'''pack''' ''slave ?slave ...? ?options? ''

'''[pack configure]''' ''slave ?slave ...? ?options?''

'''[pack forget]''' ''slave ?slave ...?''

'''[pack info]''' ''slave''

'''[pack propagate]''' ''master ?boolean?''

'''[pack slaves]''' ''master''

If the first argument to '''pack''' is a window name (any value starting with "'''.'''"), then the command is processed in the same way as [pack configure].

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'''pack''' is one of several [Geometry managers] supported by Tk.

http://www.tcl.tk/man/tcl8.5/TkCmd/pack.htm

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Geometry management is an aspect of programming where personal style seems to dominate.  That is, given the same lay description of a desired appearance, some programmers will use pack, some [grid], some will reach for [SpecTcl], and so on.  [Joe English], for example, has written

    pack works best for me if the layout is "mostly vertical"
    or "mostly horizontal" and there is exactly one main "work area"
    that expands to fill all remaining available space.  The rule
    of thumb is to pack the "top stuff" first (menubar, toolbars),
    with -expand false -fill x, the "bottom stuff" second (status
    bar, command button box) with -expand false -fill x, and the
    work area last with -expand true -fill both.  Similarly
    for horizontal layouts, but using -fill y for the "left stuff"
    and "right stuff".

    If there's a mixture of horizontal and vertical layouts,
    I create subframes when changing orientation.

while [David Cuthbert]'s experience teaches him that

    For me, it's not natural to design an interface according to pack
    This is not a terribly unusual layout; nonetheless, I'd have a somewhat
    difficult time describing it in terms of pack (e.g., which side to I
    tell the message widget to pack to?  How many frame containers do I
    need?).

    Discovering that a particular widget (or group of widgets) needs to go
    into a frame is especially painful; suddenly, the widget gets a new
    name, which must be propagated throughout (unless during my prototyping
    I had the foresight to keep it all in a variable, but...).

    So that's why I rely on grid.  Discovering that I need another row or
    column means I have to change the layout code, but not much else.  No
    new widgets, etc.

'''EE''': Actually, while I agree that having to put things into frames just to make them align the way I want is an inconvenience, it doesn't have to change the names of the widgets. You can just create the new frame as a sibling of the widgets it needs to contain, and [[pack $top.w -in $top.frame]].

[Roy Terry] is among pack's fans who emphasizes that it's like Tcl itself--it make people who expect it to be something other than what it is unhappy. He underscores the importance of "distinguishing between parcel space (-expand) and widget/slave (-fill)", which the current (8.4) documentation fails to do adequately.

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[RS] If one dimension is good enough for me, I still often use pack. Here's a simple "2-D" example with a subframe, as mentioned above:

 frame  .top
 label  .top.1 -text Hello
 button .top.2 -text world -command exit
 eval pack [winfo children .top] -side left
 text   .t
 label  .bottom -text "This goes below"
 eval pack [winfo children .] ;# -side top is default 

Notice the [eval] pack idiom, which saves you keeping track of the children...

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See also:

   * [grid]
   * [gridplus]
   * [place]

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