Will Stephenson wrote:

On Saturday 22 August 2009 01:28:15 jsa wrote:

...

What happened to the ability to have multiple wallpapers, one for each desktop? Is withholding that simple feature the stick they are using to drive us to adopting activities over multiple desktops?

See my answer to Verner's mail - once you set 'Activity per virtual desktop' then Activities just become another way to customise virtual desktops.

Will

Any way to just get rid of this concept of Activities all together? It was un-needed, a duplication of what already existed and totally confusing. What were development resources wasted on this? Were the developers totally unaware of multiple virtual desktops which has been in every version of Suse since 6? Its announced like its a totally new invention that nobody has ever seen before! Why did they add this? Can't they explain where they were going with it and what it is expected to do? They must have had something in mind when they spent all this time to get it working? I have yet to see a coherent explanation of this feature. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Patrick Shanahan wrote:

* John Andersen [08-24-09 00:24]:

...

Any way to just get rid of this concept of Activities all together? It was un-needed, a duplication of what already existed and totally confusing.

so was removing rotary dial telephones and replacing them with push button dialers. What a waste of resources! And all these mobile phones when we already had wired ones. The next thing they will be making Dick Tracy's wrist radios for communication. Sheesh....

If you have no useful answer, then just STFU. My question was perfectly legitimate. Your reply is just noise. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Am Montag, 24. August 2009 06:42:28 schrieb John Andersen:

Patrick Shanahan wrote:

...

* John Andersen [08-24-09 00:24]:

...

Any way to just get rid of this concept of Activities all together? It was un-needed, a duplication of what already existed and totally confusing.

so was removing rotary dial telephones and replacing them with push button dialers. What a waste of resources! And all these mobile phones when we already had wired ones. The next thing they will be making Dick Tracy's wrist radios for communication. Sheesh....

If you have no useful answer, then just STFU.

My question was perfectly legitimate.

Your reply is just noise.

Using expressions like STFU disqualifies you even if you would have had a point. Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Am Montag, 24. August 2009 13:05:51 schrieb Basil Chupin:

Sven Burmeister wrote:

...

Am Montag, 24. August 2009 06:42:28 schrieb John Andersen:

...

Patrick Shanahan wrote:

...

* John Andersen [08-24-09 00:24]:

...

Any way to just get rid of this concept of Activities all together? It was un-needed, a duplication of what already existed and totally confusing.

so was removing rotary dial telephones and replacing them with push button dialers. What a waste of resources! And all these mobile phones when we already had wired ones. The next thing they will be making Dick Tracy's wrist radios for communication. Sheesh....

If you have no useful answer, then just STFU.

My question was perfectly legitimate.

Your reply is just noise.

Using expressions like STFU disqualifies you

Disqualifies him from what?

And "disqualifies" him (from imaginitory whatever) according to whose criterion? Yours? If so, then what John stated also applies to you.

You try to hard! Do I have to spell out what STFU stands for and do I really have to explain why using that language disqualifies people from taking part in a discussion on this mailinglist? On the other hand depending on ones background that kind of language might really be acceptable even though the netiquette for this mailinglist states differently. Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 23 August 2009 11:28:09 pm Patrick Shanahan wrote:

* John Andersen [08-24-09 00:24]:

...

Any way to just get rid of this concept of Activities all together? It was un-needed, a duplication of what already existed and totally confusing.

so was removing rotary dial telephones and replacing them with push button dialers. What a waste of resources! And all these mobile phones when we already had wired ones. The next thing they will be making Dick Tracy's wrist radios for communication. Sheesh....

Patrick, OK, I get what an "activity" is now. I guess it is something you need if you have a boss looking over you shoulder and need to "manage" your desktop on the fly;-) For those still scratching your heads like I have been about what an activity is or how to use it. Here are a few overviews I found at kde.org http://userbase.kde.org/Glossary> Activities Activities are sets of Plasma widgets that have their own wallpaper. A bit like Virtual Desktops, but not quite. For example you have a "work activity" with commit rss feeds, a note with your TODO, a Folder View with your work related files, and a subtle wallpaper. Next to it, you have your freetime activity, with previews of family photos and dogs, rss feeds from your favourite blogs, a Folder View showing your movie collection, a twitter applet and of course that Iron Maiden wallpaper you have been loving since the early 80s. At 1700 hours sharp you switch from the work activity to your freetime activity. </quote> And now a bit more on how to use them: http://userbase.kde.org/Plasma#Activities_and_the_Zooming_User_Interface_.28ZUI.29> Activities and the Zooming User Interface (ZUI) KDE 4 has brought a lot of new features to the modern linux desktop, however many people are only using a fraction of the desktop's full potential. One of the most useful and underused features is the plasma activities. The basic idea behind are that, is that your desktop space is limited to how many widgets it can hold. A user will want to use a lot of widgets but doesn't want their desktop to be cluttered. The answer to this problem is activities; they allow you to specialize each desktop to whatever task you need to accomplish. To make a new activity you have to click on the cashew in the upper right hand corner, from there click zoom out. The desktop will zoom out then click add new activity under the small desktop. It will make a new desktop right next to it. now go click the zoom in button under the new desktop. with this desktop you can add whatever widgets to this desktop and it will not affect the other desktop. [edit] Use Cases A user likes web comics so they add their favorite web comics via the comics widget. The user now has a full desktop activity dedicated to their favorite web comics. Now the user is happy with the web comics, but the user now has to go to work, so the user creates a activity with the folder view widgets set to the folders of the projects the user is currently working on. After work the user goes home and works on a side project of writing romance novels. The user always gains inspiration by looking at pictures of the user's significant other. The user now creates a new Activity but now puts pictures frame widgets with pictures of the user's significant other. The user also has a folder view of the romance novel project folder. Now no matter what the user is doing the user has a custom tailored activity to match it. </quote> -- David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E. Rankin Law Firm, PLLC 510 Ochiltree Street Nacogdoches, Texas 75961 Telephone: (936) 715-9333 Facsimile: (936) 715-9339 www.rankinlawfirm.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

There are very few useful widgets.  There are no useful widgets which do not have an application equivalent (you know, the things the widget code was stolen from in the first place).

You could easily say the same about the GUI... there are no useful GUI tools that do not have a CLI equivalent. Konqueror? You can use ls, rm, mv, cp, and lynx (for the web browser component). I will agree that a large number of available widgets are not so useful... some I look at and wonder.. what was the guy who made this widget thinking? I said the exact same about many Superkaramba themes though. Some you shake your head in wonder, and others are VERY useful. Take the Cynapsis theme for SuperKaramba... I have yet to find one as useful (for me) in the pile of available widgets. A few desktop widgets I like/use... yaWP (for weather) and Server Status (for monitoring several webservers). Another I'm toying with is Fancy Tasks which gives you an OSX-like Kicker/task manager. The KGet widget is quite useful/handy as is the KTorrent one... the Pastebin widget is handy if you're using PasteBin a lot... Point being... widgets do a similar job as other tools we've used in the past.. just like SuperKaramba did (and still does) and even the GUI vs the CLI. Sometimes it's better, sometimes not so much (most of us still drop to the CLI to do file management from time to time right?) C. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Thu, 3 Sep 2009 14:25:51 David C. Rankin wrote:

[...] I'm sure they serve some purpose for somebody, but I have never had a problem opening the app I wanted to use, managing its window(s) when it was open, and being smart enough to close it when I was finished.

From what I can tell all that "Activities" are supposed to do for you is open up a regularly used set of apps all at once instead of you clicking the icon too start each app. I don't see the value in it. I mean what -- you can manage at most ~10 open apps and open windows at a time before you start wearing out the Alt+Tab keys, right? Where's the benefit in having entire sets of apps configured to open at once that you then have to manage and add apps to the set and remove apps from the set as apps change, are replaced, etc?

Not so much apps as plasma widgets. With virtual desktops the plasma widgets are repeated on each desktop. With activities you can have different sets of plasma widgets for different tasks - which would be OK if there were that many useful plasma widgets around...and if you preferred using them to windowed apps...and if you could get to them without having to move /minimise other windows (which you can't because they're effectively part of the desktop background and can't be on top of other windows...) It probably "seemed like a good idea at the time" but it is too much like a solution in search of a problem. That is one of the challenges for programmers - being innovative in finding solutions to real problems, not simply changing a paradigm for the sake of change itself. -- =================================================== Rodney Baker VK5ZTV rodney.baker@iinet.net.au =================================================== -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Am Mittwoch, 2. September 2009 14:21:16 schrieb Ken Schneider - openSUSE:

Wow. And all this time I have been using multiple desktops to do this. I wish all the former "Windows" programmers (who only had one desktop to work with) now working on KDE4 would learn what virtual desktops do instead of re-inventing the wheel.

Since the widgets on each virtual desktop are the same without activities, I doubt that you could do what activities are about without them. You could have had different wallpapers on each in KDE3, yet that is just a minor feature of activities and using it to claim that activities re-invents the wheel just shows that you deliberately ignore the additional functionality which was not available without them in KDE3.

Is this supposed to be easier then one single click on the taskbar to choose a different desktop?

Before KDE4 there was no plasma and hence no widgets on the desktop. The only change regarding virtual desktops was that in KDE4 they could not have different wallpapers. The latter does not hinder work, one might even call it bling. Anyway, with KDE 4.3 even that is back and whether it is called activities or whatever, now virtual desktops can even have different wallpapers again, so even those that depend on that feature and would not get any work done without it, i.e. KDE4 was useless for them without that very feature, have nothing to complain anymore regarding virtual desktops in regard to KDE3. If they continue to do so, one knows they they complain for the sake of it. With KDE4 and widgets however, the user has new issue, i.e. the area where he can place widgets is finite. So one has to pick which ones and their content. That decision depends on the context, i.e. a widget that might be useful for the office might not at home and vice versa. Same for the content, e.g. the feeds you watch while in the office might be different from those you watch at home, because the latter are rather private while the former are work-related. You might even need more space because your hobby calls for yet another content or set of widgets. Same for the apps on the panel. Hence plasma has to offer a way to fill the need to be able to have different sets of widgets. One could simply use two or more users, instead they introduced activities. They allow one user to have several different desktops and not only regarding the wallpaper, i.e. the look, but actual functionality. You do not have to use it, but just because you think it is not useful to you does not mean that there is no need for it. Nobody ever needed different wallpapers per virtual desktop, it is just nice to have. Activities are far more useful than having different wallpapers, so complaining about the former but demanding the latter is yet another hint towards trolling. Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Am Donnerstag, 3. September 2009 14:52:37 schrieb Rodney Baker:

I'm not sure whether my Kmail has broken the thread but it appears at my end that you replied to my message instead of Ken's (I don't have a problem with that, I was just confused by quotes that weren't from the message that I wrote in reply to David's...)

Just wondering if Kmail screwed up, that's all.

I use kmail from KDE 4.3.1 as well and it shows up fine here. But I get what you describe with other emails, e.g. jdd's, so I'm not sure what the bug is or whether it actually is one. Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Am Freitag, 4. September 2009 06:30:38 schrieb Bob S:

Let me see here. Maybe I am too thick-headed to understand. In KDE3 I run six virtual desktops. I can run several different apps in each one. When I switch my "activity" to a different desktop my apps open in that desktop and are there waiting for me. And switch again, and again.... Everything I wanted is waiting there for me. I can even shut down and reboot and there they are...all patiently waiting for me. How is this so markedly different in KDE4 activities?

You confuse plasmoids and windows/apps.

What additional functions are we talking about here? KDE3 seems to do everything I need.

So? KDE4 then does now as well, nothing to complain anymore, yet you continue to whine.

I guess that when I install 11.2 I will have to get used to it. Seems like an awful lot of "motion" to get the same result.

E.g. Plasmoids.

This is where you are way off base and dead wrong. The wallpapers on KDE3 were far from "bling" They provided you a way to see where you are on the desktop. I sometimes wonder if you ever really used KDE3 and ever explored all of it's many features.

I always thought that applications are what users are looking for when switching desktops and not the wallpaper. Because apart from the wallpaper and the applications in KDE3 everything is the same on each virtual desktop.

I really doubt that anyone who is on this list and a long time user complains just for the sake of complaining. They know what they are talking about and voicing their real concerns and educated opinions.

Yes, wallpapers are crucial to getting any work done!

...

With KDE4 and widgets however, the user has new issue, i.e. the area where he can place widgets is finite. So one has to pick which ones and their content. That decision depends on the context, i.e. a widget that might be useful for the office might not at home and vice versa. Same for the content, e.g. the feeds you watch while in the office might be different from those you watch at home, because the latter are rather private while the former are work-related. You might even need more space because your hobby calls for yet another content or set of widgets. Same for the apps on the panel.

Yeah, right! Can't have it so simple anymore. Like just open another desktop with the chosen apps in them.

You miss the point. If you do not use plasmoids, you can do exactly that, just as you did in KDE3. If you use plasmoids however and want different on each desktop, including different panels you need activities and KDE3 could not do that.

...

Hence plasma has to offer a way to fill the need to be able to have different sets of widgets. One could simply use two or more users, instead they introduced activities.

Call them widgets, plasmoids, whatever. They just represent applications.

Ah, a plasmoid is a window, now I see why you do not get it. In that case KDE3 could not have two different panel-applications on different virtual desktops, KDE4 can. and btw. plasmoids are different, as a wallpaper is not windeco either.

...

They allow one user to have several different desktops and not only regarding the wallpaper, i.e. the look, but actual functionality.

Thought we already had that, as described above.

No, KDE3 could only have different wallpapers, nothing more.

...

You do not have to use it, but just because you think it is not useful to you does not mean that there is no need for it. Nobody ever needed different wallpapers per virtual desktop,

Wrong !, as described above.

Ok, if you need them to get your work done, fair enough. I just wonder how people that use a plain background could ever get any work done. I could even claim that I need activities, i.e. a different plasmoid per virtual dekstop to get my work done because they show me what desktop I am on, just in case I cannot see the windows on the desktop, i.e. the apps...

...

it is just nice to have. Activities are far more useful

You need to explain why. Details please! Rather than just bullying on about it's virtues. I'm willing to learn.

It's opensource, nobody has to explain you anything. You get it for free and have the choice to either use it or not. Complaining about something you will not use anyway is just whining.

...

than having different wallpapers, so complaining about the former but demanding the latter is yet another hint towards trolling.

Really really WRONG! You are the troll, about "activities"

You try too hard, honestly. Please stop whining about things you get for free and do not use anyway. If you do not need activities but for wallpapers, use them for that and stop telling others that they must not see any usefulness in them, just because you don't. Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Fri, 04 Sep 2009 22:43:14 -0400, Bob S wrote:

I wish you would stop using that word "whine". It is very offensive to tell someone they are "whining" when all they really want is a viable explanation. You seem to think that any question asked or explanation requested is a "whine". Not so. I don't believe that you are a native English speaker and maybe therein lies the problem.

Well said. It would be good if instead of focusing on the people, we focused on the issues. When the discussion breaks down into classification of people and their behaviour, useful discussion stops and we end up not solving the problems. Sven (et al), it doesn't really help to approach something like this from a "you get it for free so stop complaining". The people participating here on both sides of the discussion have a common goal - to make things better. Dismissing user complaints tells the users they're not important. Since one of the KDE project team's goals seems to be to maintain KDE's position in the openSUSE user community as the "preferred" desktop, it seems counterintuitive to me to dismiss the user community's input, instead attacking the people (or being perceived to be attacking - from a PR standpoint, they're one and the same) who are trying to help you turn out a better product. I could facetiously say that this helps the openSUSE GNOME userbase (as it might cause people to move to using GNOME instead), but in reality it doesn't help openSUSE. Customer feedback is important, and even if that feedback is poorly phrased, it seems to me (as someone who deals with customer service issues on a very regular basis - and almost *always* customers who are upset about something) that the users want to be heard, and they don't feel that that is happening. So while I think it's incumbent on everyone to calm down and discuss the issues rationally and not make it personal, I think it's probably even more important that the developers recognize that when someone raises an issue about something that didn't work the way they expected, they've at least taken the time to provide the feedback to you. That says something about the community's dedication to KDE - if they didn't provide feedback, that would be a bad thing. So let's take the feedback given as first and foremost being offered to make things *better* and go from there. It's very possible to be passionate without making it personal. Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Am Samstag, 5. September 2009 04:57:05 schrieb Jim Henderson:

On Fri, 04 Sep 2009 22:43:14 -0400, Bob S wrote:

...

I wish you would stop using that word "whine". It is very offensive to tell someone they are "whining" when all they really want is a viable explanation. You seem to think that any question asked or explanation requested is a "whine". Not so. I don't believe that you are a native English speaker and maybe therein lies the problem.

Well said. It would be good if instead of focusing on the people, we focused on the issues. When the discussion breaks down into classification of people and their behaviour, useful discussion stops and we end up not solving the problems.

Sven (et al), it doesn't really help to approach something like this from a "you get it for free so stop complaining".

Which is why there was information about activities given first alongside the fact that with them one would get the desired one wallpaper per virtual desktop. Anyway, it's sentences like (and I could find a lot more if I's search the archives): "Well, thank goodness for that. We are back to square one." or "Wow. And all this time I have been using multiple desktops to do this. I wish all the former "Windows" programmers (who only had one desktop to work with) now working on KDE4 would learn what virtual desktops do instead of re-inventing the wheel." or "This concept of Activities is just well how can i put this but remain polite "crap" just about fits the bill" or "Any way to just get rid of this concept of Activities all together? It was un-needed, a duplication of what already existed and totally confusing. What were development resources wasted on this? Were the developers totally unaware of multiple virtual desktops which has been in every version of Suse since 6? Its announced like its a totally new invention that nobody has ever seen before!" that show that some people on this list, and its always the same group, do not only ask for explanations and accept that new features might not have a value for them while they do for others, but that they like to add some allegations. At that point, "you get it for free so stop complaining" is my answer to those allegations because to me, constructive criticism ends where these allegations are put in by those reporting an issue. If somebody would simply ask: "How do I get different wallpapers per virtual desktop", he would get the answer. Same if somebody asked: "Would it be possible to have the "different wallpapers per virtual desktop" with less clicks?". Yet as you can see in the emails I answered to, they cannot resist to add some allegation.

The people participating here on both sides of the discussion have a common goal - to make things better. Dismissing user complaints tells the users they're not important. Since one of the KDE project team's goals seems to be to maintain KDE's position in the openSUSE user community as the "preferred" desktop, it seems counterintuitive to me to dismiss the user community's input, instead attacking the people (or being perceived to be attacking - from a PR standpoint, they're one and the same) who are trying to help you turn out a better product.

True and this works very well with most KDE users.

So while I think it's incumbent on everyone to calm down and discuss the issues rationally and not make it personal, I think it's probably even more important that the developers recognize that when someone raises an issue about something that didn't work the way they expected, they've at least taken the time to provide the feedback to you. That says something about the community's dedication to KDE - if they didn't provide feedback, that would be a bad thing. So let's take the feedback given as first and foremost being offered to make things *better* and go from there.

As mentioned above, constructive criticism without any allegations is dealt with very well and if you read the archives you will notice that its only the same group of people that cannot resist from adding a little extra to their questions or feedback. You will also notice that KDE devs often start participating in a thread, i.e. answering the question, and then drop-out because the same known pattern of KDE4 bashing starts all over again. I think it is fair that developers do not put up with the allegations and waste their time on those that cannot stay with constructive criticism. Same for this thread btw. have a look at the answer to Will's email. Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Sat, Sep 5, 2009 at 18:43, Jim Henderson wrote:

On Sat, 05 Sep 2009 10:18:13 +0200, Sven Burmeister wrote:

[snip] John, your arguments not withstanding, it is high time users start being civil on this list at _all_ times, and not some of the time or when the mood suits them. Asking the devs to always turn a blind eye to personal attacks is not going to cut it. Devs are human too. This list and all other oS lists have a giude on netiqette. We all need to adhere to it. Those that don't really have no place here IMV. Mayme our admin needs to pay a bit more attention here with the stick in his hand. You ca now return to your regularly scheduled program where you get to praise KDE4 in all its glory. ne... -- Registered Linux User # 125653 (http://counter.li.org) Now accepting personal mail for GMail invites. Mike Ditka - "If God had wanted man to play soccer, he wouldn't have given us arms." - http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/m/mike_ditka.html -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Sun, Sep 6, 2009 at 01:02, Jim Henderson wrote:

On Sat, 05 Sep 2009 23:10:12 +0100, ne... wrote:

...

John,

I think you mean "Jim". :-) Sorry about that. John's post was the last one I'd read before replying to your's.

...

your arguments not withstanding, it is high time users start being civil on this list at _all_ times, and not some of the time or when the mood suits them. Asking the devs to always turn a blind eye to personal attacks is not going to cut it. Devs are human too. This list and all other oS lists have a giude on netiqette. We all need to adhere to it.

I'm not asking just the devs to turn a blind eye to personal attacks. I'm asking both sides to.

And yes, there is a guide for netiquette and we all do need to adhere to it. I wholeheartedly agree.

ne... -- Registered Linux User # 125653 (http://counter.li.org) Now accepting personal mail for GMail invites. Pablo Picasso - "Computers are useless. They can only give you answers." - http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/p/pablo_picasso.html -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Saturday 05 Sep 2009 23:10:12 ne... wrote:

On Sat, Sep 5, 2009 at 18:43, Jim Henderson wrote:

...

On Sat, 05 Sep 2009 10:18:13 +0200, Sven Burmeister wrote:

<pruned>

You ca now return to your regularly scheduled program where you get to praise KDE4 in all its glory.

Aye up the joke of the year has just landed Pete .

On Fri, 04 Sep 2009 21:57:41 -0500, Peter Van Lone wrote:

So -- in the case of your desired feature (diff wallpaper on each desktop) there is no real advantage to activities -- you can get what you want, but perhaps it takes a couple more steps.

I think perhaps this is part of the issue - it was easier in KDE3 than it is this way, which is more complicated (ie, takes more steps). From a feedback standpoint, that seems a reasonable issue to raise to me. I've heard similar feedback about Novell's iManager management tool - the old way was faster than the new way, so people kept using the old tool and not getting the benefits (like being supported) of using the new tool because the new tool was more complex than was necessary. Not a direct analogue to this situation, but it seems that if this feedback were taken back to development as something to look at (ie, "how can we make it easier to do this task"), it seems like that might meet Bob's expectations. Bob? Have I captured your issue well here? (I've not really followed the discussion from the beginning, just the last few messages in this subthread) Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Fri, 04 Sep 2009 22:21:51 -0500, Peter Van Lone wrote:

On Fri, Sep 4, 2009 at 10:06 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:

...

I think perhaps this is part of the issue - it was easier in KDE3 than it is this way, which is more complicated (ie, takes more steps).  From a feedback standpoint, that seems a reasonable issue to raise to me.

I think that is reasonable -- but users should also be prepared to say "I will live with an extra step or two on some things, to make room for new features EVEN IF they are features I myself do not personally value"

I would agree with this as well - even if it's just "for the time being". I think as a society, we're getting a little too used to the idea of instant gratification. Of course if there are ways to remove those extra steps, those should be looked at, but it also should be brought into the discussion when enhancements are being looked at to make things better. Of course with development, not everyone is going to get all their wishes implemented all the time. It's easy as a user to lose sight of that, and to become discouraged when bugs one has filed never seem to get addressed. Limited development resources and all that mean that someone's got to decide which bugs get looked at first. But this particular discussion has been had on this list a few times already, so I won't rehash it again. :-)

...

I've heard similar feedback about Novell's iManager management tool - the old way was faster than the new way, so people kept using the old tool and not getting the benefits (like being supported) of using the new tool because the new tool was more complex than was necessary.

iManager both sucks and rocks -- it is more difficult to do a host of things than it was in ConsoleOne -- but then it is much more easily extensible and portable, and therefore much better than ConsoleOne in some regards. Trade-Offs.

Yeah, there are things that are better in iManager, no question. One specific example is the difference between DNS/DHCP management in iManager vs. the old DNSDHCP Management Tool (wasn't even ConsoleOne). I have a friend who counted the number of mouse clicks to complete basic tasks, and iManager was much less efficient.

I do not think that the people who designed iManager were necessarily wrong to adopt the trade-offs that they did. I do suspect that Novell folk have a history of working a bit in a vaccuum -- of having really cool technology but not really listening to a wide range of customer feedback. They historically have listened primarily to their own tech leadership and to feedback from the very largest (and therefore heavily favored) customers without putting it all into a broader perspective. I do think they are improving in that respect (though still too slowly).

Agreed. I've been a customer and an employee (currently an employee) and have observed this from both the outside and the inside. And it does seem to be getting better, though there are some areas we could listen to much better (particularly the education and small business markets). If only I were king.... ;-)

...

Not a direct analogue to this situation, but it seems that if this feedback were taken back to development as something to look at (ie, "how can we make it easier to do this task"), it seems like that might meet Bob's expectations.

and it would be good for the customer to hear "they get that it is less efficient. They will look into it to see whether they can address it in future releases, but for now at least I can do the thing I wanted to be able to do"

Yes, one of the big things I've learned in dealing with customer satisfaction issues is that the customers who are often the most upset just want to be heard. I've made it my goal professionally to listen to those customers and do what I can (within reason) to handle their situation. As a result of those customers being made happier, my entire team (at the time that I started this; I've moved teams a couple times since then, but I still get a fair number of the complaint calls for my department) sends the upset customers my way now.

The whining bitchy carpy tone here, where folks yell at each other and call names -- is really really exhausting and ... well just leave it at exhausting. Nobody involved with SUSE/Novell is either totally evil or totally good -- and no single feature or lack thereof is total proof of total failure/success. Gees ...

Yes, agreed, and well said. Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Sat, 05 Sep 2009 00:02:17 -0400, Bob S wrote:

...

Bob? Have I captured your issue well here? (I've not really followed the discussion from the beginning, just the last few messages in this subthread)

Everything that you have said in these threads is "right on" Thanks

Thank you, Bob. So, now, from the development side, would it be fair to say that Bob's concern has been heard and that if there's a way to improve the usability for this particular feature, that can be a consideration as development continues? And along those same lines, where should Bob report the issue so it can be tracked? Bugzilla? OpenFATE? Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Peter Van Lone wrote:

So -- in the case of your desired feature (diff wallpaper on each desktop) there is no real advantage to activities -- you can get what you want, but perhaps it takes a couple more steps. But activities ALSO do other things (were designed to do so) and the wallpaper thing was a secondary feature. Perhaps backsliding a bit, from the perspective of wallpaper/virtual desktops (in that it is marginally more clumsy to setup) but ... also a very different feature set than what KDE 3.5 virtual desktops had.

You've totally missed the point of this whole discussion Peter. Nobody is complaining about how many clicks it takes to set up different wall paper, or different widgets on the desktop. People are complaining because it doesn't work. It is totally unreliable, it will corrupt itself for no obvious reason, and even running with everything "locked" you will find your desktop setup corrupted for no obvious reason. Activities breed like rabbits at times you least expect. Zooming out can reveal 5 desktops today, and 8 tomorrow when you can't remember doing anything at all that should cause this. Further you can't delete them because the Red X has vanished. Zoom out from your Programming desktop, with all your programming widgets, and zoom in to your Gaming Activity and now your IDE, Konsole shells, and programming applications, are surrounded by your gaming toys and wallpaper. Where your programming widgets and wallpaper went is anyone's guess. Once corrupted, all work comes to a halt, the task at hand is forgotten, and you have a 15 minute hunt trying to get things back, with at least two new activities generated along the way. Developers view any mention of this as a personal attack and a "barrage of criticism". Users see it as platform instability, unreliability and something they have no hope of explaining to their mother who found no such problems with gnome or windows. Its as much work helping mom recover her desktop as it was fighting viruses on windows for her. Add to this is the big disconnect that people work with applications, not widgets upon activities. There are very few useful widgets and the ones that exist are unlikely to become mainstream. Therefore until or unless you can wrap an application in a widget and nail it to an activity which in turn can be absolutely nailed down to the top left Desktop of the pager, widgets have little value in the real world. The basic problem (the 700 pound gorilla in the room) that developers seem to have forgotten, is that Applications run on Desktops, where as widgets run on activities. Mixing the two concepts is currently a mess. If Activities could easily contain mainstream applications we could dispense with the Pager and multiple desktops and substitute the activity pager. Activities, at present, is a concept that was implemented before it was thought thru, and programmed before it was designed, and imposed before it was working. Nobody is concerned about how many clicks it takes as long is once set up it remains stable. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Mon, 24 Aug 2009 16:22:01 John Andersen wrote:

Any way to just get rid of this concept of Activities all together? It was un-needed, a duplication of what already existed and totally confusing.

What were development resources wasted on this? Were the developers totally unaware of multiple virtual desktops which has been in every version of Suse since 6? Its announced like its a totally new invention that nobody has ever seen before!

Why did they add this? Can't they explain where they were going with it and what it is expected to do? They must have had something in mind when they spent all this time to get it working?

I have yet to see a coherent explanation of this feature.

This is my understanding. Say you work on development three days a week and documentation on two days a week. For each you want a different setup on your desktop (icons etc). You setup two activities (which might span multiple desktops) and then to swap between the two you just pull in the activity you require. Hope this helps. -- Regards Scott Newton -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Monday 24 Aug 2009 05:43:09 Scott Newton wrote:

This is my understanding. Say you work on development three days a week and documentation on two days a week. For each you want a different setup on your desktop (icons etc). You setup two activities (which might span multiple desktops) and then to swap between the two you just pull in the activity you require.

Hope this helps.

Hummmm well guess i gotta pile in here . The idea behind your concept is all very good IF it were true but it is far from so you setup your desktops for work some for pleasure some for WTF so certain things blindly follow from one to the next to the next remove them on 1 they are gone all over add the on one they are on all this is NOT progress . The original thoughts behind this were AFAIU desktop 1 office icons for OOo ect ect desktop 2 multimedia icons for said apps BUT MINUS the office based icons from 1 and like wise on other desktops that still DONT WORK and yes it is still the same on MS6 . This concept of Activities is just well how can i put this but remain polite "crap" just about fits the bill Pete

Am Montag, 24. August 2009 06:22:01 schrieb John Andersen:

Any way to just get rid of this concept of Activities all together? It was un-needed, a duplication of what already existed and totally confusing.

That's would be a perfectly valid opinion, if you stated that you think that and did not make it sound as a general fact, which of course it is not.

What were development resources wasted on this? Were the developers totally unaware of multiple virtual desktops which has been in every version of Suse since 6? Its announced like its a totally new invention that nobody has ever seen before!

Is that how open source works? did you search on the web for information about activities before you posted?

Why did they add this? Can't they explain where they were going with it and what it is expected to do? They must have had something in mind when they spent all this time to get it working?

I have yet to see a coherent explanation of this feature.

Why? Just because you do not like it or need it? It's not like developers owe you anything when spending their free time. Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org