Re: [Nautilus-list] Re: GNOME user environment brainstorming

[Vlad Harchev <hvv hippo ru>]

On Fri, 25 May 2001, Alex Larsson wrote:

> On Fri, 25 May 2001, Vlad Harchev wrote:
> 
> > On 24 May 2001, Havoc Pennington wrote:
> > > - On desktop, perhaps show "Havoc Pennington's Home" instead of
> > >   "hp's Home"
> > > - For user prefs folder, use full name also, "Havoc Pennington's
> > >   Preferences"
> >
> >  It would be nice to make the name format configurable ("My foo" vs
> > "userjoe's foo" vs "Joe Smith's foo" vs "foo").
> 
> We're trying to cut down on the number of preferences here. If you don't
> like the default name, just rename the icon. You can even call it "Xyzzy"
> if you like.
> 
> Adding preferences for these things is just a way to avoid actually
> making decisions.

 Making doubtful decisions is Microsoft's way.

 I think it would be enough to have some Gconf key that controlls this - no
GUI means needed (but though desired - only root will use them). These icons
are created the first time Gnome started for the given user - so code that
creates directories and icons can respect that gconf key.
 
 
> > > Default prefs
> > > ===
> > >
> > > - disable tearoff menus by default
> > > - disable tearoff menubars by default
> >
> >  I think tearoffs is a very useful feature and they should be enabled by
> > default - they don't take much space. It's one of the big advantages of gtk
> > over other widegsets, and they are erally very useful (e.g. when searching for
> > some document in the "Recent documents" user has just tear off the folder menu
> > rather than navigating to that submenu each time).
> 
> Tearoff menubars are totally on crack, I haven't seen or heard about
> anyone ever actually using them. Tearoff menus is a bit more useful, but
> still I don't think I've ever used them myself.

 I described sitation in which tearoff menus in foot menu (or in documents
menu) are useful - when you need to sequenitally activate several menuitems in
some (deeply burried) submenu.

 Anyway - please don't disable tearoffs for comboboxes (is only GAL uses them
for now) - they are badly needed. E.g. in AbiWord - you just tearoff font
selector combobox's menu and then you can *VERY QUICKLY* assign fonts to
document - there is no need to go to combobox, drop down its list scroll to
needed font - just pick up some font from it. Same for font size selector -
extermely useful. If the app written properly, it may have some submenus in
the main menu that also reflect the state of current selection - in such cases
tearoff submenus are as useful as tearoffs in comboboxes.

PS: BTW, the first item active when tornable menu pops up should be the 1st
menu item, not tearoff-widget. It's important when navigating using
keyboard. Please anybody fix this in GTK.

 Best regards,
  -Vlad