OptionMenu and sensitivity puzzle

["Karl H. Beckers" <karl h beckers gmx net>]

Hi all,

I have this puzzling problem with an option menu, and though I've found a
vaguely related thread from 1998 the issue at the time was different enough
to make the workaround not applicable for me
(http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gtk-devel-list/1998-November/msg00131.html)

Alright, let's say I have three widgets (1) a text entry field, (2) a 
check button, and
(3) an option menu. If (2) is unchecked the user can pick a value from 
(3). If (2)
is checked, the value for (3) is set to a default value calculated on 
the base of
whatever is entered in (1).

In other words: I have an event handler connected to the changed signal 
of (1)
which updates (3) if (2) is checked and the text entered in (1) 
indicates (3) should
be set to smth. different.

This far everything works well.

Now, if I check (2), (3) gets set insensitive. If I enter some text in 
(1) now, triggering
some changes to the insensitive (3), then uncheck (2) which makes (3) 
sensitive
again, and open the optionmenu, all the items of (3) that had been 
selected while
(3) was insensitive are still grayed out except for the last, i.e. the 
current one.

Apparently, due to the reparenting mechanism with which the optionmenu 
displays
the label of the menuitem, all the menuitems which were selected while 
the optionmenu
was insensitive were made insensitive, too. However, only the currently 
parented label
gets set sensitive again. (Note that I can actually select all the 
menuitems, they are
just painted grayed out.)

I would be more than willing to work around this, but can't seem to be 
able. I tried:

// event handler connected to the toggled signal of (2)
static void
on_sf_format_auto_check_toggled (GtkToggleButton *togglebutton, gpointer 
user_data) {
   if ( gtk_toggle_button_get_active ( togglebutton ) ) {
       GtkWidget *menu = 
gtk_option_menu_get_menu(GTK_OPTION_MENU(sf_format_optionmenu));
       GList     *list = GTK_MENU_SHELL(menu)->children;  
       gtk_widget_set_sensitive ( sf_format_optionmenu, FALSE );
   } else {
       GtkWidget *menu = 
gtk_option_menu_get_menu(GTK_OPTION_MENU(sf_format_optionmenu));
       GtkMenuItem *item;
       GtkObject *label;
       GList     *list = GTK_MENU_SHELL(menu)->children;  
       int i;
     
       gtk_widget_set_sensitive ( sf_format_optionmenu, TRUE );
     
       for ( i = 0; i < g_list_length(list); i++ ) {
           item = GTK_MENU_ITEM(g_list_nth_data(list, i));
           gtk_menu_item_activate(item);
           gtk_widget_set_sensitive( GTK_WIDGET(item), TRUE );
           label = GTK_OBJECT(gtk_bin_get_child(GTK_BIN(item)));
           printf("label: %s - pointer: %p\n", 
gtk_label_get_label(GTK_LABEL(label)), label);
           if ( label != NULL ) {
               printf("setting label active\n");
               gtk_widget_set_sensitive ( label, TRUE );
           }
       }
   }

This doesn't have any discernible effect, though.


Any insights would be much appreciated.

Karl.