X-Fedora vs. X-Fedora-Extra vs. X-Fedora-Extras

[Michael Schwendt]

X-Fedora : most packages imported from fedora.us use this in the
           desktop files

X-Fedora-Extra : a dozen packages switched to it

X-Fedora-Extras : package "logjam" uses it 


Which one do we use from now on?

I would assume X-Red-Hat-Extras => X-Fedora-Extra, but it would
sound dumb.

[Michael Schwendt]

On Mon, 7 Mar 2005 20:19:22 +0100, Michael Schwendt wrote:

>  X-Fedora : most packages imported from fedora.us use this in the
>             desktop files
>  
>  X-Fedora-Extra : a dozen packages switched to it
>  
>  X-Fedora-Extras : package "logjam" uses it 
>  
>  
>  Which one do we use from now on?
>  
>  I would assume X-Red-Hat-Extras => X-Fedora-Extra, but it would
>  sound dumb. 
Damn typos. Meant to write:

 ... X-Red-Hat-Extra  =>  X-Fedora-Extra ...

[Tom Callaway]

On Mon, 2005-03-07 at 20:31 +0100, Michael Schwendt wrote:
> On Mon, 7 Mar 2005 20:19:22 +0100, Michael Schwendt wrote:
>
> > X-Fedora : most packages imported from fedora.us use this in the
> >            desktop files
> > 
> > X-Fedora-Extra : a dozen packages switched to it
> > 
> > X-Fedora-Extras : package "logjam" uses it  
logjam is mine, I must be right!

Seriously though, I don't care. We should pick one and be done with it. 

If we don't want to draw any distinction, then "X-Fedora" is fine for
everyone, and I think that should be the standard for both Core and
Extras. Anyone opposed?

~spot
---
Tom "spot" Callaway: Red Hat Sales Engineer || GPG Fingerprint: 93054260
Fedora Extras Steering Committee Member (RPM Standards and Practices)
Aurora Linux Project Leader: http://auroralinux.org
Lemurs, llamas, and sparcs, oh my!

[Dag Wieers]

On Mon, 7 Mar 2005, Tom 'spot' Callaway wrote:

>  On Mon, 2005-03-07 at 20:31 +0100, Michael Schwendt wrote:
>  >On Mon, 7 Mar 2005 20:19:22 +0100, Michael Schwendt wrote:
>  >
>  >> X-Fedora : most packages imported from fedora.us use this in the
>  >>            desktop files
>  >> 
>  >> X-Fedora-Extra : a dozen packages switched to it
>  >> 
>  >> X-Fedora-Extras : package "logjam" uses it 
>  
>  logjam is mine, I must be right!
>  
>  Seriously though, I don't care. We should pick one and be done with it. 
>  
>  If we don't want to draw any distinction, then "X-Fedora" is fine for
>  everyone, and I think that should be the standard for both Core and
>  Extras. Anyone opposed? 
RPMforge uses X-Red-Hat-Base everywhere. Should we be worried ? :)
What's the effect of changing the category, what is it used for ?

Or are there any plans to use this in the future ? It may make a 
difference. If it's a branding kind of thing, we might want to make a 
macro out of it.

RPMforge uses %{desktop_vendor} already when using desktop-file-utils so 
people can rebrand packages if they care.

Any opinions about both ?

--   dag wieers,  dag(a)wieers.com,  http://dag.wieers.com/   --
[all I want is a warm bed and a kind word and unlimited power]

[Michael Schwendt]

On Tue, 8 Mar 2005 04:29:29 +0100 (CET), Dag Wieers wrote:

>  RPMforge uses X-Red-Hat-Base everywhere. Should we be worried ? :)
>  What's the effect of changing the category, what is it used for ? 
X-Red-Hat-Base puts a desktop menu entry into the top menu, while
X-Red-Hat-Extra marks desktop menu entries which appear in the
"More ..." sub-menus. X-Fedora is just a placeholder.

[Dag Wieers]

On Tue, 8 Mar 2005, Michael Schwendt wrote:

>  On Tue, 8 Mar 2005 04:29:29 +0100 (CET), Dag Wieers wrote:
>  
>  > RPMforge uses X-Red-Hat-Base everywhere. Should we be worried ? :)
>  > What's the effect of changing the category, what is it used for ?
>  
>  X-Red-Hat-Base puts a desktop menu entry into the top menu, while
>  X-Red-Hat-Extra marks desktop menu entries which appear in the
>  "More ..." sub-menus. X-Fedora is just a placeholder. 
I don't like a meaningless placeholder. Either we anticipate a change in 
the future and we should define that use (having a single identifier for 
all packages makes no sense). Or we drop it.

X-Red-Hat-Base and X-Red-Hat-Extra has a meaning, although I'm not sure 
why it includes 'Red-Hat'. Maybe we need a policy of what is expected in 
the first level menu, and what in the second. (Or another scheme).

PS I don't have any 'More...' submenus on my FC3 even though some of the 
desktop-files do use X-Red-Hat-Extra.

--   dag wieers,  dag(a)wieers.com,  http://dag.wieers.com/   --
[all I want is a warm bed and a kind word and unlimited power]

[Michael Schwendt]

On Tue, 8 Mar 2005 05:45:39 +0100 (CET), Dag Wieers wrote:

>  > > RPMforge uses X-Red-Hat-Base everywhere. Should we be
> worried ? :)
>  > > What's the effect of changing the category, what is it used for ?
>  > 
>  > X-Red-Hat-Base puts a desktop menu entry into the top menu, while
>  > X-Red-Hat-Extra marks desktop menu entries which appear in the
>  > "More ..." sub-menus. X-Fedora is just a placeholder.
>  
>  I don't like a meaningless placeholder. 
It's not meaningless. X-Fedora has been used to mark menu entries as
coming from Fedora Linux. Whether it is evaluated somewhere is
implementation dependent. X-Red-Hat-Extra is not evaluated either, I
think. Only X-Red-Hat-Base provides the special function of placing menu
entries in the top-level menu.

X-Fedora-Extra or X-Fedora-Extras would mark menu entries as coming from
Fedora Extras and would distinguish them from manually installed ones.
A desktop menu editor might put such markers to good effect.

>  Either we anticipate a change in 
>  the future and we should define that use (having a single identifier for 
>  all packages makes no sense). Or we drop it.
>  
>  X-Red-Hat-Base and X-Red-Hat-Extra has a meaning, although I'm not sure 
>  why it includes 'Red-Hat'. Maybe we need a policy of what is expected in 
>  the first level menu, and what in the second. (Or another scheme).
>  
>  PS I don't have any 'More...' submenus on my FC3 even though some of the 
>  desktop-files do use X-Red-Hat-Extra. 
FC3 KDE has "Preferences > More Preferences" here, where the
categorisation works, too. I think X-Red-Hat-Extra is from older times,
such as Red Hat Linux 8.0, where real "Extras" submenus existed.

[Dag Wieers]

On Tue, 8 Mar 2005, Michael Schwendt wrote:

>  On Tue, 8 Mar 2005 05:45:39 +0100 (CET), Dag Wieers wrote:
>  
>  > > > RPMforge uses X-Red-Hat-Base everywhere. Should we be worried ? :)
>  > > > What's the effect of changing the category, what is it used for ?
>  > > 
>  > > X-Red-Hat-Base puts a desktop menu entry into the top menu, while
>  > > X-Red-Hat-Extra marks desktop menu entries which appear in the
>  > > "More ..." sub-menus. X-Fedora is just a placeholder.
>  > 
>  > I don't like a meaningless placeholder.
>  
>  It's not meaningless. X-Fedora has been used to mark menu entries as
>  coming from Fedora Linux. Whether it is evaluated somewhere is
>  implementation dependent. X-Red-Hat-Extra is not evaluated either, I
>  think. Only X-Red-Hat-Base provides the special function of placing menu
>  entries in the top-level menu.
>  
>  X-Fedora-Extra or X-Fedora-Extras would mark menu entries as coming from
>  Fedora Extras and would distinguish them from manually installed ones.
>  A desktop menu editor might put such markers to good effect. 
I understand that. With meaningless I meant that I don't see good use for 
users to distinguish a Fedora Extras and a non-Fedora-Extras package. What 
do you think would people do with this information ? I'd like to implement 
something that has a direct benefit, which I do not see here.

--   dag wieers,  dag(a)wieers.com,  http://dag.wieers.com/   --
[all I want is a warm bed and a kind word and unlimited power]

[Michael Schwendt]

On Tue, 8 Mar 2005 15:28:11 +0100 (CET), Dag Wieers wrote:

>  > X-Fedora-Extra or X-Fedora-Extras would mark menu entries as
> coming from
>  > Fedora Extras and would distinguish them from manually installed ones.
>  > A desktop menu editor might put such markers to good effect.
>  
>  I understand that. With meaningless I meant that I don't see good use for 
>  users to distinguish a Fedora Extras and a non-Fedora-Extras package. What 
>  do you think would people do with this information ? I'd like to implement 
>  something that has a direct benefit, which I do not see here. 
X-Red-Hat-Extra has no direct benefit either. Still it adds a special
category to menu entries, which are not considered the base distribution's
preferred/primary applications. Wether it is the default to put all menu
entries, which are not categorised as X-Red-Hat-Base, into submenus [if
implemented] or if this is done explicitly based on a special X-category,
is not the point of discussion IMO. The availability of the extra category
allows for such operations, whether implemented today or in the future.
As I tried to point out above, in a powerful menu editor, you could say
"also put Extras into the top-level menu", or "move all extras into
'More...' submenus" or "move all extras into a separate 'Extras'
menu
hierarchy" to clean up overloaded menus.

[Dag Wieers]

On Tue, 8 Mar 2005, Michael Schwendt wrote:

>  On Tue, 8 Mar 2005 15:28:11 +0100 (CET), Dag Wieers wrote:
>  
>  > > X-Fedora-Extra or X-Fedora-Extras would mark menu entries as coming from
>  > > Fedora Extras and would distinguish them from manually installed ones.
>  > > A desktop menu editor might put such markers to good effect.
>  > 
>  > I understand that. With meaningless I meant that I don't see good use for 
>  > users to distinguish a Fedora Extras and a non-Fedora-Extras package. What 
>  > do you think would people do with this information ? I'd like to implement 
>  > something that has a direct benefit, which I do not see here.
>  
>  X-Red-Hat-Extra has no direct benefit either. Still it adds a special
>  category to menu entries, which are not considered the base distribution's
>  preferred/primary applications. Wether it is the default to put all menu
>  entries, which are not categorised as X-Red-Hat-Base, into submenus [if
>  implemented] or if this is done explicitly based on a special X-category,
>  is not the point of discussion IMO. The availability of the extra category
>  allows for such operations, whether implemented today or in the future.
>  As I tried to point out above, in a powerful menu editor, you could say
>  "also put Extras into the top-level menu", or "move all extras into
>  'More...' submenus" or "move all extras into a separate
> 'Extras' menu
>  hierarchy" to clean up overloaded menus. 
Michael, my point is, if almost everything will be in Extras, what use
does it have to tag them the same way ? I'd much rather have something
explicit for that purpose, like:

	TopLevel
	SubLevel

Than something that you will use as a default tag but has no practical 
use other than this. In fact, if there are other uses besides the
TopLevel/SubLevel and the real category, I'd much rather have those
explicitly defined and named now too :)

Maybe:

	Novice
	Advanced
	Expert

would be a useful tag to put on applications. Or

	Stable
	Unstable (or Beta)

I don't know. I bet people can come up with other tags that may be useful.

--   dag wieers,  dag(a)wieers.com,  http://dag.wieers.com/   --
[all I want is a warm bed and a kind word and unlimited power]

[Paul Nasrat]

On Tue, 2005-03-08 at 18:01 +0100, Dag Wieers wrote:
>  On Tue, 8 Mar 2005, Michael Schwendt wrote:
>  
>  > On Tue, 8 Mar 2005 15:28:11 +0100 (CET), Dag Wieers wrote:
>  > 
>  Michael, my point is, if almost everything will be in Extras, what use
>  does it have to tag them the same way ? I'd much rather have something
>  explicit for that purpose, like:
>  
>  	TopLevel
>  	SubLevel
>  
>  Than something that you will use as a default tag but has no practical 
>  use other than this. In fact, if there are other uses besides the
>  TopLevel/SubLevel and the real category, I'd much rather have those
>  explicitly defined and named now too :)
>  
>  Maybe:
>  
>  	Novice
>  	Advanced
>  	Expert
>  
>  would be a useful tag to put on applications. Or
>  
>  	Stable
>  	Unstable (or Beta) 
This sounds like freedesktop.org discussion.  Lobbying for stuff should
happen there IMHO.

Paul

[Nicolas Mailhot]

Le mardi 08 mars 2005 à 18:01 +0100, Dag Wieers a écrit :

>  Michael, my point is, if almost everything will be in Extras, what
> use
>  does it have to tag them the same way ? I'd much rather have something
>  explicit for that purpose, like:
>  
>  	TopLevel
>  	SubLevel
>  
>  Than something that you will use as a default tag but has no practical 
>  use other than this. In fact, if there are other uses besides the
>  TopLevel/SubLevel and the real category, I'd much rather have those
>  explicitly defined and named now too :) 
I disagree. If you put very explicit stuff like this in each menu entry
you spread policy over a large number of packages. That makes it real
hard to change it later.

Much better to put informative stuff here and have the centralised menu
logic decide what to do with it (and I hope someday each individual
system user will be able to decide things like "I want all entries with
this tag in a separate menu" or "I want all stuff with this tag to be
hidden" etc)

Regards,

-- 
Nicolas Mailhot

[Dag Wieers]

On Tue, 8 Mar 2005, Nicolas Mailhot wrote:

>  Le mardi 08 mars 2005 à 18:01 +0100, Dag Wieers a écrit :
>  
>  > Michael, my point is, if almost everything will be in Extras, what use
>  > does it have to tag them the same way ? I'd much rather have something
>  > explicit for that purpose, like:
>  > 
>  > 	TopLevel
>  > 	SubLevel
>  > 
>  > Than something that you will use as a default tag but has no practical 
>  > use other than this. In fact, if there are other uses besides the
>  > TopLevel/SubLevel and the real category, I'd much rather have those
>  > explicitly defined and named now too :)
>  
>  I disagree. If you put very explicit stuff like this in each menu entry
>  you spread policy over a large number of packages. That makes it real
>  hard to change it later. 
Policy is decided later based on the tags. I don't put policy inside of 
the packages. But you have to have something to hold on to.


>  Much better to put informative stuff here and have the centralised
> menu
>  logic decide what to do with it (and I hope someday each individual
>  system user will be able to decide things like "I want all entries with
>  this tag in a separate menu" or "I want all stuff with this tag to be
>  hidden" etc) 
Sure, that's the aim. But you won't be able to do that with a generic 
X-Fedora-Extra tag that matches 95% of your packages.

You have to have descriptive tags to base a policy on, what else do you 
have ?

But as Paul said, maybe this discussion belongs to freedesktop.org. The 
question remains, what is the use of X-Fedora-Extra if all packages are 
tagged with it.

--   dag wieers,  dag(a)wieers.com,  http://dag.wieers.com/   --
[all I want is a warm bed and a kind word and unlimited power]