Day: Status Icons and GNOME

Posted Sep 2, 2017 15:56 UTC (Sat) by adam820 (subscriber, #101353)
In reply to: Day: Status Icons and GNOME by Sylos
Parent article: Day: Status Icons and GNOME

Including TopIcons is antithetical to the whole point of eliminating tray icons entirely, which is what this explains. However, you're also given the freedom of using it if you so want it. It's not about them just throwing a dart and removing the topic lands on, but the fact that almost nobody uses them.

> Having reviewed how applications are using status icons, we are confident that the majority of applications that use status icons will not be impacted by the decision not to display them by default. In many cases applications won’t have to make any changes, and if changes are required we have hopefully contacted you already.

It's possible that they're already working with the upstream applications that you're already deemed impossible to work with, and fixes will be provided. And if not, please take the initiative of getting in touch with someone and letting them know of your concern about X, Y, or Z applications.

For some reason, if Apple were to up and remove the system tray in their next macOS update, it would be lauded as "brave, bold, and forward-thinking", but even a well-written and clearly-explained article isn't enough to stop the dog pile for G3.

Day: Status Icons and GNOME

Posted Sep 2, 2017 19:37 UTC (Sat) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link] (6 responses)

Well, here's the thing: the current status icons were anything but forward thinking, and just deleting them isn't forward thinking either. It's wishful thinking, and requires users and 3rd party developers to pick up the slack.

Day: Status Icons and GNOME

Posted Sep 2, 2017 20:49 UTC (Sat) by ken (subscriber, #625) [Link]

I's really disturbing that removing it is even considered to be an option :(.

I would love to hear what dropbox response was when they got contacted about the removal of the api.

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Thanks for the extra work, we were just piking navel lint here anyway.
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Day: Status Icons and GNOME

Posted Sep 2, 2017 20:53 UTC (Sat) by sramkrishna (subscriber, #72628) [Link] (4 responses)

Think of it more like changing developer behavior. The notification spec was being abused as they were not used for notifications but for anything the developer wished. So with GNOME there are two notification systems, the one built by GNOME and this other one that is the wild west with developers using whatever. There is also the fact that you only have limited screen space for these areas and once you've exhausted it anything extra would need to be hidden defeating the purpose in the first place.

GNOME wants consistent behavior across the stack. Consolidating to a single notification system that is also cross desktop and re-educating developers to use it is the goal. Of course there are legacy software that is going to keep using it and that is where TopIcons comes in to provide that experience, and arguably a better experience. While such things will cause temporary pain, once apps port over to the new system things will look a lot better.

Day: Status Icons and GNOME

Posted Sep 3, 2017 4:02 UTC (Sun) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link] (1 responses)

After being years in all sorts of temporary pains that never end, I just quit the Linux desktop for a Mac for my main laptop.

I still have to struggle through Gnome's tantrums at work, though. I deeply resent your attitude towards users as a result.

I know that if I treated my users the same way then my company would have gone bankrupt long ago.

Day: Status Icons and GNOME

Posted Sep 4, 2017 8:53 UTC (Mon) by NAR (subscriber, #1313) [Link]

I got a Mac laptop for work. I ended up putting Debian into a Virtualbox and run Xfce on that. I also ended up getting a PC keyboard and mouse - the Mac laptop was missing some keys like PageUp/PageDown and just couldn't get a working Hunglish keyboard layout there.

Day: Status Icons and GNOME

Posted Sep 3, 2017 5:13 UTC (Sun) by ErikF (subscriber, #118131) [Link] (1 responses)

The problem I have with GNOME tossing notification icons completely is that they are used by software developed for KDE (and also older GNOME-targetted apps.) It's great to force developers to the new improved paradigm for your framework, but the Linux desktop ecosystem is so fragmented IMO that you break apps for users unless they run an extension. Extensions are wonderful, but unless they are guaranteed to be supported for the long term, can users rely on the extension working correctly (or at all) in a year?

If in the future GNOME is able to achieve near-universality then maybe breaking compatibility can be done. Until then, I'd rather have notification icons as a supported feature that works half-decently, even if it's disabled by default.

Day: Status Icons and GNOME

Posted Sep 3, 2017 17:38 UTC (Sun) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

The problem with "near universality" is "you can't please everyone all the time".

I won't go *near* Gnome. Just my personal preference, you can do what you like, but if you put Gnome on my personal machine you'll get shot ... :-)

MS forced everyone down the MS route ... it's AWFUL and although there are linatics who think that's a good idea, trust me, it's NOT.

Cheers,
Wol