Solutions menu not showing separators and submenus

[CathyBr]

I have been regression testing using the new Html SDK.  One of the problems I have stumbled over is that the entries in the Actions menu are not being shown propery.  I have submenus and separators in my Actions menu.  They have always worked before, also in the older versions of the html Client.  So to make sure that my plugin is not doing anything impossible, I used the sts vmware tools to create a test plugin-   In that plugin.xml I added separator items, and a submenu to the action  - I've attached the plugin.xml.

Could someone possible tell me what I am doing wrong?  Or is this functionality no longer supported?

thanks

cathy

[CathyBr]

An update on this issue.  I now  see that the separators and submenus work on the actions menu of my custom objects.  So just as a test, i changed the <objecttype> from my custom object to HostSystem. - Now the submenu which had worked for the custom object  was not shown on a host system... Is there a difference here?

[Denis_Chorbadzh]

Hi Cathy,

Thank you very much for your feedback!

Currently the submenus/separators work for custom objects and indeed do not work for vSphere objects.

We are investigating whether this was a desired restriction or indeed a regression.

Will keep you posted.

Best Regards,

Denis

[CathyBr]

Hi Denis,

thanks for your info - in any case we will have to decided how to proceed - either by showing all items (about 10) in the one submenu, or reducing the actions available to only ones necessary.

[_vladi_]

Hi Cathy,

Regardless of the outcome of our investigation for the backward compatibility of this scenario the HTML Client recommendations are always:

 - Have your menus/Navigator items/Monitor views/Configure views as flat as possible. The whole HTML Client is designed in this direction as this improves the user interaction (in comparison the customer feedback for the Flex Client was that it is often difficult to find stuff when there are too many levels of nesting). Hence, this is the recommended approach also for plugins.

 - It is preferable If you can reduce the interactions/branching (number of actions) but only when that improves the clarity of your plugin workflows. For example using actions within your views makes more sense when the user needs to see the full context of your plugin solution to take a decision of executing the action. If the context of action execution is already known or obvious / visible then a menu action is better.

 - Please check the official UX standards for plugins here: UX Design Guidelines for vSphere Client (HTML5)

In any case a flat menu with 10 items is fine with regards to recommendations for integrating with the HTML Client.

Cheers,

Vladi

[Denis_Chorbadzh]

Hi Cathy,

We have fixed the issue with submenus and separator for vSphere objects and it should be available in a next vSphere release.

Regardless, it is preferable to follow Vladi's recommendations as described above.

Best Regards,

Denis

[vpatel203]

Hello @Denis_Chorbadzhiyski,

Do we have an update on this? I am working on HTML plugin development for vSphere and I am using SDK6.7

I also faced a similar issue where the separators are not showing up in the UI even after adding them in the plugin.xml

[Denis_Chorbadzh]

Hi,

The issue with the separators and submenus is already addressed and they should work as expected in the next vSphere 6.7 release.

Best Regards,

Denis

[vpatel203]

Thank you Denis

Any idea on when we can expect it to be available for download?

[_vladi_]

Hi,

The exact date is not clear yet so this is not information that can be shared publicly until the release is announced.

That said, it should be pretty soon. 🙂

Cheers,

Vladi