[Sugar-devel] [FEATURE] [DESIGN] Frame Panels

[Aleksey Lim]

Hi all,

At the end Journal Plugins mutated to Frame Panles feature.
All UI visible changes I wanted to implement in plugins could be done
via Frame Panle components(the rest of code are shell agnostic).

Frame Panles feature has the same major idea, social context - giving
non core developers more freedom in case of releasing/supporting theirs
code, e.g. adding GSM modem support could be implemented not in
core(thus stuck to sugar version, when previous sugar version users
can't grab last changes of GSM modem component) but as a standalone
activity(and deployed as a regular activity).

== Summary ==

Treat frame as a containers(upper, left, right and bottom) for
predefined or custom components i.e. having GNOME panels analog in
sugar.

== Detailed Description ==

The major reason is to let activities like FileShare or Chat special UI
representation in shell's interface. It could be also useful if user
wants fast access to some activities like Journal replacements.

Any of four panels could be stuck i.e. let user see its components all
time.

=== Predefined components ===

* rings switch
* activities list
* clipboard
* users list
* sources list
* network component
* notification area

== Benefit to Sugar ==

* let users more freedom to organize sugar shell how they want
* provide to activity developers a way to integrate theirs activities
* to shell UI(useful for activities that work in background and
* requires some kind all-time-present indicator in UI)
* having stable API for panel components, activity developers have more
* freedom and aren't stuck to core releases e.g. Network
* activity/component(analog of NM widget in GNOME) could support
* several sugar releases and previous release sugar users will benefit
* from last Network component.
* previous sugar release users will benefit from last updates of
* predefined components as well

== UI Design ==

* all of four frame panels could be stuck
* manage components, way to add-new/remove/move components
* components could have shell level key shortcuts

== User Experience ==

* sugar frame as a regular GNOME panels

-- 
Aleksey