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Node type to launch one dock from another?

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wrwetzel:
I search a bit in the forum but could find no mention of this...

LBC clearly supports multiple docks. Is there a way to launch one dock from another? That seems like such an obvious thing, especially given the regularity of LBC, yet I can find no way to do it. It would appear that a new node type would be appropriate.

Thanks,
Bill

mouser:
what would it mean to "launch" another dock? can you give me an example of how you'd like to use this feature?

wrwetzel:
Let me try. There appears to be two slightly different paradigms at work here, that of the dock, and that of the menu. At this point in my exploration I have a slight preference for the dock over the menu. This is in large part probably influenced by my prior use of FSL launcher, which provides tabbed-access to multiple pages of docks.

I would create a dock called "Photo Apps". I would create a node in another dock with a title "Photo Apps" that has a node type of "dock" and references the Photo Apps dock. Clicking on that node would display the Photo Apps dock just as it would display had I bound it to a hotkey and hit that hotkey. The Photo Apps dock would receive focus and I could select nodes just as with any dock.

Bill

wrwetzel:
Let me add a little more...

I'm attracted to LBC for lots of reasons but the one that stand out the most is that it supports nesting to arbitrary levels. That's important to me as it allows me to construct a launch structure that respects good UI design (limited choices per level, limited number of levels) and that reflects my application usage patterns. If FSL Launcher allows arbitrary nesting I'd probably not be exploring LBC.

When I have had some more time to think about it I'm going to suggest that you incorporate tabs (in the strong sense of the word - tabbed browsing, tabbed file managers, etc., not as you currently use the term) as an alternative to menus. I'm not ready to yet as I have not thought it through enough. A node type of "dock" would give me a partial means to explore how I would use tabs but without the work of implementing tabs.

Another reason to justify a dock node type: you clearly have a sense of the importance of regularity and generality in design - it is obvious from looking at LBC. Including a "dock" node type is just one more instance of that generality and will produce options for use that you and I probably cannot imagine at the outset but which will accrue as others explore it.

Bill

mouser:
Check out the setting for a menu node that lets you treat it as a "tab page":
https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=18752.0



It's not the most intuitive thing, but basically it can be used to switch whole sets of buttons displayed on a dock -- useful for changing between operating modes.  It's not exactly the most intuitive thing, and i would like to set up something a bit more tab-looking, but it does do some of what you are asking for, and a nice thing is that it's very easy to navigate like a normal menu if you like.

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