Re: Why?

[Digby Tarvin <digbyt@acm.org>]

On Wed, Jul 12, 2006 at 05:47:56PM -0600, Paul E Condon wrote:
> ...
> And -both- gdm -and- kdm can be told to start up either kdm or gnome.
> (xdm doesn't seem to have this feature.)
 
Back when I first tried using it (around 2001) KDM presented a login
box with the following items:
	Text entry box labelled 'Login'
	Text entry box labelled 'Password'
	Drop down menu labelled 'Session Type' which shows the currently
     active default when a user name is entered

Along the bottom of the box were three buttons labelled 'Go!', 'Clear'
and 'Shutdown', plus one drop down menu item labelled 'Menu' which
by default just contained 'restart X server'.

I don't know what version number this is, because it has no man page and
the binary does not seem to have any strings to identify itself...
Configuring the analog clock to the right of text entries produced
something that worked well for me..

The only improvements I would really have made to this would be to
get rid of the superfluous 'Go!' and 'Clear' buttons, and to add
an 'XDMCP chooser' and maybe 'configure' option to the bottom menu.

Later versions of KDM have gone down hill IMHO, because the selection of
of desktop environment has been demoted to a bottom menu which does not
provide an indication of the current default when the user name is
entered. 

I for one change my desktop frequently according to what I want to do,
and often log in using two different desktop (running X servers in
two different virtual consoles simultaneously), so it was very useful
to me to be able to see at a glance what the default desktop is going
to be when I log in (I can't always remember what my last choice was)
and it was more convenient when I wanted to change.

A more prominently displayed desktop selection would also help make it
obvious to inexperienced users that there is a choice if they don't like
the default.

I have also tried GDM, which similarly seems to assume that users will
GUI monogomous.

And no, the original XDM is very 'no frills' and assumes you need to log
in to change your window manager.

Perhaps it is time for an agnostic display manager which is totally
independent of the two heavy desktops.

Regards,
DigbyT

P.S. I wish the Debian community would be as intolerant of packages
with inadequate documentation as they are about licensing issues.

The two paramount concerns for me personally are source and documentation.
Licence is a secondary issue, and I don't even object to paying a fair price 
if someone has done a good job and I am going to make good use of it...
-- 
Digby R. S. Tarvin                                          digbyt(at)digbyt.com
http://www.digbyt.com