Re: On GNOME 3.0 features

[Allan Day <allanpday gmail com>]

On Tue, 2010-09-14 at 15:35 +0200, Giovanni Campagna wrote: 
> Il giorno mar, 14/09/2010 alle 10.12 +0100, Allan Day ha scritto:
> > Hi Giovanni,
> > 
> > On Thu, 2010-09-09 at 11:45 +0200, Giovanni Campagna wrote:
> > > [Resending because the first message seems lost]
> > > 
> > > Today the set of expected features for GNOME 2.34 / 3.0 System Settings
> > > (former Control Center) has been revealed on the wiki.
> > 
> > It has? ;) Seriously, which page are you referring to? This [1] one?
> > This [2] one?
> 
> I'm referring to [2]. Can't actually rembember what I referred to with
> "today" when originally wrote this email, anyway I saw it on the
> RecentChanges wiki page.
> 
> > The first was done by Jon McCann, the second my me. Speaking for the
> > second, I can tell you that many of the items have not been discussed,
> > and that I mostly came up with it myself.
> 
> Well, then it may be time for discussion, so you (we, they) can spend
> the rest of the following 6 months coding.

The new control centre is a big design task as well as a development
task. We are steadily working our way through what needs to be done, but
everything cannot be decided upon at once. That said, we don't want
design to hold up development - if there are any devs out there who want
to work on a panel but need some design guidance first, they should
definitely let the designers (or me) know.

> > I realise that this stuff looks more 'official' than it really is. There
> > should clearly be some kind of disclaimer explaining the status of those
> > pages (I'll add that). You can't blame us for not working in the open,
> > at least... :)
> 
> And the result of working in the open is people complaining early,
> right?
> 
> > If you want to see more concrete plans for the new Control Center, check
> > out the GNOME design Gitorious repo [3]. A few panels have been
> > specified there.
> 
> I know, and I follow gnome-design, but besides those panels (and those
> that already exist in master branch) I was curious about functionality,
> rather then design.
> 
> > > As expected, some functionality was moved, some was added, and some was
> > > killed. Unfortunately, as a daily GNOME user, I find some removal
> > > questionable.
> > > In particular:
> > > 
> > > - why all the theming stuff is optional?
> > > All operating systems and desktop environments, including the most
> > > minimal wms, have some theming support.
> > > Also, not all people have the same tastes: some like Clearlooks, some
> > > like Humanity, some use Murrine, some use QtCurve. I for example like
> > > the current GNOME 2.0 default, and would like to use it even for GNOME
> > > 3.0 if the future theme doesn't suit me. 
> > > Thirdly, different distros have different defaults, and the theme is one
> > > of the most prominent detail in the UI, but users should not pick their
> > > distro based on the theme!
> > 
> > I wasn't involved in this decision, but I do agree with it. The logic, I
> > think, is that themeing is only used by a minority of users, and that
> > installing an extra panel isn't a particular hardship for those users.
> > The win is a control center that is a little lighter and which is more
> > tailored to the majority of users. It's up to distros what they want to
> > ship by default, of course.
> 
> How do you say so? I don't mean personalizing one theme, installing a
> new theme, or even building up one from scratch. I mean choosing one
> among the many available in the friendly capplet.
> All my friends, both GNU users (Ubuntu, Fedora) and Windows users have
> their system themed to their likes, and they're not all computer
> addicts.

Right, and the Windows users will have had to have installed something
in order to do that - same as what we're doing.

> > Just to clarify - nobody is proposing that users should not be able to
> > change their theme, and I think everyone realises that themeing is
> > important functionality for some users. Actually, themeing will be
> > enhanced for GNOME 3.0, and there are some exciting ideas about how it
> > could be done.
> 
> Well, but you should not ask one to edit CSS files, or even copy one in
> the right directory, just to change the desktop appearance.

But isn't matching a WM theme to a GTK theme actually theme design, not
theme usage?

> > > - why no provision for setting Metacity themes, Gtk themes and icon
> > > themes independently?
> > > 
> > > Those (and Shell themes, btw) are mostly independent settings, people
> > > should be free to make their preferred combination, without tweaking
> > > with .theme files or dconf-editor.
> > 
> > The real designers probably have a better answer than me here, but my
> > argument here would be that separating WM, GTK and icon themes generates
> > more work for casual themers, while combining them into single
> > uber-themes makes themeing more accessible for more users.
> > 
> > > - the repeat key setting is necessary
> > > 
> > > Move it to the accessibility panel if you prefer, but it is needed, for
> > > the same reason we have StickyKeys and BounceKeys: some people are
> > > unable to press the same key in succession, some on the other hand keep
> > > their keys pressed to long (and enter duplicated chars every time).
> > 
> > Thanks - good to know. Are there any other reasons for this option? Why
> > isn't it currently under the a11y tab?
> 
> Can't tell, actually. But again, move it as you like, as long as it is
> there, somewhere.

Sure - seems like we should consider adding this to the universal access
panel.

> > > - you cannot ditch the Preferred Applications panel
> > ...
> > 
> > Didn't know we were...
> 
> Some old version (the one I read originally, possibly rev 5) said
> UNKNOWN in that place.
> Anyway, I think that some discussion may be needed on this panel.

Don't worry, that'll happen.

> > > - why handling the System Monitor as a System Setting panel?
> > > 
> > > It is an independent tool (like baobab, palimpsest, gnome-nettool,
> > > dconf-editor...), deserves to live in Applications -> System Tools.
> > 
> > Ditto.
> 
> Again, the original version had different plans for it. Good to know
> you've changed your mind.

I don't think I ever made it up in the first place! Honestly, I'm not
sure how or why that ended up in the wiki page. It'll probably get
removed as things firm up.

> > > Now some personal curiosities:
> > > 
> > > - will the Web Accounts panel include current "Messaging and VoIP
> > > Accounts" capplet (provided by Empathy + Mission Control)?
> > 
> > I would guess yes.
> 
> Good
> 
> > > Should it be
> > > renamed "Online services" to be include social accounts (libsocialweb,
> > > libgwibber, GNU Social)
> > 
> > No (again guessing). We originally had a name similar to 'online
> > services' but abandoned it because it seemed a bit too
> > ambigious/difficult to understand.
> 
> Well, my question was: will it include social accounts, whatever the
> name?

I don't understand the question. What are social accounts? I don't know
the technical details, but the mockup lists Twitter, Google, Facebook,
Yahoo, Windows Live, Jabber...

> In any case, I don't like "Web". Web is the thing we have in Firefox,
> pino is not a Web application, and neither is Empathy. "Social
> accounts"? Collapse it with "Personal details" (gnome-about-me)?

Us geeks have an accurate idea of what 'web' means, but most people
don't. I personally think that people will understand the meaning of
'Web Accounts' better than 'Social accounts' or even 'Internet
accounts'... User testing would be the best way to resolve that
particular argument, of course

> [...]
> 
> > > Thanks in advance for your answers,
> > 
> > And thanks for the searching questions.
> 
> Thank you again!

You're welcome.

Allan
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