'''[http://www.tcl.tk/man/tcl/TkCmd/selection.htm%|%selection]''', a [Tk] [TkCommands%|%command],  manipulates the [X] selection.



** Synopsis **

    :   '''selection''' ''option ?arg arg ...?''

Supported subcommands are:

    :   '''[selection clear]''' ''?-'''''displayof''''' window? ?-'''''selection''''' selection?''

    :   '''[selection get]''' ''?-'''''displayof''''' window? ?-'''''selection''''' selection? ?-'''''type''''' type?''

    :   '''[selection handle]''' ''?-'''''selection''''' selection? ?-'''''type''''' type? ?-'''''format''''' format? window command''

    :   '''[selection own]''' ''?-'''''displayof''''' window? ?-'''''selection''''' selection?''

    :   '''[selection own]''' ''?-'''''command''''' command? ?-'''''selection''''' selection? window''



** Documentation **

   [http://www.tcl.tk/man/tcl8.5/TkCmd/selection.htm%|%official reference]:   



** Description **

Can someone write up some text distinguishing the terms for 'inter-widget text
highlighting for copy/paste purposes' and 'user initiated indication of widget
component indication' - in other words, distingushing the concept of 'selecting
text in a text widget or whatever' vs 'selecting listbox items'...



** [Utf-8] Characters **

[DKF]: Sometimes you need to get UTF-8 characters through the selection
(especially the [clipboard]) on Unix/X11. Tk's default bindings handle most of
this automatically for you, but sometimes you need to do a bit more.

This is because the STRING selection ''type'' (selections can have many types
at once) does not properly support anything other than ASCII for historic
reasons. A standard introduced a while back to work around this problem uses
the UTF8_STRING selection type instead (and that causes string data to be sent
as utf-8, which we handle just nicely) and we support exporting the data using
that type automatically: you don't need to do anything to make that work. But
when reading a selection, you have to handle it manually (Tk's default bindings
do this for you normally, but they're just scripted). The correct way to do
this is, when looking to get a string from the selection, to try to read the
get the selection with type UTF8_STRING first, and only if that fails fall back
to using STRING.



** Replacing xv_gset_se **

[LV]: On [Solaris], under the old Open Windows , there was a command called
'''xv_get_sel''' whose purpose was to return the text that the user had
selected .  With Solaris 9, that command was no longer available. My first cut
at replacing it is:


======
#! /usr/bin/env tclsh
package require Tk
wm withdraw .
set selContents [selection get -selection PRIMARY]
puts $selContents
exit
======

I don't know whether the original command also checked the secondary and
clipboard targets or not. This does what I needed - if someone needs more
functionality, the code is here to extend.



** See Also **

   [clipboard]:   

   [label selection]:   

   [listbox selection]:   

   [Primary Transfer vs. the Clipboard]:   


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