Idle won't start

[Kurt B. Kaiser]

John Matthews <John at the.computer> writes:

> In article <8eh830tlh056hk21hm9v49m3qcinjv4pq9 at 4ax.com>, shuvit@
> 127.0.0.1 says...
>> 
>> This might be a different problem if your problem is truly
>> intermittent, but I am finding that IDLE has conflicts with other
>> installed programs.  I have been running Python 2.3 under Windows
>> XP-Home with no problem for the last few months.  Yesterday I
>> installed Ruby 1.8.1-11 and now IDLE won't start.  No response to
>> clicking the icon, selecting the menu item,  Nada.  Removing Ruby
>> restores IDLE.
>> 
>> With Ruby installed, when I run IDLE from a command line
>> C:\Python23\Lib\idlelib>idle.py
>> I get a message:
>> """
>> _tkinter.TclError: Cant find a usable init.tcl in the following
>> directories:  <c:\ruby\tcl\lib\tcl8.3> <c:\ruby\tcl\lib\tcl8.3>
>> c:/ruby/tcl/lib/tcl8.4  C:/Python23/lib/tcl8.4  C:/lib/tcl8.4
>> C:/library
>> This probably means that Tcl wasn't installed properly.
>> """
>> I have no idea why IDLE is looking for library routines in the Ruby
>> subdirectories, or why all the strange variations in the search path
>> above, but it is clear that Ruby and IDLE cannot co-exist on one
>> computer.
>> 
>> Note:  Re-installing Python23 after Ruby is installed doesn't help.
>> You have to remove Ruby completely.
>> 
>> -- Dave
>
> I have similar problems at my office machine (Win2K Pro) and my home 
> machine (WinXP). I do not, nor have ever had Ruby installed. The problem 
> seems intermittent. I gave up and went back to Python 2.2. I hated to go 
> back because the 2.3 version of IDLE was nice, but I beleive that it is 
> somehow broken and will need to be fixed for me to use it again.

The above error message is from the tcl_findLibrary procedure in
auto.tcl, in .../lib/tcl8.3 (or 8.4).

It's not IDLE, it's tcl looking for init.tcl.  It appears to be saying
it can't source init.tcl in any of those directories.

Note that the OP appears to have both tcl8.3 and 8.4 installed? That
may be confusing auto.tcl, or perhaps Ruby changed the environment.
The '\' and '/' in the paths are suggestive.

One would have to trace the execution of tcl_findLibrary to figure
this one out.  I don't have Ruby on my XP box or Win2K boxes, but
IDLE works fine.  IDLE and Ruby should be able to play together,
but it may be necessary that they both use the same version of tcl.

Too many batteries :-)

===

As for John Matthews' problem, it would be helpful to see the actual
error messages.  Please post to idle-dev at python.org.  "Similar" problems
are likely tcl/tk issues, and not necessarily due to the new IDLE.

-- 
KBK