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## Tcl/Tk Documentation > TclCmd > platform

### Tcl/Tk Applications | Tcl Commands | Tk Commands | Tcl Library | Tk Library

  NAME
    platform - System identification support code and utilities
  SYNOPSIS
    package require platform ?1.0.4?
    platform::generic
    platform::identify
    platform::patterns identifier
  DESCRIPTION
  COMMANDS
    platform::identify
    platform::generic
    platform::patterns identifier
  KEYWORDS

### NAME

platform - System identification support code and utilities

### SYNOPSIS

package require platform ?1.0.4?
platform::generic
platform::identify
platform::patterns identifier

### DESCRIPTION

The platform package provides several utility commands useful for the identification of the architecture of a machine running Tcl.

Whilst Tcl provides the tcl_platform array for identifying the current architecture (in particular, the platform and machine elements) this is not always sufficient. This is because (on Unix machines) tcl_platform reflects the values returned by the uname command and these are not standardized across platforms and architectures. In addition, on at least one platform (AIX) the tcl_platform(machine) contains the CPU serial number.

Consequently, individual applications need to manipulate the values in tcl_platform (along with the output of system specific utilities) - which is both inconvenient for developers, and introduces the potential for inconsistencies in identifying architectures and in naming conventions.

The platform package prevents such fragmentation - i.e., it establishes a standard naming convention for architectures running Tcl and makes it more convenient for developers to identify the current architecture a Tcl program is running on.

### COMMANDS

platform::identify
  This command returns an identifier describing the platform the Tcl core is running on. The returned identifier has the general format OS-CPU. The OS part of the identifier may contain details like kernel version, libc version, etc., and this information may contain dashes as well. The CPU part will not contain dashes, making the preceding dash the last dash in the result.
platform::generic
  This command returns a simplified identifier describing the platform the Tcl core is running on. In contrast to platform::identify it leaves out details like kernel version, libc version, etc. The returned identifier has the general format OS-CPU.
platform::patterns identifier
  This command takes an identifier as returned by platform::identify and returns a list of identifiers describing compatible architectures.

### KEYWORDS

operating system, cpu architecture, platform, architecture
Copyright © 1995-1997 Roger E. Critchlow Jr. Copyright © 2006 ActiveState Software Inc