Connecting a non python activity to sugar

[Bert Freudenberg]

On 31.03.2008, at 14:52, Paul Fox wrote:
> bert wrote:
>> http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Low-level_Activity_API
>>
>> Also, try the sugarize script and library:
>>
>> http://lists.laptop.org/pipermail/devel/2008-January/009387.html
>>
>> (maybe that should be added to the Wiki)
>
> indeed -- that would be a nice addition.  i'm using that script,
> along with the little libsugarize shared lib hook, with good
> success.  i think many people have found versions of that script
> via the forums, but it would be good to have it in a
> quasi-official place.  (i didn't realize where it had originated.)

Well, just add it then. It's a Wiki :)

> on that subject, i've been wondering about a related issue.
>
> my activity (RoadMap, which is a GPS-enabled street-mapping
> program) runs in a single X-window (modulo the occasional
> dialog box).  it has the ability to spawn a second program (a GPS
> "console", which gives an "available satellite" display) which
> of course creates a second X-window.  this is fine, as long as you
> quit from the spawned program before doing something sugary to
> move away from its window (e.g., alt-tab).  but if you obscure its
> window, you can never get back to it, since sugar knows nothing
> about it.  this isn't really a program that should be a
> full-fledged activity -- it can run standalone, but one
> usually invokes it from RoadMap ("Hmm -- I'm not getting a fix --
> where are my satellites?").  is there a way of wrapping the
> second application in a shared lib similar to libsugarize such
> that sugar would know about its window in at least some minimal
> way?  without this, the program gets "lost" from a UI point of
> view.
>
> (i realize that needing a second window is rather un-sugary.  in a
> new activity, it would probably be a tab, for instance.)


Sugar maintains a strict 1:1 relation between top-level windows marked  
as activity and activities. Any other top-level window should get an  
"unknown" icon, currently a gray circle. I guess marking an arbitrary  
top-level window as activity would severely confuse Sugar. What you  
could try is running it as dialog window, then it will even receive a  
window border that can be dragged around etc., similar to the object  
chooser dialog.

- Bert -