RFC: spell checking for QTextEdit

[David Edmundson]

On Wed, Aug 7, 2013 at 10:13 AM, Aurélien Gâteau <agateau at kde.org> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I'd like to reach a decision regarding spell checking for QTextEdit.
>
> It was initially a Qt5 task:
>
> "Allow to register a default syntax highlighter type for QTextEdit, the KDE
> backend would register the spell checking one coming from sonnet as
> default"
>
> I started working on this task and put together a first patch, but then
> realized it would not be enough: in addition to the syntax highlighter,
> integration with QTextEdit requires context menu support to be able to
> provide
> suggestions for spelling errors.
>
> I already have code which integrates Sonnet (our spellchecker component)
> with
> QTextEdit, in the form of a helper class named (for now)
> Sonnet::TextEditInstaller:
>
> https://git.reviewboard.kde.org/r/111912/
>
>
> There was a discussion on IRC two days ago regarding how transparent should
> spellcheck integration with QTextEdit be, with two possible positions:
>
>
> A. Find a way to inject spellchecking in all QTextEdit through either QPA
> or
> our style.
>
> Pros:
> - Completely transparent to Qt app developers
> - Porting a KDE app to KF5 is only KTextEdit => QTextEdit
>
> Cons:
> - Depends on QPA and/or style, so won't always be available depending on
> the
> platform
> - Could cause problems if spellchecking is injected in QTextEdit where it
> makes no sense to provide this feature (eg. code editor)
>
>
> B. Only provide Sonnet::TextEditInstaller, which app developers would then
> have to explicitly use to add spell checking to QTextEdit in their
> applications.
>
> Pros:
> - No under-the-hood hack
> - Independant from the platform as long as we have Sonnet plugins for it
> - Gives more control to the app developer: for example changing the
> spelling
> language, adding custom words to ignore, or ignoring blocks of text (think
> quoted email)
>
> Cons:
> - Requires developers to explicitly use the API, so porting a KDE app to
> KF5
> is KTextEdit => QTextEdit + use Sonnet::TextEditInstaller.
>
>
I'm not sure that is a real con.

KTextEdit still exists in KF5 and has been moved to KTextWidgets in tier 2.

If I've understood correctly, with option B we would only need to port to
QTextEdit + use Sonnet::TextEditInstaller for anything inside kdelibs tier
1 and to make it available for any app which only want tier 1 libs.

Porting any KDE apps can just include KTextWidgets and not change anything
when porting to KF5.

David


> I am personnaly in favor of B), but would like to hear others opinions.
>
> Aurélien
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