* Josselin Mouette <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [070725 12:57]: > Le mercredi 25 juillet 2007 à 08:54 -0400, Marvin Renich a écrit : > > Gnome and KDE are targeted primarily at desktop users, not servers. If, > > as a desktop user, I install a graphical app on my machine, I *expect* > > to see that app in the main menu. The place where I put important > > and/or frequently used apps is on a panel/toolbar. > > Do you expect to see console applications in the menu as well? All > interpreters and shells? Window managers?
My original message was specifically concerned with graphical apps. I'm not sure which console apps should be displayed; for the most part, I think the Debian maintainer should decide whether it deserves to be displayed by default. Window managers *definitely* should be displayed. If I went to the trouble of installing sawfish in addition to metacity, I would like to be able to use both. Yes, from the menu. > > If a novice user installs an app and then goes to the menu and doesn't > > find it, how is this user supposed to know what to do? > > This bit is correct: someone installing an app can reasonably expect to > see it in the menu. However you are drawing wrong conclusions: > > > This is > > completely *un*usable. The more novice the user, the more important it > > is for the *default* to be for all graphical apps to be shown. Then let > > the individual user decide which ones are important to him/her. > > If the users installs the distribution with default settings or starts a > session on a multi-user setup, he should find a usable menu, not a menu > with all possible applications he never wanted to install. Usable, yes; minimal, no. See the next paragraph: > > Menus, by their nature, are inherently unusable for the most frequently > > used apps, and we should not be trying to make them more usable at the > > expense of making less frequently used apps harder to access. > > Why shouldn't we attempt to make menus usable? I didn't say we should not make them usable, I said we should not try to make them more usable *by reducing access to less frequently used apps*. > > Menus make less frequently used apps easy to get at, while toolbars make > > frequently used apps even easier; use the right tool for the right job. > > Guess what, toolbars are not used by a good share of users. Toolbars > sound obvious for experienced users, but a novice will never have the > idea to modify the interface that is shown to him; which is why this > interface must be as straightforward as possible - and that also > includes good default shortcuts in the toolbar. That a novice will not know that he can change the interface is even more reason to make sure the (graphical) app that he installed is in the menu. A good system of hints that includes one about putting applications on the toolbar would be very helpful. Also, my experience is that a good share of less-technically-oriented- but-comfortable-using-a-computer users actually do use toolbars. Josselin, we have not met face-to-face, and email does not convey emotion very well, so I want to make sure you know that this is not a personal attack. Your contribution to Debian is significant, and I appreciate it (along with that of the many other DD's). I respect the technical opinions that you have expressed on the debian mailing lists, and agree with many of them. But I strongly disagree with you on this issue. ...Marvin -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]