Document the interface used for panels to integrate with the applet

[DemiMarie]

I see some documentation for how to write a libcosmic applet, but not how to talk to the panel directly. Since applets are just executable binaries I assume this is possible, but I’m not sure how yet.

[wash2]

Applets are wayland clients that create a regular window and popups. I'll document some of the environment variables set by the panel for applets though, and the variables applets can set in their desktop entry.

[DemiMarie]

Does this mean that something that creates a layer shell window on other platforms (specifically KDE) should create a standard (toplevel) window under COSMIC?

[wash2]

Does this mean that something that creates a layer shell window on other platforms (specifically KDE) should create a standard (toplevel) window under COSMIC?

cosmic-comp also supports layer shell, but yes, applets should create a standard toplevel window to appear on the panel.

[DemiMarie]

Does this mean that something that creates a layer shell window on other platforms (specifically KDE) should create a standard (toplevel) window under COSMIC?

cosmic-comp also supports layer shell, but yes, applets should create a standard toplevel window to appear on the panel.

Should the actual UI be in a popup?

The context is that I want to someday support COSMIC in Qubes OS, which has large user interface components written in Python (with GTK3 or Qt) and therefore cannot use libcosmic.

[wash2]

Does this mean that something that creates a layer shell window on other platforms (specifically KDE) should create a standard (toplevel) window under COSMIC?

cosmic-comp also supports layer shell, but yes, applets should create a standard toplevel window to appear on the panel.

Should the actual UI be in a popup?

The context is that I want to someday support COSMIC in Qubes OS, which has large user interface components written in Python (with GTK3 or Qt) and therefore cannot use libcosmic.

Yes, most applets create a popup that contains the majority of the UI. There are some like the workspaces list, or buttons that activate some application that don't need a popup, though.