Re: [Foomatic] Printer driver UI [proposal]

[Michael Goffioul <goffioul imec be>]

> I.e. you can group the flat list of options into a tree baseed
> structure of option groups and nested sub-groups.
> This way the user gets a hierarchical selection tree with the
> most often used options on top.

I know all of that. My point is that from a user point of view, things
could be made a little bit more user-friendly, still having the
possibility to access the full tree view. To make things clearer,
have a look at those screenshots (taken from the conceptual code
I posted, so you don't have to compile anything):

http://www.geocities.com/kdeprint/slide_1.png
http://www.geocities.com/kdeprint/slide_2.png
http://www.geocities.com/kdeprint/slide_3.png

The PPD file is always the same, but the UI is different, and
described in a XML structure.

> settings. All necessary gimpprint driver parameter settings are
> done automatically by selecting one PrintoutMode. This is done
> by the famous Foomatic 3.x "foomatic-rip" filter.

FYI, I know Foomatic. The test code even use a PPD file from Foomatic-3,
containing the PrintoutMode option.

> Till, who made this perfect solution, can explain it much better than me.
> 
> I think that the Foomatic 3.x *PrintoutMode option already solved
> the whole problem.

I don't want to replace that, I just want to present it in a smart
way. See for example the 3rd screenshot where PrintoutMode details
are shown in a separate dialog, when requested.

> > - UI can be described using XML syntax, and embedded in the driver
> >   file (for example, PPD file) using comments. These metadata can
> 
> I totally disagree to introduce any kind of special data
> which is not in full compliance to the PPD specification.

Well, Foomatic already introduced metadata in PPD files for float,
string and integer options. They used to be described in comments,
now they use additional keywords. My first idea was to put the XML
data in comments at the end of the PPD file, as Foomatic did. This
is compliant with PPD specs.

Bye.
Michael.

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Michael Goffioul		IMEC-DESICS-MIRA
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