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On Thu, 2003-08-28 at 00:22, dams@×××.fr wrote: |
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> Hello, Here are some thoughts about desktop. Feel free to react, but please, if |
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> you can, think about it long enough to post your comments all at once in a |
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> comprehensive manner, so that we can easily summ up and take everything in |
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> account. Note that we don't want to resolve every little problem here, but have |
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> a set of directions, tasks and ideas |
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> |
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> |
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> * What is desktop : |
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> desktop would be the project responsible of the desktop part of gentoo Linux, |
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> without making global decision, like : should we build a special product for |
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> desktop, should we have a modified install, should we restrict some possibility |
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> to default... |
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|
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Thanks for bringing this up again, since this was brought up months ago |
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with the creation of the toplevel structure. Although at the time it |
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wasn't deemed important enough to be formed at the spot. |
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|
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I'm all for a toplevel structure to coordinate the desktop efforts, |
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although the interference in the projects themselves should be kept to a |
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minimum. I see it mostly as a layer to communicate with other teams. |
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|
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> * The gentoo things that would be handeld by the desktop project : |
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> X, KDE, gnome, other desktop environment (wmaker, rox, xfce...) |
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> *dm (xdm, kdm, gdm, ...) |
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|
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To sum it up : everything non-console. |
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|
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> menu system (use gentoo menu system, or get the debian one) |
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|
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This is part of possible 'tasks' (see down), the whole discussion |
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concerning this is still to be started as far as i am concerned. |
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|
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> * The tasks : |
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> - maintain the project component |
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|
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obvious |
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|
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> - decide general guidelines to be applied on the desktop project components |
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> (do we want DE unification and how much, look and feel, menu entries, default |
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> desktop, gentoo control center integration in DE...) |
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|
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I think the other posts in this thread reflect the general and also my |
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sentiments on this perfectly fine. We should keep it as vanilla as |
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possible, users know how to work from there. |
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|
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> - write guidelines to be more (free)desktop compliant, to be used by the whole |
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> gentoo devs for their packages. |
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|
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We shouldn't be compliant, we should push upstream developers to be or |
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work on their packages being compliant. Us providing some hackish layer |
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of compliance is a recipe for disaster. It is fighting symptoms, while |
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you should be attacking the problem by its root. I don't see our already |
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heavily pressured teams do all sorts of compliance work. |
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|
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And no, just hiring a few more people is no solution if you want to have |
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the same quality/involvement. |
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|
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> - have a little research and development task to suggest integration of new |
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> things in gentoo, that will make the desktop experience better (f.ex. bootsplash, new |
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> DE, new GUIs (karamba like, ...)) |
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|
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I'd rather make a plea for focus on the important and most used desktop |
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aspects, like having rock stable builds for the major DE's and their |
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major components. Every day there will be new, cool 'n nifty stuff that |
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everybody likes to use, but in the end those are gimmicks and an ever |
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expanding the tree will degrade overall quality. It's already a day job |
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to keep up with current upstream development and since few people here |
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can work on Gentoo full time, it will be choice between quality and |
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quantity at times. I know what to choose. |
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|
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If we want to profile ourselves as a serious stable desktop distro, it |
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is important to stay focused : a desktop that can be instantly used with |
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the latest in productive applications. |
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|
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> desktop may need some other part/project, like some usefull packages (menu), |
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> configuration tools, unique control center... That's why we might begin with a |
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> representation of what would the perfect desktop product be, and see if we have |
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> everything we need in gentoo. If not, then we might suggest the creation of |
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> additional projects, or inclusion of needed component. |
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|
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There is no perfect desktop which you can mold into an ebuild. Gentoo |
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already provides the perfect desktop, because users can choose exactly |
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what they want from their desktop. |
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|
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- foser |
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|
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-- |
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