Replacing saving of !Boot file via Switcher

Currently, OS5 offers the same old “Save Desktop !boot file” functionality that has been around since the OS3.1 days, but under the name “Desktop Settings→” on the Switcher menu. However, these days there’s really only one usefully “unique” function that it performs – saving the position of open filer windows.

As we (all?) know, the potential for problems with a desktop !Boot file is great – not least overlapping of where settings are saved (eg. configure plugins put the setting in one place, then the !Boot file overrides it), or wrong things getting filer_booted etc.

Therefore, proposal is:

Instead of saving a full !Boot file, a file of another name (perhaps “Desktop” or “OpenFiler”) is created in <Choices$Write>.Boot.Tasks with just the Filer_OpenDir portions of the existing mechanism.

If exists, a text file is loaded from somewhere in !Boot to explain to users that the legacy functions have been removed, and how to use the Boot configure plugin to run programs, and so on.

A possible extension would be to pass applications over to the Boot configure plugin via some protocol to add them as well via a central point, but that’s probably more work than is strictly necessary.

It could also usefully issue a wimp message to trigger a Pinboard save.

This would then make this function usable without significant risk of “cocking things up”, and thus render an option which we currently have to tell users not to use, into something that is genuinely useful, and can be used by everyone to achieve a useful role.

It saves other useful stuff too, like !Draw and !Edit settings, for things that don’t have any CMOS of their own.
Updating those modules that have a corresponding !Configure plugin sounds very sensible, but I don’t think you want to remove it altogether.