Rating: 
Summary: Not very good for learning Tcl, and not a good reference
Review: For the past several years, I've spent about a fourth of my working time writing or fixing TCL/Tk programs. This is by far the best book I've ever encountered on the subject. Time and again it's bailed me out of a problem, warned me away from a bad practice, or shown me a much better approach that only in retrospect seems obvious. It was written by some of the best TCL coders around -- including Jeff Hobbs, who currently handles many of the updates and version releases for the TCL/Tk core itself. If you're programming professionally in TCL, or even if you're only using Tk (called from another language such as Perl or Python), then this book is almost certainly a good investment for you. Even students using TCL/Tk should seriously consider purchasing this book, unless you are on an extremely tight budget and have good access to online information like the TCL Wiki pages. It's not designed to be a programming tutorial, but I think even beginners would be better off buying this indispensible reference -- if only to peruse the outstanding examples. ... I certainly have my own frustrations with the language. I'm not a TCL evangelist, just a long-time user. The language is so flexible that just a few subtle bad habits can cause you serious problems, just as a few good habits can make you vastly more productive. Those who don't like TCL would do well to spend a little time looking over this book, taking note of how often you can do a lot of powerful-yet-elegant things in TCL/Tk -- if you know how. --William L. Dye
Software Enginerd
Rating: 
Summary: By far the best book on TCL/Tk that I've ever read
Review: For the past several years, I've spent about a fourth of my working time writing or fixing TCL/Tk programs. This is by far the best book I've ever encountered on the subject. Time and again it's bailed me out of a problem, warned me away from a bad practice, or shown me a much better approach that only in retrospect seems obvious. It was written by some of the best TCL coders around -- including Jeff Hobbs, who currently handles many of the updates and version releases for the TCL/Tk core itself. If you're programming professionally in TCL, or even if you're only using Tk (called from another language such as Perl or Python), then this book is almost certainly a good investment for you. Even students using TCL/Tk should seriously consider purchasing this book, unless you are on an extremely tight budget and have good access to online information like the TCL Wiki pages. It's not designed to be a programming tutorial, but I think even beginners would be better off buying this indispensible reference -- if only to peruse the outstanding examples. ... I certainly have my own frustrations with the language. I'm not a TCL evangelist, just a long-time user. The language is so flexible that just a few subtle bad habits can cause you serious problems, just as a few good habits can make you vastly more productive. Those who don't like TCL would do well to spend a little time looking over this book, taking note of how often you can do a lot of powerful-yet-elegant things in TCL/Tk -- if you know how. --William L. Dye
Software Enginerd
Rating: 
Summary: not too impressed
Review: I am not too impressed with this book. A beginner needs to have useage examples, since a quote, bracket, etc here or there can make a big difference. Welch's book does not give good useage examples on more than one topic. For example, in describing the clock statement, There is an extensive table on formatting options, but not one example on how to use the keywords. Another example is the use of the test command to check two strings in a loop control statement. On several occasions, I have wasted time just hacking around, changing placements of things, putting in extra brackets, etc. in order to find the exact sequence that works.
Rating: 
Summary: *THE* Tcl reference
Review: I am on my third edition of this book and have used it enough that the cover is threatening to come off. It continues to be well formatted and comprehensive. My only gripe is it's size: 772 pages the first 300 are TCL
the next 300 are Tk
then come 100 pages of TCL and C
followed of course by an excellent index. I don't use TK at all and would LOVE if they came out with a boxed set of 3 (or even 2) books. At 772 pages it is challenged only by Oracle books for size. Other than it's size I have never reached for this book and found it wanting.
Rating:
Summary: seems confused in its goal
Review: I constantly find myself going through ups and downs with the material presented. Parts are well explained while other parts don't flow as easily. It is neither written to just present the rules of the language without the reason behind them nor with the intention to give the reasons for why things are so done. The book in general does not flow easily in my opinion. I will continue with the tcl parts (that's what I need the book for) to learn the basics but I know it will not be a fun task.
Rating:
Summary: A good reference, and a good teaching book
Review: I had to learn Tcl/Tk for an existing application, and this book was extremely useful. Contrary to some reviewers' experiences, the Tk portion of the book was quite useful to me. I would have liked to see a bit more focus on writing fast tcl code, though; it's difficult to optimize without detailed analysis of the language.
Rating:
Summary: This book is not for beginners.
Review: I own this book and I am not a great programmer. I am looking for another with quicker and easier approaches to learning from scratch.
Rating: 
Summary: Not Recommended
Review: I was very disapointed with this book. There are any number of basic programming elements that any language needs to provide -- and tcl does, but this book doesn't even address. (Or at least, they're not listed in a way one can find them.)
An example: compound conditional expressions such as:
if {$sky == "blue" || $sun == "shining"}
are not covered.
Instead, chapter 3 goes into html. If you're looking for a book on tcl don't get this one.
Rating:
Summary: Great improvements over last edition
Review: My complaints with prior edition (bining and poor index) were well satisfied with this revision. This is still the most complete guide available, but does not have enough details on Tcl command options. At 775 pages, Tcl and Tk sections could easily be made into separate books, accomodating a Tcl command reference section as is found with Tk procedures.
Rating:
Summary: An Excellent Reference Book
Review: Not a book for beginners. This book presents various features of TCL/TK programming in a comprehensive way and will server as an excellent reference guide.
| 
