TKBC Home Page

This is the homepage of TkBroadcast. Tkbroadcast is an tcl/tk based messaging utility designed to provide the funtionality of broadcast on the Apple Macintosh. While appletalk broadcast is available for Unix, it isn't as slick as the Mac version, and it requires appletalk. If you are mainly interested in messaging between unix workstations, then tkbroadcast is for you! Written entirely in standard tcl/tk, tkbroadcast should be highly portable - EVEN to the Mac and Windows, and since it uses IP instead of a proprietary LAN protocal, it works across the internet.

The latest version is 3.2. The last stable 2.0 release is 2.1b1. 3.0 is a MAJOR overhaul and I recommend switching. 3.2 is much more robust and offers several new features and fewer internal artifacts than 3.0b1 and 3.1. The first of the new metaservers is at sitcom.vassar.edu running on port 5500. Email me if you have trouble or a bug to report. I'm thinking about putting up a tkbc majordomo mailing list on sitcom. Email me if you are interested.

requirements

• Some Un*x variant, WinNT or possibly Win95 or MacOS. (Linux, SunOS, AIX, NT known to work)
• Tcl (tk wish, really) version 7.6 or newer. The "new" file commands and tcp/ip routines are needed. If you only have 7.5 you can comment out the file commands that don't work and uncomment the exec commands that do the same thing.
• The metaserver should run under tcl 7.5 or newer.

download (save link as...)

• Download version 3.2, full distribution.
• Download version 3.2 for non Unix platforms., client only. Note that this is preliminary and though it seems to work ok I haven't tested it much. If you get it to work under 95 please let me know. Edit the top of the script to point to your hostname. This version has been seen to work under Win NT and MacOS 7.1. Use tcl/tk 8 on these platforms.
• Download version 3.1 (tcl 7.6 or newer)
• Download version 2.1b1
• View the tkbc README. Includes the Changes log and comes with the distribution

Known Public Metaservers

• sitcom.vassar.edu on port 5500 (sitcom is gone :-( )

Common problems

• Stupid (meaning "that I haven't seen") /etc/resolv.conf formats
• Firewall that won't let you receive messages from outside. You SHOULD be able to register on an outside metaserver and send messages to the outside, however.
• Older version of Tcl/Tk that doesn't support "file copy" or "socket" commands. The first can be easily worked around if you're on a Unix system , but the second means your SOL until you install recent versions of Tcl/Tk.

Known bugs in 3.2 (and maybe earlier versions)

• metaserver being ornery about updates. at least I THINK it's the metaserver

Future plans

• metaserver metaserver?
• File browser for "insert file" on outgoing messages
and file browser and save funtion for incoming messages
• Personalized Icons?
• Have the client set it's update interval auomatically based on the metaserver's update interval