Hi all, after spending some time investigating this issue ( https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=784278) where there is an assertion failure for get_background_items in nautilus-python menu provider extensions, I figured out what the issue is, but I'm hoping to get some feedback from the community about how to fix it, since it will require either changes to Nautilus or nautilus-python.
First, some history. When I last updated nautilus-python in 2011 to work with gobject-introspection, the nautilus extension framework was using introspection but not annotating much, and the functions that called out into extensions were not introspectable. So the generated Nautilus typelib-generated python module did not contain methods for Nautilus.MenuProvider.get_background_items, for example. Sometime in 2012, annotations were added, these provider methods were made introspectable, and all of a sudden there was a collision. All nautilus-python extensions sub-class their provider class of choice, like Nautilus.MenuProvider, which means they inherit Nautilus.MenuProvider's methods. In this case, Nautilus.MenuProvider.get_background_items points to a C function in libnautilus-extension/nautilus_menu_provider.c. And if a python extension doesn't override get_background_items, you get an assertion failure like in the above bug ticket, because it is trying to call into a C function that it shouldn't be calling into. In my mind there are two ways we can fix this, but I'm open to other solutions: 1) Update the Nautilus annotations to ensure that these calls to extension providers are not introspectable, which would prevent collisions in extension clases using bindings. I'm not sure if anyone is using these introspected calls in real life, but I don't see what use they could get from them anyway, unless they want to pretend to be Nautilus and access Nautilus extensions. 2) I would update nautilus-python to use a different module name (like NautilusPython.MenuProvider.get_background_items) that would never conflict with Nautilus's. This would cause breakage in any existing extension. Easy to fix, but it could catch a lot of people by surprise. I think I would prefer #1 here, since it would probably cause the least breakage for existing nautilus-python users. I could deprecate sub-classing the Nautilus module in favor of a new NautilusPython module and eventually require it. What do people think? Adam
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