XWN for March May 5th, through March May 17th, 2005
Welcome to the XWN, where piles of mailing list messages, IRC conversations, and Slashdot trolls are condensed down to something that almost resembles fun. (and where the W probably doesn’t stand for weekly anymore. Oh well).
This is my last XWN for a few weeks. As some of you know, I am getting married on the 28th, and things have reached fever pitch. Foolishly Fortunately, Brian has agreed to substitute for me until I return.
If I return. (evil laugh)
Xfce In The News
I stole all this from Brian’s Blog.
Brian On Linux Link Tech Show
Brian was on the Linux Link Tech Show, a weekly webcast. Brian advocated, educated, and generally was very cool. You can get the May 4th show from their archives, and have a listen.
Xfce Gains Market Share
According to DesktopLinux.com Xfce is the only desktop/window manager that gained marketshare other than KDE over the last year. Which certainly matches what the Slashdot trolls are saying.
Not scientific, but ultra cool
Thunar Dev
More Interface Talk
David Feldman wanted to contribue to the UI discussion on Thunar. He was pointed to the Python mockup.
Treeview/Sidepanel Unification
Ori Bernstein (with some trouble) managed to post a patch to the Thunar mockup to unify the Treeview and Sidepanel. After a mixed response, Jasper laid down with “Now, the way forward, IMO, is for one or more people to try and implement backend code based on the interaction diagram created by benny”. In otherwords major UI work is done, until someone starts writing some code. The plate is, as of yet, unstepped up to.
Botsie also started a spurious poll to give Xfce’s Least Important Developer a nickname.
The patch, the poll, the plate
Xfce Dev
Brian Versus Auke
Brian and Auke race to setup WebSVN. Looks like it was a tie
Brian is bored, Jasper is snarky, Botsie is rolling on the floor
Xfce SVN
Learn To Extend Xffm For Fun And Profit
Edscott put together a sample plugin for Xffm to show how writing a plugin can be easy and fun.
Slow Cate is a funny name for a fast file search
MailWatch Improves
More people weighed in on Mailwatch. Don’t be afraid, try it yourself.
Xfce 4.2.2
Questions were asked about the mythical 4.2.2 release. It turns out that release is mythical because Benny has passed yea on into legend, thus removing our release manager. Then Olivier took up his father’s sword . . .er . . .stepped into the quantum leap accelerator . . .er . . .released some software. Olivier also assured us that an installer would be created for the release.
Software releases make the news more interesting. Could we just release every week?
News from the front -or- avoiding 4.2.2.1
Announcing = The ChangeLog!
The actual release
Run Dialog Version Ultra Mega Power
Shuveb Hussain offered up a couple of patches for the run dialog.
First try
Features are better when they don’t make things slower
.desktop Cache
Eduard started some discussion about a common cache for .desktop files. Nothing is set yet, but this could nicely improve performance for the appfinder, and for the menu system
Eduard speaks
2x speed improvement, with preliminary cache
Mousepad – Slowly, If Not Surely
Daichi intltoolized Mousepad, which got bugzilla modules as a side effect.
I just cross my fingers and hope it works, really
Xfcalendar – Cool. Xfcalendar – Sucky
Xfcalendar is a cool app, with some nice features in the SVN version. It also has a sucky name. Proving that hackers shouldn’t name things, and that they really really want to, this is the longest thread in some time.
Appfinder Landed
In an understated announcement (despite the presense of a mind numbing three exclamation points), Eduard landed the new Appfinder widget in SVN. He even included a preliminary API in his email, with a plea for testing, thus guarenteeing that no one would notice.
Keybindings For Volume Control
Shuveb Hussain sparked some discussion on managing keybindings in Xfce. Starting with wanting to add keybindings for volume control, he called for a central keybindings file to prevent conflicts. A resounding cry of “Don’t we all wish” was heard.
C Is Not Python
Jasper told Danny that C is, in fact, not python
Your Hot Single Mom Is Gonna Wanna Date The Panel
Jasper hit us with yet another panel update (or YAPU, if this was Perl. Which it isn’t). Some of the UI has changed, but otherwise, no problems. Give it a shot!
Global options for plugins is weird
directory.xfce.org
Samuel Verstraete dropped an update on the progressing Xfce directory for Xfce applications. All seems well.
Xfce Users
The Panel Ma’am. Just The Panel
BlackFenix wanted to know if he could run just the Xfce panel. He was provided with a friendly list of dependencies. Remember kids: Gnome’s is longer.
Xfce is more than just a panel?
No, No. DDT Is A Carcinogen
Keith Dart asked if there were XML DTDs for the various config and menu files, or if he needed to make them. He needed to make them
I Ain’t Goin’ Near No SVN
Lars Behrens wanted to check IMAP with the Mailchecker. He was refered to the new Mailwatch plugin, but he cowered in fear.
We don’t just check your mail, we watch it!
Window Themes
Xan thought that the various window themes were broken. Olivier thought Xan was volunteering
Okay, maybe “broken” is too harsh
Kiosks – Dumb Terminals, With Cooler Names
Nicolas Steenlant wanted to know how to customize file chooser dialogs. He was given an accurate, if somewhat sucky, answer.
Fork GTK+ should never be the right answer
How Else Would You Know It Stopped Working?
Andreas J. Guelzow wanted to know where an equivalent of the gnome-modem-lights plugin was for Xfce. He was given several workarounds for it’s absense. Andreas decided that the right answer was to write one.
Workarounds and solutions
So it was posted to the -dev list. Sue me
Window Placement
Roger wanted to sophisticate the window placement strategy of Xfwm4. Olivier explained why that wasn’t such a good idea.
Keeping You Wife Out Of Your Hair With Xfce
Stephen Hurd wanted to make some panel plugins immutable for all users. Discussion ensued.
Wait a sec – isn’t this why I left Windows?
Opera, Themes, and Metacity
Kristoffer finds that Xfwm breaks an assumption Opera makes about how maximized window behave. Kristoffer finds this annoying. Short answer – use Metacity.
Thank goodness Xfce is modular!
Xfce Versus Pentium
Amichai Teumim wanted to know if Xfce would work on an original Pentium. Answer: “Sure, but only if you don’t screw up the list threading again, and make life hard for the summerizer”
A twisty maze of unthreaded messages, all alike
Xfce Versus Distrowatch
Nick Schermer praised Xfce 4.2.2, and asked for a changelog. Nick was then praised as a time traveler, as 4.2.2 hadn’t actually been released yet. Distrowatch was blamed. Again.
Dude, it’s like this has happened before!
Upgrade Redux
Rich Shepard upgraded some Slackware boxes to 10.1 and had some Xfce trouble.
The Footer
That’s all for this week. Give Brian a kind welcome next time, just for me.
Edit: Corrected my dates, cause I am a moron, and added the news about the installer to the 4.2.2 announcement.