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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    Re: A case for sharing Desktop and home directories
From:       Uno Engborg <uno () webworks ! se>
Date:       2002-12-04 17:21:47
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>
>
>
>(assuming i understand what you mean) the "automount problem" you suggest 
>isn't actually a problem. it doesn't actually matter that path the Desktop 
>shows, whether it's $HOME or $HOME/Desktop. in either case $HOME will have to 
>be mounted while the user is logged in.
>

It is still a problem for this idea to work if you mix
Gnome and KDE, and that is probably not so uncommon.
I even do it myself. Not that I like Gnome that much but
because I have to run RedHat on some boxes.

But with all your ways to make it backward compatible it is
not a problem to the sysadmin he just introduces a Desktop
folder and everything works as usual. My guess is that
the Desktop folder will be there by default in most flavors of
unix. And then the whole idea sort of get lost.

> 
>
>  
>
>>I mean that you could replace cd with a program or a shell script that
>>makes, you end up in /home/username/Desktop when you type cd and are logged
>>in as user username. in some shells you may even do it as aliases.
>>...
>>The real issue is that you want the user to end up on the Desktop
>>regardless if he logs in from a shell or uses the GUI environment.
>>Fixing it the way you suggest breaks things. Fixing it with changes to cd
>>and login scripts don't
>>    
>>
>
>****no it's not****
>
>the real reason is that there is only one physical location for the user to 
>use as their place on the filesystem. reread carlos's first post and all of 
>mine if you're still in any doubt as to the point.
>
>what you suggest is a *hack*.
>



If we "hack" it, I could have one single place for file
that was the same both in KDE and on our Gnomified Red Hat
boxes. And all my preferences files would be out of the way.
I would be much less chance that I deleted them by mistake.
I would also not have a Mail folder imposed on me. If we
somehow also get rid of the Trash and the link to $HOME then the
desktop would be clean. And the user could structure his
data on the desktop. Everything on the desktop would be the
creation of the user. New users wouldn't even know about
the $HOME directory. So to that user, the desktop would indeed
be the one place for storing information. And the config files
should be managed by GUI components in the control center.
The user should never access them directly. From the user
perspective, the Desktop would be this single
place for personal data that you are asking for.


Ideas like this Desktop=$HOME is easy to fix if you have some
sort of control over your users and their environments. E.g.
Microsoft could do this. They could just make it part of some
security upgrade and quite soon everybody would be in line.
But in the OSS world it is hard to force sombody to do things
that they see no, or little, benefit from. That's the problem.

If you want to lobby for doing it your way, you need to do
that in higher places than on KDE lists.  Even if we liked
the idea (I'm not saying that we don't) it is out of our
scope to do such changes.




Regards
Uno Engborg










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