Gnome Backgrounds, workspace specific [LWN.net]

From:		paul-AT-pksings.com
To:		letters-AT-lwn.net
Subject:		Gnome Backgrounds, workspace specific
Date:		Wed, 8 Dec 2004 17:35:22 -0800 (PST)

I'm a bit of a long-time Linux user and have come really like Gnome
because it is clean, fast and just plain looks and works well. There is
one feature in it that I personally really would like to see however,
workspace specific backgrounds instead of the one background for all
workspaces.

In researching how to do it I find that it apparently can not be done.
Nautilus, which handles the backgrounds, does not have that capability.

There probably is some technical reason, bloat, difficulty or something as
to why it can't. And I'd really like to know what it is.

And how many people really would like this feature.

For me it has resulted in probably 40 hours of my life searching for a way
to make it happen as it is the only thing I don't like about Gnome. Yes, I
tried KDE, which by the way, can do this, but to me it's just not as clean
and nice. Yes, I probably could spend the hours learning to customize it
and make it that way as it is pretty much infinitely customizable, but
quite frankly, I have no desire to spend more hours learning about and
customizing KDE to look like Gnome, which is what I would be trying to
accomplish. What I really want is Gnome to do this.

I am willing to spend money to make this happen. I am wondering if we the
users who would like this can make it happen. I would like to propose that
we who want this funtionality each send $5.00 US to the developer who, or
developers who provide it for us. I'm sure that there are at least 1000
users willing to provide 5 dollars each to get this functionality,
probably more. I personally will send $20. It is definitely worth that to
me, actually it's worth more but I think if enough of us are willing to
send a small amount it will add up to a large sum and somebody will do it
for us.

It as a side effect, will change the development model slightly, it will
set a precedent of how a group of users can influence a project to satisfy
a need.

Comments, suggestions?

PK
pksings@gmail.com

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me too

Posted Dec 16, 2004 2:07 UTC (Thu) by jbreiden (subscriber, #7090) [Link]

I suspect money isn't the issue. But I completely agree - I love
zen like simplicity of gnome/metacity. I like microwaves
that have a single knob, and love the zero button George Foreman
grill.

But I really really really would like this feature since I live
in two-monitor, two-virtual-desktop land, and spatial memory isn't
cutting it. Add this one feature and nothing else and I will be
happy forever.

Ok, that and being able to type a filename in the file selector.
Add these two features and nothing else and I will be happy forever.

me too

Posted Dec 16, 2004 9:31 UTC (Thu) by miekg (subscriber, #4403) [Link]

> Ok, that and being able to type a filename in the file selector.

I thought you could do that with ctrl-l

grtz

me too

Posted Dec 16, 2004 12:57 UTC (Thu) by jamesh (subscriber, #1159) [Link]

Or with GTK 2.6, just type in the file name directly ...

Gnome Backgrounds, workspace specific

Posted Dec 16, 2004 11:12 UTC (Thu) by danielpf (subscriber, #4723) [Link]

On one side you are ready to spend up to 40 hours of your life for fulfilling a wish, while on the other side you are ready to spend $20 for the same purpose.

I would conclude that the value of your time is about 0.5$/hour, quite cheap for US standards.

"New" development model

Posted Dec 16, 2004 14:09 UTC (Thu) by Luud (subscriber, #21831) [Link]

The "new" development model you're talking about isn't all that new.

Go look at the Horde project, it's doing exactly this.
Look here for how they do it: http://www.horde.org/bounties/

I do agree with your request, different backgrounds is a very handy feature.

Not Nautilus' task

Posted Dec 16, 2004 15:58 UTC (Thu) by erich (subscriber, #7127) [Link]

Hi,
setting the background is NOT nautilus' task.
I don't run nautilus (I hate file managers), and I still do have a background. I think this is handeled by gnome-settings.

You should be able to disable gnome-settings changing your background and instead use a window manager that does this upon switching desktops. I think desktop switching is the window managers task. ;-)

I like the Gnome way as it is, and I also enjoy the possibility of chaning the background by just changing a gconf key.

Not Nautilus' task

Posted Dec 17, 2004 15:52 UTC (Fri) by dcoutts (guest, #5387) [Link]

When Nautilus is running it also handles the background. That is because it paints the desktop icons and handles select-drag on the desktop too.

When Nautilus is not running, it is handeled differently as you say.

Perhaps when we've got transparent windows in Xorg there could be just one way using a transparent desktop (painted by the file manager) showing the wallpaper underneath.

Who can see the background?

Posted Dec 18, 2004 6:57 UTC (Sat) by ncm (subscriber, #165) [Link]

I guess this -- translucent windows -- answers the question as to what good different backgrounds for different workspaces could do when you can't see them anyway. Certainly on all my workspaces very little if any of the desktop background shows. But, if the windows were a bit translucent, the desktop would come through enough to help identify the place.

Use the GNOME bounty system. LOTS of bounty systems are out there.

Posted Dec 16, 2004 17:08 UTC (Thu) by dwheeler (guest, #1216) [Link]

You might try entering this to the GNOME bounty system, which was designed to do this.

In the future, I think most bug/feature request reporting systems will include bounty systems (I'll pay $X for this bug fix/feature request). The Mantis bug tracking system includes a sponsorship option; every time you report a bug or feature request, you can include an amount you're willing to pay for it. That means that any project that uses this bug tracker (including Plucker) automatically includes a bounty system. I'll mention this in a future version of my paper Why OSS/FS? Look at the Numbers!.

While I think there will continue to be 3rd-party bounty systems, the people MOST capable of modifying a particular OSS/FS project tend to be that project's developers, so integrating bounty offers into their bugtracking systems is probably going to be how most bounties are collected. Even if the bug track system doesn't directly support it, you can always include the offer in the text of the bug/feature request report.

Gnome Backgrounds, workspace specific

Posted Dec 24, 2004 14:31 UTC (Fri) by newren (subscriber, #5160) [Link]

I haven't tried it myself, but http://wallpapoz.sourceforge.net/ claims to do what you want. This program was announced to the gnome-love list with various responses at http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-love/2004-May/msg000...