Tuesday 30 January 2007

awn - update

Just updated svn with new code which drops the need for a patched libwnck, as it talks directly to X (thanks to some copy-and-paste from the libwnck source ;). It, however, does need testers to make sure it is all working properly.

Now, on to the smart launchers!

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

I checked out the SVN to see if I can get this compiled on ubuntu edgy, but I'm getting this error when running ./configure "config.status: error: cannot find input file: data/Makefile.in".

Neil J. Patel said...

Hi there,

You have to run ./autogen.sh instead of ./configure.

You can pass ./autogen.sh the same variable you would pass ./configure i.e. --prefix=/usr.

Hope that helps.

Anonymous said...

Hi neil,

Could you explain us what "smart launchers are?"

Neil J. Patel said...

Hi Felipe,

Smart launchers are just my snazzy-marketing speak for launchers [i.e. .desktop files, like from 'Application' menu] which you will able to drag onto the bar.

Clicking on these will launch the program, and will automatically associate the icon with the programs window. So the icon works like any other icon on the bar. When you close the program, the icon once again becomes a launcher!

I believe this is how the Mac OS X dock works. I have some more (orignal :) ideas on what to do with launchers, but I will try and make some mock-ups, and blog about it sometime over the weekend.

I read a translated version of your blog post about Awn, and I am glad to hear you like it! If you have any ideas, be sure to email me or comment here!

Peter Parente said...

Have you thought about making it accessible using atk? Even though it's primarily meant for sighted users to enjoy the eye candy, having a simple, accessible dock would be a big boon for blind users using a scree reader as well.

Ping me if you would like more info on how to do it.

Neil J. Patel said...

Hi Peter,

I haven't really read much on Atk, but yes, I am definitely interested in integrating it into Awn.

If you could provide some info, that would be greatly appreciated.

You can mail me :
njpatel_AT_gmail_DOT_com.

Anonymous said...

Hi Neil, I noticed in one of your screenshots that two Nautilus windows being open resulted in two Nautilus icons in AWN -- this is very different from how OSX works and may not be scalable for people who open large numbers of windows. Your program looks great but it should also act great.

Anthony said...

I just recently saw a post in ubuntu forums talking about this program. This looks really exciting and promising! I'll be keeping tabs, and waiting and watching.

Unknown said...

Hey! Thanks a lot :)
and someone put you on the Digg!
http://digg.com/linux_unix/Finally_A_Great_OSX_Like_Dock_For_Linux_Thanks_To_Google

mike said...

hey dude, just checking out awn..
Looks cool!

Thanks for putting the time into making this :)

Neil J. Patel said...

Hi everyone,

Thanks for the compliments!

Regarding task behaviour, I have not actually used Mac OS X, so I am not sure what the behaviour is.

I am already thinking of adding window grouping, however, slightly different, so you can choose which applications group, and which don't.

However, I am still interested to know what the Mac OS X dock behaviour is.