Re: Re: Debian packages and freedesktop.org (Gnome, KDE, etc) menu entries

[Moritz Moeller-Herrmann <mmh@gmx.net>]

Andrew Suffield wrote:

> On Fri, Dec 05, 2003 at 03:02:42PM +0800, Cameron Patrick wrote:

>> Except that AFAIK .desktops are still semantically richer than the
>> existing Debian system, and have more momentum behind them outside of
>> Debian.  Upstream packages are much more likely to ship to .desktop
>> files than they are Debian menu entries.  Admittedly I'm not convinced
>> that they're ready enough in other ways to replace what we have now.
> 
> Thing is, none of this matters. If upstream support .desktop files,
> then we just run them through the script that converts them to Debian
> menu entries while installing. dh_installmenu would be a good place to
> do this.

You do realize that the desktop standard has more features than the debian
menu system? Like i18n, icon theming, dynamic construction of a menu
hierarchy based on user /Desktop system preferences and so on? And that
this information would be lost? Why not run it the other way around,
convert the existing debian menu entries to .desktop files and work from
there? I think that this way would help debian on the desktops.
 
> The extra features should be pretty simple to implement - just more
> text fields.

Hardly. The desktop system in KDE-3.2+ and Gnome-2.4+ is not as static and
uncustomizable the Debian menu system at the moment.

> That way we support the upstream menu entries in
> everything, not just kde and gnome.

-- 
Moritz Moeller-Herrmann mmh@gmx.net wiss. Mitarbeiter, IMGB
        La loi, dans un grand souci d'égalité, interdit aux riches comme aux
        pauvres de coucher sous les ponts, de mendier dans les rues et de voler
        du pain. 
        (ANATOLE FRANCE)