drag dock items on top of each other to create a stack [$165]

And what is the name of the folder (and thus, the hover text) when doing this? Where is the folder created?

the folder creation issue would be solved if the implementation of what constitutes a stack was changed to how we talked about it. launchers shouldn't point to folders which contain launchers. It should just be any folder present in ~/.config/plank/launchers. In this way, creating a stack from an existing location is as simple as a symlink. The name of the folder is the name of the stack.

If you create a new stack from the dock, the folder should be given a name based on the icons you combined. More than likely it'll be a logical group like "Accessories" that you can get from the .desktop file. If not, the user should be prompted to name the stack.

Dont touch bug status.

So right now, a folder on the dock is treated as any other .dockitem. Except instead of pointing to a .desktop file, it points to a *folder* of .desktop files. That folder can be anywhere on the computer, just like the .desktop files can be anywhere on the computer. Looking at it from that perspective makes sense.

But looking at it from the perspective of a typical user, a folder/stack seems to contain items from the dock, or .dockitems. They're icons, they're on the dock, they're just grouped together. So wouldn't it make more sense to, as Dan mentioned, just have the dock pull in folders from the launcher directory? And then the .dockitems could just be moved into those folders.

As far as positioning the folders (I assume that's why you want a keyfile), could you not use either the existing settings keyfile or, even better, dconf?

I apologize if none of this makes sense; I'm just giving my input as a more "typical" user. :)

This is my mockup, a slingshot styled one. http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/171/7/3/elementary_os_plank_folder_mockup_by_qw3rtz-d545ppa.png

Well I made a this drag-an-made-a-stack feature, but the popover ui with a slinghot-like grid/list view is missing. I cannot accomplish it because I really don't know how to show a Gtk.PopoverMenu or Gtk.Popover which is connected to the DockElement, and it replaces a standart Gtk.Menu. This feature is related to: the https://bugs.launchpad.net/plank/+bug/1279895

Current version allows:
- drag an dockitem and drop on another dockitem to create a new stack
- drag and dockitem anddrag on another stack to append (add it to) the created stack
- the stacks are created in the launchers/ folder which consists symlinks to .desktops, and files
- during the dragging action the hovered icon is lighter than in normal state (I think all siblings should be darken and hovered lighten).
- if the stack is located in launchers then there is a new option above the "Kepp in dock" called "Stack settings" (should be renamed for better l10n). There user can configure the name of the stack, show where is the dockstack located.

I need some extra days to make a way better user experience (animation) when user drags an icon on other icon to create a stack.

I haven't published it yet, since I needs to change some things before attempting to collect a bounty. The progress is covered in issues on https://github.com/piqus/pantheon-dock/issues

@pk1111: Better base your work on https://github.com/ricotz/plank and https://code.launchpad.net/~ricotz/plank/stacking

@pk1111: Did you make any progress and intend to publish your work?

@ricotz: Uh, I stopped development on enhancing the drag & drop events (animations inspired from Opera and Launchpad.app), when creating new stack or appending FileDockItem to stack - I have been totally dissatisfied how the UI was unfriendly for user. Frankly, I must get back to this but recently I didn't have any free-time which I could spend on Plank. Nevertheless, you encouraged myself to update my fork to latest version and do it "from scratch" using snippets of stack creation function and publish on github (even if it would be not completed).

@pk1111: Better ask for feedback/reviews in earlier stages too.

And as a reminder, base your work on https://github.com/ricotz/plank and https://code.launchpad.net/~ricotz/plank/stacking

@pk1111: Any progress? If not I would consider this not in-progress, so I can continue looking into it again.