Workspace Switcher; Metacity; or Gnome -- whichever ??

[William Case <billlinux rogers com>]

Hi;

I need some advice.  I want to put in a feature request but I am not
sure where it should go. Workspace Switcher; Metacity; or Gnome --
whatever ??  

For over 2 years now I have been trying to somehow solve the following
problem:  I want 2 or 3 completely different Desk Top environments.
Call them my 'Play' environment and my 'Work' environment.

'Play' is usually a mess, a fun picture for a background; panel full of
icons, launchers all over the screen.  When I have work to do, I like to
work clean.  A simple background; sparse panel with only icons for those
applications I use often in my work; file launchers for just the files I
need for a project; research based bookmarks for frequently used
URL's.  

However, and here is where I get into problems, I want one mailbox for
Evolution whether at 'work' or 'play'; a shared 'NoteCase' whether at
'work' or 'play'; and a shared 'tvtimes' to follow breaking news events.

No work around seems to get all this.  I have tried setting myself up as
two different users; I have tried  hard and soft linking my mailbox,
calandar, todo etc.

If I were a programmer, and IDE would kind of do the trick but my work
projects are all non-IT.

The ideal solution would be to have a cross between a work place
switcher; gdmflexiserver; session manager; and, desktop switcher.  For
example a new applet (which is beyond my abilities to create) that would
keep the X windows running; remove the current panels, background and
desktop and replace them with what I have chosen for that 'work' or
'play' environment.  I would simply have a name for each environment
that could be launched as I needed it. 

I could have the best of both worlds; keeping the applications that I
use in both environments alive (same UID); while replacing everything
else -- maybe each environment could be password protected.  It strikes
me that this is not an unusual feature request.  Surely many people
using computers have two or three compartments to their lives.
Commercial artists who want to separate their Gimp setup etc. for work
from recreational environments for themselves and their kids; Corporate
workers who want to keep their home environment separate from work that
they have to do at home; or as in my case, a place to play and a place
to work that looks and feels like separate places for work and play.

As I started out saying, that's the feature request I want to ask for
but I don't know who I should ask it of. 
-- 
Regards Bill