Recommended Container Services - Overview

Container Services Introduction

Background

Gadgets can run in many different contexts and host containers. When a gadget needs to surface artifacts or present information in a controlled framework then there needs to be a common API and mechanism to execute these within the container. Some examples are context menus, toolbar, menu bars and window management. Containers may provide default behaviors or different UI integrations in many cases but the gadget making the calls should not care how the underlying service is implemented.  Services provided by the container should provide APIs to abstract these behaviors.

For instance, when gadgets are integrated intoweb based container dojo or div dialog may be used for pop-up dialogs that may take up the entire screen real-estate.  In another container implementation the same dialog from a gadget may be designed to render only within a restricted area.  Similarly as gadget technology extends into existing desktop applicaionts, such as a rich client based on Eclipse may have a system level dialog used. In both instances the underlying gadget called the same code. Another example might be tab management. While most browsers support multiple tabs, some web based applications have their own level of tabs within the web page. By providing an optional service to "open in tab" with the application framework the gadget is guaranteed to behavior like any application within the container.

Proposed Recommended Services(links to detailed proposals)

gadgets.selection

gadgets.actions

gadgets.views

These new services would become recommended optional features of the proposed Common-Container.xml