Re: "What's this"

[Michael ROGERS <M Rogers cs ucl ac uk>]

>Seems likely that's not really an issue the protocol would need to
>address - there would be some way to say "enter whatsthis mode" and
>the window manager or panel or whatever could provide a button that
>did that.

How about this:

When the help button is pressed, the help client (could be the WM or a 
panel applet) grabs the pointer and installs a ? cursor. When the user 
clicks on an item, the help client sends a client message to the clicked 
window and releases the pointer. Clients that don't understand the 
message will ignore it; clients that understand it can display help. 
This could be a top-level help window, or one of those popup 
explanations that Windows uses, which don't disappear until you click on 
something. (Grab the pointer and use redirect override on the tooltip 
window?)

This mechanism could be tied into the existing KDE help system (Qt would 
detect the client messages and invoke the existing mechanism), so a 
panel applet or WM could trigger the context-sensitive help attached to 
KDE widgets.

Michael