* Note: Lines starting with a d are my comments - Daniel * Note: Lines starting with a # are my comments - Cornelius * Note: Lines starting with a "z" are my comments - Zack :) * Note: Lines starting with a "s" are my comments - Simon * Note: Lines starting with a "Don:" are my comments - Don * Note: Lines starting with a "g" are my comments - Guenter * Note: Lines starting with a "m" are my comments - Matthias Kretz * Note: Lines starting with a "MiB:" are my comments - Michael * Note: Lines starting with a "h" are my comments - Holger Misc: ===== Configuration Merge ------------------- d Idea: The KOffice way of life: Offer a method that adds a given wiget of a d predefined type as page in a KDialogBase or offer a pointer to a KDialogBase d -> requires a Kontact part or an external lib per part m I believe this is a more general problem. Please take a look at m tdegraphics/kview/kpreferences{dialog,module}.{h,cpp}. I'd like to generalize m these classes and include them into tdelibs (the same configuration merge is m being done in Kate, Noatun, Kopete, KView and probably more). # The problem is even more generic. We also have to merge about boxes, tips of # the day and maybe more. Merged Foldertree View ---------------------- d Idea: Let the part send a description of their folders and reaction to calls d as XML, similar to XMLGUI # Is a folder tree really the right tool to represent events, todos or # contacts? MiB: On the one hand, Notes can be hierarchic, so a folder tree would be the MiB: nearest solution... z I think so. Applications could send the root of their tree to z Kontact so that the interface looks like - Mail | \ | - Local Folders | \ | Inbox | | | Thrash | | | Sent - Notes | \ | Notes 1 | | | Notes 2 | - Events \ Event 1 | Event 2 z which is not that bad. The question would be how to render the tree z on the Kontact side while keeping the items on the parts side ( because z e.g. KMails hold custom pixmaps for the folders which had to be z displayed in the Kontact tree). g I'm currently having 248 events. A tree is a very bad solution to visualize g them. selecting "Events" in the tree should just only start the korganizer g part. MiB: ...OTOH... yes, /me agrees with g, a folder tree becomes complex quite fast. Don: The folder tree makes sense for advanced users, but I think Don: the simplicity of the current navigator widget has advantages for Don: non power users. Don: Don: Actually instead of the navigator widget I think it makes sense Don: to consider reusing the widget choosing widget in the latest Don: version of the Qt designer, which in a sense can be Don: considered a generalization of the navigator widget. And could Don: make the folder tree in kmail unnecessary. Don: Don: I might investigate the Qt designer widget further but if someone Don: else wants to look at a folder tree widget that's cool with me. # I had a look at the Qt designer widget choosing widget. I think it has a # severe usability problem, because the buttons (or kind of tabs) which are used # to access the widget subgroups are not always at the same place but move # around when you click on them. Dependening on which group is shown, the button # is at the top or at the bottom of the widget. In my opinion this solution is # unacceptable. # But Daniel had a good idea how to improve that. It looks similar to the Qt # designer widget, but it opens the current group always at the top of the # widget and only highlights the current group in the list at the bottom, but # doesn't move it. This seems to also be the way Outlook does it. Don: Guenter, agree. Don: Wouldn't the idea to be to show calendars in the tree or Don: navigator widget, rather than individual events? # Yes, that makes sense. Calendars are much more similar to mail folders than # single events. You wouldn't integrate individual mails in the folder tree, # would you? d That raises an interesting point: The KNotes plugin would not need an own d canvas in the WidgetStack then. It's sufficient to have the notes in the d folder view, an RMB menu on them and a "New Note" action. d So the new design must be able to catch that case (the current one does not). # I think notes are on the same level as mails or events. They should be listed # in the view. KNotes would probably just create a single entry in the folder # tree. KNotes integration ------------------ MiB: Which reminds me of my own concern about the 'how' of integrating KNotes: MiB: * the current solution is to start KNotes extern, it is not embedded in Kontact MiB: at all. Thus opening a note that is on another desktop either leaves the Kontact MiB: window or moves the note. Either not perfect. Also, Kontact is likely to cover MiB: notes that reside on the desktop, easy working is impossible. Which is the reason MiB: I don't like the current approach too much. MiB: * but there's always hope---my idea would be to show the notes in Kontact itself. MiB: Now I tend to say it's a bit intrusive to not allow starting KNotes and MiB: Kontact/KNotes at the same time which raises the following issues: MiB: - if KNotes and Kontact are running at the same time, changes to the notes have MiB: to be synchronized (not much of a problem). Changes to be synced are the MiB: text/contents itself, the text color/style..., the note color. Not sure about MiB: the note size. Not to be synced is the position. MiB: - so the position in Kontact has to be saved individually and independently MiB: of the real desktop position (realized by attaching two display config MiB: files, works in make_it_cool branch mostly). Kontact's size is generally MiB: smaller than the desktop. MiB: - normally notes are on a specific desktop, now they have to be displayed on one MiB: area---how to do this best? MiB: what does M$ do? How do they manage the notes in their PIM app? (I don't know MiB: it, never seen that thing) Toolbar Items ------------- d The KParts Technology only provides actions for the current part. It might be d desireable to have common actions that are always available. Don: I agree that it is desireable to have common actions always Don: available (and parts too like the todo list) Don: Don: But are you sure Kparts is limited in this way? KOrganizer can load Don: multiple plugins simultaneously. And all of these plugins are tdeparts Don: (eg. birthday import), and tdeactions for all loaded plugins are Don: created and made available simultaneously. Don: Don: Yeah, I'm quite positive you can load multiple parts simultaneously. # Certainly. Actions like "New Mail", "New Contact", "New Event" should be # available independently of a selected part. Don: This is a very important issue, I think we need a library with three Don: methods: Don: KAddressBookIface loadKAddressBook() Don: KMailIface loadKMail() Don: KOrganizerIface loadKOrganizer() MiB: And don't forget KNotesIface loadKNotes() :-) h: That doesn't sound extendable ;) h: So if I would like to add a 'New ShortMessage' part we would have to extend h: that library... better use TDETrader and some sort of a common framework h: and Mib's comments shows that problem! d: That's what KDCOPServiceStarter is for :) Don: Now if kontact is running then loadX will load the X part in kontact Don: (if it is not already loaded) and return a dcop iface for that Don: part. Don: Don: If kontact is not running but is the users preferred application Don: then loadX will start kontact and then do the above. Don: Don: If kontact is not running and is not the users preferred application Don: then a standalone version of X should be started, and an iface for Don: that standalone app returned. Don: Don: I think this library should be in libtdepim ad all the tdepim apps Don: should be moved into tdepim, so their iface files all be in one Don: package. Or alternatively a new kdeinterfaces package be created Don: and used as a general repository for interface files. Don: Don: Another important issue is invokeMailer and the fact that currently Don: KDE just runs kmail with command line arguments by default. That has Don: to be made smarter. Don: Don: I guess when kmail is run with command line arguments it could Don: actually use loadKMail() and then use the resulting iface. Don: Don: And the same for all other loadX apps. Status Bar ---------- d We need a more sophisticated handling (progressbar, etc) Don: Definitely. # We now have tdelibs/tdeparts/statusbarextension. This is intended to solve these # problems, right? d: Right. Simply add it as childobject in your part and use it's API. Works even d: for other KPart hosts than Kontact Kontact plugin unification ------------------------- # Currently all Kontact plugins look quite similar. It would be nice, if we # could provide infratructure to reduce duplicated code as far as possible. d I thouht of a KontactPart, similar to a KOPart, if that makes sense. I don't think d a normal KPart is sufficient for us. Don: I've spent quite a bit of time in all pim *_part files and IIRC Don: the amount of duplicated code, is pretty much negligible. Don: Don: But a KontactPart could make sense for when the parts want to communicate with Don: the container. Eg. if the parts want to add folders to the container Don: apps folder tree (or navigator) Don: Don: And maybe for communicating with the status bar. Communication/Interaction: ========================== d Invoking parts when they are needed for the first time takes too long, d starting all takes too long on startup d Idea: Mark complex parts as basic parts that get loaded anyway # parts could be loaded in the background based on usage patterns. Kontact could # remember which parts were used at the last session and load them in the # background after loading the initial part to be shown at startup. z This idea seems to be similar to Microsoft's z hide-unused-item-in-the-menu strategy. But it probably mess up z kaddressbook integration. Although not used during every session z this part is needed and should be always loaded. This strategy z would be great for could-to-come parts, like a summary part. z Background loading of parts is OK. The idea is simple : load the z last used part on startup. Make sure its loading finishes and then z load the rest once the user can already interact with the last used z loaded part. g why do we always need the addressbook? Is libtdeabc not sufficient? Don: I guess my machine is too fast, starting parts is pretty quick here :-) d DCOP is too slow, internal communication should be handled via a dedicated d interface, communication with external applications (i.e. knotes) should be d done via wrapper parts that communicate with their respective IPC method to d their application using the native protocol (DCOP, Corba, etc). # Are you sure that DCOP is too slow for in-process communications? I thought it # would handle this special case efficiently. s It is only efficient in the sense that it won't do a roundtrip to the server but s dispatch locally. What remains is the datastream marshalling. Not necessarily s ueberfast. But I think the point is a different one: It is simply not as intuitive s to use as C++. Yes, DCOPRef already helps a lot for simple calls, but talking to s remote components still requires one to do error checking after each method call. s in addition the stub objects one deals with (AddressBookIface_stub for example) s are no real references. To the programmer they look like a reference to a s remote addressbook component, but it really isn't. there is no state involved. s like if between two method calls on the stub the addressbook process gets restarted, s the state is lost and the programmer on the client side has no way to find out s about that. you'll end up with really complex code on the caller side to handle things s like that. d Yes, but of course one should always prefer in-process IPC if possible. DCOP d currently _works_ for Kontact, but that's all about it. It isn't exactly elegant. d The only advantange of the current approach is that we can allow the user to d run one of the parts standalone. I am not really sure we want that. I used to find d it desireable, but I am not sure anymore. MiB: But that's the whole idea behind Kontact---to be able to integrate apps MiB: _and_ to have standalone versions. Just think about KNotes... impossible MiB: to have it limited to only Kontact! Don: I love being able to run the apps inside or outside of the Don: container, it's just really cool being able to choose I think it's a Don: great feature and users will really love having the Don: choice. Especially when they are migrating. MiB: Definitely. Don: I think if we use the loadX methods defined above then we can still Don: support this. I'm PRO DCOP. And this way we don't have to special Don: case of the code depending on whether the application is running in Don: a container app or not. Don: Don: I find difficult to imagine a function that DCOP is not fast enough Don: to support. It supports all our current PIM IPC needs fine. MiB: yes, not too much against DCOP. But for KNotes I thought about turning MiB: a note into a plugin that can be loaded by Kontact and KNotes independently. MiB: like this, there's no DCOP necessary anymore and makes it much more flexible. MiB: e.g. usage of different display configs, a note embedded somewhere and having MiB: a parent or standalone on the desktop. # Communication with external applications is something which doesn't fit too # well with the 'integrated' approach of Kontact. Is this really necessary? d We won't get around it, think knotes, maybe sync tools, think abstact 3rd party d projects (not sure the latter is really that important, but we should consider it. d it barely plays a role anyway). MiB: hm. true. But not too important, IMHO. Just add a Kontact-DCOP interface :-) h: Pretty much to talk about... h: 1. the speed of DCOP is not that important. I worry more about the integration h: of all parts. So how would I cross reference an 'Event' with a 3rd party h: Kaplan Part? A common base class for all PIM records comes into my mind - again - h: Now with normal C++ you can pass a pointer through the framework h: Doing it with DCOP we need to marshall and demarshall it. This part can get really h: ugly if we want more tight integration of all KaplanParts. We could add h: a pure virtual method to marshall to a QDataStream. So now marshalling is done. h: For demarshalling we need to get the type of the QDataStream content and then we need h: to ask someone - a factory - to get a object for the type and then call another pure h: virtual..... h: The question is if this is really necessary h: 2. stand a lone apps h: The 'stand a lone' app can always run in the same address space but be a top level widget h: itself. WIth some DCOP magic clicking on the KMAIL icon code make Kaplan detach the part... h: 3. Integration! h: The goal of Kaplan should not be to merge some XML files an give a common Toolbar for h: X applications in one shell. I want true integration. Yes KMAIL can use KABC to show h: all emails for one contact but a generic way to do such things would be more than nice. h: It would be nice if I could relate the PIM objects in a common way. So I create an Event and h: relate some todos to it. So for KDE4 I want a common base class for all PIM classes including mail h: see Opies OPimRecord for a bit too huge base class Security -------- d If we use the tdeparts (ktrader) approach to find a parts by looking d for an application with the correct mime type this might raise security d problems. (Martin's concern) # Looking up Kontact parts isn't based on mime types but on services of type # "Kontact/Plugin". This is just as save as starting a program statically linking # its parts. I really don't see any security concerns here. d Ok, if we limit stuff to Kontact/Plugin and Kontact/Part that might be safe enough d indeed. I (and Martin, who raise this concern initially) was just afraid of d allowing "any" part. h: hmm If somebody can install a Service into the global kde dir or the user kde home h: there is something else broken IMHO Summary View ------------ h: How would one best integrate a summary view into kontact? h: a) add a virtual QWidget *summary(const QDateTime&, QWidget* parent ); h: to get a summary widget for a day? h: b) use some sort of XML to UI to represent the summary informations h: c) have a stand a lone part which opens the PIM data seperately? ( How h: to synchronize access? )