Re: Proposal: Use Ubuntu's MeMenu and Session Menu in the top panel

[Dylan McCall <dylanmccall gmail com>]

On Tue, Apr 6, 2010 at 8:23 AM, Ryan Peters <sloshy45 sbcglobal net> wrote:
> P.S. Maybe KDE is your thing more than GNOME is; they seem to care quite a
> lot more about customization.
>

Absolutely not the case. KDE liked to leave important, (possibly
polarizing) design decisions up to end users instead of making a solid
decision and standing by it. They are getting better about this
nowadays, but I think it's a mindset that takes a long time to heal.
( Nice blog post on such a subject:
http://mystilleef.blogspot.com/2005/12/just-add-option-to-turn-it-off-or-on.html
)

However, _where it counts_, Gnome is as customizable as KDE. For
example, being able to choose any font or theme that you want, and
changing the keyboard shortcut to open the main menu. That sort of
customization is important because it lets users fit the desktop
environment to their own particular needs, which in some cases is the
difference between being able to use the system and not using it.

My point isn't really about "adding options," but just that the Gnome
project, as I know it, DOES care about customization. The difference
with Gnome Shell, so far, is that the customization is intended to
happen a bit further from end users, via more rigid extensions that
control specific points of the shell interface (instead of forcing the
user to define those points). Correct me if I'm wrong, please!

If you look at other applications, like web browsers (Chromium), text
editors (Gedit), and image editors (GIMP), you'll see that this
approach has won over the "an extension is a widget that the user
places somewhere" approach, and for good reason. A widget the user
places somewhere may as well be a normal application that runs at
startup ;)


As for the topic at hand, the top right of the screen: there is still
a menu (and a big green icon) for controlling your IM presence;
setting yourself as online or offline. However, logging in to an IM
account and setting up an IM account has nothing to do with that chunk
of the screen. This is the problem that the Me menu and message
indicator strive to address, and may be worth some pondering.


Thanks,
Dylan