Re: GNOME Usability Improvements - Fix the window manager!

[Ronald de Man <deman win tue nl>]

On Wed, Aug 04, 1999 at 02:19:59AM +0200, Matthias Warkus wrote:
> +++ Tue, Aug 03, 1999 at 05:07:56PM -0400 +++
> Matt Herbert e-mails me. Film at 11. Reply right now, after the break.
> > Matthias Warkus wrote:
> > > 
> > > Impossible. The best thing we could do were to copy the entire
> > > system menu over to the home directory and have it edited there. But
> > > then upgrades to the system menu's wouldn't reach you any more.
> > > 
> > 
> > Why is this impossible? This doesn't seem like it should be that difficult.
> > First the code would read in the menu's from the system area.  Then it
> > would check the user's home directory, and add any new entries into the
> > menu tree that were found.  Then display the menu.  Obviously the user's
> > settings would have precedence over the system menu's.
> 
> But isn't this what we've already got if you display the user menus
> and the system menus together (this is configurable)?

Where can I configure this? I briefly looked but couldn't find it.
The obvious place would be in the Global properties of the panel,
but it doesn't seem to be there.

>  
> > This would allow Joe Average User to open up the menu editor, and change
> > something about the gnorpm entry. The menu editor would then save a whole
> > new gnorpm entry in the users home directory (say .gnome/apps/System/gnorpm.desktop),
> > which would override the settings of the system entry.
> 
> What's the point? Anyway, if the system administrator changes the
> position of the gnorpm binary or removes it altogether, what happens
> to all the entries pointing into empty space now?

The point is that people want to be able to change those system menu
entries! A user should be allowed to decide that the GnomeICU menu
entry would have a much more logical place in the Internet submenu,
than among the network applets.

And if a user doesn't use half of the applications appearing in the
system menus, why not allow him to take those out?

Entries pointing into empty space are hardly a problem. You will have
the same problem with the current User menus.

> 
> > It may also make sense to add a new "Special=delete" entry to the menu
> > item, so If a user wanted to completely remove gnorpm from their menu,
> > they would be able to delete it via the menu editor, which would create
> > a gnorpm.desktop file in the user's home directory, with the special setting,
> > and thus not show the gnorpm menu entry at all.
> > 
> > Granted, I don't know C, but I do know perl, and I can picture exactly how
> > the code would work.  Maybe I'm missing something, but this seems like
> > it would be a relatively easy change.
> > 
> > This addition would be very nice.  It would allow a user to change their
> > menu entries to suit their own personal needs, -and- still allow them
> > to see changes to the system menus.  All without having to su to root.
> 
> All fine and dandy, but I think there are more important issues than
> this perennial topic of discussion on this list. It's OK the way it
> is. Even what you mention is but a fine tweak with both advantages and
> disadvantages.

If you think so, then maybe you should confine yourself to discussions
about the more important issues. The proposed tweak adds natural
flexibility. In the current situation users wonder "Why can't I?"
and there is no good reason why they can't.

Ronald