How do I add my configuration to Sublime Text 2's menu?

Question

I've written a plugin for Sublime Text 2, which talks to a binary that I wrote. I expose the flags to the binary through as settings file, but I cannot figure out how to get the settings file placed into the menu bar.

Here is my best attempt so far.

Here are the docs on settings (not sure where the ones on menus are).

Answer 1

From what I can tell, in order to add your own items to a menu, its original declaration must have a pre-existing id value, which must then be included in any package-specific menu expansions. For example, consider the default definition for Preferences:

{
    "caption": "Preferences",
    "mnemonic": "n",
    "id": "preferences",
    "children": [ ... ]
},

Notably, the Settings – More object in Packages/Default/Main.sublime-menu does not have an id.

{
   "caption": "Settings – More",
   "children": [ ... ]
},

You can prove this requirement yourself by adding an id value to Settings – More in the default Main.sublime-menu and including that id in your package's Main.sublime-menu, similarly to how Preferences' id is referenced. Your custom menu will then show up under Settings – More.

Based upon the exclusion of an id for Settings – More, I would assume that the creators of Sublime Text 2 did not intend for third party packages to be able to edit the menu in question. Also, note that the – in Settings – More is not a hyphen (-); that's not the cause of your problem, but I initially suspected that it might have been.

The standard practice for adding one's own package settings to Preferences appears to be inserting a new item into Preferences -> Package Settings, which can be accomplished with a Main.sublime-menu file like this:

[
  {
    "caption": "Preferences",
    "mnemonic": "n", // The mnemonics are for quick keyboard access
    "id": "preferences",
    "children": [
      {
        "caption": "Package Settings",
        "mnemonic": "P", // On windows, Alt+N (above) followed by Alt+P would open this menu
        "id": "package-settings",
        "children": [
          { 
            "caption": "Seeing Is Believing",
            "children": [
              {
                "command": "open_file",
                "args": {"file": "${packages}/Seeing Is Believing/Seeing Is Believing.sublime-settings"},
                "caption": "Settings – Default"
              }
            ]
          }
        ]
      }
    ]
  }
]

I would highly recommend referencing a menu-rich plugin's Main.sublime-menu to figure out what else you should include and how you should do it. For my research I examined both Sublime Text 2's Main.sublime-menu and AdvancedNewFile's.