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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    RE: Configure desktop initial thoughts
From:       "Poletti, Don" <Don.Poletti () comverse ! com>
Date:       2002-05-14 14:21:01
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>have much time for other things at the moment. but this really 
>doesn't mean 
>you can't spend your time on it ... just means you'll have 
>less hands to help 
>out.

Good, Frankly the kicker stuff doesn't interest me right now. So
I'll work this as time permits I really need something interesting
to get me motivated to learn KDE programming.

>> I propose keeping the topmost desktop this includes the screensaver
>> and background. I could argue that screen saver is not part of the
>> desktop but the background certainly is. Move the background 
>and screen
>> saver dialogs to tabs on the desktop dialog. Thus the icons 
>are not needed.
>
>and if someone wants to configure their background they need 
>to infer that 
>they should look in desktop settings?

As of 3.0 you have to go under "configure desktop" to get to backgrounds
at lease when accessing from the desktop menu. Actually I think the current
method of presenting the dialogs in two way is confusion. The Control center
has the 3 section (Background, desktop, screen saver) mixed in with other
dialogs and it uses small icons in a tree, where from the desktop it has
3 large icons. This was one of the reason to combine them into one dialog

>> The appearance tab could be incorporated into the desktop 
>tab and renamed
>> to General. Thus eliminating the 3'rd use of the word "desktop"
>
>you'd need to eliminate a lot of widgets to make those to 
>merging work... 
Not sure what you mean here. I was suggesting moving the appearance
tab into the "Desktop/general" tab. The appearance tab has
very little on it and I think it could fit with out too
much trouble.

>renaming the desktop panel to "General" is a good idea, and there is 

Ok one point decided the desktop should be renamed General, unless
someone else has a better term.

>
>> The background dialog.
>> Change the list of desktop to tabs. This would save a lot of space.
>> The first tab would have the common background check box, if 
>checked the
>> other tabs would be grayed out.
>
>tabs are bad enough; dynamic tabs are evil. and what about the 
>poor sot who 
>has 16 desktops and therefore gets 16 tabs!

I agree that that was an evil suggestion.

>
>> There are just too many option in this thing and its not clear what
>> controls what. Widgets on one tab (wall paper) control 
>whether control
>> on the advanced tab are grayed or not.
>
>some good ideas here.. could you make some Qt Designer 
>mock-ups? you can 
>probably start with the existing .ui files and go from there.. 

What's the easiest way to get them? I assume I need to check out
a CVS module?

>please don't remove this option. not only does it make normal 
>backgrounds look 
>really, really nice but it is also extremely useful when used 
>w/PNG images 
>that have transparent backgrounds (e.g. the KDE Box 
>background, or the KDE 
>buttons). 

I hadn't thought about the transparent png thing. Do you think
that all the options of the first tab are need or just a sub set
For instance I can see using flat colors and gradients but not patterns,
nor programs.

>
>> I think the list of option can be combined into 3 tabs
>>
>> Colors & Patterns   (This includes modes flat, pattern and all the
>> gradients)
>> Wallpaper           (This would be the current wallpaper tab
>> Animations          (This is the background pattern option.
>
>well, it isn't really "Animations" since background programs 
>can be quite 
>static, perhaps "Dynamic Background" or some such better 
>describes things.

I agree animations is too specific and thus inaccurate in some
cases. Maybe just "Dynamic" or "Program".

>
>also, how would you show that having a background program is mutually 
>exclusive to using a background color?

This is tricky. I was thinking that a background program would be 
responsible for the whole background not be dependant on other
content. In general I think KDE does a poor job providing this service
as it wipes out desktop icons. There are many windows programs that add
very nice animations and don't screw up the icons.

There is no way the dialog could know what the cabilities of the program
are. In the current dialog if you select the program you can not
select other background, I'll have to see how it currently works (very
oddly I'm sure)

>
>speaking of which, the "Programs in desktop window" option in 
>the desktop kcm 
>should probably be moved into the background kcm...

Absolutely, having it in two such separate dialogs is horrible. And if
an "animation" is selected then this check box should be automatically
selected and grayed out.

>
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