[Python-Dev] Can't compile _tkinter.c with Redhat 9 (post-SF#719880)

[Martin v. Löwis]

"Jeff Hobbs" <jeffh@ActiveState.com> writes:

> Right, I'm aware of it, and will make it so for 8.4.4 and 8.5.  It
> won't get back into 8.3 (which we consider end-of-devel life).
> Which brings up another point ... since Martin, et al, also did a
> great job correcting Tkinter support for 8.4, why not move up to
> that as the base version (it is already the base version in SuSE
> and Debian-testing)?  

If that helps: This is what Python 2.3 will do on Windows: ship with
Tcl 8.4.

> It is 100% upwards compatible from 8.3 and provides numerous
> enhancements for Tk users (like compound buttons, new core widgets,
> enhanced performance, etc).

Unfortunately, it is not. Tk decided to set some "indeterminate"
fields in event structures to '??', whereas earlier they have been
numbers. This has caused an incompatibility in Tkinter of Python 2.2.2
and earlier, which now crashes when trying to convert these to
integers. This has been fixed in Python 2.2.3 and 2.3, by not trying
to convert these fields, so that now Pmw crashes when interpreting
these fields as integers (where "crashes" means "raising Python
exceptions").

Regards,
Martin