Buffet menu

Is it in Edit or Tools? The Buffet menu shows every menu of an application at once, side by side, from one button in the header bar. Everything is laid out in front of you, like a buffet: two clicks to any command, and no more opening one menu after another to find it.

It's an experiment for GTK3 applications in the Linux Mint XApp style. It keeps what makes a menu bar easy to use (File, Edit, View…, keyboard shortcuts next to the items, access keys) and takes no more room than a header bar's hamburger menu.

Try the Buffet Menu Challenge

Which is quicker: a normal menu bar, or the Buffet menu? The challenge times you finding 12 commands in the menus of Xed, Linux Mint's text editor: one round with the menu bar, one with the Buffet menu, in a random order. It takes about 2 minutes, with the mouse only.

1. Download buffet_challenge.py and buffet_menu_test.py into the same folder (or the whole project: Code → Download ZIP).
2. In a terminal, in that folder:

   python3 buffet_challenge.py

3. Before you start, size the window the way you normally use Xed: maximised, or the size you usually keep it. The second round opens at the same size. You'll also be asked how often you use Xed: if you use it a lot, you know where its menu bar keeps things, and the results show that.
4. At the end, click Copy results and paste them where you were asked to share them.

The menus don't do anything: they're only for finding. Nothing is saved, nothing is installed, and nothing is sent anywhere. It doesn't need administrator rights. You can read the code first.

Requirements: Linux, with Python 3, GTK 3 and PyGObject. These come with Linux Mint, Ubuntu and most GTK desktops (on Fedora: python3-gobject). On a Wayland session (Ubuntu's or Fedora's GNOME, for example), start it with GDK_BACKEND=x11 python3 buffet_challenge.py, so that the Buffet menu can place its pop-up.

The test window

buffet_menu_test.py is a window with Xed's menus as a Buffet menu, to try it out freely:

python3 buffet_menu_test.py            # the Buffet menu, as set in Edit → Preferences
python3 buffet_menu_test.py --classic  # the same menus as a normal menu bar

Open the menu with the button at the top right, or with F10. Alt+F, Alt+E… open it at a menu, and the arrow keys move across the columns. The status line shows how long it took to choose an item.

Edit → Preferences sets how the menu looks:

• Menu layout: one row, then equal rows (7 menus become 4 + 3); one row, then fill each row; two rows; or a fixed number of menus per row. Shorter rows line up on the right, near the button.
• Row width: as wide as the application's window, or the screen.
• When there's no room below the title bar: move the menu up (above the title bar, or over it), or change the rows to fit.
• Rows: lined up, or stacked up (each menu right under the one above it: a shorter menu).
• Keyboard shortcuts: next to each item, in a tooltip, or hidden.

When the menus are too tall for the screen, the menu scrolls.

The Buffet Menu app

Buffet Menu gives your own applications the Buffet menu, without changing them. Choose the applications in its window: they then open with a header bar and a Buffet button, which shows all of their menus at once. Ctrl+Alt+N opens and closes it from the keyboard.

Install

On Linux Mint 22 (or Ubuntu 24.04), download buffet-menu_0.1.0_amd64.deb from the Releases page, then:

sudo apt install ./buffet-menu_0.1.0_amd64.deb

apt installs what it needs with it (appmenu-gtk3-module, gir1.2-keybinder-3.0). Then:

1. Open Buffet Menu from the applications menu (it's in Preferences).
2. Choose an application on the left and click +.
3. Close the application and open it again from the menu: its menu bar is gone, and the Buffet button in its header bar shows all of its menus.

Buffet Menu starts at login from then on, and does its work quietly in the background: set it up, and forget about it.

Using it

• Each application has its own settings: click the gear next to it. The first time its Buffet menu opens, it picks one row for an application with up to 4 menus, two rows for more.
• Keyboard shortcut and Start at login are at the bottom of the window. Start at login is on from the start; without it, the applications' menu bars come back until Buffet Menu is started again.
• The menu works like a menu bar's: keyboard shortcuts next to the items, ticks and choices that follow the application, greyed-out items it has disabled, access keys with Alt, and the arrow keys.
• To stop it: buffet-menu --quit (the menu bars come back). To remove it: remove each application with − first, so that they're as they were, then sudo apt remove buffet-menu.

What it works with

GTK 3 applications that have a menu bar, on X11 (Cinnamon, MATE and Xfce on Linux Mint). Tried with Xed, Nemo, LibreOffice, Inkscape 1.x, Pluma, Mousepad, gedit, Code::Blocks, Update Manager and xl-Calculator.

• The list only offers GTK 3 applications. One that turns out to have a header bar of its own (and no menu bar behind it), or no menu bar, is taken off the list when it first opens. Tick Show all applications to see the others, and why they're left out.
• Not with GTK 2 applications (GIMP 2.10), GTK 4, Qt, Flatpak or Snap applications, or Wayland.
• The LibreOffice applications share one program: whichever opens first decides whether they all have the Buffet menu.
• Update Manager starts at login on its own: it has the Buffet menu once it's been reopened from the menu.
• Xed 3.6 (Linux Mint 22) doesn't tell GTK when it's maximized, so its maximize button stays as it is; Xed's next version fixes it.

How it works

+ puts a copy of the application's menu entry in ~/.local/share/applications, which starts it with appmenu-gtk-module, the module that global menu panels use to read an application's menu bar over D-Bus, and with Buffet Menu's own module (buffet-headerbar.c). That one gives the main window its header bar and Buffet button, and hides the menu bar while Buffet Menu runs; other applications keep theirs. − deletes the copy, and the application is as it was.

Run it from the source

sudo apt install appmenu-gtk3-module gir1.2-keybinder-3.0 build-essential libgtk-3-dev gettext git
git clone https://github.com/xlcheese/buffet-menu.git
cd buffet-menu
./build.sh                  # the header bar module and the translations
python3 buffet_menu.py      # its window; python3 buffet_menu.py --quit stops it

git pull and ./build.sh bring it up to date. The files:

File	What it is
buffet_menu.py	The app: its window, and the service that shows the Buffet menus
buffet.py	The Buffet menu itself, and its settings
buffet_remote.py	Reads another application's menus over D-Bus
buffet-headerbar.c	The GTK module that gives the applications their header bar
i18n.py, po/	The translations
debian/, Makefile	The package: dpkg-buildpackage -b, or on GitHub, a version tag (see .github/workflows/deb.yml)
buffet_challenge.py, buffet_menu_test.py	The challenge and the test window, which stand on their own

Translate

Buffet Menu uses gettext. Spanish, French, German, and Brazilian Portuguese are included as drafts that still need a review by native speakers: corrections are very welcome. ./build.sh compiles them (it needs gettext: sudo apt install gettext), and make pot updates po/buffet-menu.pot after any text in the program changes.

To start a new language, for example Italian:

msginit -i po/buffet-menu.pot -l it -o po/it.po

then translate the msgstr lines in po/it.po (with Poedit, or any text editor), add it to po/LINGUAS, and run ./build.sh. To try it: LANGUAGE=it python3 buffet_menu.py. Text in braces, such as {application}, stays as it is, and an underscore marks the letter of an access key (_Hide).

License

GPL-3.0. See LICENSE.