[Tclplugin-core] Tcl/Tk browser plugin v3.0 ready for test - known issues

[Jeffrey H. <Je...@Ac...>]

Those of you who received the Tcl Dev Kit beta announcement will have
noticed that it comes with a fully functional Tcl plugin (yeah!).

The Tcl Dev Kit beta provides binaries and does the correct installation
for what the plugin requires.  You can get that from:
	http://www.ActiveState.com/TclDevKit/beta

ActiveState has contributed all the changes for v3.0 back into the SF
cvs project (tclplugin), so you can build it from there for platforms
which we don't have binaries for.

This email is to basically go over known issues to preempt lots of
questions flooding my inbox.

* I am basically targetting (read: testing) IE5+ and Mozilla 1+.  This
is an Netscape Plugin API plugin, so it should work with Opera and a
few others, as well as Netscape 4 of course.

* Focus in Mozilla on Unix.  Mozilla doesn't like giving focus to the
plugin on unix (Windows OK).  This is important for receiving key
events, but not for mouse events.  Once the plugin is loaded, if you
click outside Moz and then back in, you usually get focus.  This does
not affect N4 on Unix.

* Out-of-process only on Unix.  The Moz guys dropped the X app context
on unix (argh!), which means I have to meld the event loop with gtk.
I got lazy and decided to go out-of-process for now since that works
and is transparent to the user.  May get back in-process later.

* Arrows Keys in IE.  It appears that on any page with a vertical
scrollbar on IE, the arrow keys are used for that before the plugin
ever gets them.  You can get other keys fine, just not arrows.  If you
fit all on one page, you are OK.

* Tcl 8.4.1+ required.  Due to reload issues that had to be fixed in
the core, you must have a very recent version of Tcl (the one in the
Tcl Dev Kit 2.5b1 is good, ActiveTcl 8.4.1.1 is not).  When you go
out-of-proc this is irrelevant (ie for Unix), but assuming I fix the
in-proc stuff, you need the latest version.

* Policies.  The current safety stuff is the same as before, but I do
plan to alter that in the coming weeks.  More power to both the user
and the tclet developer is needed.

* The end goal is to have a plugin with a one-click-from-browser install,
but right now I am targetting functionality only.

-- 
     Jeff Hobbs                     The Tcl Guy
     Senior Developer               http://www.ActiveState.com/
         Tcl Support and Productivity Solutions