Reinier Olislagers wrote:
The current situation- and this is with Lazarus trunk, not stable-
appears to be that HTML keyword-based application help works well
provided <snip why HTML help might not be such a good idea>
I very much look forward to the CHM reader being made available for apps
rather than just for the IDE, I'm starting to code what could be my
magnum opus and I'd like the opportunity to exercise it.
>
From another outsider's view, wouldn't this be a solution:
1. document the IPC mechanism used for communication between IDE and
lhelp so application developers can use it
2. compile and distribute lhelp with your application... should be
possible already, shouldn't it?
3. in application: start lhelp and pass messages using 1.
Agreed, or tentatively "componentize" the relevant classes
(TLclChmHelpDatabase and TChmHelpViewer?).
As a general point, current desktops (including KDE and Gnome) have a
standardised set of programs for opening files by extension (xdg-open
etc.), and to be quite honest I think it's not to the credit of anybody
who tries to open a browser or viewer without reference to these.
In general, agreed, but:
If that standard allows keyword lookup etc.. I'm all for it. Also, the
number of standards must be manageable ;)
No, the tools are strictly for handling file and mime types:
-----8<-----
xdg-desktop-icon (1) - command line tool for (un)installing icons to the
desktop
xdg-desktop-menu (1) - command line tool for (un)installing desktop menu
items
xdg-email (1) - command line tool for sending mail using the
users preferred e-mail composer
xdg-icon-resource (1) - command line tool for (un)installing icon resources
xdg-mime (1) - command line tool for querying information about
file type handling and adding descriptions for new file types
xdg-open (1) - opens a file or URL in the users preferred
application
xdg-screensaver (1) - command line tool for controlling the screensaver
xdg-settings (1) - get various settings from the desktop environment
----->8-----
Finally, quite probably not *all* desktops support this (saw your
"current" up there)... so a fallback mechanism would be needed if others
are supported, too.
I agree about the fallback, but the xdg stuff has been in most if not
all Linux distreaux for around five years (doesn't appear to be in
Solaris 10 which is 5+ years old now, don't have a newer version to
check). The important point is that the xdg command lines are
standardised, the implementations are platform-specific.
--
Mark Morgan Lloyd
markMLl .AT. telemetry.co .DOT. uk
[Opinions above are the author's, not those of his employers or colleagues]
--
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