An idea for a fun menubar hack

[Joel Becker <jlbec evilplan org>]

Folks,
	Here is an idea for a nice GTK+ 2.2 bit.  This is only half
serious, as it would be a lot of work, but man would it be neat to do
right.
	I've spent a long time arguing with our resident Mac lover and
"I want it usable for my father-in-law" person.  He is very adamant
about the benefits of the Mac-style single menu bar.  The fact that
there is infinite screen space to mouse to is a big win.  I can't
disagree with him on that point, but I do dislike the Mac-style menu,
and prefer regular menus-per-window approach.
	However, this is X.  That means we should allow a choice (or
three, if possible).  So, what if we did this:

o Wrote an application that sat at the toplevel and displayed a menu.
  When running, it would set a property on the root with its window_id.
  This way, other applications would be able to find it.

o Change the GTK+ menus so that the code silently looks for this root
  property.  If it finds the root property, it communicates with the
  menu application and creates menus via proxy.  The toplevel menu
  application actually displays the menus.

o Whenever an application gets the focus, it notifies the menu
  application and communicates its menu list.  In this fashion the
  menu application changes its menu.  I don't even think that the
  application has to do a remote object architecture.  I rather think
  that simple "Text, Hierarchy, unique_id" tuples would do.  Remote
  object systems (like CORBA) are heavy and might not be needed.  Not
  only that, but a non-GObject-based system would allow a GTK+/KDE
  spec.

o When events happen on the toplevel menu bar (I'm not sure how
  granular we would want it, every event or merely "activate"), the
  menu application would notify the focused app.  The recieving 
  application would then behave as if the menu were local.

o By propagating events when the menu application was started or
  stopped, the GTK+ applications could gain/lose their menu bars in
  sync.  A user could then choose on the fly if they would like a
  single, toplevel menu bar, or a menu bar in each application.

	So, discuss.  It would be a neat hack :-)

Joel

-- 

"All alone at the end of the evening
 When the bright lights have faded to blue.
 I was thinking about a woman who had loved me
 And I never knew"

			http://www.jlbec.org/
			jlbec evilplan org