Disable aqua on mac?

[smithsp]

I would like to disable the aqua front end of tk, and use the regular x11 face. I tried building without aqua on my Mac, but came across problems. Here are the changes I made:

diff --git a/recipe/build.sh b/recipe/build.sh
index cb190da..3faa53e 100755
--- a/recipe/build.sh
+++ b/recipe/build.sh
@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ cd $SRC_DIR/tk${VER}/unix
        --prefix="${PREFIX}" \
        $ARCH_FLAG \
        --with-tcl="${PREFIX}/lib" \
-       --enable-aqua=yes \
+       --enable-aqua=no \
 
 make
 make install
diff --git a/recipe/meta.yaml b/recipe/meta.yaml
index 1c0795e..b9a363d 100644
--- a/recipe/meta.yaml
+++ b/recipe/meta.yaml
@@ -26,8 +26,16 @@ requirements:
     - curl           # [win]
     - 7za            # [win]
     - vc {{ VC_VERSION }}  # [win]
+    - xorg-libx11 1.6.*        
+    - xorg-xproto 7.0.31 6
+    - libxcb 1.12 1
+    - xorg-kbproto 1.0.7 1
+    - xorg-libxdmcp 1.1.2 3
+    - xorg-libxau 1.0.8 3
+
   run:
     - vc {{ VC_VERSION }}  # [win]
+    - xorg-libx11 1.6.*
 
 test:

My build fails abruptly with

Fixing linking of /atom/conda-bld/tk_1516137711021/_h_env_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_place/lib:/usr/X11R6/lib/libtk8.6.dylib in /atom/conda-bld/tk_1516137711021/_h_env_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_placehold_place/lib/libtk8.6.dylib
Error: Could not find lib:/usr/X11R6/lib/libtk8.6.dylib

Full log is attached.

I was able to build previously, but that version seems to have had some opportunistic linking to my MacPorts installation in /opt/local.

[smithsp]

conda_build_tk.log

[dsentinel]

@smithsp Did you have any luck with this? Or even better upload to a channel?
I have the same need.

[smithsp]

@dsentinel Not that I remember. @kalling do you remember getting this to work?

[kalling]

@smithsp , @dsentinel
I don't think this ever occurred. In fact, I think we starting moving away from custom tk builds?

[dsentinel]

Thanks! Looks like I'm on my own here.

[dsentinel]

I got a build working package built.

[smithsp]

@dsentinel That sounds great! Did you upload it to a channel?

[dsentinel]

I haven't.
I'd be happy to if there is interest. This would require a bit of effort to create a channel and test for more general use.

It sounds like you all moved away from it, and I didn't come across any others complaining in my research for this. Which surprised me. We have legacy tkinter apps that look terrible on aqua, and some custom elements flat out don't work. I figured there would be others out there with the same issues, but all I found were old complaints that thought x11 looked bad and wanted aqua.

[smithsp]

@dsentinel We reverted to using MacPorts, since we couldn't come up with a solution, but having a non-aqua conda version is still desirable. Maybe you could open a pull request on this repo, and we could work with the conda-forge folks to come up with a non-aqua variant for mac-osx-64 that could be managed through their channel.

[dsentinel]

@dsentinel We reverted to using MacPorts, since we couldn't come up with a solution,

I love macports! But I can't ask my users to install it for my software to install.

but having a non-aqua conda version is still desirable. Maybe you could open a pull request on this repo, and we could work with the conda-forge folks to come up with a non-aqua variant for mac-osx-64 that could be managed through their channel.

Sure thing. Gimme a couple of weeks, I'm about to travel.
I can create a custom channel if it comes to it. I have an internal channel serving here.

I built this on a mac, so it may require a bit of effort to get it working in CI with a Linux docker cross-compile. I made a quick attempt in that direction but bailed for forgotten reasons.

[smithsp]

Mention @orso82 and @FantuzziMatteo97

[FantuzziMatteo97]

Using the default tk package from conda-forge, if I use Dark mode, then I can't see the menu subitems:

If I just switch back to the default appearance mode (light), then the subitems show up fine

This was the motivation for wanting to move away from the aqua build of tk.

[jakirkham]

@FantuzziMatteo97, did you raise this with the Tk developers?

[smithsp]

@jakirkham We have not raised this with the Tk folks. We just wanted to use the non-aqua version of tk, since it works with that (installed via MacPorts). But do you happen to know the best way to contact them?

[kalling]

@jakirkham @FantuzziMatteo97 The dark mode issue is certainly an annoyance with some (all?) conda versions of tk. I have tried a number of tk versions and some are worse than others. (As in, some versions of tk make everything blank, while others just have the menu issue in dark mode.)