[opensuse-kde] System Settings vs. Personal Settings
This may be a question you get a lot, but why is System Settings renamed to Personal Settings in openSUSE? Besides having the obvious issue of it being a break with upstream, and the fact that the application name (Personal Settings) does not match the executable name (systemsettings), it causes a lot of problems when trying to help people with KDE. On the KDE forums in particular, if you don't know what distribution the person is using you don't know what program you should tell them to use to change their settings. For someone not familiar with the issue it can be much worse, there are a number of cases of people going back and forth trying to solve a problem, sometimes for days, only to find out that the problem is that openSUSE calls a central component of KDE something entirely different than everyone else. Although you could argue that Personal Settings is a more appropriate name (although I don't think that is the case anymore), and the change may seem fairly minor, but it has led to some difficulty and quite a bit of confusion. So I think this naming should be reconsidered. In general I think renaming core parts of KDE is a bad idea, it can't help but lead to confusion amongst users. -Todd -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
Am Dienstag, 2. November 2010, 16:42:17 schrieb todd rme:
This may be a question you get a lot, but why is System Settings renamed to Personal Settings in openSUSE?
Besides having the obvious issue of it being a break with upstream, and the fact that the application name (Personal Settings) does not match the executable name (systemsettings), it causes a lot of problems when trying to help people with KDE. On the KDE forums in particular, if you don't know what distribution the person is using you don't know what program you should tell them to use to change their settings. For someone not familiar with the issue it can be much worse, there are a number of cases of people going back and forth trying to solve a problem, sometimes for days, only to find out that the problem is that openSUSE calls a central component of KDE something entirely different than everyone else.
Although you could argue that Personal Settings is a more appropriate name (although I don't think that is the case anymore), and the change may seem fairly minor, but it has led to some difficulty and quite a bit of confusion. So I think this naming should be reconsidered. In general I think renaming core parts of KDE is a bad idea, it can't help but lead to confusion amongst users.
-Todd
we consider yast to be the 'system' settings tool, in comparison to the modifications from kde systemsettings which are in most cases only for a single user. It's not optimal yeah =/ System settings in alt f2 does bring up the kde settings for me though (german localisation) Regards, Karsten -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
2010/11/2 Karsten König
we consider yast to be the 'system' settings tool, in comparison to the modifications from kde systemsettings which are in most cases only for a single user.
I understand that, and that would be fine if it is an openSUSE-only application, but it causes problems when trying to communicate with the rest of the KDE-using world. Lots of other distributions have tools of the same sort as YaST (maybe not as good, but of the same general idea), but as far as I am aware only openSUSE goes so far as to rename a key application like this.
System settings in alt f2 does bring up the kde settings for me though (german localisation)
It shows up, but it is labeled as "Personal Settings". When someone tells you to find a particular setting in "System Settings", there is no indication that this "Personal Settings" application is what you should be using, and vice versus if an openSUSE user is trying to help someone using another distribution. -Todd -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
2010/11/2 Karsten König
Am Dienstag, 2. November 2010, 16:42:17 schrieb todd rme:
This may be a question you get a lot, but why is System Settings renamed to Personal Settings in openSUSE?
Besides having the obvious issue of it being a break with upstream, and the fact that the application name (Personal Settings) does not match the executable name (systemsettings), it causes a lot of problems when trying to help people with KDE. On the KDE forums in particular, if you don't know what distribution the person is using you don't know what program you should tell them to use to change their settings. For someone not familiar with the issue it can be much worse, there are a number of cases of people going back and forth trying to solve a problem, sometimes for days, only to find out that the problem is that openSUSE calls a central component of KDE something entirely different than everyone else.
Although you could argue that Personal Settings is a more appropriate name (although I don't think that is the case anymore), and the change may seem fairly minor, but it has led to some difficulty and quite a bit of confusion. So I think this naming should be reconsidered. In general I think renaming core parts of KDE is a bad idea, it can't help but lead to confusion amongst users.
-Todd
we consider yast to be the 'system' settings tool, in comparison to the modifications from kde systemsettings which are in most cases only for a single user. It's not optimal yeah =/
Has this change been pushed or even suggested to the upstream? -- Matt Williams http://milliams.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
Tirsdag den 2. november 2010 18:13:22 skrev Matt Williams:
2010/11/2 Karsten König
: Am Dienstag, 2. November 2010, 16:42:17 schrieb todd rme:
This may be a question you get a lot, but why is System Settings renamed to Personal Settings in openSUSE?
Besides having the obvious issue of it being a break with upstream, and the fact that the application name (Personal Settings) does not match the executable name (systemsettings), it causes a lot of problems when trying to help people with KDE. On the KDE forums in particular, if you don't know what distribution the person is using you don't know what program you should tell them to use to change their settings. For someone not familiar with the issue it can be much worse, there are a number of cases of people going back and forth trying to solve a problem, sometimes for days, only to find out that the problem is that openSUSE calls a central component of KDE something entirely different than everyone else.
Although you could argue that Personal Settings is a more appropriate name (although I don't think that is the case anymore), and the change may seem fairly minor, but it has led to some difficulty and quite a bit of confusion. So I think this naming should be reconsidered. In general I think renaming core parts of KDE is a bad idea, it can't help but lead to confusion amongst users.
-Todd
we consider yast to be the 'system' settings tool, in comparison to the modifications from kde systemsettings which are in most cases only for a single user. It's not optimal yeah =/
Has this change been pushed or even suggested to the upstream?
I think it would make more sense changing it upstream too. Systemsettings is a pretty bad name for something that is 95% user settings. I vote to call it KControl again :-) -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
On Wed, Nov 3, 2010 at 5:59 AM, Martin Schlander
Tirsdag den 2. november 2010 18:13:22 skrev Matt Williams:
2010/11/2 Karsten König
: Has this change been pushed or even suggested to the upstream? I think it would make more sense changing it upstream too.
Systemsettings is a pretty bad name for something that is 95% user settings. I vote to call it KControl again :-)
So can we abide by upstream's decision on the matter, whatever they decide? -Todd -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
Onsdag den 3. november 2010 15:14:57 skrev todd rme:
On Wed, Nov 3, 2010 at 5:59 AM, Martin Schlander
wrote: Tirsdag den 2. november 2010 18:13:22 skrev Matt Williams:
2010/11/2 Karsten König
: Has this change been pushed or even suggested to the upstream? I think it would make more sense changing it upstream too.
Systemsettings is a pretty bad name for something that is 95% user settings. I vote to call it KControl again :-)
So can we abide by upstream's decision on the matter, whatever they decide?
Not if it was up to me :-) Upstream is probably not very interested in such a big change, and having "System Settings" and "Administrator Settings" would create more problems than the current state imho. But I guess you can bring it up as a meeting topic. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
On Wed, Nov 3, 2010 at 11:47 AM, Martin Schlander
Onsdag den 3. november 2010 15:14:57 skrev todd rme:
On Wed, Nov 3, 2010 at 5:59 AM, Martin Schlander
wrote: Tirsdag den 2. november 2010 18:13:22 skrev Matt Williams:
2010/11/2 Karsten König
: Has this change been pushed or even suggested to the upstream? I think it would make more sense changing it upstream too.
Systemsettings is a pretty bad name for something that is 95% user settings. I vote to call it KControl again :-)
So can we abide by upstream's decision on the matter, whatever they decide?
Not if it was up to me :-)
Upstream is probably not very interested in such a big change,
It may be worth at least asking:
From here: http://piacentini.blog.br/2010/11/renaming-kbattleships-and-ktron/
"As you all know, KDE is a project that encourages as much cooperation with upstream as possible. So if a distro has a reasonable request we generally try to find a way to make life easier for them, as this will ultimately benefit all KDE users when they migrate between different environments. So it is time for us to make life easier for our Fedora friends, as they have been maintaining patches against some of our games for a while. Please help us choose a new name for KBattleship and also a new one one for KTron. These will be considered for KDE 4.6, so we need you to act fast! The poll closes on Sunday, November 14th." -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
On Wednesday 03 Nov 2010 15:47:27 Martin Schlander wrote:
Onsdag den 3. november 2010 15:14:57 skrev todd rme:
On Wed, Nov 3, 2010 at 5:59 AM, Martin Schlander
wrote: Tirsdag den 2. november 2010 18:13:22 skrev Matt Williams:
2010/11/2 Karsten König
: Has this change been pushed or even suggested to the upstream? I think it would make more sense changing it upstream too.
Systemsettings is a pretty bad name for something that is 95% user settings. I vote to call it KControl again :-)
So can we abide by upstream's decision on the matter, whatever they decide?
Not if it was up to me :-)
Upstream is probably not very interested in such a big change, and having "System Settings" and "Administrator Settings" would create more problems than the current state imho.
But I guess you can bring it up as a meeting topic.
I was on holiday when this topic started, but I can second Todd's statement about the difficulty caused by this decision. To geeks it's not a big thing. To people new to Linux it is impenetrable when people tell you to open System Settings and you don't have such an application, nor can you find it in Software Management. I recently spent more than a week in a conversation with someone who, it turned out, was having exactly this problem. We couldn't move on until I had realised it. I spend a lot of my time in user support, and things like this matter a great deal. Anne -- KDE Community Working Group New to KDE Software? - get help from http://userbase.kde.org
Am Freitag, 19. November 2010, 21:00:38 schrieb Anne Wilson:
On Wednesday 03 Nov 2010 15:47:27 Martin Schlander wrote:
Onsdag den 3. november 2010 15:14:57 skrev todd rme:
On Wed, Nov 3, 2010 at 5:59 AM, Martin Schlander
wrote: Tirsdag den 2. november 2010 18:13:22 skrev Matt Williams:
2010/11/2 Karsten König
: Has this change been pushed or even suggested to the upstream? I think it would make more sense changing it upstream too.
Systemsettings is a pretty bad name for something that is 95% user settings. I vote to call it KControl again :-)
So can we abide by upstream's decision on the matter, whatever they decide?
Not if it was up to me :-)
Upstream is probably not very interested in such a big change, and having "System Settings" and "Administrator Settings" would create more problems than the current state imho.
But I guess you can bring it up as a meeting topic.
I was on holiday when this topic started, but I can second Todd's statement about the difficulty caused by this decision. To geeks it's not a big thing. To people new to Linux it is impenetrable when people tell you to open System Settings and you don't have such an application, nor can you find it in Software Management. I recently spent more than a week in a conversation with someone who, it turned out, was having exactly this problem. We couldn't move on until I had realised it. I spend a lot of my time in user support, and things like this matter a great deal.
Is it due to me using KR45 or due to the German translation that I have two "Systemeinstellungen", i.e. system settings in my menu, which is also confusing because both YaST and KDE systemsettings are called that way? So IMHO it does make sense to call KDE's systemsettings "personal settings" if YaST is called "system settings". Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
Am Sonntag, 21. November 2010, 21:55:56 schrieb Sven Burmeister:
Am Freitag, 19. November 2010, 21:00:38 schrieb Anne Wilson:
On Wednesday 03 Nov 2010 15:47:27 Martin Schlander wrote:
Onsdag den 3. november 2010 15:14:57 skrev todd rme:
On Wed, Nov 3, 2010 at 5:59 AM, Martin Schlander
wrote: Tirsdag den 2. november 2010 18:13:22 skrev Matt Williams:
2010/11/2 Karsten König
: Has this change been pushed or even suggested to the upstream? I think it would make more sense changing it upstream too.
Systemsettings is a pretty bad name for something that is 95% user settings. I vote to call it KControl again :-)
So can we abide by upstream's decision on the matter, whatever they decide?
Not if it was up to me :-)
Upstream is probably not very interested in such a big change, and having "System Settings" and "Administrator Settings" would create more problems than the current state imho.
But I guess you can bring it up as a meeting topic.
I was on holiday when this topic started, but I can second Todd's statement about the difficulty caused by this decision. To geeks it's not a big thing. To people new to Linux it is impenetrable when people tell you to open System Settings and you don't have such an application, nor can you find it in Software Management. I recently spent more than a week in a conversation with someone who, it turned out, was having exactly this problem. We couldn't move on until I had realised it. I spend a lot of my time in user support, and things like this matter a great deal.
Is it due to me using KR45 or due to the German translation that I have two "Systemeinstellungen", i.e. system settings in my menu, which is also confusing because both YaST and KDE systemsettings are called that way?
So IMHO it does make sense to call KDE's systemsettings "personal settings" if YaST is called "system settings".
Sven
That is due to the german translation, it's not 'fixed' as in the english opensuse translations. Lubos used to be our l10n guy, anyone else around to make the call? Karsten -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
Søndag den 21. november 2010 22:27:21 skrev Karsten König:
Am Sonntag, 21. November 2010, 21:55:56 schrieb Sven Burmeister:
Is it due to me using KR45 or due to the German translation that I have two "Systemeinstellungen", i.e. system settings in my menu, which is also confusing because both YaST and KDE systemsettings are called that way?
So IMHO it does make sense to call KDE's systemsettings "personal settings" if YaST is called "system settings".
That is due to the german translation, it's not 'fixed' as in the english opensuse translations. Lubos used to be our l10n guy, anyone else around to make the call?
Hmm.. it seems to be both :-) In the case of DE it does seem they have translated "Personal Settings / Configure Desktop" to "Systemeinstellungen": https://svn.berlios.de/wsvn/opensuse-i18n/trunk/lcn/de/po/update-desktop- files-kde.de.po But for DA "Personal Settings / Configure Desktop" _is_ translated "correctly" in opensuse svn, yet for some reason I always get the upstream translation, when using KDE from OBS - even when using KDS. So I think it's a combination of a decision by the German team, and some weirdness with the handling of .desktop-file translation in KDE from OBS. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-kde+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-kde+help@opensuse.org
participants (6)
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Anne Wilson
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Karsten König
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Martin Schlander
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Matt Williams
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Sven Burmeister
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todd rme