multi-level menu with ivy?

[et2010]

Hi,

How to implement a multi-level menu with ivy? I tried on a simple two-level case:

This is accomplished by manipulating ivy-on-del-error-function and ivy-quit-and-run which is very cumbersome. Is there a canonical way to do this kind of job?

[abo-abo]

Ivy is single-level. You can add multiple levels by calling ivy-read in the :action of the first ivy-read. Could you please show your code here, maybe it will be more clear what you want to do?

[et2010]

As I showed in the gif. the first level menu contains some categories and the second level contains some synonyms of the chosen category to replace word at point. When I choose the wrong category and want to go back, I hit escape or backspace to go back to the previous menu. Such actions can be repeated infinitely. I found it hard to implement such feature with ivy API especially when the list structure is complex.

(defun stardict-thesaurus--do-replace (replacement)
 (if (use-region-p)
     (delete-region (region-beginning) (region-end))
   (let ((bounds (bounds-of-thing-at-point 'word)))
     (delete-region (car bounds) (cdr bounds))))
 (insert replacement))

(defun stardict-thesaurus--pick-synonym (synonyms)
 (let ((key (stardict-thesaurus--pick-lvl-1 synonyms)))
   (stardict-thesaurus--pick-lvl-2 key synonyms)))

(defun stardict-thesaurus--pick-lvl-1 (synonyms)
 (let ((keys (mapcar #'car synonyms)))
   (completing-read "Choose a key: " keys)))

(defun stardict-thesaurus--pick-lvl-2 (key synonyms)
 (let* ((repick (lambda ()
                  (interactive)
                  (ivy-quit-and-run
                    (stardict-thesaurus--pick-synonym synonyms))))
        (ivy-on-del-error-function repick)
        (kmap (make-sparse-keymap)))
   (define-key kmap (kbd "<escape>") repick)
   (ivy-read "Choose a synonym: "
             (assoc-default key synonyms)
             :require-match t
             :keymap kmap
             :action #'stardict-thesaurus--do-replace
             :caller 'stardict-thesaurus--pick-lvl-2)))

Here I play with ivy-quit-and-run and ivy-on-del-error-function to reach the goal. Any suggestions?

[abo-abo]

I found it hard to implement such feature with ivy API especially when the list structure is complex.
Here I play with ivy-quit-and-run and ivy-on-del-error-function to reach the goal.

I think you went with a good approach. Re-using ivy-on-del-error-function is fine, you could also just stick with <escape> in your :keymap.

Your code looks good enough for me, you are using the API correctly to implement something more advanced than what the API was originally intended to do.

Any suggestions?

• Extract repick into its own named command
• Extract kmap into its own named variable
• Don't use ivy-on-del-error-function, :keymap is enough

[et2010]

Thanks for your suggestions! Any plan to extend the API to support such feature? Maybe a keyword argument such as :anchor or :parent?.

[abo-abo]

Any plan to extend the API to support such feature?

There's no plan to do it. There's no need to complicate the API when the existing one can be used to create the same functionality.