Recent

Author Topic: Systray v AppIndicator  (Read 5175 times)

dbannon

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2778
    • tomboy-ng, a rewrite of the classic Tomboy
Systray v AppIndicator
« on: May 19, 2018, 11:13:22 am »
Ubuntu is now using Gnome3.28, apparently Fedora is too.
The SystemTrayIcon Component does not display its Icon on such a systems. There is, apparently a difference between what a SystemTrayIcon and an AppIndicator does.
There have been several attempts to bridge that gap but it appears the Gnome3 people want us to use AppIndicator and not SystemTray.

Anyone aware of just what the differences are and is there any chance that 'our' SystemTray component can be made to behave like a AppIndicator ?

Davo

Refs -
https://github.com/ubuntu/gnome-shell-extension-appindicator/issues/127
https://github.com/wincinderith/topicons
https://github.com/mjnaderi/TopTray
https://github.com/phocean/TopIcons-plus
https://github.com/laike9m/topIcons
Note that early Gnome3 releases still honoured SystemTray when you moved the mouse down to lower left but that seems to have stopped now.
Lazarus 2, Linux (and reluctantly Win10, OSX)
My Project - https://github.com/tomboy-notes/tomboy-ng and my github - https://github.com/davidbannon

dbannon

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2778
    • tomboy-ng, a rewrite of the classic Tomboy
Re: Systray v AppIndicator
« Reply #1 on: May 22, 2018, 01:40:05 am »
I have a (somewhat) clearer picture in my mind about this SystemTray issue.

It appears that Gnome has decided that the world does not need anything like the SystemTray, suggestions to the contary invoke a "that conflicts with the plan" - which in gnome speak is a very serious offence.

https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=652122

Ubuntu, while playing with Unity, decided the SystemTray was getting messy and needed reinventing, they came up with the App Indicator App  -
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DesktopExperienceTeam/ApplicationIndicators
Which seems to be about providing a way to allow several processes to communicate via one icon on the panel.

Ubuntu seem to have carried that model forward to Ubuntu Gnome 3 based 18.04

There was an apparently unsuccessful push to get the App Indicator model into Gnome itself, it too was resisted. The Plan has Spoken ...

As there is a class of applications that need this sort of functionality, there are several Gnome Extensions that restore normal behaviour. But some are on the verge of being abandonware.

So, in summary, the Lazarus SystemTray Icon uses the original System Tray model, nobody except the users and their programers like that one. We could update it to App Indicator and it might work then with (eg) newer Ubuntu but Gnome will still disapprove.

Or we could tell our end users to use Ubuntu Mate   :D

This is a challange for a development env that claims to support Windows, Mac AND Linux.

More research is indicated .....

Davo
Lazarus 2, Linux (and reluctantly Win10, OSX)
My Project - https://github.com/tomboy-notes/tomboy-ng and my github - https://github.com/davidbannon

dbannon

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2778
    • tomboy-ng, a rewrite of the classic Tomboy
Re: Systray v AppIndicator
« Reply #2 on: May 23, 2018, 02:40:20 pm »
OK, I have logged a bug report along with a patch that does fix this problem for Ubuntu based systems.

Turns out that the problem is probably there for all newer systems, not just straight Gnome3 Ubuntu.

Bug report - https://bugs.freepascal.org/view.php?id=33778

Wiki update - http://wiki.freepascal.org/How_to_use_a_TrayIcon#Problems_with_newer_Gnome_based_Linux

Davo
Lazarus 2, Linux (and reluctantly Win10, OSX)
My Project - https://github.com/tomboy-notes/tomboy-ng and my github - https://github.com/davidbannon

sash

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 366
Re: Systray v AppIndicator
« Reply #3 on: June 08, 2018, 10:35:59 pm »
TTrayIcon works in my Xubuntu (xfce) 18.04.
Lazarus 2.0.10 FPC 3.2.0 x86_64-linux-gtk2 @ Ubuntu 20.04 XFCE

 

TinyPortal © 2005-2018