Mac-style Menu Bar for GTK and Java/Swing applications!

[wyrfel]

Hei,

i'm on gentoo and installed the macmenu supporting gtk version from the xeffects repo. It mostly works ok, but it seems to cause some trouble with panels temporarily disappearing and application crashes (like evolution).

But i'm not writing to directly solve these issues...it more made me think about if the patch couldn't be changed/branched to utilize dbus.

The idea is this:
- patch gtk to transparently export the whole gtkmenu properties and events to dbus.
- change the panel-applets to adjust to that dbus interface

Then, when an application creates a gtkmenu object, the patch would cause gtk to not draw the menu, but rather export all necessary information on the dbus interface and set event handlers on that interface. This includes patching the connect() and related functions for event handling as well.

Similarly, the panel-applet would signal menu events to the dbus interface, enabling the applications to react on them. My experience in gtk- and dbus-coding (via python) is pretty limited, so i can't really estimate if it could be done in one interface or if one would be needed for every application.

Does this make sense or is it too much trouble or would it cause dbus namespace cluttering?

The benefits i imagine are:
- cleaner implementation
- more possibilities in terms of hosting and drawing the actual menu, which could then be represented in virtually any form.

André.

[XTREEM|RAGE]

ok, i'm a noob!
And i dont get it , how do i use the topic starters code on feisty?
step by step answers plz?

tnx very much

[winter_mute]

I'm trying to compile the GTK patch on Feisty, and I'm running into an error that I can't seem to fix.

creating libpixbufloader-png.la
/bin/sed: can't read Storge/gtk+-2.10.11/gdk-pixbuf/libgdk_pixbuf-2.0.la: No such file or directory
libtool: link: `Storge/gtk+-2.10.11/gdk-pixbuf/libgdk_pixbuf-2.0.la' is not a valid libtool archive
make[4]: *** [libpixbufloader-png.la] Error 1
make[4]: Leaving directory `/data/Temporary Storge/gtk+-2.10.11/gdk-pixbuf'
make[3]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[3]: Leaving directory `/data/Temporary Storge/gtk+-2.10.11/gdk-pixbuf'
make[2]: *** [all] Error 2
make[2]: Leaving directory `/data/Temporary Storge/gtk+-2.10.11/gdk-pixbuf'
make[1]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/data/Temporary Storge/gtk+-2.10.11'
make: *** [all] Error 2


Any help here? I was following the instructions at here

[XTREEM|RAGE]

here

tnx for the link, sorry i cant help you.
But isn't there any step by step guide?
Because for a noob like me it's pretty hard, i tried to search but no succes!

edit, i tried the patch but i got this.

configure: WARNING: *** TIFF loader will not be built (TIFF library not found) ***
configure: error:
*** Checks for TIFF loader failed. You can build without it by passing
*** --without-libtiff to configure but some programs using GTK+ may
*** not work properly

how do i make this work :s, because i want to make it without errors ?

[jiminycricket]

Thank you SkiesofAzel and Me801 for hosting those debs. I've showed it to some people and they've gotten very interested in Linux thereafter

Andre, if they take a dbus approach, does that make the possibility of KDE or Firefox/XUL apps appearing in that applet? I know someone in the Gnome bugzilla also raised the issue of making a freedesktop standard for this.

[SkiesOfAzel]

tnx for the link, sorry i cant help you.
But isn't there any step by step guide?
Because for a noob like me it's pretty hard, i tried to search but no succes!

edit, i tried the patch but i got this.

configure: WARNING: *** TIFF loader will not be built (TIFF library not found) ***
configure: error:
*** Checks for TIFF loader failed. You can build without it by passing
*** --without-libtiff to configure but some programs using GTK+ may
*** not work properly

how do i make this work :s, because i want to make it without errors ?

You haven't installed all the dependencies . Anyway if you are on feisty you can get just get and install the debs on page 54. Your searching skills also need a little improving .

[SkiesOfAzel]

I'm trying to compile the GTK patch on Feisty, and I'm running into an error that I can't seem to fix.

creating libpixbufloader-png.la
/bin/sed: can't read Storge/gtk+-2.10.11/gdk-pixbuf/libgdk_pixbuf-2.0.la: No such file or directory
libtool: link: `Storge/gtk+-2.10.11/gdk-pixbuf/libgdk_pixbuf-2.0.la' is not a valid libtool archive
make[4]: *** [libpixbufloader-png.la] Error 1
make[4]: Leaving directory `/data/Temporary Storge/gtk+-2.10.11/gdk-pixbuf'
make[3]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[3]: Leaving directory `/data/Temporary Storge/gtk+-2.10.11/gdk-pixbuf'
make[2]: *** [all] Error 2
make[2]: Leaving directory `/data/Temporary Storge/gtk+-2.10.11/gdk-pixbuf'
make[1]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/data/Temporary Storge/gtk+-2.10.11'
make: *** [all] Error 2


Any help here? I was following the instructions at here

If you want to be sure that you have all the dependencies installed just

sudo apt-get build-dep libgtk2.0-0

You could also get the debs i posted 3 pages before.

[wyrfel]

Andre, if they take a dbus approach, does that make the possibility of KDE or Firefox/XUL apps appearing in that applet? I know someone in the Gnome bugzilla also raised the issue of making a freedesktop standard for this.

I'm afraid, not. KDE currently doesn't use dbus.
And XUL apps don't support the bar currently as well and won't by default if it's dbus'ed.

However, if we use dbus, these could all be patched to do so as well. That's another advantage. AFAIK, KDE is about to move to dbus, anyways.

But seemingly i was under the wrong impression about how it's done currently. Can someone please shed some light for me? What is "the KDE method" of exporting the menu?

Thanks,
André.

[SkiesOfAzel]

Similar to the gnome one, just a little more polished and stable execution ,from my admittedly limited experience with it. To do this properly you would probably need wrappers for every major linux toolkit out there, or better yet as the gnome devs said, a freedesktop specification .
What can be done is a rewrite of the patch to eliminate the rough edges but as the whole project is currently unmaintained this doen't seem likely to happen . Ideas always fly around, what is usually missing is a team to implement them .

[ayoli]

@SkiesOfAzel: looks like you bring some fresh to macmenu patch and the applet ?
Why don't you make a new topic with clear new instruction in Tutorials & Tips subforums (with a link to the original thread) ?
If i renember well, Adq (original poster) do his army and should not maintain this for a while, you may want to succeed ?