Re: idea -> internal frames?

[Kevin A. Burton]

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"Stefan Monnier" <monnier+gnu/address@hidden> writes:

> > A good example is the speedbar.  I like the speedbar in Emacs 21...  the 
> > only
> > problem is that it gets lost in my other X applications (mozilla, xterms, 
> > etc).
> > 
> > If I could keep it within my current maximized Emacs frame this would allow 
> > me
> > get work done and keep the speedbar close at hand.
> > 
> > The key here is that this would be "superior" to other windows.  AKA
> > (delete-other-windows) would have no affect on an internal frame.
> 
> I'm not sure whether it justifies `internal frames'.
> But I agree that window manipulation could/should be improved.  Another
> example was for the EDE (if I remember correctly) where they wanted
> to have a small side-window (for speedbar kind of things) and a small
> bottom window (for *Compilation* kind of things) and then allow the user
> to split/unsplit the main remaining window without trashing those two
> other ones.

dedicated windows?  The thing is that I think they should look somewhat
different than regular windows... maybe have their own minibuffer?

> Maybe we could try to make the window-hierarchy (inside a frame) more
> constraining (i.e. have C-x o only switch within some subset and have another
> C-x 7 o to get outside of the set of windows).  I'm not sure I'm making
> sense...

It would need to be more flexible.  I wrote the original "PluginHolder"
implementation for the jEdit editor.  It has the ability to hold a "plugin" at
NORTH, SOUTH, EAST, and WEST.  You can also split these locations into multiple
frames and store more than one plugin in each section.

It would be nice if Emacs had a similar system.

> Of course, another solution is to use multiple frames and then ask your
> window-manager to keep them positioned in a particular way. `scwm' had that
> ability since you could use its constraint-solver to force some frames to
> always stay side-by-side or to have the same height or ...  Sadly, sawfish
> killed scwm.

Yes.  This was another thing brought up in the design of PluginManager.  It
seems that about 50% of the people want to have these things as a dedicated
window and the other 50% want this as an "inner window" (or whatever it is
called).

Either viewpoint is valid of course...
<snip>

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Kevin A. Burton ( address@hidden, address@hidden, address@hidden )
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