[wplug] Re: My distro beat up your distro (yet again, sigh) -- GConf optional?

Bryan J. Smith b.j.smith at ieee.org
Sun Jul 22 22:17:41 EDT 2007


On Sun, 2007-07-22 at 21:11 -0400, Patrick Wagstrom wrote:
> As someone who contributes to GNOME, I can say that your statement is 
> incorrect.  While authors may choose to allow other options to be 
> configured through the registry, the mantra for GNOME is just to do 
> things right from the beginning.  If you're arguing for a configuration 
> option in an application, there had better be a good reason for it.

First off, I hope you noted the "smiley."  ;)  But with that said, it
was probably a tad to inflammatory to make that comparison, smiley or
not.  You have my apology for doing such, it was in poor taste.

Secondly, no good deed goes unpunished.  GNOME is an outstanding desktop
system that is getting wide UNIX/UNIX-like support for a reason.  Anyone
who contributes to GNOME should be commented, not chided.  So my
apologies for doing so.

Now with that said ... third, I'm not the first person to mention the
fact that there is quite an expanding "registry" for GNOME.  While I do
believe you are sincere and very much technically and factually correct
on the Mantra, there is a _lot_ that _must_ be configured from GConf.

*BUT*, lastly, if *I* have a problem with all that I need to configure
GConf and don't like it, *I* _should_ put forth the effort to address
those and contribute.  Since *I* have decided not to (or at least not in
any significance in the past), *I* should consider my lack of efforts
first, before complaining about GNOME.

> That being said, I think we're (as in people who code, document, and 
> market GNOME) are doing a great job of just making a system that works 
> without having to worry about configuration.

Oh, I very much agree.  I love the entire "Utopia" approach with
gnome-vfs built upon so much else.  "It just works," as you said.

But I've had to dig into GConf more than I've liked.

> It's a shift in mindset, but it's a little like going from C programming 
> to Python.  Once you realize that you don't need to mess around with 
> settings you'll be much more productive.

I work on embedded Linux.  While I can use Python for many things (and
very much do for tool-level), I still have to dive into C, endianess,
data alignment, etc... when things don't work like I want them to.

But, as I mentioned, if I don't like it ... I can contribute.

Like the sign says at the animal shelter ...
  "If you don't like what you see here, volunteer!"  


-- 
Bryan J. Smith         Professional, Technical Annoyance
mailto:b.j.smith at ieee.org   http://thebs413.blogspot.com
--------------------------------------------------------
        Fission Power:  An Inconvenient Solution



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