python - How to select at the same time from two Listbox?

Question

from Tkinter import *


master = Tk()

listbox = Listbox(master)
listbox.pack()
listbox.insert(END, "a list entry")

for item in ["one", "two", "three", "four"]:
    listbox.insert(END, item)

listbox2 = Listbox(master)
listbox2.pack()
listbox2.insert(END, "a list entry")

for item in ["one", "two", "three", "four"]:
    listbox2.insert(END, item)

master.mainloop()

The code above creates a tkinter window with two listboxes. But there's a problem if you want to retrieve the values from both because, as soon as you select a value in one, it deselects whatever you selected in the other.

Is this just a limitation developers have to live with?

Answer 1

Short answer: set the value of the exportselection attribute of all listbox widgets to False or zero.

From a pythonware overview of the listbox widget:

By default, the selection is exported to the X selection mechanism. If you have more than one listbox on the screen, this really messes things up for the poor user. If he selects something in one listbox, and then selects something in another, the original selection is cleared. It is usually a good idea to disable this mechanism in such cases. In the following example, three listboxes are used in the same dialog:

b1 = Listbox(exportselection=0)
for item in families:
    b1.insert(END, item)

b2 = Listbox(exportselection=0)
for item in fonts:
    b2.insert(END, item)

b3 = Listbox(exportselection=0)
for item in styles:
    b3.insert(END, item)

The definitive documentation for tk widgets is based on the Tcl language rather than python, but it is easy to translate to python. The exportselection attribute can be found on the standard options manual page.