Re: [gentoo-dev] desktop

[Spider]

begin  quote
On Thu, 28 Aug 2003 22:35:05 +0200
dams@×××.fr wrote:

> Spider <spider@g.o> said:
>
> >
> > 9)  Decisions and communications
> > All theese things need to be properly discussed and in the open. I
> > was shocked to find out I suddenly got a manager who thought I was
> > to run my decisions about including applications to the Gnome
> > desktop by them, as well as the idea of a single uniformed Gentoo
> > desktop is completely-appalling- to me.
>

> What does that mean? do you already hate me ? :)

No, this was in no way a personal assault and I'm very sorry that you
choose to take it as such, and continued with the replies out of order
when doing so.  

I tried to carefully keep issues here apart, in order to further a
discussion about points I had. 


>
> Sad but true, the only answerwe have is that we don't want their
> desktop. But every propositions to change things from the vanilla
> state won't fit everybody. So the bottom line is the vanilla state,
> for now.

ok, thats a good start. I hope you refer to my point above here that
decisions about changing this "for now" are made in the open and
including the developers who are in line for it.  I really don't want to
find myself in a situation where there are global allcompassing
decisions made about things like this without open discussion and
communication.  I realize that for as long as this is a privately held
company, and perhaps even after that, Daniel has final say.

> I'm trying to make you all react so that we can find something else.

Erm, I wish to think I did react here before, and also tried to be
constructive in how I looked at things. Perhaps you disagree.



> Why change the background of frame buffer, loader,  and not the DE
> background?

I consider Splash-screens (Grub, Lilo, "Starting Gnome" ,  "loading 
KDE" )  and Login prompts to be good places for branding because they do
not infere with the function of the desktop, and don't intrude on our
users. 

This is also why I'm opposed to changing the desktop background, and
default theme's and icons. 



> I'd say : let don't do "gentoo desktop"! we just maintain the desktop
> vanilla stuff. Default config is the vanilla one, changed to fit the
> (non desktop) modification that have been done to the core gentoo. If
> the guy wants an unified menu, he emerges the menu system, we provide
> the good config file. If he wants a background for the frame buffer,
> he can put one himself...
>
> That's the best solution : let's customize every pieces without
> thinking about the global desktop experience. The user will choose
> which pieces to put together.

This is a good way of doing it, and one I agree with completely.  

(That doesn't mean I wouldn't like to see a uniform theme for Grub,
bootsplash and GDM screens, so the computer doesn't look like its doing
a fast-forward between themes on bootup ;)

> I think that's the debian desktop. That's not that bad, debian desktop
> is rock solid, stable, good looking once configured, and powerfull if
> you install the powerfull stuff.
>
> But you seem to want something else...

I think I stated the things I'd like to see pretty well in the previous
post to the list.



 
> >   In this regard the ruling cabal (ie, management)
> > have flunked completely and their actions ,  and  more
> > importantly, inactions are to be questioned.  This whole process
> > could have been dealt with far nicer.
>
> I'm sorry about that, I learned I could be the desktop leader 10 mins
> before we argue together on irc.

No reason to be, you weren't the one behind this decision. 
 
//Spider

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