Skip to content

ContextMenu

Public ContextMenu — dispatches to a platform-appropriate backend.

On macOS this materializes as a native tk.Menu (NSMenu) so popups integrate with the system, dodging the key-window/activation issues that affect a reused overrideredirect Toplevel on Aqua. On Windows and Linux it uses the themed Toplevel-backed implementation so bootstyle, density, and rich item types apply consistently.

The public API is identical across backends. Consumers should not rely on item() returning a Tk widget — on the native backend it returns the original spec dict, since no per-item widget exists.

__init__ 

__init__(
    master: Master = None,
    minwidth: int = 150,
    width: int = None,
    minheight: int = None,
    height: int = None,
    target: Misc = _TARGET_DEFAULT,
    anchor: str = "nw",
    attach: str = "se",
    offset: tuple[int, int] = None,
    hide_on_outside_click: bool = True,
    items: list[ContextMenuItem] = None,
    density: str = "default",
    trigger: str | None = "right-click",
)

Create a ContextMenu.

Args mirror the underlying backend; trigger is a dispatcher-level convenience that auto-binds the menu to target's click event so callers don't have to wire a bind('<Button-3>', show_at) handler themselves. Set trigger=None (or 'manual') to opt out and manage activation in caller code (e.g. when the menu is built lazily).

target defaults to master when omitted, since the menu is usually attached to the same widget that owns it. Pass target=None explicitly to opt out of positioning/auto-binding (e.g. when calling show(position=(x, y)) with cursor-driven coordinates instead).

Trigger values
  • 'right-click' (default): portable right-click via bootstack.runtime.utility.bind_right_click — <Button-3> on Win/Linux plus <Button-2> and <Control-Button-1> on Aqua.
  • 'click' / 'left-click': <Button-1>.
  • 'double-click': <Double-Button-1>.
  • 'shift-click': <Shift-Button-1>.
  • 'ctrl-click' / 'control-click': <Control-Button-1> (note that on Aqua this is the same as Ctrl+click for context menus, since macOS uses Ctrl+click as a context-menu gesture).
  • None or 'manual': no auto-binding.