Re: Initial Thoughts

[Andreas Nilsson <nisses mail home se>]

On 11/05/2010 11:35 AM, Matthew Paul Thomas wrote:
> Bastien Nocera wrote on 04/11/10 19:32:
> > On Thu, 2010-11-04 at 15:05 +0000, Calum K Pringle wrote:
> > ...
> > > *   Another thought I would like to raise is that of application
> > >      specific settings; for example Empathy has instant messaging
> > >      accounts that are used mainly in Empathy but could be used in
> > >      other applications as well, so should the setting exist inside
> > >      empathy or separate like “Messaging and Voip Accounts”. Should
> > >      these be retitled to settings for those applications only, and
> > >      then live inside an “Internet” heading of preferences? This
> > >      then acknowledges the rapidly changing use of social network
> > >      applications, and when people download applications, there is
> > >      opportunity for developers to have a separate preference
> > >      option?
> > This should all be integrated into "Web Accounts". Did you look at the
> > mockups available at:
> > http://gitorious.org/gnome-design/gnome-design ?
> >
> > There's already a mockup for the web accounts stuff, just need a person
> > to work on it.
> > ...
> Calum's point is that Gnome is used in operating systems that can
> continue to be used three, seven, even ten years after they're released.
> But the sort of Web services that would be covered by a "Web Accounts"
> panel change much more rapidly, so those settings might make more sense
> in more-updateable applications rather than in global settings.
>
> For example, if you were using an OS with a version of Gnome released
> only three years ago, and the "Web Accounts" panel had existed in Gnome
> back then, possibly it would know about Facebook, but it wouldn't know
> about Twitter. Meanwhile, the version of Gwibber you installed on that
> OS would have its own interface for setting up both, regardless of what
> Gnome did.
I'm not quite sure I follow your logic here. Are applications on a 
faster pace than a contol-center, or is the control center stuck in time 
in any way.
The way it works on most distros right now, is that both are on a 6 
month schedule, but that could indeed change.

One good thing about having it centrally would be that you would only 
have to set up your Google account once, and then both your e-mail 
client, chat client and photo app could make use of it. This could also 
apply to Facebook, Ubuntu One, Yahoo or any other multi-service account 
out there.
- Andreas