Didier 'OdyX' Raboud writes ("Bug#741573: Two menu systems"):
> The 'trad' menu file or the 'desktop' xdg file are only the starting
> point of their technical differences; one other technical difference
> that matters is the support for icon formats.
You have missed my key point about differences of goals between the
two menu systems. The trad menu explicitly has the goal of providing
a menu item for every invokable thing; whereas the desktop menu
maintainers want it to provide only entries for a much smaller subset
of programs.
This means that we need two systems.
Now in principle you might argue that the "comprehensive" menu should
also be provided via xdg desktop files because they are supposedly
technically superior.
However, this technical superiority is disputed by the maintainers of
the software for handling the trad menu. Under the circumstances I
think it is not appropriate to try to enforce an "upgrade".
> >From the 'trad' Debian Menu System:
> > * The icons should be in xpm format.
...
> This doesn't say what non-xpm icon formats are supported
Yes, it clearly does. "The icons should be in xpm format". I.e. no
non-xpm formats are supported. The set of supported non-xpm formats
is empty.
> and in practice, the icon path also has to be specified completely;
> one can't provide more than two (fixed) icon resolutions either.
This is not, however, a disbenefit of the trad system. It does reduce
the capability of the system as a whole, and impose more constraints
on the providers of menu entries. But the other side of that is that
it is easier to consume menu entries. It's a tradeoff.
> Enforcing the use of the antique XPM format
I don't think there is anything wrong with the xpm format for small
fixed-size icons. "Antique" is here a pejorative word for "well
supported by a range of mature and reliable software".
> in a limited resolutions set
> is one of the pains of the 'trad' menu system IMHO.
The limited set of resolutions is another tradeoff that makes it
easier for a wm to consume menu entries.
> In practice, in
> order to add an xpm icon to one of my packages [0] which already shipped
> a .desktop file, an SVG icon and built various sizes' pngs at build-time
> using rsvg-convert [1], I had to add an imagemagick build-dependency and
> convert it out of the 32^2 png icon as I didn't find a software to
> convert the svg directly to xpm.
The alternative would be to force menu entry consumers to add a
similar dependency. It is IMO better to have a build-dependency than
an install-time dependency.
If you think imagemagick is too heavyweight, perhaps you would prefer
pbmplus.
Thanks,
Ian.
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