menu spec: [menu-file-basename]-merged directory

[Matt Kynaston]

Hi,

OK, I'm brand new to this list so shoot me down if this doesn't make
sense or if I've missed something obvious.

I'm in the v. early stages of adding editing capabilities to pyxdg,
and I've just been reading the "menu editing with multiple menu
editors" thread from back in Feb:
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xdg/2005-February/005937.html

Two things bother me about the spec at this point:
    1. The issue raised in the thread: having more than one file to merge in 
        $XDG_CONFIG_DIRS/menus/[menu-file-basename]-merged/  will only 
        lead to a mess, currently avoidable only by handshake agreements
        between menu editor developers.
    2. The past tense of [menu-file-basename]-merged directory name itself 
        seems to imply that what you'll see is the result of merging other menu 
        files. It isn't - the contents of the directory still have to be merged.

Wouldn't it make more sense if there was a single directory,
$XDG_CONFIG_DIRS/menus/merge/, containing [menu-file-basename] files
to be merged? So with my Gnome-2.10 setup, I could possibly have:
        ~/.config/menus/merge/applications.menu
        ~/.config/menus/merge/preferences.menu
        ~/.config/menus/merge/settings.menu

That way:
    1. It's impossible for there to be more than one merge file for a given
        menu - all menu editors would be forced to work with that.
    2. There's a single directory mirroring the contents of
        $XDG_CONFIG_DIRS/menus/ instead of lots of ugly, double-barrelled
        directories which, in a sane world, would only contain one file.
    3. We do not risk the wrath of the grammar police ;)

I have no idea what kind of havoc changing things at this point would
cause, but it seems to me better than going forward with the obscure
and mess-prone status quo.

Regards,

Matt