Tcl-URL! Weekly Tcl News and Links (August 26)

QOTW: "... more popular.  Not better; just more popular.  I prefer
to pick my tools based on functionality rather than popularity, which is
why I stick with Tcl."  -- Bryan Oakley

"One programmer's best practice is another's dangerous revisionism."
-- Bill Machrone


    ActiveState announces the release of the Tcl Dev Kit 2.0.  Features
    and benefits include: TclPro Checker, TclPro Debugger, TclPro Wrapper,
    TclPro Compiler.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?th=622c5431b72547b5
        http://www.ActiveState.com/Initiatives/Tcl

    Learn how to "dock" a small Tk window under KDE and how to create a
    translucent frame, both made possible with George Peter Staplin's
    Tk_Theme extension.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?th=9f0ff6eaec824550
        http://groups.google.com/groups?th=91cf8ad1f1d6286d
        http://www.xmission.com/~georgeps/Tk_Theme/

    Mac Cody has released "Toucan 1.2 - A feathered friend for the Palm.
    Toucan is an integrated development enviroment (IDE) for developing
    applications for the Palm OS using Ashok Nadkarni's PalmTcl
    interpreter."
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=pgpmoose.200208220905.1730%40despot.non.net

    Mark G. Saye begins a discussion on possible enhancements to the
    [package] mechanism to create package meta-data & enable
    introspection without needing to do a [package require].
        http://groups.google.com/groups?th=f236b4a2bdc0025f


Arjen Markus reports on Wiki activity:

    A lot of algorithmic stuff appeared last week on the Wiki. This 
    may seem a bit "dry", but let us look at a few entries:
    
    There are quite a few pages which address the Internet:
    - An example of an HTTP robot appears at <http://wiki.tcl.tk/1303>;
    - Hidden in a more general page about the Tcl's interp statement is
      the answer to a question that was raised on the newsgroup: 
      automatically downloading and running code - <http://wiki.tcl.tk/1477>;
      A small receipe with indications of what to do if you can not rely
      trust the code (answer: use a safe interp!)
    - Ever dreamt about the wonders of a worm-hole? Well, "burrow" comes 
      close: <http://wiki.tcl.tk/3929>; describes the creation of a TCP/IP
      tunnel between two hosts, using nothing but Tcl.
    - Getting tired of spam? Spam filters may help, one using statistical
      techniques is based on other work (see the references contained in
      the page, <http://wiki.tcl.tk/3901>;
      As the author of this Wiki page, says: enjoy!
    
    Two pages that address graphical user-interfaces:
    - XML may or may not be the ultimate solution to all of your
      data exchange problems. But have a look at XML files with a 
      simple browser! <http://wiki.tcl.tk/3884>;
      (Actually: it is an example of how to combine the many facilities 
      that Tcl offers)
    - So much function in so little code, <http://wiki.tcl.tk/1913>; presents
      a notebook application.

    Another two pages, these address interfacing to the system:
    - Expect is one of those applications that surpasses the imagination 
      of many of its users. Try and follow the links (but be careful):
      <http://wiki.tcl.tk/3913>; leads to a wealth of information and
      then try the other Wiki pages on Expect!
    - <http://wiki.tcl.tk/3643>; describes a package that lets your application
      know that the contents of a directory have changed.
    
    Well, this leaves a number of pages for which I could not think of 
    an appropriate subject, other than "techniques":
    - The idea of a scripted compiler (<http://wiki.tcl.tk/3687>;) has led
      to several pages, including one on parsing C code,
      <http://wiki.tcl.tk/3906>;
    - An application of the msgcat package, universal greetings  
      (<http://wiki.tcl.tk/2938>;) are everyday's reality in the Tcl'ers chatroom
    - Analysing programs (predicting performance for instance) can sometimes be
      done by making a small simulation - <http://wiki.tcl.tk/3923>; has an
      example.
    - Calculating the frequency of substrings is one fundamental subject
      in encryption/decryption techniques. This page, <http://wiki.tcl.tk/3838>;,
      shows that it is not that hard to do.
    

Everything you want is probably one or two clicks away in these pages:

    The "Welcome to comp.lang.tcl" message by Andreas Kupries
        http://www.purl.org/net/tcl-welcome

    Larry Virden maintains a comp.lang.tcl FAQ launcher
        http://www.purl.org/NET/Tcl-FAQ/

    Brent Welch maintains "The Tcl Developer Xchange", a highly
    organized resource center of documents and software with
    provisions for individuals to "set up a link to your software
    and update ... as you release new versions."
        http://www.tcl-tk.net/resource/
    The Xchange sponsor also keeps info to convince your boss Tcl
    is a good thing
        http://www.tcl-tk.net/scripting/      

    The Tcl'ers Wiki is a huge, dynamic, collaboratively edited repository
    of documentation, examples, tutorials and pontifications on all things Tcl.
        http://wiki.tcl.tk/0
    For the ideal overview of the topics about Tcl most likely to
    interest a newcomer, see "Arts and Crafts ..."
        http://wiki.tcl.tk/969

    ActiveState Tools maintains a Cookbook of Tcl recipes
        http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Tcl

    NeoSoft has a comp.lang.tcl contributed sources archive
        http://www.neosoft.com/tcl/contributed-software/

    Cameron Laird tracks many Tcl/Tk references of interest
        http://starbase.neosoft.com/~claird/comp.lang.tcl/

    Cetus Links maintains a Tcl/Tk page with verified links
        http://www.cetus-links.org/oo_tcl_tk.html

    Google Groups archives comp.lang.tcl.announce posts
        http://groups.yahoo.com/group/tcl_announce/   

Previous - (U)se the (R)esource, (L)uke! - messages are listed here:
  http://purl.org/thecliff/tcl/url.html
--in principal.  In spring 2001, though,
  http://www.ddj.com/topics/tclurl/
  http://tcl.activestate.com:8004/tclurl/
are more consistently up-to-date.  A fourth possibility is                 
  http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_q=+Tcl-URL!&as_ugroup=comp.lang.tcl  

Suggestions/corrections for next week's posting are always welcome.

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