This is the user guide for non-E17 EFL programs.

3.7 - Entropy

The Entropy File Manager is not so much a file manager, as it is a message-based file-system aware engine. It's based on the EWL widget library, so make sure you install it as well. Entropy is comprised of two parts:

• The EVFS application
• The Entropy application itself

EVFS is the successor to EFSD. It supports abritrary file systems (such as the samba demo currently in the tree).

The entropy application itself, at it's core - is just a messaging hierarchy with a few bells and whistles. It accepts requests (e.g. load this directory and it's contents, get their mime type, thumbnail them, and tell me when you're done). To prevent thread problems, entropy uses ecore_ipc as a notify system to the main thread to signal that event data is ready to be used.

Entropy-Core also defines a GUI plugin and layout hierarchy. There are four main types of GUI plugin: layout-plugins (a container for other GUI elements), structure viewers (think of the tree-layout paradigm at the left of windows-explorer style systems), local-viewers (folder-contents), and action plugins (event consumer/response units).

Important note: Entropy is still in early development! It is not recommended to use it for handing any important files! Data loss may occur.

Please keep these warnings in mind:

• It's in cvs://e17/proto/entropy. At the current time, don't trust it with your files. I haven't had any file corruption, but you could be the first.
• You'll need EVFS from the latest CVS tree (cvs://e17/apps/evfs). EVFS is now started on demand, so you needn't worry. All happens in the background.
• If you're planning on playing with the source, be warned: a lot will change very quickly. Especially with regards to some functionality that will move to the core, and the core's central notification/event response system.
• This source still needs valgrind'ing - there are leaks both in Entropy and EVFS that I know about and will catch.
  

Some of the features/functionality are currently non-obvious, see docs/README for hints on use.