Re: [9front] [PATCH] programmable menus for rio

[Jacob Moody <moody@mail.posixcafe.org>]

On 8/24/22 01:05, qwx@sciops.net wrote:
> On Wed Aug 24 07:01:48 +0200 2022, moody@mail.posixcafe.org wrote:
>> On 8/23/22 20:46, ori@eigenstate.org wrote:
>>> Quoth Jacob Moody <moody@mail.posixcafe.org>:
>>>> Something I've been playing with is a way of exposing part of the rio
>>>> menu to the programs running within it. This is a bit of a simple
>>>> approach, but I would like to gauge interest that people have in
>>>> something along these lines before continuing.
>>>>
>>>> This adds a /dev/menu file that can be written to
>>>> to add new entries to the button3menu. The file
>>>> can be read to get the text string of an added
>>>> menu entry when hit by the user.
>>>>
>>>> Thanks,
>>>> moody
>>>>
>>>
>>> It seems like an interesting trick -- but, the
>>> programs that might use it would already likely
>>> be graphical, no?
>>>
>>
>> Switching languages via special character in ktrans
>> doesn't feel quite right to me. I wanted a graphical
>> way of switching them, and it seemed like something
>> I wanted on the rio menu.
> 
> This is interesting.  umbraticus and I experimented with adding menu2
> entries in sam for commands we use all of the time.  Initially I tried
> doing this with menu entries for adding/removing items, but it was
> horrible.  umbraticus proposed defining a new sam command `M' which
> adds or removes a menu entry: as an example, `M ^R mk install' would
> add `^R mk install' verbatim to the menu (R being some sam script),
> and sending this again would remove it.  We both have scripts which
> define a bunch of rc functions to use within sam, which also works for
> adding stuff at the start of a session.  Then, while using sam, one
> can add or remove commands one ends up using a whole bunch during a
> session instead of switching to the command menu, finding, selecting
> and sending them, which happens way too often for me (for example,
> things like `|fmt -l 80', `|cmd |awk ...' or `!window -m -cd ...
> cmd', etc.).  This works very nicely in my case.
> 

I would 100% be behind bringing this sam work upstream.
That is quite neat.

> For rio, it's a bit different, and I don't know how it would work out
> or what the best interface would be, but I think it's worth
> discussing.

Yeah I'm not sure what the right solution here, I'm just throwing
out code to start the conversation.

- moody