<br>Rereading this message, please understand that all I am talking about is about a fast interface that does not need mouse picking the correct choice. <br><br>I was very concentrated thinking about this problem (in the toilet, you know ...) and had a thought both trivial and illuminating. <br>
Even if they may seem the same the following two are very different cases:<br>- <a href="http://whatever">http://whatever</a><br>- =2+2 <br><br>In the first case, we have _plain text_ that happens to be an URL <br>In the second case, we have a _domain specific language_ '=' is not likely to be found in most document in that position.<br>
<br>I think both are really cool and both have very good uses not only in krunner but for the desktop. <br>The main advantage of the first approach (other than less typing) is that anything becomes krunnable, any konqueror word, any Localizer sentence, any equation.<br>
To achieve it we just need a shortcut that runs krunner in whatever you last put in your clipboard and launch the most relevant action. Even the applications can give tips to krunner to choose the runner?<br>And Imagine a shortcut that do the above and takes the information back to your application (maybe this can be managed with drag and drop or something similar and get a lot of power with little effort). <br>
Also is the way to go if you don't know the commands.<br><br>The main advantage of the second approach is that it lets you make complex things with a very natural interface and in an unified way all over the desktop. <br>
"translate" <br>"map"<br>"send to <a href="mailto:bugs@kde.org">bugs@kde.org</a>"<br>"svn up"<br><br>All those commands will be applied again to the last thing you entered in the clipboard (or run them in Krunner as "command data")<br>
It will be very possible but not so general to select the word "Madrid" (or write it in krunner) and get the top rank runner a map service runner. <br>And almost imposible get the translation service in the first place given any general word. <br>
So commands can specify!<br><br>I argue that both modes (plain text and command line) are useful not only in krunner but beyond.<br>But they must be differentiate (you may want to look for the word "translate" in your HD).<br>
The fastest thing I can think is using an special character like ':' or '=' that will not be likely to appear in a natural text at the beginning of a sentence.<br>So:<br>translate -> feed runners and get their results (the user select or launch the top ranking)<br>
:translate -> The command is parser and only the "translate" service runner is called<br><br>I hope all this make sense for you as it does for me and see how the big picture can make it a really powerful feature in KDE. I think that at least the krunner and runners work is attainable in one SoC. Using it in applications ... You know better than me how hard it can become. <br>
<br>Please let me know your thoughts. Sorry for the horrible long email... I may be too verbose explaining myself ...<br><br><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">2008/3/19 Aaron J. Seigo <<a href="mailto:aseigo@kde.org">aseigo@kde.org</a>>:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><div class="Ih2E3d">On Tuesday 18 March 2008, Jordi Polo wrote:<br>
</div><div class="Ih2E3d">> If you write:<br>
> <a href="http://www.domain.com" target="_blank">http://www.domain.com</a><br>
> Surely you want to open a browser with that<br>
> But it will be possible (if it is not working yet) that the files<br>
> downloaded from internet are annotated with the page from where they were<br>
> downloaded. Then you may mean search for that in your metainformation.<br>
<br>
</div>which is one reason we have relevancy ranking and the ability to have multiple<br>
returns.<br>
<div class="Ih2E3d"><br>
> So, what I thought was create domain specific runners as you said (the<br>
> current swith user, logout, etc. Functionality is a good example) and a<br>
> language to avoid ambiguities. ("search 2+2" or "calc 2+2" for instance).<br>
<br>
</div>the calc runner actually use '=' to denote a calculation. so 2+2 won't produce<br>
a calculation, but =2+2 will. so we're mostly on the same page here. we could<br>
easily add "calc" to it the calc runner if we wanted, of course =)<br>
<br>
but yes, i agree with the concept.<br>
<br>
that said, krunner supports the idea of multiple answers, so even if you got<br>
two returns it's also ok. being able to rank them properly is pretty<br>
important, of course.<br>
<div class="Ih2E3d"><br>
> Also, it can be a good idea to make the commands eventually produce<br>
> information that could be inserted in other applications.<br>
<br>
</div>the translation runner sort of does this already, actually, by putting its<br>
answer into the clipboard when selected.<br>
<div class="Ih2E3d"><br>
> But the "parse high level language and give the parsed information to one<br>
> domain specific runner" is pretty different and I'd say that even<br>
> incompatible with the "give the info to the runners and get the results"<br>
> that I think is how the current krunner works.<br>
<br>
</div>i'm not sure i follow you here.<br>
<br>
there are two places the parsing can happen:<br>
<br>
* in individual runners<br>
* before hitting the runners<br>
<br>
if the latter, that just means we need to expose another data structure in<br>
addition to the raw search term to runners that care that contains the<br>
results of the parsing.<br>
<div><div></div><div class="Wj3C7c"><br>
--<br>
Aaron J. Seigo<br>
humru othro a kohnu se<br>
GPG Fingerprint: 8B8B 2209 0C6F 7C47 B1EA EE75 D6B7 2EB1 A7F1 DB43<br>
<br>
KDE core developer sponsored by Trolltech<br>
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<br></blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Jordi Polo Carres<br>NLP laboratory - NAIST<br><a href="http://www.bahasara.org">http://www.bahasara.org</a><br>