Xfce Forum

akb825

Member

Registered: 2011-04-02

Posts: 11

A request for the next version: desktop improvements

I recently switched from GNOME to XFCE due to the direction that GNOME is moving in (such as with GNOME3...) as well as the amount of bloat that came with it. I am glad I made the switch, as XFCE is light weight and doesn't sacrifice too many features. The overall usage is intuitive and pretty much does what you expect.

However, there is one weak link that is not intuitive and has interrupted my work flow, and that is the desktop. In particular, there are two major issues that have caused me many headaches in my normal usage. First is the fact that dragging multiple items at once still isn't supported: you can select them, but dragging only drags the one under the mouse. The second, and most agrivating, is the fact that draging a file to or from the desktop results in a copy instead of a move. This really interrupts my workflow, since I often use the desktop as a temporary place to hold files.

Both of these issues are in bugzilla, but have been untouched for 2-3 years. I think usability issues for core elements like the desktop should be given a higher priority, since they are highly visible and interrupt normal, everyday workflow. I think putting some polish on the desktop and fixing these long standing problems will give you a very large bang for your buck in terms of providing a better experience for your users, as well as make it more welcoming for new users trying out XFCE. Especially when you consider that I'll be far from the last person looking into alternatives with the direction GNOME is going in...

gnome_refugee

Member

Registered: 2010-01-15

Posts: 169

Re: A request for the next version: desktop improvements

Hi, akb825.

What versions are you using? I run Xfce 4.6.2 and Thunar 1.0.2 (in Debian Squeeze). I don't have either of the 2 problems you mention.

akb825

Member

Registered: 2011-04-02

Posts: 11

Re: A request for the next version: desktop improvements

I am running XFCE 4.8 and Thunar 1.2.1 on Arch. I know that Debian will often apply custom patches to their packages, so it's possible that they fixed them locally and either haven't submitted them upstream or they have been submitted but not accepted.

Edit: I should probably also mention that Arch patches only when necessary to get a package to build, so what I have should be very close to the official version.

Last edited by akb825 (2011-04-02 22:43:58)

Nick

Dev

From: ~

Registered: 2005-02-17

Posts: 1,144

Website

Re: A request for the next version: desktop improvements

In the next release xfdesktop will be removed and be a plugin for thunar, so that will atleast fix things like multi select and probably also dnd-move since thunar is aware it moves to the same disk.

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akb825

Member

Registered: 2011-04-02

Posts: 11

Re: A request for the next version: desktop improvements

Cool! I'm looking forward to it!

Clio

Member

Registered: 2011-01-25

Posts: 102

Re: A request for the next version: desktop improvements

I know that Debian will often apply custom patches to their packages

No, thats wrong.
This actions you can find into Ubuntu, but never into Debian.

akb825

Member

Registered: 2011-04-02

Posts: 11

Re: A request for the next version: desktop improvements

Really? The reason why they rebranded Firefox to Iceweasel is because Mozilla didn't agree with Debian's policy of backporting security fixes to older versions of Firefox. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iceweasel) This is probably part of the reason why they are still stuck on Iceweasel 3.5, even on their "up to date" unstable branch. (yes, that directly translates to Firefox 3.5) The SSL security issue with Debian was due to a custom patch to fix a compiler warning. Debian always requests that you report a bug with them, and not upstream, since it could be Debian specific.

Frankly, with Debian's policy of freezing packages, how else are they going to fix bugs and security issues as they come up? As soon as they freeze a package version, they have no choice but to modify it themselves.