ENB: Opening non-outline files

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Edward K. Ream

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Nov 9, 2023, 1:08:19 PM11/9/23

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This Engineering Notebook post discusses what Leo's open-outline command should do.

PR #3645 restores Leo's ability to load/import non-outline files from the command line. Leo puts those files in new tabs.

While testing, I realized that Leo's open-outline command should do the same. Instead, this command inserts @edit or @file nodes in the presently selected outline! Doing so makes no sense.

The new plan

Each of Leo's tabs should be able to contain either:

- An outline (.leo or .leo.db) file,

- An external file created by @file,

- any other kind of external file.

You might imagine that this will complicate Leo's save-file logic. In fact, the new code may be simpler than the old.

The simplifying principle: all Leo's tabs contain commanders, but not all commanders represent outlines.

Summary

Leo's open-outline command should create a new tab for each new file, just as opening a file from the command line does.

I'll rename open-outline to open-file, retaining the old name for compatibility.