[ruby-talk:6075] ANNOUNCE: Tcl/Tk 8.4a2 Release

FYI:

==========================================================
Subject: 
             ANNOUNCE: Tcl/Tk 8.4a2 Release
        Date: 
             Fri, 03 Nov 2000 17:45:47 -0800
       From: 
             Jeffrey Hobbs <[e-mail]>
 Organization: 
             Ajuba: B2B Integration Solutions
         To: 
             [e-mail]
 Newsgroups: 
             comp.lang.tcl

Tcl/Tk 8.4a2 Release Announcement
November 3, 2000

We are pleased to announce the 8.4a2 releases of the Tcl scripting
language and the Tk toolkit.  This is the second alpha release of
Tcl/Tk 8.4. More details can be found below.  We'd like to thank all
those that submit bugs and patches as they are the primary source of
information for us to identify problems in the core.

This is an alpha release, which means that the release is likely to
have bugs and is not yet feature-complete: we may add new features
or change some of the existing features before the final 8.4 releases.
Please let us know immediately about any problems you uncover with
these releases.

This is the last release to be made directly by Ajuba Solutions.
The Tcl Core Team will be taking over management of Tcl releases
for the future, based at SourceForge:
        http://tcl.sourceforge.net/

Where to get the new releases:
------------------------------

Tcl/Tk 8.4a2 are freely available in open source from the
Tcl Developer Xchange web site at

        http://dev.scriptics.com/software/tcltk/8.4.html

This web page also contains additional information about the
releases, including new features and notes about installing and
compiling the releases.

For additional information:
---------------------------

Please visit the Tcl Developer Xchange web site:

        http://dev.scriptics.com/

This site contains a variety of information about Tcl/Tk in general,
the core Tcl and Tk distributions, the TclPro tool suite, and much more.

Thank you for your contributions:
---------------------------------
As usual, this release includes contributions from the Tcl community.
We have a page honoring these contributions at:

        http://dev.scriptics.com/software/tcltk/contributors.html

Summary of Changes since Tcl/Tk 8.4a2:
--------------------------------------

The following were the main changes done in Tcl/Tk 8.4a2. A complete
list can be found in the changes file at the root of the source tree.
The more complete ChangeLog is also now included with each release.
This is an alpha release, so it primarily included new features and
performance enhancements.  Below are only the most notable changes.

 * New 'array names -exact/-glob/-regexp' options (melski, gazetta)

 * Added -nocomplain option to 'unset' (hobbs)

 * Added support for mingw (gcc on Windows), AIX-5 and Win64 builds
   (dejong, hobbs)

 * Added ability to use Tcl_Obj*'s as hash keys (duffin)

 * New ::msgcat::mcmax function, extended ::msgcat::unknown function,
   new ::msgcat::mcmset function (duperval, krone, nelson)

 * Much improved doc SEE ALSO, NAME, KEYWORDS sections (peonitz, english)

 * Updated IO core to 8.3.2 version.

 * Fixed mem leak in Tcl_CreateChannel. Re-purified core via test suites.
   (hobbs)

 * Added tclPlatDecls.h to default install (melski)

 * Enhanced trace syntax to add:
        trace {add|remove|list} {variable|command} name ops command
   (darley, melski)

 * Improved string allocation growth for large strings (hintermayer,
   melski)

 * Set ^Z (\32) as cross-platform default EOF char.  This was already
   enforced by Windows, it is now just cross-platform.

 * partial fix for bug 2460 to prevent exec mem leak on Windows for the
   common case (gravereaux)

 * New non-panic'ing mem allocation functions Tcl_AttemptAlloc,
   Tcl_AttemptRealloc, Tcl_AttemptSetObjLength (melski)

 * Updgraded tcltest to version 2 with completely new, enhanced syntax.
   This provides backwards compatability with tcltest v1. (hom)

 * Fixed overaggressive stat'ing of files in Windows glob command (results
   in significant speed increase for glob) (hobbs)

 * Added "ja_JP.eucJP" to "euc-jp" encoding mapping (takahashi)

 * Corrected excessive mem use when info exists was called on a
   non-existent array element (patton)

 * New Tcl_SetMainLoop function that enables defining an event loop for
   tclsh.  This enables Tk as a truly loadable package.

 * Added -multiple option to tk_getOpenFile (melski)

 * Introduced some localization support to Tk dialogs (duperval, et al)

 * Improved support for static builds on Windows (gravereaux)

 * New -state option for listbox, better native color defaults (melski)

 * Tcl_Obj'ified clipboard, message, tkwait, bindtags, grab. place,
   selection commands (melski)

 * More correct GNU configure support (no more --enable-gcc)
   Windows users will want to set the CC env var to "cl" if they are not
   using mingw (dejong)

 * Corrected Windows menu indicator drawing (oberhumer)

 * Added tkPlatDecls.h to default install (melski)

 * Added TK_OPTION_CUSTOM type, similar to TK_CONFIG_CUSTOM (melski)

 * Several fixes for multi-display uses of Tk (hipp, hobbs)

 * New Tk_CreateAnonymousWindow C API to create anonymous Tk windows
   controllable from C (melski)

 * Improved error checking in Windows native dialogs (melski, hobbs)

 * Made 'tk useinputmethods 1' the default in tk.tcl, for users of XIM and
   "dead" keys (hobbs)

-- 
   The Tcl Guys
   Jeffrey Hobbs                                Eric Melski
   hobbs at ajubasolutions.com                  ericm at 
ajubasolutions.com
==========================================================

Conrad Schneiker
(This note is unofficial and subject to improvement without notice.)