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List:       kde-core-devel
Subject:    RE: More thoughts about embedding (fwd)
From:       Simon Hausmann <shaus () uermel ! Med ! Uni-Magdeburg ! DE>
Date:       1999-09-30 8:59:47
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..stupid f***** reply-to :-(

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 1999 09:49:45 +0100
From: David Faure <David.Faure@CRAMER.CO.UK>
To: 'Simon Hausmann' <shaus@neuro2.med.uni-magdeburg.de>
Subject: RE: More thoughts about embedding

> I think there are several problems when attempting to use an IDL
> interface to create/connect to a GUI:
> 
>  1) Using IDL will *always* end up in a restricted solution, meaning
>     developers will not be able to create/modify certain GUI elements,
>     because they're either not defined in the IDL, yet, or 
> they are too
>     difficult to describe them in IDL (too much bloat)
> 
>     In the end this means that applications using this 
> technology will not
>     be able to use the latest features of Qt/kdeui and therefore
>     possibly have a less-functional GUI than applications not 
> using this technology.

I agree, hence my mixed corba-XML solution proposal.

>  2) Using IDL will *always* create a certain kind of bloat. Take the
>     OpenParts pixmap conversion for example...
Yes, but OTOH using QPixmap all over the place kills ANY interoperability,
be it with Java, bonobo, c, perl, whatever.
Hence the idea of _using_ QPixmap for koffice to koffice stuff,
but keeping the IDL for interoperability.

>  3) It requires developers to learn a "new GUI" system. This 
> is bad IMHO, as there should IMHO be *one* interface for creating a GUI.
If we can provide both, they don't need to learn the non-Qt one.

> Another point:
> If you want to use XML to describe a GUI, then you *need* 
> direct access to
> the embedded component, like for accessing QAction objects 
> for example.
> You cannot use CORBA here.
Really ? I need to know more about this.
Can't you describe in XML "I want a menu with such and such items, please
add it" ?
I suppose the problem is the callback when the item is pressed,
but that's where corba helps.

I really see good points in that mixed XML-CORBA solution :
you can add a lot of new GUI stuff in the XML format, so you
don't create IDL bloat for that, but you are still able to
communicate via CORBA to other languages/processes/machines,
to send the XML and to implement actions when menu items are pressed,
when you need to redraw yourself, etc...

--
David Faure
faure@kde.org - KDE developer
david@mandrakesoft.com - Mandrake
david.faure@cramer.co.uk - Cramer Systems

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