Selection

The selection is the highlighted text shared between applications (the PRIMARY selection on X11; also used for a widget’s own highlighted range). These methods read it, clear it, and claim ownership of it.

The canonical upstream reference is the Tk selection manual page (Tcl 8.6).

selection_get(**kw)

Return the current selection.

Parameters:

kw – selection= names which selection (default "PRIMARY"); type= the requested data form.

Returns:

the selected text.

Return type:

str

Raises:

TclError – if there is no selection.

selection_clear(**kw)

Clear the selection this widget owns.

Parameters:

kw – selection= names which selection to clear.

Returns:

None.

selection_own(**kw)

Make this widget the owner of the selection.

Parameters:

kw – selection= names which selection to claim; command= a callback invoked if ownership is later lost.

Returns:

None.

selection_own_get(**kw)

Return the widget that currently owns the selection.

Parameters:

kw – selection= names which selection to query.

Returns:

the owning widget.

Return type:

Misc

Raises:

TclError – if no widget in this application owns it.

selection_handle(command, **kw)

Supply the selection’s contents on demand: register command to be called when another application asks this widget for the selection it owns. Tk calls it with an offset and a maximum byte count, and it returns that slice of the value. Use it when the selection is large or generated — for a plain string, owning the selection is enough.

Parameters:

• command – called as command(offset, length); returns the requested slice as a string.

• kw – selection= names which selection, type= the target form.

Returns:

None.