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List:       kde-devel
Subject:    Re: Easy to use components
From:       Simon Hausmann <tronical () gmx ! net>
Date:       1999-07-02 21:54:43
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On Fri, 2 Jul 1999, Kurt Granroth wrote:

> Simon Hausmann wrote:
> > But: Why not use the full-fledged HTMLView component from Konqueror
> > directly? IMHO this is what components are for, and embedding a
> > remote KonqHTMLView can be done in about 10 LOC.
> > 
> > Advantages are:
> > - Use all features from Konqy, including Plugins (see tool-issue thread on
> >   kfm-devel)
> > - KonqHTMLView has nice features, just like "save document as..." for
> >   example . Either call the method directly or use the GUI (next point)
> > - Just send the HTMLView a special event with a reference to a
> >   OpenPartsUI::Menu and it fills it with it's menu entries.
> > 
> > I think this is the 100% equivalent thing to the ActiveX component
> > or IE.
> 
> This does indeed encapsulate the functionality of the IE component!  I kind of
> expected that konqueror would have that kind of functionality..
> 
> HOWEVER, my point was more on the lines of "how do we make it easy for 3rd
> party developers to *use* our components?"
> 
> Say I am developing an app called MapDemo.  It needs to have a 640x480 "web
> browser" widget that will display the contents of a specific URL *completely*
> formatted as if you were viewing it in the full-up web browser.  I don't care
> about any menus or buttons or anything -- but it *must* be able to follow all
> links and react to any web page "correctly".
> 
> I already detailed how easy it is to do this with VC++ and the IE ActiveX
> component.  As soon as IE was installed on my system, it *immediately* become
> one of the potential ActiveX components available for use.
> 
> Okay, now lets talk about what needs to be done with KDE:
> 
> 1) When I install konqueror, it needs to "register" all of its Parts
>    *somewhere* that can be accessed by IDEs or by geeks.  That is, an
>    application can be made to "browse" a list of all the available Parts.

Well, Konqueror publishes it's services by installing konqueror.desktop
into $(kde_servicesdir) . This makes it available for kded. In fact
for the registry this is only one service, it's the implementation of the
Konqueror::Application interface. This interface contains (as a central
place) all factory methods to create all available components of Konqy
(IMHO it's not worth to install 8-10 autoloaders -> much duplicated code).
So if you really want to *use* the components of the dragon, then you
have to read the IDL.
But that's what a developer should do anyway when dealing with CORBA, 
IMHO.
It's just like when using a third-party library -> you have to read the
*.h files :)

> 2) I must be able to use an individual Part *very* simply.  Your 10 LOC
>    estimate sounds acceptable... but maybe we can make it even simpler?

I think it doesn't count how much LOC you have to insert really (at least
it's IMHO unimportant in the range of +-10 lines..) . It's more important
how the actualy interface of the component looks like, how easy it is to
use.

What's more important about both points is IMHO: An IDE supporting this
might be nice. Reasonably the KDevelop guys are currently more focused on
releasing a 1.0 version rather than switching to HEAD. But I personally 
really hope that they switch before 2.0 is out.

> Is this doable already? 

Reality is exciting ... :-)
(IMO)

Greetings,
 Simon

P.S.: Perhaps some example code using components from all over KDE might
      be interesting? But where to put it?

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