Re: GnomePrinterSelector private?

[Jim Evins <evins snaught com>]

On Wed, 2003-01-08 at 13:10, Chema Celorio wrote:
> On Sun, 2002-12-15 at 17:41, Jim Evins wrote:
> > Hello,
> > 
> > 	Is GnomePrinterSelector (gnome-printer-dialog.h) going to no longer be
> > public in the 2.2 API?  The header file is no longer installed with
> > 2.1.2.  This was very useful in the 2.0 API for constructing custom
> > print dialogs.
> 
> I have been wanting to declare the API of gnome-print stable [*1], and
> are feeling _very_ close to it. I stopped installing headers that I
> wasn't sure why app developers would need to use them, this is something
> that I'd like to discuss further.
> 
> You want to create custom printer dialogs, but it seems to me that the
> best way to do that would be to provide that functionality within
> gnome-print-dialog.h, and allow apps to embed widgets into it. Custom
> dialogs will not gives users a consistent UI for printing and whatever
> improvements we do or features we add (and some of those are coming this
> way soon) users will not get.
> 
> So i guess my questions are:
> - How does gnome-print-dialog not satisfy your needs?


In gLabels, I needed a custom Job page -- see: 

    http://snaught.com/glabels/screenshots/screenshot-print-merge.png

I am also considering adding a second page for selecting individual
merge records (this would be a GtkTree) -- alternatively, I might just
add a button to this page that launches a popup dialog for this purpose.

I also do not need the paper selection page that you currently get with
a GnomePrintDialog.  In gLabels the user selects a label type (e.g. an
"Avery 5522") when he/she creates a new document.  The user is then
"locked" into the appropriate page size for the selected label type.  It
would confuse the user to be presented with a dialog seemingly capable
of applying an inappropriate page size for the selected label.


> - Could this be fixed in GnomePrintDialog?

Yes.  If I could be exposed to the GtkNotebook, so that I could
prepend/append pages as needed to the GnomePrintDialog (Assuming, of
course that you keep the GtkNotebook or similar multi-page layout).

I can imagine all sorts of applications that would need to add all sorts
of custom widgets to the dialog:  Footer and header selection widgets;
position and scaling widgets with mini preview; color layer selections
with mini preview; and various other print properties specific to the
application.  These widgets could be easily categorized and distributed
between multiple pages in a GtkNotebook.

I would also need the ability to remove pages that are not appropriate
for the given application (e.g. the paper size page).  The only page
that is probably common between all applications would be the printer
selection page -- and I might even be wrong about that.

> - Can you provide a good case where you would need this?

As long as I can get access to the GtkNotebook and have the ability to
remove unneeded pages, I would be happy with either approach.  I am not
too sure that this is too different for you providing these basic
building blocks (printer selection widget, page selection widget, etc.)
and me putting them together with my own GtkNotebook.  I am still not
being exposed to the internals of these widgets.

> 
> regards,
> Chema
>