user interface for mouse actions configuration

[Michael Rudolph]

Hello everyone, hello Chani,

I've seen your screenshot of the mouse actions configuration dialog at
the plasma IRC meeting and in your recent blog post and I was
wondering what your reasons were for making the user interface plugin
based? I mean, letting the user select the plugin first and then
assign a shortcut to it.

I know that keyboard shortcuts are assigned like that and the idea of
activating a hot spot area and then just hitting the key combination,
I want assigned to an action, is really clever. Yet, for the mouse
action configuration, it seems kind of backwards to me. Maybe I'm just
slower in adjusting my mental model of the process, but couldn't an
event based configuration ui be better, more understandable in this
case? That is, show the key (or button) events first and then let the
user select, what action (or plugin) he wants invoked.

The number of possible events is quite low, especially compared to the
regular keyboard shortcuts configuration. Typically only four events:
left, right, middle mouse button and a scroll wheel. Also the number
of modifier keys is manageable as well. So perhaps it could be done.

Anyway, I made a little mockup, of the configuration dialog, that I
seemed to be able to grok much easier. What do you think?
http://skitch.com/michaelrudolph/bsrix/configuredesktopactions

michael