Re: FVWM: howto conditionally add menu entries?

On 8/3/19, hw <[email protected]> wrote:
> Dan Espen <[email protected]> writes:
>> Try PipeRead.  Use shell, Perl, Python, your choice.
>
> How would that work?  I'm trying to make a kinda dynamic configuration,
> meaning that there is supposed to be a basic configuration accompanied
> by optional configurations. [...]
> If I was to write some program to create the root menu, I would always
> need to modify the program when new optional configurations are to be
> added so it could recognize them.  That is something I would prefer to
> avoid. [...]
> Unfortunately, that raises the question how I can make it so that the
> entries in the root menu appear in a desired order and with the title at
> the top rather than somewhere in between the entries ...  Is there a way
> to sort menu entries once no more entries are being added?
>
> I'm probably not the first one to try this.  It can't be this difficult,
> can it?

I have long thought about menu stuff, too.
What I wanted for me is a menu that allows me to browse apps and
files, the latter also categorywise (i.e. all, or only
text/graphics/multimedia, or on extension).
And this menu must include recent accesses nicely presented, so one
does not need to search for long. Kind of self-sorting menus that do
not make the need of sorting arise.

Imho PipeRead and some script language is the way to go.
You can look at what I use on
https://github.com/kernschmelze/meowpurr. Actually two programs,
<meow.pl> reads the .desktop files' information and is usually started
once FVWM starts up, <purr.pl> does the menu generation when called by
PipeRead.

It is still WIP - the integration/merging of the Freedesktop Recent
file/URL data is still in progress - and there are some small bugs
ofc.
When I got time I also will add the MenuColor directive that
@ThomasAdam recently implemented (big kudos to Thomas!)

So if you want to see how to dynamically generate complex nested menu
structures, maybe take a look at that, or even give it a try.
You might like Its self-sorting features, which it adapts depending on
your usage.