Re: 'Switch User' action

[Bryan W Clark <clarkbw clarkson edu>]

On Fri, 2003-12-05 at 13:00, Mark McLoughlin wrote:
> 	I guess the things you need to look at when deciding whether or not
> something should go into the Actions menu are[1]:
> 
>   + Is it something that a large proportion of the user base will do
>     pretty regularly?
> 
>       In this case, I think not - surely, most users will only ever use
>       one account? And even if we thought a lot of users use more than
>       one account, surely switching between accounts wouldn't be that
>       common ?
> 
>   + Is it a confusing feature ?
> 
>       Again, in this case, no matter how well we implement it, I think
>       the concepts might turn out to be too confusing to put it in
>       such a highly visible place. "Switch User ... do you mean logout
>       and let someone else take my seat?"
> 
>       For this same reason, I have a hard time believing that we'll ever
>       clean up the whole concept of session management well enough to
>       have "Save Session" in the menu. The Actions menu is not the best
>       place to hide something :-)

So I'm not sure if this is implementable from within the actions menu,
but I know that GDM can do this so I'll ask.  

Is it possible to:
<bad pseudo code>
	if ( users_show_in_gdm_user_list > 1 )
		action_menu.add(user_switch_menu)
</bad pseudo code>

GDM has a user list that only displays the relevant users (i.e. not
system users).  Can we count that list and display the item if the list
length is greater than one?  

I'm hoping this avoids the confusion that a user who doesn't have more
than one account might encounter.  They could both be confused and don't
need this functionality.  However users with more than one account can
take advantage of this extra functionality and are more likely to know
about switching users.

~ Bryan

-- 
Bryan W Clark
Graduate Student for Hire :-)
Math && Computer Science Dept.
Human Computer Interaction Group
Clarkson University
Potsdam, NY USA
 
http://www.clarkson.edu/~clarkbw/