Re: Debian menus policy

[Erik Steffl <steffl@bigfoot.com>]

"Marcelo E. Magallon" wrote:
> 
> wow... when did this discussion degenerate into dictating mouse binding
> policy?

  the question is what good a menu is when you cannot get to it...

> 
> >> Erik Steffl <steffl@bigfoot.com> writes:
> 
>  >   that's (almost) exactly the same behaviour as I was suggesting for
>  > left button in window maker.
> 
>  The point you are missing is that Window Maker doesn't like overloading
>  actions, and the authors are particularly sensitive to overloading
>  mouse actions.  What you are proposing is "if the user left-clicks, A
>  happens; if the user left-clicks+holds-the-button-down-for-more-than-N-
>  seconds-and-moves-it-M-pixels-in-that-timeframe B happens".  If you

  don't be ridiculous. click and drag having different functionality is
fairly common, even in ms win (the newbie system, generally considered
non-confusing enough) [there is some discussion about how much different
though]

>  take a look at Window Maker, you'll notice you can bind the left mouse
>  button to "select windows" and the right mouse button to "Applications
>  Menu".  Note I didn't say "left drag" nor "right click".  If you

  stupid me. I thought window maker is reasonably configurable (=user
can assign actions to different common mouse activities (click, double
click, dragging) and different parts of dektops (root window,
decorations, windows). oh well.

>  compare Window Maker's menu behaviour to the GNOME panel's menu
>  behaviour (or GTK+'s menus in general), you'll notice they are quite
>  different.  Try this with a common desktop installation of Debian using
>  Window Maker: right *drag*.  When you press the right mouse button a
>  menu will appear.  Move the mouse to "Apps" (the first item in the
>  menu), you'll notice it's highlighted (which doesn't happen if you
>  right click).  You'll see the Apps menu to the right.  Go to viewers
>  (the last entry on Apps).  With Window Maker you can go from Apps to
>  Viewers along the obvious path.  You don't have to move the mouse to

  what is the obvious path? I don't see any significant difference
between how window maker manu behaves and how other menus behave (I just
tried gnome menu and fvwm menu)

  one meaning of obvious path would be the shortest path but you can't,
you'd have to cross the Games and other items which would open Games (or
other) menu and App menu is gone. So you can take any path which avoids
the rest of the main menu - the same for gnome or fvwm (or other)
menu... what is it that I'm missing.

>  the first entry in Apps first.  This is called menu hysteresis.  GTK+
>  has never managed to get it right (neither has Mozilla nor Qt for that
>  matter).
> 
>  Now, please stop trying to dictate policy where there's no policy to be
>  dictated.

  are you trying to dictate what I should do? IMO a little bit of
consistency in how the debian system works wouldn't hurt. and window
maker is not the worst example, I don't really care that much which
particular button it is (that pops up the menu). there a are a lot worse
WMs (worse default configurations).

  and, seeing the 'configurability' of window maker I see there is no
danger of binding debian app menu to single click in root window... so
you don't even have to say please for me to stop:-)

	erik