I am off to Tel Aviv and ICQ tonight so there will be only sporadic updates next week. Before I go though, one of my loyal readers mentioned that with the number of plugins available now, the Actions menu is getting crowded. We have been supporting multiple plugin command entry points for a while, but the latest AIM client built off of the Open AIM platform supports the following actions (to read all about plugin commands here is the documentation):
- AccCommandFlags_ActionsUi – command takes buddy names and will appear in Actions menus
- AccCommandFlags_BuddyUi – command takes buddy names and will appear in buddy context menus
- AccCommandFlags_GroupUi – command takes buddy group names and will appear in buddy group context menus
- AccCommandFlags_ImSessionUi -command takes IM session remote participant names and will appear in IM session menus (e.g., People menus)
- AccCommandFlags_PreferencesUi – command takes empty variant and will appear in Preferences/Setup UI
- AccCommandFlags_AboutUi – command takes empty variant and will appear in About box, plugin context menu or similar
- AccCommandFlags_PresenceUi – command takes empty variant and will appear in Presence UI
Now we also support flyout commands, via IAccCommand::put_Property(AccCommandProp_ParentId, …); For example here is the code from AIM MusicLink that could do the submenu support…
// Create Flyout Command Placeholder
CComPtr <IAccCommand> spiCommand;
piPluginInfo->AddCommand(kCommandId, &spiCommand);
CString menuCommand3;
menuCommand3.LoadString(IDS_ML_MENU_ITEM);
spiCommand->put_Property(AccCommandProp_Text, CComVariant(menuCommand3));
spiCommand->put_Property(AccCommandProp_Flags, CComVariant(AccCommandFlags_ActionsUi));
// add submenu by passing in the command ID of the above command
CComPtr <IAccCommand> spiSubCommand;
piPluginInfo->AddCommand(kShowLogCommandId, &spiSubCommand);
CString menuCommand;
menuCommand.LoadString(IDS_ML_SHOWLOG);
spiSubCommand->put_Property(AccCommandProp_Text, CComVariant(menuCommand));
spiSubCommand->put_Property(AccCommandProp_Flags, CComVariant(AccCommandFlags_ActionsUi));
spiSubCommand->put_Property(AccCommandProp_ParentId, CComVariant(kCommandId));
So as you can see we can easily manage the menus and keep them clean. I actually need to update a few of my plugins to take advantage of the flyout. As always keep the questions coming.
Thousands of AOL members are being harassed by the following Buddy Invite message every time they sign in.
“Someone has invited you to be a Buddy on their profile. Want to become a part of their network? Find out who it is now”
It is not clear to the AOL members how to turn off the message.
(Actually, it can be turned off by clicking on the underlined word “now” at the end of the message. This will take you to a web page where you can accept or decline the invitation.)
This feature needs to be redesigned immediately, to make it clear how to turn off the message.
“Someone has invited you to be a Buddy on their profile. Want to become a part of their network? Find out who it is now”
SUGGESTED CHANGE:
Instead of “Find out who it is now”, say something like “Click HERE to make your choice”.
That way the member would know exactly how to respond to the message, so that the message would go away.