One of GITI’s least developed features is called “Quick Key”. Basically, it is a shortcut system for GITI. Type your command in the box (a “key” command, not the fully GITI path) and it takes you where you want to go. Unfortunately, they are very simple, and most rely on module functionality to make them work. The biggest drawback to something like this is that it is not possible to type “add assignment” and have GITI pick up the meaning on that. The most advanced that gets is being able to call a specific assignment by number “assignment 1143” returns the details page for Assignment #1143. The way that works is that GITI only recognizes one word in the string for the key, so if there is more than one, it breaks it up and passes the other part as a parameter to the module.  This eliminates any possibility for “natural language” keys, which sucks. Most keys do not even accept parameters, so that further limits flexibility.

Add, Find and View are some of the functions I would like to add as universals, but I have not quite gotten to writing the core level code that would allow GITI to have its own internal keys that are not module dependant. To do this will also likely require me teaching GITI a list of mappings for each of the special “natural language” commands (ie. “Add Recipe” calls Cookbook’s Add function). Find should be especially interesting, since at this point no modules, except Address Book and Library even support the ability to search for anything. The weirdest possibility for “find” would be writing a universal search tool that would look through specified fields on each module’s entities. I would worry about the database load of such a functionality though. I am not sure how “natural language” typing the phrase “find contact Kularski” actually is.

All of this stuff comes up now because of the creation of a new empty module called “Cookbook”. The module at the moment has no code, only its GITI constructs and things that will expedite my ability to write the module. It is a fairly simple module on the surface, its ingredient lists, directions and cooking times. No big deal at all there. I will likely get into more elaborate concepts such as categories and ingredient searches, but so far, I am just planning to create the data constructs for them and put not much effort into writing those components,focusing on the “important” stuff, like recipe insertion and retrieval. The mere conceptualization of the module causes these other needs to arise in Quick Key because it is a module that can require things to be accessed in a short amount of time, perhaps being pecked out on a keyboard using the end of a wooden spoon.

Quick Key could be a very useful functionality if I spent more time with it and perhaps made it more obvious in the user interface (beyond a small textbox).

exhibit 1: Quick Key command list