Frank:

On 12/27/09 11:26, Frank Batschulat wrote:
>> It makes more sense when the "face" mode is enabled
>> so you either click on a face/login name or click the button to type one in:
>> http://defect.opensolaris.org/bz/show_bug.cgi?id=13568
>
> What ? "face mode" - this is a non-starter.
>
> do we still remember that we have had a project called "Secure by Default" ?
> http://hub.opensolaris.org/bin/view/Community+Group+on/2006060101
>
> "face mode" enables listing of all accounts available for login on a given 
> system.
> No - I do not want that and I'm pretty sure, if OSOL/Solaris.Next ever ends 
> up in production use,
> the people supposed to run it won't want to have that either. even the 
> gdm(1M) man page
> mentions that.

Since GDM is a GNOME application, it should not be a surprise that it
does provide options geared towards the typical GNOME desktop user, as
opposed to the typical OpenSolaris server user.

That said, the Face Browser is disabled by default on OpenSolaris for
exactly the "Secure By Default" reasons you mention.  Users who want to
use the Face Browser can enable it if they choose.

> apparently you can restrict that sort of as gdm(1M) further mentions:
>
> <snip>
>       greeter/IncludeAll=false (boolean)
>
>           If true, then the face browser will show  all  users  on
>           the  local machine. If false, the face browser will only
>           show users who have recently logged in.
> <snip end>
>
> even that is too much.

IncludeAll is set to false by default, but its setting is only used
if the user first enables the Face Browser.

> besides, I suppose that there are a lot of users out there, that do not want 
> or
> need things like "face mode", playing sound or movies on Login or similar
> gadgets. Heaven, this is Unix, this is Solaris, this runs on Servers....

There has been some discussion that perhaps it would make sense for
the OpenSolaris installer to ask users if they want the Face Browser
enabled or not.  As you say, most people who use OpenSolaris as a server
probably do not want it on.  However, many desktop users prefer the
Face Browser which is why most other Linux distros enable it by default.

If the installer asked, then users could easily turn it on and get a
user experience more similar to what they find when using GNOME on
other distros.  While OpenSolaris does tend to cater the configuration
more towards server users, but it is also good to support desktop users
reasonably.  Such a change to the installer would be a good step
forward, I think.

> also letting the inital "want to login" box hanging around for some time 
> eventually
> places an additional error window in the inital login screen that GDM 
> apparently
> is not able to login the user automatically....ehmm...which user please ? why
> would it do that by default anyways ? I've not told it todo so..

Are you talking about doo bug #13208?

   http://defect.opensolaris.org/bz/show_bug.cgi?id=13208

Also build 130 does have a bug with the jack user autologin feature
being broken.  This is mentioned in the release notes.

> do we have to import every funny game the Gnome/Linux community comes up with 
> ?
> Concerning out of the box experience, can't we give it at least some love to 
> make
> this look and work a little bit like our environment ?

A great deal of effort has gone into making the new GDM work well on
OpenSolaris.  I do not think it is very fair to refer to GDM as a
"game", but anyway, if you do have any suggestions on how to improve
specific problems, please file bugs at defect.opensolaris.org.  Many
issues that users have complained about on this forum have already been
reported, so it would be appreciated if people checked to see if a bug
is already filed and adding comments to the existing bug rather than
filing a new one.

Brian

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