Could we have the panel menu patched? Charitable bounty included.

[Oli Warner]

The behaviour of the places menu is driving me insane. In short, I want
to be able to have more than five bookmarks or drives before the menu
truncates into another level. See:
http://i.thepcspy.com/blog/20080626-ubuntu/menu.jpg

I posted this in the forums yesterday but I guess that's the wrong
audience: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=6796654#post6796654
I'm hoping I have more luck here.

There are a few really simple fixes (and one slightly tougher one), any
of which would make my use of the panel menu about a billion times
nicer:

1. Replace the current static value MAX_ITEMS_OR_SUBMENU with a higher
value. The two downsides are this doesn't fix the problem, it just puts
it off, and a higher value might not work for people with tiny screen
heights.

2. Move the MAX_ITEMS_OR_SUBMENU variable off into gconf or some other
user-accessible variable store. This would be an excellent fix but it's
hardly a "just works" style of thinking.

3. Rip out the whole block of logic and make the places panel scroll if
there are too many entries. You'd probably need to work out the panel
orientation to work out the starting scroll point.

4. (The tougher one): detect the screen height and work out how many
entries the menu could support. and truncate/scroll on that basis.

#1 would work for me but might break things for others. I don't think
it's a viable option for the masses.
#2 is the safest compromise (shouldn't break anything but allows people
to bump the number higher)
#3 least hassle but might not work for all people
#4 as 3.

So if somebody who knows gnome-panel can sit down, implement their
favourite of #2/#3/#4 and con, rape and pillage the right people to get
this included in the Ubuntu build process for Jaunty (I've no idea how
that process really works), I'll donate £30 to a charity (or FOSS
project) of your choice.

If you think I'm crazy (and/or think this will never work), please point
out why.

-- 
Oli Warner <oli at thepcspy.com>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel-discuss/attachments/20090226/102a63d1/attachment.html>