Re: PPP, Mount/Unmount

[Michael Dennis <miked kerneltech com>]

Mount/Unmounting removable media :

I like the idea of changing the icon on the desktop to reflect which state
the drive is in (mounted or not).  Then just put mount, unmount, eject,  etc
in the Context menu for the icon.  A properties context menu entry could
take you to a dialog where you edit the fstab definition for that drive.
Double clicking the icon could auto mount the disk(if not already mounted)
and open a gmc window at your mount  point.  Eject would auto unmount if not
already unmounted and eject the media.  Mount and Unmount are really not a
hard concept to grasp... really.. even for new users. The one problem I do
have with the mount/umount is that by default when I installed my system my
fstab was not set up so the drive icons would appear on the desktop
(RH6.0).  I had to go in and manually edit my fstab to set my removable
drives to user.  I'm not sure whether this is just an issue with my machine
or whether it is common problem but it is definitely counter-intuitive.


PPP and security :

I have no problem with restricting PPPD to root only by default.  I think it
makes sense to force the administrator to pay attention to it when setting
up user accounts.  I do think, however, that the users should be able to run
GNOME in root (for single user systems) without being constantly harassed
that they shouldn't be running GMC as root.  If you're the only one using
the system(stand-alone single user system) why shouldn't you run GNOME as
root?   If your running root on a multi-user system then you should be the
system administrator and should know the power/pitfalls of having root
privileges right?  To me that warning makes no sense other than to confuse
the user.  Hopefully the new version of the GNOME file manager addresses
this issue.


Mike