Re: [dev] [dmenu] Putting key combinations in config.h

On Wed, Oct 21, 2009 at 18:55, Peter John Hartman <
peterjohnhartman_AT_gmail.com> wrote:

> I guess not! We agree at least on the first part: that it should be in
> /either/ dmenu.c or config.h and not passed to it from the commandline.
> Fair enough.
>
> Dwm is a very personal program which everyone tailors to his needs.
>> Here configurable shortcuts are of much value and do not conflict much
>> with other users/different systems.
>>
>> Dmenu, on the other hand, is a quite generic program which sould be the
>> same everywhere. If people start configuring the key strokes, one needs
>> different dmenus for different users on one system. Also, one may not be
>> able to use dmenu on a different machine. That's to avoid, for sure.
>>
>
> [snip]
>
> Dmenu should be seen like grep or sed -- a standard tool that works the
>> same everywhere.
>>
>
> I'm not convinced that dmenu shouldn't have keybindings right out in the
> open and in config.h. I do, at least, see your point. (A better analogy
> would be 'less'. Imagine instead of q quiting out of less someone hacked
> up a variant that had r quit. O the pain!)
>
> However, I do see the real need to configure at least the keybinding I
> mentioned before, namely, the Esc keybinding. In a lot of cases, it is
> nice
> to bind the exact same key which opens the menu to the close menu function,
> e.g.\ in the case of the "Windows" key, or in my case, the Super_R key; and
> in some cases Esc might not be the best guy for the job (although I prefer
> having both Esc and the Super_R key precisely because other users will get
> upset.)
>
> I'm not sure if I have a positive solution. If there aren't any other
> cases
> when it would be useful to fiddle with the default keybindings, then we
> probably shouldn't bother. But maybe I'm not being creative enough?
>

Peter
>

Well dmenu should at least have the defaults in config.h, just like the
default colors, etc. Then those who really want functionality X could patch
it in themselves, just like any other tools. Just because, say, I add Ctrl-G
to open a page in my browser with the current input as the URL doesn't mean
(and that probably wouldn't ever) it should become mainstream, or even
something widely used. It's my version of dmenu, hacked to what I want/need
in a choice selection program. Just like I could have a `less' that does use
O to quit rather than q.

I don't know about anyone else, but having escape as the default kill key
works out really well for me. Of course, I do have caps lock switched with
escape, however. It also helps with editing in vim.
Received on Thu Oct 22 2009 - 00:07:30 UTC