Re: [gnome-love] Gnome goal proposal : proxy support

[Olav Vitters <olav bkor dhs org>]

On Tue, Oct 28, 2008 at 03:58:02PM +0100, Lionel Dricot wrote:
> At work, I'm stuck behind a proxy with a password. I then discovered that a
> lot of application are not capable of handling a connection with a proxy.
> Others require a specific configuration while the proxy configuration is
> already available by Gnome. Last but not least, some applications use the
> Gnome proxy preferences but forget to handle proxy exceptions or handle
> proxy correctly only if no password is required.

'some applications' is a bit vague. Are these part of GNOME, meaning,
listed on http://www.gnome.org/start/unstable ?

> The idea of my Gnome Goal proposal would be to have perfect and consistent
> proxy support in the whole Gnome desktop, which is a great asset in the
> corporate world.

That is not the purpose of a GNOME goal. A goal must be a change which
could be implemented easily across a lot of modules. I don't think
adding proxy support fits with that.

Also, proxy is a bit vague. What does it do, socks or just http?

> 4) If the proxy requires a password *and* the password is not set in the
> gnome-proxy-settings, then ask for it.

We have gnome-keyring for passwords.

> 5) If the password is already in the gnome proxy settings, don't ask for it
> (unlike Epiphany).

File a bug for that.

> In order to achieve this, we could make an howto on how to set a local proxy
> on your computer and, for a week or two, we will ask all Gnome developpers
> to eat their own dog food and only connect through their local proxy. I'm
> sure it will reveal a lot of eatches to scratch !

I don't think that'll work. Better to test every application and report
bugs.

> Do you believe it worth a Gnome Goal ? Or do you think that individual bug
> reports are enough for that. ?

Not exactly sure if it is a 'bug' or more a request for enhancement.
Anyway, bugs aren't solved because they're filed. However, don't think
it is a 'goal' as intended with the GNOME goal wiki site.


There is a proposal for libproxy, but it only handles the configuration,
not the actual proxy. Also saw something on the wiki regarding GProxy.

-- 
Regards,
Olav