Re: Mummy, I made a platform in my pants! [Was: focus!]

["Luis Villa" <luis villa gmail com>]

On 7/19/06, Alex Graveley <alex beatniksoftware com> wrote:
> Respectfully, I don't agree.  There is a big set of missing frameworks
> that stops rich interop in Gnome applications, and generally make
> applications much harder to write well.  All other desktop platforms
> include at least a subset of these...
>
> * Document framework
> Provides document loading/saving/printing/etc abstractions, window/tab
> management, automatic recently used, scripting hooks, etc.
>
> * Scripting framework
> Allows apps to easily expose external scripting and event notification.
>   D-BUS was the big missing piece here.  Can specify sets of interfaces
> for common tasks that apps can implement, and building up the frameworks
> to provide useful default implementations.
>
> * Rich Extension/Plugin framework
> Common UI for installing/removing plugins and checking for updates and
> downloading, common hooks for menu/toolbar integration and UI event
> integration.
>
> * Undo framework
> Almost no applications in Gnome support good Undo.  Should provide both
>   reliable desktop-wide interaction for text widgets as well as at an
> abstract object level.
>
> * Rich DND/CopyPaste framework
> Undocumented DND targets, poor support, and manual data parsing abound
> in our applications.  Could provide structured data interop to make
> doing this loads easier.
>
> * Persistence framework
> Saving and indexing application-internal data, optionally exposing to
> search engines like beagle.

I'd add:

* collaboration framework (though maybe the Abi guys are pushing in
this direction in a way we can all use)

* web integration framework- we know that MS is going to make all
their apps backend to various web services in the not-too-far future,
and we know that we can make our apps much more compelling if (for
example) f-spot integrated seamlessly with web-based picture sharing,
or gourmet integrated seamlessly with web-based recipe sharing.

* search framework.

Luis