Re: GTK+ Application class

[Rodrigo Moya <rodrigo gnome-db org>]

On Mon, 2006-10-23 at 14:39 +0100, Emmanuele Bassi wrote:
> Hi everyone;

...

> * API Overview
> ==============
> 
> The base cass is GtkApplication - an abstract G_TYPE_OBJECT with a bunch
> of methods to be overridden:
> 
> struct _GtkApplicationClass
> {
>   GObjectClass parent_class;
> ...
> 
> We have a document-based API using these five vfuncs:
> 
> ... 
>   gchar *       (*new_document)      (GtkApplication       *application);
>   gboolean      (*save_document)     (GtkApplication       *application,
>                                       const gchar          *document_name,
>                                       const gchar          *document_uri,
>                                       gboolean              save_backup,
>                                       gboolean              overwrite,
>                                       GError              **error);
>   gboolean      (*open_document)     (GtkApplication       *application,
>                                       const gchar          *document_uri,
>                                       gboolean              read_only,
>                                       GError              **error);
>   gboolean      (*close_document)    (GtkApplication       *application,
>                                       const gchar          *document_name,
>                                       GError              **error);
>   GSList *      (*list_documents)    (GtkApplication       *application);
> ...
> 
> The vfunc signatures should be self-explanatory.
> 
> Each document is addressed by a unique id, using a string; newly created
> documents might have a "document-<timestamp>" id string, or a
> "document-<monotonic_counter>" id string; opened documents might use the
> MD5 hash of the document URI.  Documents have an unique id because there
> can be multiple views of the same document and we need to keep a list of
> documents as well as windows (and windows for documents) of the
> GtkApplication.
> 
> Subclasses of GtkApplication *must* override the new_document,
> save_document and open_document vfuncs; close_document and list_document
> can offer a default implementation (close_document calls save_document
> and if successful will remove the document id from the list of known
> documents, and list_documents returns the list of known document ids).
> 
so, who would be calling those vfuncs? Gtkapplication internals? If so,
how? Since below you say the app is responsible for creating the UI, how
does Gtkapplication know Open/Close/Save have been selected?

I would really like to have a more generic GtkApplication object, not
really tied to a window (even though it could perfectly have ways for
binding it to a Window). That way, any app (think GUI daemons, like
power manager, for instance) could use it as a central point of access
to the session management, unique apps, main windows, etc.
-- 
Rodrigo Moya <rodrigo gnome-db org>