Sebastopol, CA--Like the pairing of fine wine and food, some things are just meant to go together. Early Perl users who had to be content with command-line interfaces or full-screen interfaces using Curses or similar systems were delighted with the splitting off of the Tk widget library from the Tcl language, because it opened a whole new world to Perl. Using Tk's flexible and friendly widget set, Perl programmers could now create graphical interfaces for their programs. Buttons, menus, dialog boxes, scrolled text areas, and more could be used to add a little flair and professionalism to Perl applications. In Mastering Perl/Tk (O'Reilly, US $44.95), veteran authors and Perl/Tk users Steve Lidie and Nancy Walsh introduce Perl/Tk and show how to build attractive, intuitive interfaces for Perl programs.
Written for novices and seasoned Perl/Tk programmers alike, Mastering Perl/Tk begins with a fast-moving tutorial that covers the basics on how to use Perl/Tk, including a discussion of all the basic widgets and the geometry managers that determine how each widget is laid out. The book then branches out into advanced applications of Perl/Tk, with a series of extensive program examples that will take even experienced programmers to the next step in learning how to program elegantly and effectively in Perl/Tk.
"This book evolved from my earlier book "Learning Perl/Tk," explains Walsh. "The response to that book made it clear that there were many avid and loyal Perl/Tk users, but readers also let us know that they wished the book showed advanced techniques, covered some nonstandard widgets, and included more extended examples of Perl/Tk programming." Walsh and Lidie worked together to double the size of the book and change its title to reflect the new expansion, and the baby emu on the cover of the earlier book grew into the adult emu on the cover of the current book.
Although Perl/Tk is very popular, the lack of a complete, comprehensive book on the topic has made it difficult for programmers to locate a central source of information. In Mastering Perl/Tk, Lidie and Walsh go into detail on creating custom widgets, working with bindings and callbacks, IPC techniques, and offer many examples of nonstandard add-on widgets for Perl/Tk, including Tix widgets. This book is sure to be the definitive guide that every Perl/Tk programmer will need.
Online Resources:
An article by coauthor Steve Lidie, A Drag-and-Drop Primer for Perl/Tk
Chapter 15, "Anatomy of the Main Loop" is available free online
More information about the book, including table of contents, index, author bios, and samples
Mastering
Perl/Tk
By Steve Lidie and Nancy Walsh
January 2002
ISBN 1-56592-716-8, 746 pages, $44.95 (US), $67.95 (CAN)
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