[Panel-devel] [PATCH] tooltips + taskbar thumbnails

[Jason Stubbs]

On Thursday 27 December 2007 03:39:19 JST Sebastian Kügler wrote:
> On Wednesday 26 December 2007 02:50:01 Jason Stubbs wrote:
> > I don't particularly like it... If kwin decides to change its config
> > layout or if the name of the taskbar thumbnail effect changes, this patch
> > will break. Also, if the user makes changes to settings the user can end
> > up with both tooltips or no tooltips for the remainder of the session. If
> > the taskbar thumbnail effect is enabled but composite is disabled, the
> > user will also end up with no tooltips. In an environment where the
> > thumbnail effect doesn't do anything (like mine) the user will also end
> > up with no tooltips.
> >
> > The taskbar thumbnail effect currently works by checking if the mouse
> > position is within the published geometry on every single mouse move and
> > is more of a quick hack to show what can be done - hence, demo in its
> > name. I'm not sure if it'll remain for kde 4.0 or not, but I think it'd
> > be much better to work with the kwin team to sort this out rather than
> > working around it.
>
> I do agree to your points. My patch was more a quick hack to make this
> situation suck less than it currently does. I am using those taskbar
> thumbnails, and there's just no way to remove those tooltips. Sure it can
> break, and sure it's not a nice piece of code, but it *does* lighten some
> cases and it makes it at least possible to have the taskbar working without
> major visual glitches (even if it might take re-logging in).
>
> How about adding a check for composite, and putting it in at least for 4.0?
> (I hope the taskbar will see much love then anyway, right now it kind of
> sucks (little options, two rows would be nice, grouping isn't done, ...)

I know that plasma is exempt from the feature freeze up until 4.0.0 is 
released, but what about afterward? Even if feature creep is allowed during 
4.0, it'd make most sense to me to go with the safest (in terms of chance of 
bugs) for 4.0 and leave anything more for 4.1.

The safest way would probably be to simply add a configuration dialog with 
a "show tooltips" checkbox. Another option that could be added with minimal 
fuss is setting the number of rows, which I was planning to do this week 
anyway. In fact, options like these could probably be thrown straight into 
the context menu.

What do you think?

-- 
Jason Stubbs