Menus

[edscott wilson garcia]

El mar, 28-01-2003 a las 00:08, Biju Chacko escribió:
> Hi,
> 
> This is just an attempt to get all my thoughts straight. I figured
> expaining them would clarify them for me too. ;-)
> 
> I have come to the conclusion that the freedesktop menu spec is a
> complicated solution to a real problem. The problem is that distro
> makers and application makers need a consistent way to present menus to
> users. Unfortunately, the current menu spec is *very* complicated and is
> a moving target as well.
> 
> However, I don't think we can afford to ignore it completely. We need
> *some* way to represent all the applications installed on the system,
> and this is the most promising way.
> 
> There is also the issue that hierarchical menus are not really
> compatible with the way XFce works. Many people (eg tom at unhooked.net)
> prefer small simple menus that are easily edited.
> 
> So, what needs to be done?
> 
> Here is my initial solution:
> 
> * Menu parsers are implemented as plugins. Example plugins would be:
> xfdeskmenu rcfile, old-style menu directory and freedesktop menu spec.
> Distros could implement their own plugins for their own system menus.
> 
> * Each parser would have an interface of a minimum of three functions:
> 
> 	* get_menu() -- returns a data structure representing the menu.
> 	* add_menu_item(path, data) -- adds or replaces the item at 		'path'
> using 'data'
> 	* del_menu_item(path) -- deletes the item at 'path'
> 
> * Menus returned by the plugins would be merged by the parent  
> application.
> 
> * The parent application would be a library, so that consistent menus
> can be displayed by xfdesktop, xftaskbar and xfce-panel.
> 
> * Menu editing would be integrated into menu display similar to how  
> popups in xfce-panel behave.
> 
> OTOH, this may be overly complicated for something as trivial as menu
> display. The other alternative would be to have something with similar
> functionality to xfdeskmenu. It would be simple to begin with, but
> difficult to add features to.
> 
> Comments, flames, etc?

On this issue I've been thinking on something Jasper proposed time ago,
which is to have each root entry in xffm as a plugable module (sounds
real good and I have absolutely no idea how to do it or if it even can
be done). Then menus and submenus could then appear as a tree structure.
Creating personalized menus would by as easy as drag+drop. 

EWG

> 
> -- b
> 
> 
> -- 
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> Biju 'botsie' Chacko                        biju_chacko at vsnl dot net
> http://www.symonds.net/~botsie          Public Key available on request
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
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