The only ui possibility is changing how the application menu key behaves as it
unlike ALL other keys doesn't distinguish between short and long presses, the
most complete proposal i had is something like this:

press and hold menu key +
tap touchscreen = right click (equivalent to pressing the right mouse button on
a multi-button mouse), this would include sending right mouse down, right mouse
move, right mouse up, right mouse click.

press and hold menu key +
release key = context menu (equivalent to pressing the context menu key on a
104 key keyboard)

short press menu key +
release key = application menu

currently the application menu appears on menu key down, under the proposal,
the menu work never appear until key release or mouse up.

this was vetoed by our ui specifier for violating platform conventions.

How come you can't add a regular menu that contains the context menu?  Even if
you can't make it a dynamically filled menu, you could make it contain "all
possible context menu items" and grey out the ones that don't apply, based upon
the current selection.

I know you can add menus, because the "Advanced" menu was there for a while,
according to the maemo-users mailing list.  So, why not a menu named "context"
that is the context menu?

Or, why not add the 2 items to the navigation menu?

> How come you can't add a regular menu that contains the context menu? 

Here are some of the rules (believe me, I'd rather get someone else to publish
the full rules than try to remember them incrementally):

1. Menus should not have more than 7-9 items (don't ask how they can say not
more than a range..., in short, 10 is a bug - I filed one, the next time I see
it in a shipped product, I'll file it in bugs.maemo.org).
- The browser menu without set engine has 7 items
- set engine is #8. and it's not intended to remain, it's an interim 
2. I believe there's some limit on menu depth

> Even if you can't make it a dynamically filled menu,

this is actually an interesting point. The context menu rules indicate you are
allowed to be dynamic about construction, but iirc the spec for application
menus says that you aren't supposed to have dynamic menus.

now, if you count the number of possible items in the context menu, you'll
quickly see we're well past 10. 

iirc, it's actually possible to trigger 10 browser context menu items if you
use frames and a couple of other things, you don't need to file bugs about
this, we know.

and note that the task navigator, bookmark, and history menus probably have
some special dispensation because they're essentially user content.

> you could make it contain "all possible context menu items"
> and grey out the ones that don't apply, based upon
> the current selection.

this ends up violating the 10 item limit (yes, i know we occasionally break the
rules).

> I know you can add menus, because the "Advanced" menu was there for a while,

Hidden/Advanced/Set Engine, it's the same menu.

> according to the maemo-users mailing list.  So, why not a menu named "context"
> that is the context menu?

> Or, why not add the 2 items to the navigation menu?

Navigation currently has 7, I'm not sure what 2 you'd add (please specify, I
don't mind talking/listening, it's the only way to get ideas somewhere people
can see them).

Note that typically the context menu and the edit menu have some similarity,
however, id on't know of any way to combine them that wouldn't upset everyone.

Comment 4 Andre Klapper 2009-05-08 17:50:36 UTC

I'm going to set the TM to Fremantle here because the original request, to make
it easier to open the context menu, will probably be fulfilled for Fremantle as
far as I have been vaguely told. Not the time for details yet.

Comment 5 Andre Klapper 2009-06-19 18:48:15 UTC

If the code was more reliable (see bug 1839) this issue would also be fixed by
it.
Hence marking as a duplicate of bug 1839.

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 1839 ***

(In reply to comment #3)

> > Or, why not add the 2 items to the navigation menu?
> 
> Navigation currently has 7, I'm not sure what 2 you'd add (please specify, I
> don't mind talking/listening, it's the only way to get ideas somewhere people
> can see them).
> 
> Note that typically the context menu and the edit menu have some similarity,
> however, id on't know of any way to combine them that wouldn't upset everyone.
> 

(sorry I never replied to this)

The two items I would add to the navigation menu are:

Open in New Window
Open in New Tab (assuming tabs are enabled, I think they were in microb)

'tabs' weren't enabled in microb (we internally had tab support), the system
itself in diablo was tabbed.