Re: Staying on GTK/GNOME 3.8 next cycle/for the LTS?
I see where you're coming from and I don't want to take up much of anyone's time, but I can't help but worry about an impending integration nightmare as you continue to dawdle with GNOME's APIs. Do we know what is going to happen with Ubuntu-specific system utilities with 14.10 and Unity 8? In particular, I'm curious about Software Centre / Updater, Ubuntu One, Startup Disk Creator, Jockey and Ubuntu Online Accounts. Incidentally, those are quite central to Ubuntu. Arguably more so than the Unity shell, itself. Are these going to be replaced with new-style applications built on the Ubuntu SDK, or are we hanging on to them for a while? If the latter, how long do we expect to go on with GUIs that were basically built for GNOME 2 running under Unity and (an increasingly out of date) GNOME 3.x? What does this mean for Unity's compatibility with modern GNOME 3 applications, or for anyone who still wants to run GNOME 3.12 in Ubuntu? As I see it, the more you dawdle with GNOME's APIs, the more those core applications which are built on them are going to bit-rot, and while several of them already seem clunky and weird, at some point you'll have a real problem bringing them up to date without some serious, expensive, and potentially very rushed, rewriting. -- Dylan On Tue, Oct 1, 2013 at 10:45 AM, Sebastien Bacher seb...@ubuntu.com wrote: Hey everyone, I know this cycle is not finished yet, but in case some of us start thinking about next cycle, I wanted to start a discussion on the GNOME version to use for the lts. I think we should stick with GNOME 3.8 another cycle, here are the reasons why: - we (Ubuntu Desktop) are currently mostly happy with what we have - the focus for the Ubuntu Desktop team is likely to continue to be Ubuntu Touch/phone next cycle - due to the previous factor, we are going to be limited in resources to do desktop work - it's a LTS cycle, we should focus on bugs fixing if possible - GTK 3.10 deprecates several options, it would be good to stay away from those controverses for the LTS (see https://launchpad.net/bugs/**1228886https://launchpad.net/bugs/1228886as an example of what is going to happen once we deprecate those options) - it seems like the next RedHat enterprise edition is going to be based on GNOME 3.8, if that's the case it would make sense for us to focus on bringing quality to the same version/share the maintainance work a bit What do other things? I guess the Ubuntu GNOME Remix is going to want newer version, we should try to accomodate that need if we can. One way would be to do the fork of gnome-control-center we have been talking about for a while. Blocking GTK to 3.8 is likely to make hard to update GNOME components anyway, if we decide to go this way... What do others think? Cheers, Sebastien Bacher -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.**com ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/**mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-**desktophttps://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
Re: Why ubuntu-desktop depends on xdiagnose and xterm
On Tue, Apr 2, 2013 at 2:19 AM, Ma Xiaojun damage3...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Apr 2, 2013 at 4:55 PM, Oliver Grawert o...@ubuntu.com wrote: xterm is used by many people doing development on ubuntu as a preferred terminal over gnome-terminal, so i dont think we can or should hide it if we don't want to put off people using ubuntu as a platform for their development tasks. Well, I know there are people have good reasons to prefer xterm over gnome-terminal. However, there are also plenty of people don't bother to know what is terminal in the their entire life. Though there doesn't seem to have a good solution to satisfy both groups. Sure there is. The TINY minority of people who know or care about xterm, and have a reason to prefer it over gnome-terminal (?!), can open it with Alt+F2 or, if they really are concerned about this, add their own launcher. (Heck, maybe an additional package could provide a desktop file with NoDisplay=False for the even tinier group of people who prefer xterm, use the dash to launch stuff, and don't want to use the menu editor?). Ubuntu right now has a ridiculous number of Applications installed by default, which makes the dash completely hostile for someone who wants to explore the functionality provided by Ubuntu. Right now, well over half of these Applications are cryptic settings panels and recovery tools that provide nothing of value to end users. Dylan -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
Re: [Desktop13.04-Topic] Default file manager
On Sat, Oct 13, 2012 at 1:57 AM, Omer Akram om2...@ubuntu.com wrote: there.. that is the thing that i don't like at all... we need to patch nautilus to show a complete menu bar. nautilus (and other gnome apps) with just one menu + settings cog isn't really that suits very well to Unity.. As file manager is more important than any other [gnome] app we would really want our file manager to look like a real app :-) I agree with you to the extent that Nautilus 3.6 doesn't fit well with Unity, but this is not localized to Nautilus. This is _almost every GNOME app going forwards_. In Quantal that includes (to varying extents) System Log, Contacts, Empathy, Character Map, Disk Usage Analyzer, many of the default games, Calculator, Font Viewer, Screenshot and Disks. The number is going up, not down. Incidentally, that makes them very much real apps ;) Whether it fits with Unity or not, that is where the vast majority of core applications in Ubuntu are heading. For reference, with today's Unity, you will always have something like this: http://ubuntuone.com/4fX6ac4X8OeJyy2KSTpkvE (Menu bar that says EmpathEmpathy in Ubuntu 12.10). On Sat, Oct 13, 2012 at 4:00 AM, Sebastien Bacher seb...@ubuntu.com wrote: Right, as mentioned in reply to your other email though I think we just don't have the resources to play catchup with GNOME that way (or that it's not the best use of our efforts) so I would suggest we update to 3.6 and resolve the concerns we have with it, we will get 3.8 next cycle then, etc I'll admit to looking at this from some distance, but that sounds like a wasteful strategy, and I suspect it would eventually drain more resources than trying to solve this 'for good'. If you handle divergence by patching these applications to fit downstream, without providing any benefit for upstream, these projects will never stop diverging — and the divergence is way bigger than Nautilus as it is. Before talking about file managers, people should talk about how Unity fits with the direction GNOME applications are going. Because that is the problem: Unity has a very different vision for how applications should work than the GNOME project, which it depends on for applications and development tools. I think there needs to be a detailed plan for how Ubuntu is going to solve that problem with upstream. Barring that, there needs to be some consensus around why solving it upstream is unacceptable. Without that understanding, I think it would be impossible to make an informed decision on what to do about Nautilus. Dylan -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
Re: [Oneiric-Topic] Default Browser
On Thu, Apr 7, 2011 at 8:36 AM, Micah Gersten mic...@ubuntu.com wrote: Since now both Firefox and Chromium have committed to rapid release schedules, I think it's time to reevaluate the default browser in Ubuntu. I am concerned that some of these upgrades might break system integration at some point. One nice thing with Chromium and Epiphany is they store passwords using the native keyring daemon. (Epiphany always has, Chromium recently has and it should be enabled by default at this point). That is, passwords are properly encrypted at no cost to the user. As we move towards enabling third party apps through Software Centre, it is worth exploring ways we can improve personal security with features such as that. This, of course, demands considerable integration work in the default web browser ;) Dylan -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
Re: Call for Natty Feedback!
without a proper system for applications to register themselves at runtime. Hopefully when we have GApplication in 11.10 this can be taken on directly. That's it! For the most part, I'm pretty happy with Unity. I can totally see myself using this in a month, probably with a few geeky customisations. (And I hope to contribute a patch or two once school settles down). At the moment, though, I'm glad it just lives in VirtualBox :b Dylan McCall -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
Re: Beautiful awesomeness ---stupidity?---
On Sun, Mar 7, 2010 at 3:55 PM, Erik Andersen erik.b.ander...@gmail.com wrote: Hi, I too would like to put in my vote for putting the buttons back on the right side in the order most people are used to. Thanks, Erik B. Andersen I have opinions on both sides of the fence here. I am very concerned about end users, though, so I think I'd agree with the put buttons back how they were crowd for the most part. That, or at least a hack to get the window button position controlled by the current Metacity theme. I'm leaning more towards just changing the order back, though. While there may be some geeky merit in the different order, it breaks a lot of themes and it reeks having with muscle memory moreso than the left / right thing does. (At least for me it does, and I am of course the centre of the universe). I observed something really neat with the way things are right now. Moving a window is more Fitt's-law-ish (if you'll forgive the number of times that law gets thrown about every day), since one can push the mouse pointer to the top right of a window and, without a second thought, start dragging it. This is helped by the enlarged target via the (although slightly hacky :b) draggable menu patch in downstream GTK. Having the window buttons on the left means the area to the top right of the window is clear of obstruction, so there isn't a risk of pressing something by accident. Food for thought, anyway... Dylan PS: Anyone know what happened to the context menu on right clicking the window title bar? -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
Re: Google Chromium In Lucid
Firefox's biggest issue in Ubuntu, for me, has always been its integration. Sure, its UI looks like it uses GTK+ now, (and big kudos for that) but it doesn't _feel_ like GTK+. Meanwhile file and uri handling is done in Firefox's own way; the browser has no interest in the standards that Freedesktop and others have put so much effort into producing. Chromium, on the other hand, uses GTK. The main browser window doesn't look like GTK usually does, but it feels like a GTK app and all the other windows use it. It knows about standards, including how to add to the main menu properly. Files and uris are always opened with the correct application according to desktop-wide settings. It is aware of GNOME's tools for proxy stuff. Even better, it isn't burdened by crazy branding legalese. (In fairness, Chrome would be, but there is less need and less expectation to ship that vs. Chromium). I would also like to see Chromium by default (or at least seriously considered) in the near future. It would make Ubuntu a smoother, more predictable and more consistent experience, greatly improving the out of the box experience for our users. Bye, Dylan McCall-- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
Re: Intuitive Popup Scrollbars
Hi Thorsten! You've probably noticed this already, but I find it hard to grab the 'bar' if my mouse is already in the trough. I have to move the mouse off of the trough and then back on where the bar is. I know it's not necessary to grab the bar, and also that one can drag after clicking an arrow (cool!) but some users will expect that functionality anyway. Right now I subconsciously move my pointer onto the bar after entering the trough from the top. As a result, I click the Down arrow by accident. The only way to avoid that is if I move my pointer slightly upwards, which is distracting mouse acrobatics. It may cause problems when the bar is bigger, but what if the arrows were not allowed to move inside of the bar? For example, instead of following the mouse pointer onto the scroll bar, the arrows would skip to either end of it. Then again, that may be too much of a sacrifice since the arrows are then no longer totally predictable. Does anyone have other ideas? The scroll arrows should have a timer for when they disappear. Some users will move the mouse off of the trough by accident. Right now, the arrows disappear and then reset at a different position. If the pointer is moved straight back on, the arrows are centred around it instead of one being directly below. The timer could work like this: -Pointer moves inside trough. The arrows follow so that he is poised to click the top one. -Pointer moves off of trough. Arrows are still visible... -Within three seconds, pointer moves back onto trough. User can immediately click to press the top arrow. and this: -Pointer moves inside trough. The arrows follow so that he is poised to click the top one. -Pointer moves off of trough. Arrows are still visible... -Within three seconds, the pointer is put back to an entirely different place on the trough (away from the arrows' current position). Arrows follow pointer as usual. Bye, -Dylan signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
Re: Change autohide panel default settings ?
I suggest 3 change to the default gconf settings: * The unhide_delay is way too slow. For the sake of responsiveness, it should be immediate. I suggest a delay of 0. * Even when unhide_delay is set to 0, the rather slow speed of the animation effect (about 0.5s) still makes it rather unresponsive. I suggest to set enable_animation to 0, unless it is possible to speed it up (not in gconf apparently). * The auto_hide_size default of 6 pixels gives the impression that the panel is stuck half way on its move out of the screen. A small part of the applets and icons are still visible, but unrecognizable. IMO the expected behavior of an autohide feature is that the panel completely disappears, or only draws a line on the border of the screen. My suggestion: 0px or 1px. (which actually behave the same, the panel does not completely hide when set to 0) I agree completely, Ric! These are almost the same settings I use, too. One issue is that the hidden panel is almost completely invisible this way, save for a very slight line, which does hurt discoverability. It would be kind of cool if a little arrow (placed always below instead of always on top) appeared in the panel's place. This way, if someone is just logging in, he is led to the hidden panels fairly easily from his desktop. I have had a few users become very confused when using my computer via my user account. (Actually, why doesn't the panel just lower to the bottom of the stack and rise to the foreground when the mouse hits the edge of the screen anyway?). Another possibility would be for the applets to be hidden when the panel is hidden, which would solve the ugliness we presently see from them being cut off. Of course, those ideas are a bit off topic; this is just a configuration change. On that discussion, I should point out that animation speed /can/ be changed, though the values are rather odd. It's the animation_speed key for your selected toplevel, where you have the choice of slow, medium or fast. Default is medium. Bye, -Dylan signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
OpenSSL security fix for human beings
First off, kudos to those involed with the openssl fix. It was swiftly produced and in the repos within record time. I had learned about the problem earlier today and welcomed the updates quite happily. (As well as their instructions. Those info popups are cool). However, one question very quickly sprang to mind: Did usability people look at this? I assume that almost every user of Ubuntu with ubuntu-standard installed encountered at least some of these ssl related updates, which should make usability an issue worth considering. Various problems: -I experienced not one, but three popups telling me about the update. The first one was a big one, clearly instructing me to run ssh-keygen -l -f HOST_KEY_FILE when I log back in. It also told me that something would be done for me on log in. (Which has me wondering: Do I actually need to run that command? I jumped through the message rather quickly). The message was very long and deeply technical. It was informative, but even the command it gave me (and I instinctively copied) is useless: What is HOST_KEY_FILE? I smell confused and angry phone calls / support requests already. -Another popup message shortly after, with very similar contents. Slightly shorter. The gist of it was that a security flaw had been detected on my system (eeek!) and it was now being fixed after a restart. Note: Telling me about the restart is a tad redundant in the first place, thanks to that icon and notification bubble. -A third popup message came along, again the same thing. This one was a bit more concise, with instructions for what to do. It also, nicely enough, told me to ignore the message if I did not know what it was about. That is definitely the most user friendly of the three, although even it bothered me. I think, on the usability front, a nice thing with GNOME (and Ubuntu by extension) is not belittling the user. That is, never presenting information the user does not know about and then telling him to just ignore it because it means nothing to him. If information means nothing to the user, it should not be waved under his nose. If it does mean something to the user, it should be presented clearly. The result: Users get used to reading what is on screen instead of frantically avoiding scary technical information. Sorry, I should have copied the messages and what package they were coming from. I know the three there don't say much, since I have many packages which are not default. For that matter, the first two with which I am concerned may have been my own doing and of a technical nature themselves... Will run the update later on another box to see. Still, it seems odd to me that openssh-client, openssh-server and openssl would all be saying essentially the same thing with varying levels of complexity. What I am really concerned about here is how capable our existing infrastructure for major security updates is of being user friendly. I suppose the update script wanted me to run that command myself since it is running as root (so it would be bad for it to do that), which does expose some problems: Here an updater that needs to change something for a user is giving the user instructions that it should seemingly be able to follow itself. Perhaps the issue here is really nonexistent. After all, Ubuntu has had truckloads of security updates by now and this is the first one I have seen to have presented a usability issue... and looking at Ubuntu Forums, it appears to have gone relatively unnoticed. Most updates handle themselves quite tidily. Furthermore, good Vulcan logic dictates that critical security updates should not be slowed down for the sake of usability review. Still, I think it could be worthwhile to give a little heads-up about this event before a rambo releases an update telling people to run rm -rf ~/something as their own users (sure to get CLI paranoiacs up in arms! :P). Is there a system in place for a rapid usability review queue of some type? Could be interesting to ponder. There was a post (I believe to the ubuntu-art list) about a magical way of sorting discussions in a hierarchy by topic-problem-solution-problem-solution-etc..., which could work wonders for such a thing. What we need is a way to very, very quickly get software (packages in general? automagically?) reviewed for usability and have it confirmed that there are no outstanding issues within a very short time. I think Ubuntu's speedy updates on any day of the week are a great strength, but so is usability. To be truly user-friendly, though, that philosophy of usability must be present everywhere from the web site to the security patches. It seems to me, though, that this security update had very little time in which to get a proper look at how it could be applied without disturbing users. Indeed, I fear that it, with all the crazy popup messages and (repeated!) instructions, may be unnecessarily disruptive. Alternatively, maybe I just messed up my system :P Bye, -Dylan
[Bug 202174] Re: Please update to version 2.6
Just tossing in my 2 cents here: 2.6.0 has a number of visible changes, but the older version is unlikely to have a significant ammount of support going into the future. This means that, if any errors are observed with the 2.4.x series (eg: The outstanding and very ugly bugs mentioned), it could become necessary for Hardy to upgrade to 2.6 anyway or spend an unnecessary ammount of time fiddling with patches. Changing major versions of included software within one release is, of course, not really Ubuntu's way of doing things. Thus, in the interest of having AbiWord kept reasonably well supported, it would be sane to get the 2.6.x upgrade dealt with for Hardy from the start. -- Please update to version 2.6 https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/202174 You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Desktop, which is a direct subscriber. -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
[Bug 161960] Re: Add function to WinKey button on keyboard
Here is a good reason to make it so: Discoverability! People often come to Ubuntu and wonder where the Start menu is. If they could press the Super key (Start) and have something appear, that would mean they quickly learn what Ubuntu has instead. People must think outside of the anti-Windows thing here. The Start key may have been inspired by Microsoft's main menu, but that does not mean it should be ignored. It does not say Windows' Start Menu; it says Start. Start can mean whatever we make it to mean, and it can most definitely apply here. I think that it makes sense for that key to mean and do what it tends to say these days, which is to start the user off. No, the menu does not have to say Start for that to make sense. I, for one, would prefer if the menu did not since having two Starts would be redundant. The Super key could be effectively mapped to either GNOME's main menu applet, or to Deskbar. Both of those applets are present by default and offer a great way of starting off one's journey into Ubuntu. Either one could be achieved via a fairly straight-forward patch that changes default settings for the respective application. I'll see what I can do myself, although I must admit to having never looked at either application (and I am a bit lost as to what project is ultimately in charge of GNOME's hotkeys). -- Add function to WinKey button on keyboard https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/161960 You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Desktop, which is a direct subscriber. -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
Re: [Bug 161960] Re: Add function to WinKey button on keyboard
I think you are looking at this from a completely unnecessary and, frankly, foolish perspective. Microsoft's Windows renders GUI applications into different blocks (windows), each with their own externally controlled Close, Minimize and Maximize buttons. The fact is, people expect this and it is an intuitive choice. Similarly, Super L says Start on it 99% of the time (number pulled from thin air, but can't be far off!). In addition, it is mapped to nothing by default. What harm is there in mapping it to something? I for one prefer using Super as a modifier key for all my Compiz plugins, but as one who has been converted and adapted to Ubuntu and the joys of customization, I do not mind in the slightest the idea of going and turning that event-stealing functionality off. As for the claim that We shouldn't look like Windows!!, I would like to point you to a recent change in Ubuntu, which added symlinks simulating Windows' shell commands. (For example, dir). There are a lot of Windows users out there, and it certainly does not hurt to help them along. There is absolutely no harm in either of these things. How can I say that? Well, did you notice that you can type dir in the shell and have it do something? Has that change come out and eaten your hand off? Thought not. The claim that Ubuntu must be learned is an interesting one. I accept that I would scream in horror if somebody gave me Linux command line directions using dir and the like, but it can't be learned at all if the first step to learning is a tricky one. Our job is to make it as easy as possible so that people do not *need* to read the documentation. The system should make sense on its own. Super L triggering a function that resembles Starting is a relatively simple concept, unlikely to harm anyone, and no more intrusive than the Windows shell symlinks -- and those have proven quite painless so far. Now, back to the topic at hand: Implementation! On Wed, Feb 20, 2008 at 8:47 PM, Jo-Erlend Schinstad [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Have you ever seen the disbelief on Windows users faces when you tell them there aren't any viruses for Linux? They're so used to it, they think it's completely natural for an operating system to have viruses. But it's not. The question isn't why Ubuntu doesn't have the same default keyboard shortcuts as Windows. The question is, why would Super L be a good choice for the Applications menu? The fact that Windows has a similar menu pop up when someone presses it, is not a good reason. Why should it need to be learned? Because if we mimic Windows too closely just to be similar, people will make other assumptions too. Ubuntu is a different system with its own philosophy. It must be learned. -- Add function to WinKey button on keyboard https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/161960 You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Desktop, which is a direct subscriber. -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop -- Add function to WinKey button on keyboard https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/161960 You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Desktop, which is a direct subscriber. -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
Re: DisplayConfigGtk
Applying the settings could trigger the execution of a new program. When a user logs in (or is it possible at the GDM screen?), it asks if the new settings should persist. Otherwise, it assumes not, reverts with the next reboot and disables itself. Just like the resolution change, but a bit larger scale. Bye, -Dylan McCall On 11/6/07, Vincent Untz [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Le samedi 03 novembre 2007, à 22:21 -0400, Sebastian Heinlein a écrit : Hello, the coming XRandR support will require some changes to the layout of the main window and the monitor dialog, since we are going to support configurations that can be completely applied on the fly (xrandr for open source drivers) and file based configuration. Furthermore I would like to completely replace GNOME's resolution changing capplet. I'm really worried that this is duplicating some work that is also planned (or already being done, I don't know) upstream. The GNOME control center maintainers want to have a nice screen configuration tool, using xrandr. It might make sense to do this work upstream, and have a script that detects if the computer has a xrandr-suitable driver to launch the upstream tool or DisplayConfigGtk (which would deal with the need to write to xorg.conf). Vincent -- Les gens heureux ne sont pas pressés. -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list ubuntu-desktop@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
