TixTList is the Tabular Listbox Widget. It displays a list of items in a tabular format. For example the TixTList widget in figure 3-1 displays files in a directory in rows and columns.
TixTList does all what the standard Tk listbox widget can do, i.e, it displays a list of items. However, TixTList is superior to the listbox widget is many respects. First, TixTList allows you to display the items in a two dimensional format. This way, you can display more items at a time. Usually, the user can locate the desired items much faster in a two dimensional list than the one dimensional list displayed by the Tk listbox widget.
In addition, while the Tk listbox widget can only display text items, the TixTList widget can display a multitude of types of items: text, images and widgets. Also, while you can use only one font and one color in a listbox widget, you can use many different fonts and colors in a TixTList widget. In figure 3-1, we use graphical images inside a tixTList widget to represent file objects. In figure 3-2 , we display the names of all employees of a hypothetical company. Notice the use of a bold font to highlight all employees whose first name is Joe.