[aferen@xxxxxxxxxxxx (Andrew C. Feren)]

I was starting to add blurbs to the hf_register_info fields for my
protocol dissector, but I couldn't figure out how they were actually
used.  I grepped the source and found that the answer is that many
places they aren't.

Attached is a quick patch to use the blurb (if available) for in
display filter help.  I swapped the order of the columns make the
display more readable (some of the blurbs are rather long).  Probably
the right thing to do is actually use a table or tree widget.  An
expandable tree would be nice so that by default there would just be
the relatively short list of protocols.  I suppose with the tree you
could combine "Protocols" and "Display Filters" into a single tab.

Index: help_dlg.c
===================================================================
RCS file: /cvsroot/ethereal/gtk/help_dlg.c,v
retrieving revision 1.18
diff -u -r1.18 help_dlg.c
--- help_dlg.c	2001/08/21 06:39:18	1.18
+++ help_dlg.c	2001/11/06 21:36:21
@@ -367,15 +367,13 @@
 
   case DFILTER_HELP  :
 
-    /* XXX we should display hinfo->blurb instead of name (if not empty) */
-
     /* first pass to know the maximum length of first and second fields */
     for (i = 0; i < proto_registrar_n() ; i++) {
       if (!proto_registrar_is_protocol(i)) {
 	hfinfo = proto_registrar_get_nth(i);
 	if ((len = strlen(hfinfo->abbrev)) > maxlen)
 	  maxlen = len;
-	if ((len = strlen(hfinfo->name)) > maxlen2)
+	if ((len = strlen(ftype_pretty_name(hfinfo->type))) > maxlen2)
 	  maxlen2 = len;
       }
     }
@@ -387,20 +385,26 @@
     set_text(w, dfilter_help, maxlen3);
 
     for (i = 0; i < proto_registrar_n() ; i++) {
+      char *name_or_blurb = 0;
       hfinfo = proto_registrar_get_nth(i);	
+      if(hfinfo->blurb && hfinfo->blurb[0])
+	name_or_blurb = hfinfo->blurb;
+      else
+	name_or_blurb = hfinfo->name;
+	
       if (proto_registrar_is_protocol(i)) {
-	snprintf(buffer, BUFF_LEN, "\n%s:\n", hfinfo->name);
+	snprintf(buffer, BUFF_LEN, "\n%s:\n", name_or_blurb);
 	set_text(w, buffer, strlen(buffer));
 	nb_lines += 2;
       } else {
 
 	type_name = ftype_pretty_name(hfinfo->type);
-	snprintf(buffer, BUFF_LEN, "%s%s%s%s(%s)\n",
+	snprintf(buffer, BUFF_LEN, "%s%s(%s)%s%s\n",
 		 hfinfo->abbrev, 
 		 &blanks[B_LEN - (maxlen - strlen(hfinfo->abbrev)) - 2],
-		 hfinfo->name,
-		 &blanks[B_LEN - (maxlen2 - strlen(hfinfo->name)) - 2],
-		 type_name);
+		 type_name,
+		 &blanks[B_LEN - (maxlen2 - strlen(type_name)) - 2],
+		 name_or_blurb);
 	if ((len = strlen(buffer)) > maxlen3) {
 	  maxlen3 = len;
 	  if ((len = gdk_string_width(m_r_font, buffer)) > width)


-- 
-Andrew Feren
 Cetacean Networks, Inc.
 Portsmouth, NH