Updated Fedora Workstation PRD draft

[Christoph Wickert]

Am Montag, den 09.12.2013, 12:33 -0500 schrieb Matthias Clasen:
> On Mon, 2013-12-09 at 17:20 +0100, Christoph Wickert wrote:
> > Am Mittwoch, den 27.11.2013, 09:42 -0500 schrieb Matthias Clasen:
> > > 
> > > It will have a default user experience that is using one desktop
> > > environment, GNOME. We will define criteria for other desktop
> > > environments to be installable as alternatives. Those criteria will
> > > include things such as:
> > > 
> > > - use logind for session registration
> > > - work with gdm as the display manager
> > > - does not interfere with the default user experience (cf the recent
> > > incident where installing cinnamon broke screen locking in GNOME)
> > 
> > Why do you use the term "default user experience" when you in fact are
> > talking about gnome and gdm? Correct me if I'm wrong, but the working
> > group has not made a decision yet.
> > 
> > I think that GNOME is the DE suited best to become the default, but I
> > cannot support your other criteria. If other desktops are not supposed
> > to not interfere with GNOME, can we expect GNOME to not interfere with
> > other desktops?
> 
> I would expect that clear rules about expected integration points would
> help avoiding interference both ways. 

If the rules are fair, then yes, but if one of the rules is "Other
desktops have to use GNOME's login manager" then not.

Making the login manager the starting point for any integration efforts
locks in all other desktops into then user's session.  In fact, it can
break things inside the session and thus the integration. AFAIR KDE has
some features that only work with KDM. So GNOME would in fact violate
teh "must not inter with other user experiences" rule.

> Do you have any concrete example
> in mind where GNOME trampled other desktops ?

      * libnotify 0.7 API changes
      * the GTK 2.24.7 update broke xfce4-keyboard-shortcuts as it
        changed handling of the CTRL keys. Even with a patched Xfce lost
        all their configured shortcuts with CTRL in F15
      * network-manager 0.9 was rushed into F15 just two days before
        beta-freeze and broke knetworkmanager, even in compatibility
        mode
      * Packaging changes for GNOME's polkit agent (moving the desktop
        file to launch the gnome-session package).
      * GNOME people requested the removal of tray icons from desktop
        agnostic programs simply because it was no longer usable in
        GNOME, while it still is very useful in all other desktops
      * default GTK themes (icons and window decorations)
      * icon naming changes in gnome-icon-theme (removal of the -legacy
        names).

If I thought longer or searched by bugzilla mail, I would probably find
more examples.

Best regards,
Christoph