[Konversation-devel] Modifying the tree view

[Eike Hein]

First of, I'm generally unwilling to accept any addition
to the treelist that isn't also reasonably implementable
for the tab bar at this time, as the current design di-
rection focusses on proposing the treelist as a vertical
alternative and otherwise functional equivalent to it.


> Server TreeViewItem would display
>    - if they are set to auto-connect on startup

I'm OK with implementing this as a toggle action in the
context menu. Constantly shoving it into the users face
with a visual is unreasonable clutter, IMO. In the con-
text menu it makes a fine addition, though.


>    - if they are currently connected

Greying out the labels of disconnected views was on my
original todo for the treelist, but I ran out of time
to implement it for the 1.0 release. It needs some care
to interact properly with the highlighting system and
the selection, but it's certainly possible.

I'm presently rewriting the parts of our code that in-
stanciate and track connections, which gives a nicer
API for this, and probably would have implemented it
afterwards. It's certainly possible in the current code-
base, too, though, and if you want to try, be my guest.


>    - and if they are set into a "Favorite" list of server.
> Favorite servers are always shown although not connected. thus, you can
> have
> a Server always present in your tree view without having it in
> auto-connect.

I'm not a big fan of the "Favorites" mechanics and
would rather pass on this for the current release
cycle, especially given how hairy it would be to
implement with the current lack of seperation be-
tween the GUI and the protocol backend. I'm don't
really see the use either.


> Channel TreeViewItem would display
>    - auto-open on server connect

See above: context menu toggle.


>    - currently opened (join)

Properly disentangling GUI and backend here is pen-
ding refactoring we have on the slate for the KDE4
port, I don't think it's reasonable to attempt this
in the current codebase given the release cycle.


>    - in my favorite list of channel.
> Again, favorite channels are always shown on my list but unlike the
> auto-open, it does not join the channel, only display it.

See above.


> Query TreeViewItem would display
>    - auto-start query? I'm not sure if this is enough interesting as a
> feature.

Nor am I ;).


>    - is the user is in my favorite list (NotifyList)
>    - if the user is online (that "replaces" the WatchList/NotifyList in a
> more presentable way)

IMO the WNO code is shakey and unreliable, and I'd
rather not prominently display data it comes up with
in the UI until that changes.


>    - if the query is current open.

Unlike channels, queries are stateless. The server
doesn't know whether you have a query open or not.


> I think that be sweet looking and would improve the user experience.

Personally, I'm not willing to ship such a cluttered
interface. Two of the features you propose (connection
state and auto-connect/join state) can be implemented
with less clutter and with consistency between the
treelist and the tab bar, and the third (notify) gets
struck down on viability, IMO.


-- 
Regards,
Eike Hein, hein at kde.org