Re: Name vs GenericName (again)

[Karl Lattimer <karl qdh org uk>]

On Fri, 2008-07-25 at 14:52 +0200, Vincent Untz wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> In GNOME, we generally only use Name. Which mean gedit appears as "Text
> Editor" and Totem as "Movie Player". Makes a lot of sense to me.
> However, if you install another text editor or movie player, we end up
> with something like "Text Editor" and "GVIM" in the menus, or "Movie
> Player" and "VLC Movie Player", etc.
> 
> It doesn't really help that much. I'd like to propose the following:
> 
>  + define at the fd.o level some standard GenericName values (Text
>    Editor, Movie Player, Calculator, etc.)
>  + start using those GenericName values in .desktop files in GNOME

http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=426196

I provided this patch an ice age ago to let us edit the generic name tag
easily by modifying the place in the gnome panel where the .desktop file
editing occurs. 

If we apply this patch then at least we'll have a feature exposed in the
UI. Then its not exactly a difficult matter of editing the files. 

Can we include this patch in 2.24 then worry about the rest for 2.26?

>  + when using GenericName, then define Name as "name of the app +
>    generic name" or "GNOME + generic name". Eg: "Totem Movie Player" or
>    "GNOME Movie Player". We do this for translators, since we cannot
>    automatically concatenate the name and the generic name.
>  + when displaying a menu, use this algorithm:
>    - if only one item for some value of GenericName, then display this
>      item as GenericName
>    - if two items for GenericName, then display both items with their
>      names.
> 
> This way, we'll have "Movie Player" when only totem is installed, and
> "Totem Movie Player" and "VLC Movie Player" when totem and vnc are
> installed.

Methodology seems absolutely sound :)

BR,
 K