Re: New modules in 2.14

[Mark Rosenstand <mark borkware net>]

On Tue, 2006-01-17 at 22:37 -0500, Ryan Lortie wrote:
> First, I don't think that g-p-m itself and the technologies that it
> depend on are mature enough that we should standardise on any particular
> solution yet.  g-p-m is one way of cracking the power management egg and
> I think there are a lot of better possibilities.
> 
> Certainly, at the current time, it appears to be the best offering.
> However, after discussing this at length at Ubuntu Below Zero, I
> believe, that we'd be better served by a system with the two following
> key properties:
> 
> 1. Based on system daemon.
>   This would make the system more secure as a normal user process
>   wouldn't be given the ability to 'suspend now' as g-p-m (and 
>   any system which makes policy decisions at user privilege) currently
>   requires we provide it with.  This (and other privileges that g-p-m
>   need to be provided with) have serious security implications.
>   Having a system daemon would also mean that the policy system runs
>   when the user is not logged in without resorting to hacks like gdm
>   invoking a private copy of g-p-m.
> 
> 2. More platform-neutral approach.
>   The technologies on which g-p-m is based have seen wide acceptance
>   from other desktops.  We should try and create a power management
>   system that has the same acceptance.  g-p-m is very Gnome-centric.
>   With a faceless system daemon doing all the real hard work we could
>   have multiple configuration front-ends (Gnome, Qt, etc).
> 
> Of course, this wonderful system does not exist.  Again,
> gnome-power-manager is the best offering we have at this time.

Without actually using the stuff, I think this sounds pretty much like
what HAL does (and g-p-m uses.)