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tkinter: The deprecated trace variable command was removed from Tk 9.0 - tkinter still uses it. #127802
Description
Bug report
Bug description:
The file tkinter/__init__.py contains the following code:
def trace_variable(self, mode, callback):
"""Define a trace callback for the variable.
MODE is one of "r", "w", "u" for read, write, undefine.
CALLBACK must be a function which is called when
the variable is read, written or undefined.
Return the name of the callback.
This deprecated method wraps a deprecated Tcl method that will
likely be removed in the future. Use trace_add() instead.
"""
# TODO: Add deprecation warning
trace = trace_variable
The deprecated Tcl method was removed from Tcl 9.0, before the deprecation warning was added in tkinter. The trace_variable() and trace() methods still exist in both the current tkinter/__init__.py and the replacement which was included in PR #124112. Calling those methods with Tk 9.0 raises a TclError.
CPython versions tested on:
3.13
Operating systems tested on:
macOS
Activity
[-]tkinter: deprecated Variable.trace_variable command is removed from Tk 9.0 [/-][+]tkinter: deprecated trace variable command was removed from Tk 9.0 - tkinter still uses it. [/+][-]tkinter: deprecated trace variable command was removed from Tk 9.0 - tkinter still uses it. [/-][+]tkinter: The deprecated trace variable command was removed from Tk 9.0 - tkinter still uses it. [/+]culler commentedon Dec 10, 2024
The deprecated Tcl
trace variablecommand was a short cut fortrace add variable. My suggestion would be to add the deprecation warnings to thetraceandtrace_variablemethods of theVariableclass, and also make those commands call thetrace_addmethod. That way code which uses the deprecated methods will still work.gh-127802: Schedule removal of legacy tkinter variable trace methods …
serhiy-storchaka commentedon Jun 25, 2026
They will be removed in 3.17.
[3.15] gh-127802: Schedule removal of legacy tkinter variable trace m…
terryjreedy commentedon Jun 25, 2026
idlelib/, turtledemo/, and turtle.py have no instances of
trace_variable.