The -options switch is good if you want to specify subwidget options for one or a few mega-widgets. If you want to specify the subwidget for many mega-widgets, it is easier to use the Tk Option Database.
Options in the Tk Option Database can be specified using the option command and the pathname of the widget. For all the Tix mega-widgets, it is guaranteed that the pathname of their subwidgets ends with the name of the subwidgets. For example, if we have a mega widget called .a.b.megaw and it has a subwidget whose name is subw, then we can be sure that the pathname of the subwidget will be something like
.a.b.megaw.foo.bar.subw
Therefore, if we want to specify options for it in the Option Database, we can issue commands like:
option add *a.b.megaw*subw.option1 value1
option add *a.b.megaw*subw.option2 value2
Notice that it will be wrong to issue the commands as:
option add *a.b.megaw.subw.option1 value1
option add *a.b.megaw.subw.option2 value2
because in general we will not know whether the subwidget is an immediate child window of .a.b.megaw (such a decision is left to the mega-widget implementor and may vary in different versions of the same mega-widget).
Program 1-7 demonstrates how the Tk Option Database can be used to achieve the same effect as program 1-5.
option add *TixControl*label.width 8(Figure 1-7) Using the Tk Option Database in Place of the -options switch
option add *TixControl*label.anchor e
option add *TixControl*entry.width 10
option add *TixControl*entry.borderWidth 3
tixControl .income -label "Income: " -variable income
tixControl .age -label "Age: " -variable age
pack .income .age -side top