Re: 'Switch User' action

[Malcolm Tredinnick <malcolm commsecure com au>]

On Sat, 2003-12-06 at 23:17, Rodrigo Moya wrote:
> On Sat, 2003-12-06 at 00:42, Malcolm Tredinnick wrote:
> > Sri,
> > 
> > On Sat, 2003-12-06 at 05:19, Sri Ramkrishna 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 ?
> > > > 
> > > 
> > > I disagree.  In XP, I've found that since it's really easy to create 
> > > accounts at the begining of install that people tend to use them.  On my 
> > > XP box at home we have two accounts one for me and one for my wife.  The 
> > > advantage is that I can make changes to my account that won't affect hers.  
> > > Thats pretty compelling since most people don't like to see their 
> > > environment change underneath them.  Once a person understands the 
> > > advantages I think it will be used often.  
> > 
> > Your examples shows two users using two accounts (one account each).
> > That is the normal multiuser system usage. You and your wife do not
> > constitute a single user (although local and federal laws may view that
> > differently in some circumstances :-) ).
> > 
> > The question quoted was about one user using multiple accounts. This
> > question is not the be all and end all -- as others have pointed out,
> > sometimes a second user wants to log in without the first user needing
> > to log out -- but it is one of the use cases.
> > 
> right, I think I get your point. We really need to have a way for a user
> to log in a new session when the screen is locked by the screensaver,
> but it might not be so obvious to have a user switch to another session.
> For this latter case, is then the 'New login' and 'New login in window'
> items in 'System tools' enough?

Um ... dude .. I had no point to make, so stop pretending that you
understand me. I was just clarifying some terminology. :-)

For what it's worth, I am not really sure that allow somebody to log in
again as themselves with a different session on the same machine is a
use case worth spending much time on. The number of people wanting to
use that feature must be very small. But, like I said, I have no real
opinions here.

Malcolm