Re: Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-30 Thread Odysseus Flappington
On 30/10/2008, Matthew East [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

 Hi,


 On Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 4:38 PM, A. Walton [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
  I personally have no problem seeing Ubuntu ship a few default
  templates in /etc/skel/. From my GNOME point of view, I think it'd be
  a healthy thing to do, and I think distros have the good sense to
  manage what they put in there, even though it's not recommended.


 This is the problem right here. I think it's pretty uncontestable, for
 the reasons that Michael Meeks states on the Gnome mailing list
 thread, that having some templates in ~/Templates by default would
 improve enormously the user experience. So, it's a valid bug. But,
 it's been closed by the Ubuntu developer because we have one Gnome
 developer, not even the nautilus maintainers, with a loud voice on a
 thread on the Gnome mailing list saying it's a bad idea because he
 doesn't trust distributors to do a good job to maintain a healthy list
 of templates.

 It seems plain to me having read the thread that the correct approach
 here is for distros to take responsibility for this and ship some
 templates in ~/Templates by default (whether using /etc/skel or other
 technical means). It's only distros who have control over whether that
 list of templates will get cluttered or not, so it's distros who can
 keep it clean.

 I think closing the bug was the wrong decision and I really hope that
 it can be reconsidered as a potential feature for Ubuntu 9.04.

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Re: Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-30 Thread Didier Roche
2008/10/30 Matthew East [EMAIL PROTECTED]


 It seems plain to me having read the thread that the correct approach
 here is for distros to take responsibility for this and ship some
 templates in ~/Templates by default (whether using /etc/skel or other
 technical means). It's only distros who have control over whether that
 list of templates will get cluttered or not, so it's distros who can
 keep it clean.


I think that Matthew is totally right: the responsability is on distros to
handle a correct list of templates, regarding application they shipped and
maintain it accorded to its evolution. This would provide reasonable default
which can hilight this feature for new users and give them a clue on how
they can populate the Create Document item.

This feature is, to my mind, very powerful, easy to use but unfortunately
unknown because of not explaining/guiding people on how to use it.

Didier
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Re: Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-30 Thread Sebastien Bacher


Le jeudi 30 octobre 2008 à 08:30 +, Matthew East a écrit :
 it's been closed by the Ubuntu developer because we have one Gnome
 developer, not even the nautilus maintainers, with a loud voice on a

Hi,

that is a wrong statement, the launchpad nautilus bug has been closed
because that's not a nautilus bug and such changes should be discussed
on a mailing list where you will get comments on and not a bug tracker.
the way to do that would be to copy some templates in the user
directory, note that doing that automatically when adding an user has
been decided against before because it's specific to GNOME and users
doing server installation don't want those template for example.

Sebastien Bacher


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Re: Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-30 Thread Mikko Ohtamaa
Hi,

This is a little offtopic, but...




 that is a wrong statement, the launchpad nautilus bug has been closed
 because that's not a nautilus bug and such changes should be discussed
 on a mailing list where you will get comments on and not a bug tracker.
 the way to do that would be to copy some templates in the user
 directory, note that doing that automatically when adding an user has
 been decided against before because it's specific to GNOME and users
 doing server installation don't want those template for example.


Could we have a different state for this kind of things in Launchpad? A lot
of people get offended by invalid, since they assume that the bug is being
ignored. For example being discussed with a pointer to the discussion or
finding a new home when the bug is not against the correct product and the
new one has not been decided yet.

Where could I propose this kind of thing?

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Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-29 Thread Mikko Ohtamaa
Hi,

After 3 years of discussion it looks like Ubuntu is still going to ship with
empty Create Document menu in Nautilus. This menu should be populated
which choices Create text file, Create OpenOffice Writer document and so
on.

Bug #23332 was marked as invalid.

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/nautilus/+bug/23332

and here is discussion about the matter
http://mail.gnome.org/archives/nautilus-list/2008-June/msg00123.html

This is one of these things were discussion led to nowhere. The last word
was no we are not going to do anything for this because there could be
possible abuse by software packagers and such. This is a bit unflattering
for the end users. I'd rather have this very handy usability feature on the
risk of hypothetical abuse. I can clean up my menu if my evil Linux software
vendors try to clutter it up.

This is a very visible bug (feature) to all users coming from other
operating systems/distributions. Could we at least remove Create Document
menu if it's going to be unsupported?

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Re: Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-29 Thread A. Walton
On Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 10:39 AM, Mikko Ohtamaa [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
I can clean up my menu if my evil Linux software
 vendors try to clutter it up.

Yeah, if you have root privelidges to remove said templates from a
global directory. This is fine if you're working on a single user
machine and you're the admin. Really really bad if you're on any
multiuser machine, be it in a corporate environment or just the kid of
an Ubuntu dad who really likes his 40 global templates.


 This is a very visible bug (feature) to all users coming from other
 operating systems/distributions. Could we at least remove Create Document
 menu if it's going to be unsupported?


It's perfectly supported as designed. Put some template in ~/Templates
and enjoy. If you want to push it to new users, put it in
/etc/skel/Templates and every new user gets them.

Choice of menu items vs. Compulsory menu options. Hmm, tough choice eh?

-A. Walton

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Re: Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-29 Thread Martin Pitt
A. Walton [2008-10-29 11:10 -0400]:
 On Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 10:39 AM, Mikko Ohtamaa [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 I can clean up my menu if my evil Linux software
  vendors try to clutter it up.
 
 Yeah, if you have root privelidges to remove said templates from a
 global directory. This is fine if you're working on a single user
 machine and you're the admin. Really really bad if you're on any
 multiuser machine, be it in a corporate environment or just the kid of
 an Ubuntu dad who really likes his 40 global templates.

There is no reason why GNOME shouldn't be able to override those in
your user configuration.

I don't really buy the original argument. Right now, it's not really
an useful thing to put into the context menu in the first place. So if
we see that abuse actually starts to happen in Ubuntu packages, then
heck, it's not like it was impossible to fix those packages to throw
them out again.

Martin
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Ubuntu Developer (www.ubuntu.com)  | Debian Developer  (www.debian.org)

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Re: Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-29 Thread Wouter Stomp
On Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 5:21 PM, petr bug [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:


 Perhaps if we add item Add or Remove Templates... to the bottom of
 the list which would open Nautilus with the directory.

That sounds like a good idea, but perhaps it could then give a list of
templates for programs you have installed? So any program could add
their template to the list and yet it wouldn't clutter up the menu.

Also if that would be implemented, I would rather have the directory
hidden (in ~/.config or something). It has always felt like a really
odd thing in the user directory.

Wouter.

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Re: Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-29 Thread A. Walton
On Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 12:21 PM, petr bug [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 Hi

 Basically I see the Create Document menu equivalent (in
 abuse-ability sense) to the Main Menu (the one in top left for
 launching all the applications). Any package or user that can add item
 there can abuse it.

 So if ugly distro or super-user clutter either of the menus then
 super-user can clean it up using command line (kinda works now). If
 the user lacks super-user capability then there is a difference: the
 Main Menu has unprivileged mechanism (the Main Menu editor, in
 Preferences/Main Menu) for disabling items while Create Document
 does not.

 2008/10/29 A. Walton [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
 It's perfectly supported as designed. Put some template in ~/Templates
 and enjoy. If you want to push it to new users, put it in
 /etc/skel/Templates and every new user gets them.

 Where can user put the templates? To ~/Templates dir? No way, he/she
 does not know that information!

Seems you do though. Funny how we don't give users credit for being
able to find out even the most trivial of trivialities. Perhaps we
should Retitle it Create Document from ~/Template to waste even more
screen pixels?


 Perhaps if we add item Add or Remove Templates... to the bottom of
 the list which would open Nautilus with the directory. Or perhaps it
 could open editor similar to the Main Menu editor. This may also
 solve the problem when new application is installed and a new template
 is created in /etc/skel/Templates but existing users do not see the
 template.

 Choice of menu items vs. Compulsory menu options. Hmm, tough choice eh?

 [flame on]
 That's the GNOME philosophy - a feature was made not configurable to
 make it just simple, if user does not like it then bad luck.
 [flame off]

It's perfectly configurable the way it is. Open a folder, drag and
drop. Sure, we could add  a dialog with a list of checkboxes, a button
or two to add and remove templates, and have the users go in hit a few
knobs and turn off the links, but that seems like a hilariously
ludicrous workaround for something as easy to manage as a folder of
templates. Save the dialog and button twiddling for something that's
harder to manage, like which volumes appear on your desktop (as GVFS,
Hal aren't as easy to manage as a folder).

I personally have no problem seeing Ubuntu ship a few default
templates in /etc/skel/. From my GNOME point of view, I think it'd be
a healthy thing to do, and I think distros have the good sense to
manage what they put in there, even though it's not recommended.
From my Ubuntu point of view, if it makes users more likely to use it,
then by all means put in a few (and maybe one that says Delete this
file if you don't want this menu entry anymore).

-A. Walton


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Re: Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-29 Thread petr bug
2008/10/29 A. Walton [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
 On Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 12:21 PM, petr bug [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 2008/10/29 A. Walton [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
 It's perfectly supported as designed. Put some template in ~/Templates
 and enjoy. If you want to push it to new users, put it in
 /etc/skel/Templates and every new user gets them.

 Where can user put the templates? To ~/Templates dir? No way, he/she
 does not know that information!

 Seems you do though.

I (as a C programmer) did not know that such directory exist
yesterday. Ordinary users are even less likely to know since they
generally do not have computer science degree. I (as a accountant who
does nothing with computers) still do not know.

 Funny how we don't give users credit for being
 able to find out even the most trivial of trivialities.

How can user know where the directory is or where to find out where it
is described?

It is not mentioned in standards.freedesktop.org. Search for gnome
templates finds something but it is not a howto. How can user know
that gnome templates are the right keywords? The do not know what
gnome is or that the feature is really template. End even then:
why should people search webs for something that they already have
before their eyes?

 Choice of menu items vs. Compulsory menu options. Hmm, tough choice eh?

 [flame on]
 That's the GNOME philosophy - a feature was made not configurable to
 make it just simple, if user does not like it then bad luck.
 [flame off]

 It's perfectly configurable the way it is. Open a folder, drag and
 drop.

Again, open which folder?

Of course, if user knows what directory it is then it is easy. Dialog
with check boxes will be even easier.

 Save the dialog and button twiddling for something that's
 harder to manage, like which volumes appear on your desktop (as GVFS,
 Hal aren't as easy to manage as a folder).

I do not see why we can not have both dialogs. They do not compete.

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Re: Empty Create Document menu

2008-10-29 Thread A. Walton
On Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 2:26 PM, petr bug [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 2008/10/29 A. Walton [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
 On Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 12:21 PM, petr bug [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 2008/10/29 A. Walton [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
 It's perfectly supported as designed. Put some template in ~/Templates
 and enjoy. If you want to push it to new users, put it in
 /etc/skel/Templates and every new user gets them.

 Where can user put the templates? To ~/Templates dir? No way, he/she
 does not know that information!

 Seems you do though.

 I (as a C programmer) did not know that such directory exist
 yesterday. Ordinary users are even less likely to know since they
 generally do not have computer science degree. I (as a accountant who
 does nothing with computers) still do not know.


You do not need to be a C programmer nor  do you need a computer
science degree to open your home folder and see a folder named
Templates, wonderfully translated into the language you read. And
you do know, as you just told me what directory it was yourself an
email ago.

 Funny how we don't give users credit for being
 able to find out even the most trivial of trivialities.

 How can user know where the directory is or where to find out where it
 is described?

So here's the problem indicated here: it's not discoverable enough of
a feature. So why don't we talk about why it's not discoverable, and
try to solve that problem? We can add some documentation to point
people here in Help, for example. This is a very good reason to file a
bug, like this one I just filed for you:
http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=558435
Feel free to add your notes or suggestions to how we can make this
more discoverable.


 Of course, if user knows what directory it is then it is easy. Dialog
 with check boxes will be even easier.

 Save the dialog and button twiddling for something that's
 harder to manage, like which volumes appear on your desktop (as GVFS,
 Hal aren't as easy to manage as a folder).

 I do not see why we can not have both dialogs. They do not compete.

They compete for time, from people like me and you, time in bugs, time
in I/O, and on. They distract us from real issues, like one I pointed
out. We have better ways to spend our time working on Nautilus. It's a
very nasty solution to a very trivial problem, which is the entire
point I was making.

-A. Walton


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