[Scummvm-devel] Global menu save/load dialogs

[Max Horn]

Am 10.11.2008 um 20:28 schrieb John Willis:
[...]
> With all the work on the menu, configuration and the like could an  
> option
> such as "Use unified save/load menus" not just be snuck into the  
> options
> dialog? Ok, there is a little evaluation that has to happen at  
> runtime but
> this could be minimised. Just default it to 'off'. Maybe do this in  
> addition
> to a new key combo but that starts to look all a little bloated I  
> guess.


I fail to see the benefit here! If the user wants to use the GMM, he  
uses our global hotkey (until we choose otherwise: F6). Voila. No  
config option to find and document, no surprised "Hm, odd, on my  
machine the save menu looks completly different" by friendly neighbors  
trying to help out with your ScummVM install.

And if you prefer the game's built-in dialog, just access it via  
whatever means the game offers.

So, besides always being sceptical about adding options to avoid  
having to make a decision, in this particular case I also don't quite  
see the advantage of the option...

Maybe you were thinking of what you wrote next, more on that below:

>
>
>> Also, it should be possible for *backends* to trigger the GMM, e.g.  
>> by
>> adding a new event for that. This way, we can add a "open GMM" hotkey
>> to console ports with few keys. That might be quite useful.
>
> This would be more then useful :). IMHO some of the ports would gain  
> more
> from a standard load/save dialog system (with things like known visual
> constraints) then they would loose not seeing the original  
> dialogues. A
> standard event for this that dropped back to the engines 'original'  
> save
> dialogues if the GMM was not suitable would be an ideal  
> situation ;). Keep
> what we have by all means but give porters the flexibility to force  
> the GMM
> if it suits there environment better.


OK, maybe you were thinking of this when you suggest an option for  
choosing between original and GMM save dialog. However, that won't  
work. Some games just never will be able to save via the GMM, or even  
to provide a hotkey for a savedialog (some games don't even have the  
concept of "saving" your game state). Showing the GMM is about the  
best we can do for them... And/or letting the engine override the  
EVENT_SHOW_MAINMENU handling by triggering their built-in  
"menu" (actually, we could just make Engine::openMainMenuDialog  
virtual for that purpose). Alternatively, those engines could add an  
"show built-in GUI" button to the GMM, if for whatever reasons they  
want to offer both menus.

Bye,
Max