From: Thomas Martitz <kugel_at_rockbox.org>
Date: Wed, 04 Jan 2012 19:32:21 +0100

Am 04.01.2012 17:05, schrieb Jean-Louis Biasini:
> Hi all,
>
> 1) what I do for now
> I'm working on keymaps and manual for the new fuze+ port. I suppose
> that you already know the kind of harrassing boring task this can be.
> If not you may have a look to the kind of patch that one has to provide:
> for manual:
> http://www.rockbox.org/tracker/task/12492#comment42100
> for keymaps:
> http://www.rockbox.org/tracker/task/12405#comment42101
> (both patch are incomplete I'm still missing keymaps for demo and app)
>
> 2) the problem
> The problem is not only that it is extremly long and boring to do, but
> that this way there is a high probability of error or wrongly set
> keymaps. I don't think that a lot of us want to really take the time
> to carefully think about the best way to control each plugin one by
> one before setting the keymaps in the code for a new target, then
> DOING IT ALLOVER AGAIN in manual. The likely consequence of that (as
> keymaps are mandatory to have plugin compiling) can be poorly
> implemented keymaps in plugin for new target. (making a lot of then
> unusable for example, this is exactly what happened on Fuze+ case)
> Which means also that someone has to go do the harrassing job ALLOVER
> AGAIN. A lot of time and energy are wasted on uninterresting task
>
> 3) a possible solution?
> I saw that some plugin are relying on pluginlib-action for their
> keymaps which bring 2 major speed up: keymaps get set in a general way
> (only one keymap for all) AND it is possible to write the manual in a
> way that takes all keymaps for those plugin from one single file
> (keymap-xxx.tex).


This is a good idea in theory. But pluginlib-action (short: PLA) has one
problem, it offers only few actions. This is quite on purpose though,
this way it can cover all targets without lots of complexity.

If you look at PLA history, it used to be a lot more complex. But that
wasn't practical and thus trimmed down.

Anyway, the few actions make the number of plugins it can possibly be
useful for limited. There are still some, like lamp, stats, rockblox or
superdom (possibly more). So yea, patches are welcome!

But not all plugins can use PLA. And we should not try to make PLA more
complex again so it can fit them. It didn't work in the past.

>
> 4) question to all
> Somehow a lot of plugin still not use the keymaps privided by
> pluginlib-action for now. Is there any good reason for that?


The plugins need to many buttons.

>
> 5) Answer I already get:
> - Sagarota told me this would be related to the fact some small old
> device might not have enough key to be used through pluginlib-action.
> -> this could be turned around with an alternative
> pluginlib-action keymaps for those target
> -> or we could even let the old method for those old target
> and set pluginlib-action for bigger/new ones.
>


This is not true. PLA provides so little actions that it can cover all
targets..


Any patch that converts one (or more) plugin to PLA is highly
anticipated! Actually, it would have been done by now if plugin keymaps
weren't so boring :)

Best regards.
Received on 2012-01-04