[Xfce-bugs] [Bug 5934] Xfce system-wide settings

[bugzilla-daemon at xfce.org]

http://bugzilla.xfce.org/show_bug.cgi?id=5934

--- Comment #4 from Jannis Pohlmann <jannis at xfce.org> 2009-10-31 14:37:20 UTC ---
(In reply to comment #0)
> The continual problem with items changing within the desktop environment is
> very annoying.  I've even booted up after shutting down from a perfectly good
> DE and found that there were no panels.  I had to run xfce4-panel from the
> command line to get them back.  It would be very good to have all settings
> centralized into one place, and able to be made unchangable.

The "no panels" problem probably is a bug in the panel, not in the config
storage backend. We already have a centralized settings backend (xfconf), so
obviously that is irrelevant to this issue. A centralized settings manager GUI
won't help in avoiding this problem either.

> "Centralized" means not having desktop, appearance, windows and other settings
> under different managers.  There should not be more than one place where these
> things are handled.  Also, settings are settings, and there is no need to have
> separate GUI's for each section of the environment.  Only one GUI interface is
> needed for all of them.  The existing Settings Manager is not an interface;
> rather it is a folder view of 17 applets.  That's not a manager; that's a
> folder.

So, first of all, this is a problem that affects almost *all* components of
Xfce. So it's not something you file as a request in a bug tracker. It's
something you discuss on a mailinglist. So maybe we should take this to
xfce4-dev at xfce.org to be more productive.

With so many configuration options, you will *always* end up with categories
for these options or with a hierarchy of options. We have a mixture of both.
The main reason why we have settings split across many dialogs is because of
the modular architecture of Xfce. You can run the window manager without the
rest, you can run the file manager without the rest and so on. Consequently, we
don't force people to install everything together and that's why you only get
to see those dialogs for which you have applications installed. This simply is
the easiest way to do it.

Last year, I hacked up support for "embedded" dialogs, something you can see in
this video: 

 
http://lunar-linux.org/~jannis/videos/xfce/xfce4-settings-manager-20080912-2.ogv

This hasn't made it into 4.6 because some of our dialogs have a width/height
ratio of 4:4 or even 4:5 instead of 4:3 or 5:3 which is needed for this concept
to work properly.

I wouldn't mind simplifying the settings dialogs, making them more consistent.
But merging e.g. the keyboard settings won't be easy as they belong to
different applications (for valid reasons).

> Also, the groupings could be inproved.  There are at least two different places
> where mouse, keyboard, and icons are found.  There is even one applet that
> contains within it a tab for "Settings".  There is also an applet named
> "Accessibility", and a tab in another applet with the same name.  The same for
> "Workspaces".  Those are examples of being redundant.

Not entirely, for the reasons described above. The keyboard shortcuts for
launching applications are monitored and executed by a different application
than the window manager shortcuts. Those cannot be merged easily.



(In reply to comment #3)
> In any case, I'm not a coder.  What I am, however, is one of the very best
> software design directors available.  And that is something that coders need
> desperately.  Xfce is no exception to the fact that good leadership is badly
> needed.  Hence the feature improvement request.

And I am one of the world's finest software developers. There's only one
problem: like you, I have little evidence for that and even if I did, it
wouldn't matter. I'm happy that, in open source, titles and certificates don't
count. The only thing that is valid is good argumentation, so *please* put
don't try to impress anyone with your reputation. You'll quickly be marked as
arrogant and incompetent otherwise. 

> What I don't understand is how programmers start down these bad paths in
> creating a simple interface.  It is almost as if it is all a patchwork of bits
> and pieces of code brought together in a poor manner.  And yet, it is so easily 
> fixed.

If you are such a good software design director, as you say, you should've
heard of how software evolves over the years and design-once-use-forever
thinking is highly unrealistic. 

Xfce has existed for more than ten years and while the settings storage has
been redesigned several times (e.g. mcs -> xfconf for 4.6), the settings
dialogs GUI has not been changed *that* much lately. We're open to suggestions
and improvements (to be proposed on xfce4-dev at xfce.org if they are of general
nature) a "I don't understand how you programmers could make such a mistake"
attitude won't get us anywhere. Ivory towers, anyone?

> Oh well, if anyone needs my design help on this, I'm always available.

We can always use feedback on our GUI. Feel free to create mockups and concepts
for an improved settings manager on the mailing list in order to start a
prosperous discussion.

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