# shell - Create and manipulate a shell widget

## SYNOPSIS

shell pathName ?options?

## INHERITANCE

itk::Toplevel <- shell

## STANDARD OPTIONS

background | cursor | foreground |

See the "options" manual entry for details on the standard options.

## INHERITED OPTIONS

title |  |  |

See the "Toplevel" manual entry for details on the above inherited options.

## WIDGET-SPECIFIC OPTIONS

    Name:                   height
    Class:                  Height
    Command-Line Switch:	-height

Specifies the height of the shell. The value may be specified in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. A value of zero causes the height to be adjusted to the required value based on the size requests of the components placed in the childsite. Otherwise, the height is fixed. The default is zero. NOTE: This may cause some amount of flickering on slower machines. To prevent it simply set the width and height to a appropriate value.

    Name:                   master
    Class:                  Window
    Command-Line Switch:	-master

Defines the shell as being a transient window with the master window given by the master option. The master window should be either another existing toplevel window or {} for no master. The default is {} for shells and "." for dialogs.

    Name:                   modality
    Class:                  Modality
    Command-Line Switch:	-modality

Allows the shell to grab control of the screen in one of three different ways: application, system, or none. Application modal prevents any other toplevel windows within the application which are direct children of '.' from gaining focus. System modal locks the screen and prevents all windows from gaining focus regardless of application. A modality of none performs no grabs at all. The default is none.

    Name:                   padX
    Class:                  Pad
    Command-Line Switch:	-padx

Specifies a padding distance for the childsite in the X-direction in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. The default is 10.

    Name:                   padY
    Class:                  Pad
    Command-Line Switch:	-pady

Specifies a padding distance for the childsite in the Y-direction in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. The default is 10.

    Name:                   width
    Class:                  Width
    Command-Line Switch:	-width

Specifies the width of the shell. The value may be specified in any of the forms acceptable to Tk_GetPixels. A value of zero causes the width to be adjusted to the required value based on the size requests of the components placed in the childsite. Otherwise, the width is fixed. The default is zero. NOTE: This may cause some amount of flickering on slower machines. To prevent it simply set the width and height to a appropriate value.

## DESCRIPTION

The shell command creates a shell which is a top level widget which supports modal operation.

## METHODS

The shell command create a new Tcl command whose name is pathName. This command may be used to invoke various operations on the widget. It has the following general form:

    pathName option ?arg arg ...?

Option and the args determine the exact behavior of the command. The following commands are possible for shell widgets:

## WIDGET-SPECIFIC METHODS

pathName activate

  Display the shell and wait based on the modality. For application and system modal activations, perform a grab operation, and wait for the result. The result may be returned via an argument to the deactivate method.
  pathName center ?widget?
    Centers the shell with respect to another widget. The widget argument is optional. If provided, it should be the path of another widget with to center upon. If absent, then the shell will be centered on the screen as a whole.
  pathName cget option
    Returns the current value of the configuration option given by option. Option may have any of the values accepted by the shell command.
  pathName childsite
    Returns the pathname of the child site widget.
  pathName configure ?option? ?value option value ...?
    Query or modify the configuration options of the widget. If no option is specified, returns a list describing all of the available options for pathName (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command returns a list describing the one named option (this list will be identical to the corresponding sublist of the value returned if no option is specified). If one or more option-value pairs are specified, then the command modifies the given widget option(s) to have the given value(s); in this case the command returns an empty string. Option may have any of the values accepted by the shell command.
  pathName deactivate ?arg?
    Deactivate the display of the shell. The method takes an optional argument to be passed to the activate method which returns the value. The optional argument is only effective for application and system modal dialogs.

  ## COMPONENTS

      Name:                   shellchildsite
      Class:                  frame

  The shellchildsite component is the user child site for the shell. See the "frame" widget manual entry for details on the shellchildsite component item.

  ## EXAMPLE

       shell .sh -modality application -padx 20 -pady 20 -title Shell

       pack [label [.sh childsite].l -text SHELL]

       .sh center
       .sh activate

  ## AUTHOR

  Mark L. Ulferts

  Kris Raney

  ## KEYWORDS

  shell, widget