Alessandro Bottoni wrote:
Will, Laurent,
excuse me for this intrusion but I think Will has to be warned about a couple
of issues.
to write extensions, you only need :
- a text editor to edit all js, css, and xml file you want (xul,
overlay, xbl, html, svg, contents.rdf etc)
- a zip tool to create the xpi package
- your application to test the extension
- and ... knowledge about XUL, overlay, css etc...
There isn't yet an existing RAD tool (to create a rad tool helping to
develop overlay, it is very difficult...). Some project for such tools
are began but they are still in developpement, and some of them are
cancelled...
Creating estensions may be easy for a programmer but certainly it is not for a
end-user. A _real_ end-user is the kind of person you can see behind the desk
of a post office or a bank, that is: a clerk or a secretary. This kind of
person does not edit XML files to change the UI of an application (even
granted that such a sophisticated feature is actually required or useful).
I'am agree with you Alessandro. But Wil wants that the user could change
the UI, *deeply* (replace a tree by a list box for example). this is not
an end-user as you describe. An end-user will never change the ui of an
application (except cosmetic change like toolbars..). I don't know a
technology that allow an end user to change the UI and so change the
behavior of the UI, without writing some line of code (xml, js, java,
visual basic or other).
Wil talk about "advanced" user. for example, a developer in a company
(this is a user, in the point of view of the editor) that use the wil's
software and wants to modify it for the end-user of the company.
Even for a programmer, XUL and Mozilla may be not the most elegant or the
easiest way to create a graphical front-end for a server-side application.
it is your point of view, not mine :-)
And this is not the subject here. Wil talk about a standalone
application, not server-side application.
Mozilla and XUL requires to manage at least 3 different languages (XML/XUL,
Javascript/ECMAscript, and CSS)
Three languages to perfom three different things (XUL = GUI, JS =
behaviors, CSS= look). For me, this is a good thing because it is clear
: we haven't a file where all of this datas are mixed. So developpement
is easier. Source code is clear.
and to keep under control a few annoying
issues (like the permission to execute your code on the end-user machine).
In the case of an universal browser like Firefox or Mozilla browser,
security is necessary !
But in the case of Wil, we talk about a standalone application where
issues you point don't exists. We don't talk about the *browser* Mozilla..
There are easier ways to accomplish such a task.
For example, have a look at wxWidgets (www.wxwidgets.org) or wxPython for a
good cross-platform GUI library. You can use a XML file to describe the UI
interface of a wxWidgets application (see wxGlade) and there are a few nice
UI builders (see DialogBlocks or wxHatch). It may be what you are looking
for.
well, ask now a user, to modify the gui of your software, adding new
buttons, changing a menu or else, *without* modify the software itself.
I don't know if you can do it with wx*. But with a Mozilla application,
you can : look at the firefox extensions. You can update the software
without to apply again and again your modification, to apply some patch
or else on the source code of the application. You only need to make few
modification in your extension (if necessary), and update the extension
(which can be automatic throw a network with the update system of the
mozilla framework).
Wil ask for a such functionality i mean.
--
Laurent Jouanneau
http://www.xulfr.org
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