Re: Beyond Nautilus 1.0

["John Sullivan" <sullivan eazel com>]

> I think something like a well-designed Nautilus is a good idea, but I don't
> believe its being done properly.  I see the interface as needing a bit of
> work, but being fairly good.  I just don't like the underlying code from
> what I've browsed of it and what I've read by the authors.  I think the
> 'right way' to do this is to have the ability to handle certain MIME types
> in certain ways and allow the user to pick which handler to use (I may have
> 3 spectral analysis programs and 12 mp3 players) when previewing certain
> types of files.

Hi Michael,

You'll get more informed opinions on this kind of thing if you post on
nautilus-list (you can sign up at http://nautilus.eazel.com).

I'm not sure which meaning of "preview" you are using here. There is the
"show contents in a Nautilus window" meaning, and there is the "show
contents as thumbnail in icon" meaning.

The thumbnailing mechanism in Nautilus is not generalized at this time. We
intend it to be, but that isn't going to happen before the first release of
Nautilus.

However, the "show contents in a Nautilus window" mechanism is currently
very generalized. It does allow for any number of components that can handle
certain MIME types, and it does let the user control which component is used
by default, and which set of components are offered as the standard choices,
as well as letting the user choose from any of the potentially long list of
available choices.

Some of this is currently muddied by the very in-progress appearance of the
"File Types and Programs" control center capplet. But the architecture is in
place now, and has been for quite some time.

> As long as its done with a good component interface, the software writers
> will end up writing more component based software to allow their programs to
> fit into the interface (the file manager ends up being a 'chrome' or 'skin'
> of sorts for various programs).  Zooming in (maximising) would let you use
> the file right from that interface having at some point loaded the program
> to use it behind the scenes.  Zooming back out shows that preview view of
> that file along with dozens of others.  Depending on the file type, this
> interface works well, if properly designed in code.
> 
> I'm just not convinced that the Nautilus team is as concerned about their
> back-end code as they are about eye-candy.

As usual, there are a mix of programmers with different strengths and
interests working on the Nautilus project. I feel safe in saying that none
of us are interested only in superficial appearance.

John Sullivan