From kde-devel  Thu Apr 13 20:26:10 2000
From: m_elter () t-online ! de (Matthias Elter)
Date: Thu, 13 Apr 2000 20:26:10 +0000
To: kde-devel
Subject: kicker developement branch merged
X-MARC-Message: https://marc.info/?l=kde-devel&m=95565812708309

Hi

I have merged the kicker make_it_cool_branch with HEAD.

A short summary of changes:

- The splitter is gone, buttons and applets live on one panner now.
- The applet API has been simplified/improved.
- Applets can be moved/removed just like buttons. In fact kicker does
not make a distinction between applets and buttons internally.
- Gerneral code cleanup to get rid of dangerous stuff like "external
blah"
- The layout save/restore code has been reimplemented to be more robust.

Some explanation:

- You can move buttons useing the MMB. A RMB click gives you a context
menu. Applets have a "handle" area on the left. Use the handle to move
applets (MMB) and to get a context menu (RMB).
- The handles default look will be changed soon and will be themeable
using KStyles.
- Instead of filtering MMB and RMB clicks like GNOME panel our applets
are more flexible because of the handles. I know there are possible
approaches using GUI merging to avoid the handles but all of them have
problems. I can explain in private mail if you are interested.
- In contrast to the GNOME panel approach our applets do not dictate the
panel size. The panel dictates the height (horizontal panel) or width
(vertical panel) of the applets. The applets choose the second size
component.
- Applets can set a stretch flag. A good example is the taskbar applet.
A stretch applet will be granted all available free space on the reight
of the applet. Better try this out as it's hard to explain.

Todo:

- The date applet has not been ported yet due to lack of time. koolclock
currently is the default clock but this will be changed back to
date-applet soon.

- External applets are not moved to the right positions on kicker
restart. I have a solution for this but it's not implemented yet.

- The dock applet is not loaded by default as it has (and always had)
problem. I plan to fix it soon.


Future:

While I have some ideas/plans for advanced features like drawers and
multiple toplevel applet/button areas I plan to work on makeing kicker
more robust and kcmkicker in the near future to make it ready for the
kdebase freeze.

Have fun,
Matthias

-- 
Matthias Elter
elter@kde.org
me@caldera.de