tkinter errors out without clear message

[Terry Reedy]

On 5/21/2014 12:11 PM, Kai Song wrote:
> Dear Python community,
>
> I have been trying to make Tkinter work on my Scientific Linux 6 (SL6)
> system. The python version is the SL6 default Python/2.6.6, and the
> tkinter is also from SL6 repository, "tkinter-2.6.6-51.el6.x86_64".
>
> I was able to import _tkinter and Tkinter, and the _test() will bring up
> an empty window, but it will then fail without any actual error message.
> I think it's when it tries to create buttons. I tried to use python gdb
> to debug through the code, but It's hard to pin point the problem.

> _tkinter.TclError

Nasty. I have seen TclErrors, but with a message.

Here is a simple test I just ran (from within Idle) on Win7, 2.7.6.

 >>> import Tkinter as tk
 >>> root = tk.Tk()
 >>> tk.Label(root, text = 'label text').pack()
 >>> tk.mainloop()

and I see a window with label with text.

tk._test() works too, with slightly more involved window.

You said you tried 2.7.5. I believe 2.7.6 has some tkinter bug fixes.
There is also the issue that TkVersion == 8.5 is underspecied -- there 
are multiple bugfix releases. The 2.7 Windows installer has been 
installing 8.5.2, which has some bugs, but 2.7.7 will install 8.5.13, 
which is much better.

-- 
Terry Jan Reedy