“Kommander is on its way to become one of the most compelling tools in KDE. It has elements that should be very interesting to application developers, power users, newbies and companies looking at using the Linux desktop. So the answer to the question many of you may be asking, “What is Kommander?”, really has to be answered from each perspective. A simplified technical description is that Kommander is two programs, an editor and an executor, that produce dialogs that you can execute.” Read the article at TheDot.
Kommander Looks to Shake Up the Desktop
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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So this is a souped up AppleScript studio for Linux? Maybe I’m just dumb, but I’m still not sure what exactly it is.
What is DCOP?
DCOP is a way at communicating to programs from other programs. Say I want to have Kopete sign on a 8:00am every morning and sign off at 5:00pm, I could write a script or 2 that uses the DCOP hooks and put that script in a cron job to run at 8 and 5 every day. so alot like kind of like AppleScript, like Renaldo said, as it lets you control outside programs but i don’t think DCOP has the language built around it like AppleScript does, i believe its just an API.
Seems to be something like that, though I’m a little confused as well. It’s an IDE that doesn’t require programming. What the hell does that mean!
Have a look at:
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-dcop/?ca=dgr-…
and in related news:
http://dot.kde.org/1082391595/
If you are running KDE already you might want to enter
dcop kdesktop KScreensaverIface lock
on your konsole as a simple example for a DCOP command.
Tackat
That’s understandable, especially if you’re not a programmer. Lets start with the dore, which is DCOP.
DCOP is a KDE API the allows for interapplication communication. It allows one KDE application to send information or even control another KDE application. Some examples have already been given but, think of things like macros in your word processor that make the word processor open up the spreadsheet application, perform some calculations, create a graph and return the graph to the wordprocessor. Or perhaps, you need a particular button in a particular application to be clicked at a regular interval or when a specific event occurs. This can be accomplished via DCOP.
If this sounds familiar, it should. DCOP is KDE’s version of Microsoft’s DCOM and DAO interfaces. DCOP is an extremely powerful interface that is still not widely used by a lot of KDE aplications but, nearly every KDE app is DCOP enabled.
DCOP can also be used from scripts to perform various operations on or in KDE applications. This is where Kommander comes in. Kommander is a graphical IDE and scripting language/interpreter that can be used to generate and run scripts that leverage DCOP.
Essentially, if I am not mistaken, Kommander is roughly analogous to Microsoft’s Visual Basic for Applications(VBA). It can be used to create and run exceptionally powerful scripts within KDE, while providing a more comfortable or less complex environment than Bash, Perl or Python.
You’re right. DCOP is language neutral. One way you can gain a lot of power though is by using it with kjsembed the KDE client-side javascript library.
Cool feature, but documented so that only fanboys can understand it.
If this turns out to be anything like AppleScript I will be very impressed.
Just out of curiosity, why hasn’t some genius figured out that a good way to get Windows users familiar with Linux is to produce a graphical shell that is compatible with both Linux *and* Windows? I mean, why limit yourself to Linux? Push into companies, get them familiar with the alternate shell, and then move people transparently to Linux.
Okay, this article tries to make sense of commander, but I still don’t see how it differs from a your run-o-the-mill scripting language or RAD.
DCOP is a nice API for KDE apps to talk to each other. Fine, I get that.
I did a little more chcking by checking the Kommander site. From a first glance (i.e. not actually installing/trying ig) Kommander is just another language which can call DCOP. It looks just like another scripting or RAD type language.
Maybe this is the next best thing since sliced bread, but the author really didn’t explain what is so great about it. Maybe its a great RAD or scripting language. He goes to lengths to say what it is not. This hurts the article, because at the end, I only come out with the impression that it is what the authoer wants me to think its not
On another read…
Is Kommander really just a framework if u will, that links dialogs to a scripting language of your choice?
Like suppose I made my own scripting language called abc which outputs text with the following command:
ABC_print “my text”;
Could I use this kommander. For example, taking the contents of a text box and calling ABC_print on it. FOr example, the code might look like this:
ABC_print @mytextbox
*************************************************
Yamin
Just out of curiosity, why hasn’t some genius figured out that a good way to get Windows users familiar with Linux is to produce a graphical shell that is compatible with both Linux *and* Windows?
Uhhhhhh… Because that is incredibly difficult, bordering on impossible. You’re talking about creating a desktop environment, a lot of very good technology and infrastructure, and then you’re talking about porting all of that to Windows where the infrastructure and tools are completely different?
After all of that incredible, virtually impossible work, you’re then talking about moving people trasparently to Linux anyway?! Being cross-platform is a worthy goal, but you can only go so far. People will either move away from Windows or they won’t.
People who come up with all of this “Oh, make it cross-platform” stuff have absolutely no grasp of how much work is involved in doing that.
You’re right. DCOP is language neutral. One way you can gain a lot of power though is by using it with kjsembed the KDE client-side javascript library.
DCOP is one of the best things I’ve seen in any desktop environment, and it is good as developer to get a nice front-end to it in kdcop.
I have to say, I’m not sure about Kommander. In this CVS KDE right now I can see Qt Designer, KDevelop and KDevelop Designer. KDevelop Designer is just a KDE-ified Qt Designer. I’m just not convinced at all that another IDE is really needed, and a bit more communication is required between different people on how all of this could be implemented with significantly less effort.
Does anyone know if DCOP will be replaced by DBUS in KDE 4.0, or is that too early to say?
“Does anyone know if DCOP will be replaced by DBUS in KDE 4.0, or is that too early to say?”
dbus is designed to be dcop compatible as far as possible but dcop is very heavily used inside kde and it would take immense amount of work to ditch dcop completely and the kde project is waiting for dcop to mature. the other day i was talking to zack from kde working on fd.o and he said he would wait for more time.
>>Just out of curiosity, why hasn’t some genius figured out that a good way to get Windows users familiar with Linux is to produce a graphical shell that is compatible with both Linux *and* Windows?
Download Athene. It’s incredibly easy to install on Linux and Windows and is exactly what you described. The project is still in the early stages, but it’s very slick and impressive. Basically the idea is, if you write a program for Athene, and Athene is easy to install on Linux and Windows, you have just written a cross-platform program. (Now you just have to convince whoever your user is to download and install Athene in order to run it.)
Kurumin (http://www.kurumin.com.br) use kommander to make a “control panel” (named “clica-aki” or “press here” in english) of the system:
http://www.vivaolinux.com.br/screenshots/comunidade/1077553746.foto…
Buttons and other widgets, when pressed, run shell scripts that install softwares, configure hardware devices, etc. It is a very popular brazilian distribution.
If operating systems where done right from the beginning dcop and simlar concepts wouldn’t be needed. This really shouldn’t be done as an afterthought ontop of applications.
The whole concept of isolating a bunch of commands inside a construct we like to call an application is just stupid. Any computer should have exactly one application, the operating system.
:”The whole concept of isolating a bunch of commands inside a construct we like to call an application is just stupid. Any computer should have exactly one application, the operating system.”
that was the crappiest comment i ever heard. read it again. dcop enables applications to communicate with each other. what are you objecting to? huh
Any computer should have exactly one application, the operating system.
Yes, and also exactly one programming language – LISP. Things are how they are for a reason.
So technology that Apple and MS have had available for eons is suddenly going to “shake up the desktop” because its finally coming to Linux via KDE ? ooookkkkk
It does look nice though and it puts KDE on a closer par with what Windows developers and power users are used to having.
Kudos
“So technology that Apple and MS have had available for eons is suddenly going to “shake up the desktop” because its finally coming to Linux via KDE ? ooookkkkk
It does look nice though and it puts KDE on a closer par with what Windows developers and power users are used to having. ”
dcop is something thats not found any in any other OS. stop talking about technology you dont know.
dcop is something thats not found any in any other OS. stop talking about technology you dont know.
So then lets start with COM on Windows. Please show me or explain something I can do with dcop that I can’t accomplish with COM on Windows ?
I’m genuienly interested but at this point all I’ve read about is a technology that makes me think ‘COM for KDE’ or ‘wow KDE has something like ActiveX – neato!’
“So then lets start with COM on Windows. Please show me or explain something I can do with dcop that I can’t accomplish with COM on Windows ? ”
com is a programmable ipc interface unlike dcop which also has a utility which can do cool things from the command line itself
for example changing a virtual desktop every few seconds with a different wall paper each time for a demonstration. this is just a example that was actually used in a kde demo.
of course you can write programs in com for this but dcop is very easy and is much more usable even for newbies. look for dcop docs inside kde.org for more apis and stuff.
this is not like activex either
for example changing a virtual desktop every few seconds with a different wall paper each time for a demonstration. this is just a example that was actually used in a kde demo.
How this would be any different than me firing off a VBS script via the WSH at the commandline?
of course you can write programs in com for this but dcop is very easy and is much more usable even for newbies. look for dcop docs inside kde.org for more apis and stuff.
You don’t even need to write an app, you can script a COM object right from notepad.
this is not like activex either
Well ActiveX is COM, just relabeled and welded into IE for the internet with a couple of new interface types.
I guess I just don’t see how this is a technology that will “shake up the desktop”. I haven’t turned up anything yet that really strikes me as new or more powerful than existing technologies.
Then again I just heard about dcop and will investigate it more deeply in time.
“for example changing a virtual desktop every few seconds with a different wall paper each time for a demonstration. this is just a example that was actually used in a kde demo.”
How this would be any different than me firing off a VBS script via the WSH at the commandline?
For users who do not have time to write scripts, that feature found in KDE comes in handy as standard.