Re: Having external control panels in System settings

[Olav Vitters <olav vitters nl>]

On Tue, Feb 07, 2012 at 12:05:08PM +0000, Alberto Ruiz wrote:
> We have to accept that bad practice is going to happen anyway, so the way
> to address this is good guidelines and public shame :-)

I don't think that is a compelling argument. As said, distributions can
patch if really needed. Applications cannot.

> > I don't see why any of above should be separately in System Settings
> > (program updates is already in system settings btw, but then better
> > integrated).
> >
> > Is the request for the API solely for distributions?
> >
> 
> I think that Deja Dup or Dropbox or Ubuntu One, are perfect examples, they
> are not applications, they don't help the user to achieve a task, they are
> just settings for a system wide specific service, we can't anticipate every
> single way in which third parties are going to need to extend it, so I

I see this differently. I rather have something well integrated. Not a
random mashup of "things you can configure". I don't want to configure
"Deja Dup", I might want to configure my backup. I'd like a backup
setting which takes care of that. Part of the OS, not something for
which I first install Deja Dup.

Dropbox, I don't see why it should be in system settings? Just because
we have something where you can put settings doesn't make it for me
logical that you put Dropbox there.

Ubuntu One, that for me is an online account. Configure it there. Having
the same stuff all over the place is just messy.

> don't think that fine grained extensibility cuts it (ie through GOA). Going
> further, someone might want to do a GNOME OS Server Edition and might want
> to add advanced control of networking settings (such as setting up network
> bridges and VPNs), a panel to control a network SAN or a specific printer,
> those are third party system components that make little sense upstream
> given our focus but that still make sense.

If you have specialized needs and want to modify GNOME somehow, then
just patch GNOME.

> > Note: I do have an nvidia card. I don't think the nvidia stuff belongs
> > in system settings. Further, I initially disliked the API removal. I've
> > changed my opinion.
> 
> wrt that note, I find it really odd that we are so much against the nVidia
> panel and yet we are writing a wacom tablets panel ourselves.

I don't see any similarity between the two. I rather configure nvidia in
the existing screens. Not have the same stuff in yet another applet.

-- 
Regards,
Olav