MenusRevisited2

Revision 10 as of 2008-03-16 08:41:58

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Summary

The main menu has become extremely crowded in Hardy. This wiki page talks about which menu items should be removed to keep the desktop sane and the experience intuitive. The General Policy used in Dapper, the first LTS release, will be followed (lightly) as a guideline.

Rationale

General Policy

The following general policy guidelines are followed in each decision

  • If an item is primarily launched by a specific MIME type and works with one file at a time, it can be hidden

  • The separation between Applications > System Tools and the System menu must be removed. This will be achieved by removing the items in Applications > System Tools

    • With above, items that are mostly system administration tasks and/or use gksudo should be moved to System > Administration

    • Items which affect only the current user are to be moved to System > Preferences

    • Anything else that is not going to be hidden/removed is moved to Applications > Accessories

  • Tools which are likely to simply confuse users are to be hidden or removed
  • Tools which have their functionality replaced with another simpler tool are being hidden or removed
  • There should be a single point to access each function of the system

Implementation

Specific Menu Item Actions

  • Each of the following items has been reviewed and a decision has been made on it. Any item not listed will be kept.

Accessories

  • Seahorse
    • - hide, poweruser tool - replace Seahorse Preferences with this
  • Manage Print Jobs

    • - append to Printing w/ PolicyKit?

      • - Printing is for configuring printers, while this is for managing print jobs (has nothing to do with configuration)? -- Jan Claeys

        • - with this reasoning, it could be merged with Default Printer -- NanleyChery 02-02-08

  • Tracker Search Tool vs Search for Files...
    • - duplicity/overlapping functions?

Internet

  • Avahi SSH Server Browser
    • - hide, poweruser tool.

      - is already covered by Places -> Connect to server (Nautilus)

  • Avahi VNC Server Browser
    • - hide, as it is accessible through Vinagre's Find function
  • Terminal Server Client vs VNC Client
    • - duplicity/overlapping functions?

      • - we should make sure both RDP & SDP protocols are still available though -- Jan Claeys

  • Transmission?
    • - like gnome-bt, what are the benefits of having it in the menu? [keeping]
      • - Transmission isn't like gnome-bt. Gnome-bt is a program that operates on a torrent file and downloads it. Transmission is a torrent manager. Removing Transmission makes as much sense as removing f-spot or Rhythmbox. -- Adam Petaccia 2007 01 28
      - Menu entry doesn't explain what it is.

Sound and video

  • Brasero Disc Burning
    • - does more than just sound and video (probably best place though) - CD/DVD Creator still needed?

Shortening "System" > "Preferences"

See also [http://live.gnome.org/PreferencesRevisited PreferencesRevisited]

  • Default Printer
  • Main Menu
    • - accessible through right-click on menu
      • - do we care about the (non-)discoverability of that? -- Jan Claeys

        • - it's something to consider, as the right-click should satisfy the single point of access - NanleyChery 02-02-08

  • Windows
    • - hide, power users only

Coordination with Gnome

  • Pass ideas and rationale to upstream
  • Encourage upstream to do the following integration work:

    • "About Me" + "Users & Groups"

      • - Use Policy Kit
    • "Keyboard" + "Keyboard Shortcuts"

Outstanding issues

Reviewers Comments

Discussion and Comments

see ["/Comments"]

Random Quote

"We must be proactive, eternally vigilant, forever fighting, overwhelmingly clever and handsome." - Robert Love

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