Menu Editor

[Harald Judt]

Hi,

Am 07.05.2012 12:42, schrieb Raphael Groner:
>> Date: Sun, 06 May 2012 15:12:05 +0200
>> From: Harald Judt<h.judt at gmx.at>
>> To: Xfce development list<xfce4-dev at xfce.org>
>> Subject: Re: Menu Editor
>> Message-ID:<4FA678A5.6000302 at gmx.at>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed
>>
>
> Hi Harald,
>
>> As for the features...
>>
>
> thanks for your feedback about missed features for a menu editor.
> Please find my comments below.
> Alacarte is a good starting point in my opinion, what the design of a
> menu editor belongs to. Unfortunately, Alacarte has a strong dependency
> to the Gnome project and some of their libraries. So this is more like
> a design or technical decidion to take here, not for even more features
> what can be discussed after the port or fork has been done. Therefore,
> I have to ask you for patience. What about starting your own project? :)

I totally agree with that in regard to dependencies. I'm not urging 
anyone to do something, nor do I want to start a project. If I did not 
misunderstand you completely, you're going to do that?

You asked for features, so here was my answer. What you do with the 
ideas is your business, not mine.

>> Or perhaps "how it should look like"? I have only seen screenshots of
>> Alacarte, but those make it seem a bit uncomfortable to use. Maybe
>> it's better to create something from scratch. So here are some ideas
>> to support an efficient workflow:
>>
>> * Menus/Submenus and applications in one tree?-view (WYSIWYG) where
>> the menus can be collapsed/expanded. I find the Alacarte approach
>>     with the menu/item separation inflexible and confusing.
>>
>
> Good idea. So why then not implement an Edit mode to the existing menu
> structure of Garcon? You know that the menu is visualized and organized
> in a tree structure when you're using the applicationsmenu panel plugin
> or the desktop context menu. I can imagine that it should be possible
> to edit directly there.
>
>> * Additionally, use an own area to the right or below the tree-view
>>     that shows the properties of the menu/application (name, command,
>>     path,...). One should not have to double-click the item in the
>>     tree-view and have to deal with an extra dialog to modify or see
>>     something. This would mean lots of tedious extra clicks.
>
>> * Add a new item via the context menu or the main menu at the place of
>>     the current selection.
>
> That's a conflict in my opinion. You request to not have to open an
> extra dialog to change some additional settings of one menu entry. But
> you would like to see a context menu to create a new item. More
> simpler: We add a "New" button somewhere in the already existing window,
> done.

Of course, you can add buttons anywhere, not only implement the 
functionality in the context menu. It was only an example. But I'd hate 
to have to open dialog windows for every single change, that gets 
tedious soon.

>> * Drag&  Drop of single and multiple items. Alacarte seems to have
>> only cumbersome "move up"/"move down" buttons? Connect move up/down to
>>     shortcuts.
>
> Shortcuts souldnt't be a problem at all and can be easily added by a
> patch, afterwards. I know that you can add shortcuts (at least in Qt) to
> every Action (Qt class: QAction) item.
>
>> * Copy&  paste existing entries.
>
> Also a feature request, very nice to have.

Just to be more clear: It's not a request, it's just an idea.

>> * Search for and filter applications. Maybe one could use
>>     xfce4-appfinder to add new entries via drag&  drop?
>>
>
> That's also an enhancement to what Alacarte is able to do, already.
>
> - Raphael

Harald

-- 
`Experience is the best teacher.'