If you are compiling python and you want to build idle/tkinter, you need to have the development packages for tcl and tk. The python build scripts will only build tkinter should they find the libraries (libtk8.4.so and libtcl8.4.so) and the header files (tk.h and tcl.h). If you don't have the development packages installed, you most likely do not have the header files.
If you install the development packages and recompile, test by importing _tkinter. If that is successful, idle should run just fine. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
