Re: [TCLCORE] Re: TIP #145 'Enhanced Tk Font Handling' and Re: TIP #154: Add Named Colors to Tk

[Donal K. F. <don...@ma...>]

Michael McLennan wrote:
> I don't think we should introduce an API for something like this,
> and then change the API at a later point because the original was
> botched.  People will start updating their widgets to support the
> new color objects, only to have to change the code again later.

While I understand and appreciate that PoV, I worry that it makes it so hard to
take the first step and get a feature at all that we end up never getting the
feature in the first place.

> I'm not saying that we need a "complete solution" for everything,
> but we should at least have a plan that takes into account future
> development.  We should at least figure out how the notifications
> should work for redraw only, then figure out how to make that
> compatible with the 1.0 release, which will be much simpler.

There's a 9.0 possibility beginning to appear on the horizon for deliverables
(after 8.5 reaches feature-freeze I'd say), and people using whatever API we
make can be expected to have to alter things a bit at that point.

I suppose we could have widgets be updated with the WorldChanged unless they've
defined a handler for doing it more neatly.  That'd allow for graceful support
of existing widgets, while allowing new (and core) widgets to be updated to use
a more efficient interface (which could be whatever makes sense...)

Donal.
-- 
Donal K. Fellows   http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~fellowsd/   don...@ma...
-- Name me one elf who wants to go to Blackpool after he dies.
                                -- Raymond E. Feist on fei...@co...