Re: Can GTK+ create a GtkWindow in a GtkWindow?

[Rob Pearce <rob bdt-home demon co uk>]

On Tuesday 09 September 2008, John Hobbs wrote:
> If you want MDI use the Notebook widget.  But be aware of what you are
> doing, from the gnome HIG document [1] "MDI has several inherent usability
> problems, so its use is discouraged in applications."

The developers of GTK generally dislike MDI, and repeatedly put forth reasons 
why it's bad. What they never seem to grasp is that all their reasons are 
based on the assumption that what you're doing is opening several independent 
and unconnected documents in an editor-like environment. The Windows 3 "MDI" 
approach is actually quite useful for applications that present multiple 
aspects of a single coherent entity, for which the notebook widget is 
practically useless. That leaves multiple top-level windows, or a collection 
of HPaned and VPaned. Both are ugly but that's the choice you have unless you 
want to implement a whole load of stuff yourself.