[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread] 

List:       kde-devel
Subject:    Re: Using KDE in corporate environment - Queries and suggestions
From:       Michael Jarrett <gexcfxyy () umail ! corel ! com>
Date:       2001-03-12 18:54:02
[Download RAW message or body]



biswapesh.chattopadhyay@bt.com wrote:
> 1. Fonts. This is probably distribution-specific but is it possible to have
> a kde-fonts package which will select the best-of-breed of the available
> free fonts and fine-tune the desktop themes based on these ? It makes a
> major impact on the 'feel' of the desktop. I imported my Windows fonts and
> set the theme to a mostly Verdana based one and the improvement is really
> remarkable. Also, in this respect, does anyone have any idea regarding the
> license of MS fonts ? Are they redistributable ? I thought the downloadable
> core web fonts were ? Another idea might be fo check if the user has a
> 'Windows/fonts' or 'WINNT/fonts' directory while starting KDE for the first
> time and automatically importing them.

Licensing is very thorny, and even importing them from Windows by
default can be difficult.

 
> 2. SMB browsing. Again, this is probably distribution specific as well but
> why isn't kio_lan built by default ? I'm still unable to get SAMBA browsing
> to work with Konqueror inspite of the (much appreciated) help from AlexX,
> probably because there is no LISA support (?)

Last time I used lisa on a corporate network, my MAC address was blocked
in under a day. It is not a refined tool IMHO, nor does it work in the
way many people would expect from a "Network Neighbourhood" kind of
perspective.
(shameless plug here) Corel Linux does provide full Windows network
browsing from their file manager. It's an Explorer-ish interface and
quite nice indeed.

> The bothersome thing is that
> the error message is not very expilcit (asks me to configure LAN Browsing
> which I've already done !). It would be nice to have a menu in the Control
> Center called 'Check Installation' which would tell you about the missing
> pieces, preferably with hints on how to resolve it (for example, a typical
> output might look like:
> a) Missing OpenSSL - You won't be able to use https sites
> b) Missing kio_lan/kio_smb - You won't be able to browse network
> neighbourhood
> c) Unable to locate Netscape Plugins - Flash probably won't work
> d) Unable to locate JRE - Java won't work

Agreed. The error messages should be clearer. Now that 2.1 is out,
changes to the messages may well happen. 
 

> 3. Printing. There doesn't seem to be a straight-forward way to get printing
> to work, and be consistent across applications. Also, there doesn't seem to
> be any plan for integrating netware printing (netware is pretty common in
> corporate environments for file and print services). Talking of netware, it
> might be an idea to wrap the netware functions like login, getting shares,
> sending print requests etc as an option. It should be trivial since the
> command line client already exists (the ncpfs RPM is avaibale for linux at
> least, and probably for other OS's as well I guess. Also, is there any plan
> to support sending print requests to Netware shares in the upcoming new
> printing architecture ? It woould be nice if one could enter something like
> 'Enter command line for sending requests where '%s' is the file name, so I
> could write something like:
> 'nprint -S XXX -U XXX -P xxx %s' and all KDE apps will use that as default.

I don't think many developers of KDE really use netware, making
something like that difficult to develop. Though a good note to make.
A previous thread did mention Corel's printing system (which is very
nice), and there is work going on with printing right now in fact, which
should show up in KDE 2.2.

> 6. Mail. OK, this is a lame one since probably you can't do anything abouut
> it, but has anyone had any success talking Exchange's proprietory protocol
> through ANY mail client ? This is the one major thing that forces me to
> switch back into NT every two hours or so. Also, how difficult would it be
> to get KMail to access mails automatically from the standard internet mail
> systems like Yahoo & Hotmail ? It would really be a killer feature ! It
> would need some tricky scripting and of course, someone would have to
> actively maintain the stuff so that changes in the website are incorporated
> but it might be worth the effort if the current KMail architecture supports
> it.

Hotmail in particular is very difficult - and it has been tried by a few
adventurous people in the past. The web interface switches between SSL
and normal at least once (maybe twice), uses several cookies in the
interim, and a few tricks that nobody has successfully been able to
follow.
Exchange is probably the legal thorn from hell, but I wouldn't know.

Cheers
Michael Jarrett
michaelj@corel.com
-- 
The address in the headers is not the poster's real email address.  Do not send
private mail to the poster using your mailer's "reply" feature.  CC's of mail 
to mailing lists are OK.  Problem reports to "postmaster@umail.corel.com".  
The poster's email address is "michaelj@corel.com".
 
>> Visit http://master.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/kde-devel#unsub to unsubscribe <<

[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread]