Make UDC "Open with..." extension sensitive.

[Gandolf]

Is there any way of making the UDC "Open with..." sub-menu extension sensitive in the same way as the Windows context menu is? It doesn't really work having to search through a large list of programs which aren't applicable to the file type.

[admin]

I don't understand.

[TheQwerty]

Well the real goal of the request is a better way to manage the User -> Open With... submenu. But I think what he really wants is for the that menu to change based on the file type selected.

It would be interesting if we could add a new field there "Only Show for selected file types" where the user could enter a pattern ("*.jpg;*.gif;*.png;*.bmp") and then that UDC would not be shown unless the selected files all matched the pattern. I'm not sure how well that would actually work though, and, at least to me, it doesn't seem the gain would be worth the effort.


It brings up another thought though, what if we had the ability to add UDC items to the Catalog, so we could go crazy organizing them and have them available at a single click?

[admin]

It brings up another thought though, what if we had the ability to add UDC items to the Catalog, so we could go crazy organizing them and have them available at a single click?

jacky had this idea already, if I got him and you right.

Or -- now I get an idea -- do you mean this: call menu items by Catalog? I mean by name: Destination = User/Open With/ZipDated which would just be another interface to the menu item... interesting idea. Not sure how easy to implement...

[TheQwerty]

It brings up another thought though, what if we had the ability to add UDC items to the Catalog, so we could go crazy organizing them and have them available at a single click?

jacky had this idea already, if I got him and you right.

Or -- now I get an idea -- do you mean this: call menu items by Catalog? I mean by name: Destination = User/Open With/ZipDated which would just be another interface to the menu item... interesting idea. Not sure how easy to implement...

That's all it would be is another interface to the command menu items.

There could also be a new submenu of Catalog Context Menu -> "Insert As New Item(s) Here" -> UDCs -> UDC Categories -> UDC Commands. It could be a copy of the current User menu and allow easy adding of commands.


One thing I'm not sure about is what should be done with the icons.
The way I see it there's three options:
1) Use the current Manage Commands icon for all UDC items in the catalog.
2) Add an icon for each UDC category that will be used for all commands of that type.
3) Default to #1, but allow the user to customize the icons.

As you're going to be playing with that code soon because of the program argument feature anyway it might not be a bad time to look into making all Catalog icons user customizable.


Sorry for kind of hijacking your thread here Gandolf!

[jacky]

jacky had this idea already, if I got him and you right.

Yes, a way for us to create our own UDC categories, or submenus within a category, would be a great thing, if only for ordering things, and the ability to popup a menu with many UDCs not all of the same command by chosen by other criteria (relating to a given project, etc as one wishes)

The way I saw it, if we had somehow the ability to create submenus on the Manage UDC interface would be doing the job fine. Maybe some prefix (on caption) that would indication the item must be put in a submenu or something ?

Or -- now I get an idea -- do you mean this: call menu items by Catalog? I mean by name: Destination = User/Open With/ZipDated which would just be another interface to the menu item... interesting idea. Not sure how easy to implement...

Now that could be interesting as well indeed!

[Gandolf]

...But I think what he really wants is for the that menu to change based on the file type selected....

Exactly. I use the Windows context menu a lot, I have 15+ different programs that are associated with image files alone so I don't want them in the "Open with..." menu if I'm opening a text file.

Sorry for kind of hijacking your thread here Gandolf!

No problem - that's the enjoyment of this forum, users expand the ideas and we all benefit.

[admin]

...But I think what he really wants is for the that menu to change based on the file type selected....

Exactly. I use the Windows context menu a lot, I have 15+ different programs that are associated with image files alone so I don't want them in the "Open with..." menu if I'm opening a text file.

Okay, I got it now. It's not so easy to do, but I keep it in the back of my mind.

Same with the other ideas in this thread. XY now has so many possibilities (and *scripting* is already knocking at the door!), that it's a perfect moment to sit back and see how things fall into places (mentally).

[Gandolf]

Another idea, which might be easier to implement, is to be able to put a separator between items in the UDC list to enable them to be grouped easier.

[admin]

Another idea, which might be easier to implement, is to be able to put a separator between items in the UDC list to enable them to be grouped easier.

If you mean a menu separator, that's already possible now: simply use "-" (minus) as command caption to make a separator.

[Gandolf]

That's exactly what I want. I had tried it but deleted the "New" application default, since I thought it should be blank. Just entering the "-" works a treat. Thanks.

[admin]

That's exactly what I want. I had tried it but deleted the "New" application default, since I thought it should be blank. Just entering the "-" works a treat. Thanks.

It's not even a feature but a side-effect. Jacky discovered it before me!