Instead of storing individual widgets in separate scalars, you can store those scalars in a orderly hash structure, which will allow you to access them by a key. So for instance, say you had 2 pages, and 3 widgets on each page. You could be "clunky" and call them $page1_widget1, $page1_widget2, $page1_widget3, and $page2_widget1, $page2_widget2, $page2_widget3.

You can see how clunky that is. An alternative, would be to store them all in a hash, like

my %hash;   # NOT my $hash, unless you want to set it up reference sty
+le
# then create in  loops $hash{$page}{$widget}
#like 
foreach my $page(1..2){
   #add the page
   $hash{$page}{'page'} = $nb->add(......)
       #fill each page with widgets
       foreach my $widg( 1..3){
           $hash{$page}{$widj} = $hash{$page}{'page'}->Button(.....opt
+ions.)
            }
      }
[download]

This is a very simple example of course, and real world apps each need the best hash setup. It sort of is an art that is learned by spending a few afternoons setting up hashes and experimenting. There are 2 great benefits to storing widgets in a hash.

1. It makes accessing and looping thru them easy. You can loop thru all the widgets on page2 for instance.

2. And this comes later.... if you want to put your script into a package or module, the hash is already setup to be blessed. Instead of $hash{$page}{$widj} you would have $self->{$page}->{$widj}.

A whole book could be written on this, so I'm stopping now. Just play around with simple apps, and store things in hashes...it won't take long for you to figure it out.

Hi,

I think you mean

my %hash;

not

my $hash;

Thank your for your patience and help. I have improved the code a bit, but have hit a snag. I am using a hash reference to call a Checkbutton variable. The reference on line 55 , $flags{$tab} is the variable $pgr1_flag. Evidently this is ill-advised. Advice?

use warnings;
use strict;
use Tk;
use Tk::NoteBook;
require Tk::Pane;
use Tk::LabEntry;

my $mw = MainWindow->new;
$mw->geometry( "600x500" );
$mw->title("Survival Kit");

##mainwindow, scroll, frames##
my $spane=$mw->Scrolled('Pane')->pack(-expand=>1,-fill=>'both');
my $frame1=$spane->Frame()->pack(-side=>'left',-expand=>1,-fill=>'both
+',-padx=>15);
my $frame2=$spane->Frame(-padx=>15)->pack(-side=>'right',-expand=>1,-f
+ill=>'both');

##Checkbuttons##
my ($pgr1_flag,$pgr2_flag);
my %flags = qw(program1 $pgr1_flag program2 $pgr2_flag);
     my $cb_cnt=1; 
    for my $flag (keys %flags){
       if ($cb_cnt < 6 ){
        my $flag_but=$frame1->Checkbutton(-text => "$flag ", -variable
+ => \$flags{$flag} )->pack;
       } else {
              my $flag_but=$frame2->Checkbutton(-text => "$flag ", -va
+riable => \$flags{$flag} )->pack;
          }
        $cb_cnt++;
    }


##OPEN button##
my $open=$mw->Button(-text => "Open\n Tool (s)", -command => \&but)->p
+ack( -side=>'bottom', -pady=>20);


MainLoop;

####################### subs #################################

sub but {

## kill top window
$spane->destroy($open);

###default hash
my %tools = ( 'program1' => { 'PARM1' => 1, 'PARM2' => 'n', 'PARM3' =>
+ 'y', 'PARM4' => 'n', 'PARM5' => 'y', 'PARM6' => 'n', 'PARM7' => 'y',
+ 'PARM8' => 'n', 'PARM9' => 'y', 'PARM10' => 'n' }, 'program2' => { '
+PARM1' => 1, 'PARM2' => 2, 'PARM3' => 3, 'PARM4' => 4, 'PARM5' => 5, 
+'PARM6' => 6, 'PARM7' => 7, 'PARM8' => 8, 'PARM9' => 9, 'PARM10' => 1
+0 });

## create notebook

my $book = $mw->NoteBook()->pack(-expand=>1,-fill=>'both');

#####program1#######
my $tab_cnt=1;
for my $tab (keys %flags){
     if ($flags{$tab}){       
     ##create tab,scroll pane,frames
      my $tab_tab=$book->add("Sheet $tab_cnt", -label => "$tab")->pack
+(-expand=>1,-fill=>'both');
      my $tab_spane=$tab_tab->Scrolled('Pane')->pack(-expand=>1,-fill=
+>'both');
      my $tab_frame1=$tab_spane->Frame()->pack(-side=>'left',-expand=>
+0,-fill=>'both',-padx=>15);
      my $tab_frame2=$tab_spane->Frame(-padx=>15)->pack(-side=>'right'
+,-expand=>0,-fill=>'both');
    $tab_cnt++;
        
    
       ##now fill frames
      my $parm_cnt=0;
       print "Processing tool: $tab\n";
         foreach my $parm ( keys %{$tools{$tab}}) {
        print " $parm = $tools{$tab}{$parm}\n";
             if ($parm_cnt < 5){
                 $tab_frame1->LabEntry(-label => "$parm=", -textvariab
+le => "$tools{$tab}{$parm}" )->pack;
            } else {
                 $tab_frame2->LabEntry(-label => "$parm=", -textvariab
+le => "$tools{$tab}{$parm}" )->pack;  
                   }
              my $tab_parms .= "$parm=$tools{$tab}{$parm}\n";
          $parm_cnt++;
            }
       }
   }

###################SAVE parameters?
 ## button - disappears on reset?
  #my $save1=$sub_spane->Button(-text => "Save Parameters ")->pack;
########Exit button###########

## Implement save?
my $leave=$mw->Button(-text => "Save & Exit ",-command => \&save_parms
+)->pack;

##############################

#######Reset button#############
##needs better implementation?

my $return=$mw->Button(-text => "Reset ", -command => \&rtn)->pack( -s
+ide=>'bottom', -pady=>20);

}

######################################################################
+######################################

sub rtn{
    system 'perl doOver.1 &';
    exit;
    }
#############################

#our ($pgr1_parms,$pgr2_parms);
sub save_parms {
#    open (SP1,">pgr1_parms.txt");
#    print SP1 $pgr1_parms;
#    close SP1;
#    open (SP2,">pgr2_parms.txt");
#    print SP2 $pgr2_parms;
#    close SP2;
    exit;
          }
[download]

BJ