Why is xscreensaver removed in favor of gnome-screensaver

[Jonathan Berry]

On 2/17/06, Miles Lane <miles.lane at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 2/17/06, n0dalus <n0dalus+redhat at gmail.com> wrote:
[snip]
> > I agree that neither of the reasons they list are very good. Having
> > one extra button to open a second dialogue hardly clutters the UI, and
> > makes it no harder for the user. To let system admins lock down
> > settings, they should simply provide a "Don't show or let users open
> > advanced controls." key. I think it's still a good concept to provide
> > multiple variations of some of the screensavers in the list, but
> > that's not mutually exclusive to allowing advanced controls.
>
> Yes, I agree.  What I find upsetting is that this is such an
> obvious solution to many usability issues in Gnome and yet
> this approach is not getting implemented.  Much of my
> frustration would vanish if I saw signs that this reasonable
> attitude to empowering users was adopted.  If you are
> capable of making this case and triggering a shift, you will
> have my profound gratitude.

I would have to agree with you that the movement of Gnome away from
user configurability is rather disappointing.  Surely there is some
balance to be reached between configurability and not complicating
things.  Many things such as the screensaver issues seem to be going
toward the extreme of making configurability very difficult or
impossible.

> Here a similar situation:
> Gnome has given us "Spatial" browsing versus Hierarchical file
> browsing.   Why can't I make all my folder icons default to
> "Browse Hierarchically?"  The functionality is there, but only
> if I right-click on a folder icon and select "Browse Folder."
> This is buried functionality and clunky UI.
> I like the "Spatial" UI for its presentation of media files and
> actions, but it breaks down for file browsing.  I really dislike
> cluttering my desktop with folder windows.
>
> Yes, I know that there are avid fans of the "Spatial" UI,
> but please let me choose defaulting to hierarchical directory
> browsing.

I'm afraid you chose a bad example here; you can configure that :-)
(thankfully).  I cannot stand the spacial view in Nautilus either. 
Open up a Nautilus window, Edit -> Preferences -> Behavior[tab] ->
Always open in browser windows[checkbox].

Jonathan