On Tue, Nov 16, 2010 at 5:27 PM, eveningnick eveningnick < eveningn...@gmail.com> wrote: > Hello! > I have to write an application, that should run on the background. > When the user needs, it should display some control panel. On Windows > system i would have used System tray, and an icon there - when the > user clicks on that icon, it displays some GUI. but what is the Mac's > usual practice? I am thinking that the analog to that tray application > is an agent, launched by launchd. On what event it is considered to be > good to trigger that "control panel"?
It depends on what you're writing. Don't use the status area (near the clock) just to provide access to your app. If you're writing a VPN client or something else whose status needs to be monitored continuously, the status area is a good place to put your UI: a status item with a menu that afford access to the app's configuration/preferences dialog. But don't use the status area for transient things. If you're writing a backup app, for example, and don't feel like burdening your users' status area with mundane "backups are happening" information, don't all of a sudden put UI to alert the user that something's gone wrong. But then how do you alert the user or let them configure things? If you have no configuration options (the only interaction you need in your background app is to alert the user) you can use the CFNotification API. If you *do* have configuration, then create an app that only configures things, and embed your background app as a helper tool inside this app wrapper. When you need to show UI, have your background app launch the main app that it's a part of. Alternatively, your main "app" could be a system preferences pane rather than a full-blown app. --Kyle Sluder _______________________________________________ Cocoa-dev mailing list (Cocoa-dev@lists.apple.com) Please do not post admin requests or moderator comments to the list. Contact the moderators at cocoa-dev-admins(at)lists.apple.com Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/cocoa-dev/archive%40mail-archive.com This email sent to arch...@mail-archive.com
