Active activities as Widgets

[Gerard J. Cerchio]

Dafydd Harries wrote:
> Ar 30/11/2007 am 10:25, ysgrifennodd Eben Eliason:
>   
>>> I have been reviewing the code in the chat application and given the
>>> abilities of the dbus do not feel that text messages will add all that
>>> much complexity to the application. My original query was not as much
>>> having a chat window in my activity but more of a Delphi like component
>>> that I could drop into the buddy panel weld into my existing tubes and
>>> be done with chat.
>>>       
>> This, I do believe is probably a fantastic thing to work on.  What we
>> really need in cases like this is, as you say, a chat widget that is
>> based on the chat activity, having the same look, feel, options, etc.
>> Just as we have an Abiword widget for text which can be used anywhere
>> we should adopt a standard chat widget that can be designed and
>> maintained by OLPC, so that the experience is always consistent and
>> any fixes or improvements are automatically seen within any activity
>> that makes use of it.
>>
>> Do those working on Chat see this as a viable possibility?
>>     
>
> I don't see any reason why not.
>
> Do you envision this as something that might be enabled in every activity
> automatically, or something that each activity would integrate manually? The
> former might mean that the chatting UI would be more consistent, but perhaps
> allows for less flexibility in integrating with different styles of activity
> UI.
>
> (Shared activities are built on top of chat rooms, so there's already a way
> for all the participants to send messages to each other.)
>
>   
I am all for the manually adopted widget. I think Eben has pointed out 
problems with the every activity model. But in any case, the widget is a 
natural first step to any further functionality.