Re: some thoughts..

[Andreas Kostyrka <andreas rainbow studorg tuwien ac at>]

On Wed, 6 May 1998, Timo Sirainen wrote:

> Just some thoughts about gnome and mostly file manager.. Maybe you've
> discussed about these before, but I just started to actually read this
> list only few days ago..
> 
> I think file manager should be somewhat "i can do everything" program,
> besides being a normal file manager, it should also be able to use ftp,
> http, samba?, etc protocols. It should also be able to (un)pack files
> using tar/gzip/etc packers, and do other things I can't right now think
> of. (I know, gmc does some of these already)
> 
> These extensions probably use a lot of memory to do things which usually
> aren't done all the time, so it just uses megs of totally useless memory
> most of the time. This seems to be the problem with whole KDE, it takes
> over 11 megs of memory (+shared 2-5MB?) to do things I mostly don't need.
> Solutions? I can think of some:
As long as the code isn't used, all you loose is the memory allocated to
the page tables. (Linux does on demand paging of executables.)
> 
> Start different programs to do it's own things - web browser for http, ftp
> client for ftp, some gui-packer for packed packets. Well, maybe, but is
> this really user friendly? to start programs which all look and behave
> differently?
> 
> Can libraries be loaded/unloaded while program is running? All different
> extensions could be put to different libs and loaded as necessary.
Binaries/Libraries are loaded on demand by default in Linux.
[snip]
> OK, enough about memory use, I just hope gnome would take less than 10MB
> when it's in "useful" stage.. (Win95 is btw usable with 8MB memory, KDE
> isn't usable with 16MB.. hm.. X eats way too much memory..)
Hmmm, I've been using X with discless clients that only had 8MB without
swap. It worked, but it was not good for my sleeping habits, so the things
now have 16MB + NFS swap in.

> 
> File open/save dialog - GTK's default one isn't going to be enough, I
> think it should be merged with file manager somehow, dialog should
> probably look something like in win95? :) Like having either small icons
> (different to each filetype, like in file manager) for each file and after
> them the file's name, or then the long file list with more specific file
> information. Directories could also be created in this dialog as well as
> files/directories moved, removed, renamed and changed their properties.
Directories can already be created, etc. in the Gtk FileSelection.
It just depends upon the program if it shows the button bar.
> And what goes to merging of file manager, I think short+long lists should
> be in both file manager and file dialog, file manager should also have the 
> "big icons" list. So, gnome-libs should have a "short file list" widget,

> Are you sure gmc is the right file manager to use? I personally don't
> like it right now, and because it's ported to many operating systems, it
> probably has a lot of useless code. Anyway I'd dare to say that creating a
porting to many OSes == lot of useless code?
Since WHEN is this so? Ever seen autoconf and consorts at work?
(Besides, typical user level stuff isn't too much of porting between
 different UNIXes.)
> new fm from scratch would be better since gmc still doesn't seem do very
> much.

> Should the desktop icon handling belong to file manager? Unless some icon
> is really clicked and file manager window is displayed, I think it's a
> waste of memory to keep it sitting there at background..
Again. If it is not needed, the gmc code is not in memory, and the
unneeded data lays in swap :)
> 
> Hm.. what else.. well, a couple of suggestions:
> 
>  - using buttons as links in gtk-xmhtml is awful, underlined texts 
> please.. :)
What about theming that one? *g*
>  - gnomine: left+right mouse click should work like middle mouse button,
> winmine works like this and my middle mouse button doesn't work well.. and
> the worse problem: when pressing button in field and moving mouse off the
> field before releasing mouse, it doesn't open the field!
That's a X11 configuration problem. I know this is sometimes a problem
when hardware shopping, but Unix/X11 usually uses three button mice.
(Even if X11 supports I believe B1 tru B5)

Andreas