Meaningless name (was: Re: rpms/xchat/devel ...)

[Nils Philippsen]

On Fri, 2007-06-01 at 08:45 -0400, Matthias Clasen wrote:
> On Fri, 2007-06-01 at 07:33 -0500, Josh Boyer wrote:
> > On Thu, 2007-05-31 at 18:13 -0400, Matthias Clasen wrote:
> > > On Thu, 2007-05-31 at 17:03 -0500, Josh Boyer wrote:
> > > 
> > > > If you're referring to migrating Windows users, even they realize there
> > > > is more than one program to accomplish the same task.  Think of AIM,
> > > > Trillian, ICQ, blah blah blah.  Or McAfee vs. Symantec.  Or IE vs.
> > > > Firefox.  Hell, even Microsoft doesn't label IE as "Web browser" (which
> > > > is another bogosity we do but one thing at a time).
> > > 
> > > How convenient that the desktop team can alternatively be slammed for
> > > copying Windows or for failing to copy it... 
> > 
> > Wait a minute... I'm not slamming anyone.  Nor did I alternate here..
> > (at least I don't think I did).
> > 
> > I'm simply saying that including a program's name in the menu entry
> > seems common sense to me.  What I don't understand is your
> > classification of "regular user" and why you think having the program's
> > name in the menu entry is confusing to them.
> > 
> 
> The program name in the menu doesn't help you make a choice unless you
> know the programs by name. That was the argument for including "Firefox"
> in the menu item even though Firefox is the default browser, because the
> name is well-recognized even with people who don't spend a large
> percentage of their life in front of a computer. Since x-chat doesn't
> have the same "brand recognition" that firefox has, adding its name to
> the menu does not help.
> 
> Anyway, as Owen said, after the merge, and with the packaging guidelines
> agitating for putting everything in the menus, organizing meaningful
> menus is largely a lost cause, and we should concentrate on making
> application browsing in bigboard work well instead.

Perhaps the menu (whether gnome-panel or bigboard, I don't care) could
do it like this: If there is only one type of $GenericName, display
$GenericName, otherwise $Name and a set-off/smaller script/however
distinguished $GenericName. Exceptions like e.g. Firefox, OOo could be
flagged in the desktop file (e.g. "ShowNameOnly=true").

Nils
-- 
     Nils Philippsen    /    Red Hat    /    nphilipp at redhat.com
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