Dock app using distributed objects

[Riccardo Canalicchio]

Hello,

I have been thinking about how to have a live image representation of an app for a dock application and I wanted to try with distributed objects.

I've implemented a proof of concept dock app that exposes a service where other applications can send their views to be used as icons for a dock. The dock protocol accepts menus that when clicked can trigger callbacks on the original apps. If an app wants to show a badge (with for example the number of notifications) it could draw it itself and then send an update to the dock.

Here the code for a basic dock.app, the protocol and a simple client:

https://github.com/nongio/dock.app

Ideally MiniWindows could automatically register to the service..

In the screenshots following you see the client window (bordered) and right below the borderless window of the dock app.

cheers,

Riccardo