menu_font 		
	fixed_font 		
	text_font 		
	linkcolor		- not working completely yet
	vlinkcolor
	alinkcolor



TO MAKE A PREVIOUS TIX USE THIS AS THE DEFAULT SCHEME:
------------------------------------------------------

1) Compile Tix with 
	-DTIX_DEF_SCHEME "WmDefault"
	-DTIX_DEF_FONTSET "WmDefault"
or change the defines in generic/tixInit.c 

#define TIX_DEF_SCHEME "WmDefault"
#define TIX_DEF_FONTSET "WmDefault"

2) Edit the installed lib/8.1/Tix.tcl and change the -configspec 
in tixClass tixAppContext with the following
	{-fontset    		WmDefault}
	{-scheme     		WmDefault}

3) Copy the files WmDefault.* AND pkgIndex.tcl to the installed
   lib/tix8.1/pref

4) Make or edit the file lib/tix8.1/pkgIndex.tcl and add the lines

package ifneeded wm_default 1.0 \
	[list source [file join $dir pref WmDefault.tcl]]