Positions forming in the Debian init system discussion

Posted Jan 6, 2014 17:27 UTC (Mon) by dlang (guest, #313)
In reply to: Positions forming in the Debian init system discussion by Cyberax
Parent article: Positions forming in the Debian init system discussion

> Yep. They run on the same kernel, use the same display server, they can run side-by-side.

> As a user, I'd expect them to interoperate.

define "interoperate"

if you install two different windows apps, they will both run on windows, but the chances of them being able to use each other's data is low. It's only if they are interacting with remote services (such as LDAP/AD)

Even for something like picture managers, they may import pictures from the "My Pictures" directory, but they will each store their own metadata, edits, and everything else in incompatible ways.

Positions forming in the Debian init system discussion

Posted Jan 6, 2014 17:46 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link] (4 responses)

I can install a nice weather tray application on Windows and it will work on Win 2000, Win XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7 and even Windows 8. That spans about 15 years.

I can't install a weather tray application from GNOME2 on GNOME3 Fallback mode. I can't install GNOME2 tray application on Xfce, and though they even both use GTK!

THIS is fragmentation. It's unnecessary, divisive and ultimately self-destructive.

Positions forming in the Debian init system discussion

Posted Jan 6, 2014 18:03 UTC (Mon) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link] (3 responses)

are you sure about this? you can use Gnome system tray apps with KDE for example.

So if you can't do this with Xfce it sounds like Xfce needs to update their system tray to support the freedesktop.org standard that has been worked out.

Now, this standard did not always exist, and at one time every window manager did their own thing, but then they started to coordinate and established a standard.

Positions forming in the Debian init system discussion

Posted Jan 6, 2014 18:14 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link] (2 responses)

I'm pretty sure. I tried to use GNOME's Power Manager applet in Xfce and failed.

Positions forming in the Debian init system discussion

Posted Jan 6, 2014 18:20 UTC (Mon) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link] (1 responses)

I wonder if the problem was related to the systemtray or if that applet depends on other power management tools that weren't available?

Power management is one of the areas where there is a lot of work going on, which translates into lots of experimentation and incompatibility.

Try some other applets.

As a Kubuntu user, I've run into quite a few cases where I end up running a Gnome applet in the systemtray.

Positions forming in the Debian init system discussion

Posted Jan 6, 2014 18:33 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]

Nope. It used the same power management daemon (upowerd?) as Xfce's native applet.

I couldn't make the applet to start without it trying to start the GNOME panel.