Re: [platform-ui-dev] GEF transition to use editorActions extension poin

[Nick_Edgar@xxxxxxxxxx]

Randy,

We are aware of these limitations with contributed actions.  There are no 
plans to improve on this for 2.1. 
However, we would like to look at broad improvements to action 
contributions (and, more broadly, the whole action architecture) post 2.1.

The intent of contributed actions is to allow other plug-ins to add 
functionality to existing views, editors, and the context menu for 
selected objects.
It is not recommended as the primary means for an editor or view to 
provide its own actions.

To address your points below,
Point 1: To do better, we would have to activate plug-ins more eagerly. We 
want to avoid this.
Point 2: We looked at supporting combo boxes in action sets late in 2.0. 
WSAD would like this as well.  However, it is not on the plan for 2.1. 
There are plug-in activation issues here too (to populate the combo box).
Point 3. This is a documentation and education issue.  It is possible to 
make object contributions to context menus dynamic based on different 
filtering criteria.

Nick






Randy Hudson/Raleigh/IBM@IBMUS
Sent by: platform-ui-dev-admin@xxxxxxxxxxx
12/11/02 09:57 AM
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        Subject:        [platform-ui-dev] GEF transition to use editorActions extension point




GEF currently provides a way for clients to programmatically populate the 
toolbar and context menu.  But, we don't do anything like merge 
contributions, etc., we just say "here, you build it". 

We would like to switch over to the "platform" way of populating the menus 
and toolbars via plugin.xml.  However, after talking to others who work 
with "real world" Editors (as opposed to our Logic example), most Editors 
do not use the platform method for contributing to actionbars. If GEF 
changed to use plugin.xml as the way to add actions, many clients would 
not be able to maintain their current functionality. 

There is a variety of reasons for not using the current platform 
mechanism, including: 
- Action proxies are not resolved until the user clicks on the Action. 
This is unacceptable for toggle actions, or actions which change their 
text/image dynamically. 
- There is no way to add a Combobox (or non-standard widget) to the 
Toolbar via plugin.xml (this has been discussed peviously, I have a DCR to 
allow ActionContributionItem extension point instead of Action) 
- Developers didn't know about or understand the filter mechanism, and 
thought that context menus could not be dynamic 

Will any of these issues be resolved for 2.1? 

Thanks, 
Randy Hudson 
GEF Team