quinet@xxxxxxxxxx (2001-06-06 at 1724.41 +0200):
> > The GPL wants you to put a visible notification about the license into
> > your program. This notice should be seen whenever you start Gimp. We
> > only show it on user installation and one day RMS will come and get us
> > for this lazyness.
> Well, I doubt that RMS would blame us for that. The notice must not
> be displayed every time the program is started, as long as it can be
> accessed easily using some command-line option or dialog box that is
> commonly used to display some information about the program (such as
> --help, --version or some About dialog for graphical programs such as
> the Gimp).
Have anybody, in last months, tried any commercial app? Seessh, I have
to click Accept even to get some damn docs. Or to get new drivers for
a card that I own, and I still have to see the damn license again and
again. The point is to show, IMHO, that Gimp is not public domain, it
has a license like anyone, and it is serious about that.
> consequences. Or maybe because they wanted to try the program quickly
> and they pressed "OK" or "Next" on all installation windows, assuming
> that the defaults are fine and that only the experts need to change
> them.
Most people just hit Next like a mad monkey. In some cases, they are
right, cos the config tool does nothing. In others, it allows
interesting things, like in Gimp case (cache, monitor resolution).
BTW, maybe a guided tutorial would be fine, that way people learn to
change things once they have the app installed. With the click Next
mania, I guess that could be the default way, no entry dialog, only
the tuts.
> Here is a suggestion. I doubt that I will implement it, but maybe
> David can do it since he wants to improve the installation process.
> Keep the current dialog as it is (telling the user to adjust the value
> as needed), but try to change the default value of 32M on the systems
> in which the available memory is easy to guess. This means that the
> users of other systems will still have to change the tile cache size
> from the default of 32M, but at least those who are using one of the
> common configurations (e.g., Linux 2.2 or 2.4 on a single-user
> machine) will get a more sensible value by default.
There is not sensible size. Start some apps, and Gimp suffer, close
those apps, and Gimp is not using all RAM. Users could try to guess
how much RAM free they have when they work with Gimp. IIRC in MacOS
users have to decide how RAM was shared (old MacOS, not last version).
Calc default, OK, but make sure the user knows it could be really
wrong.
> /tmp. I think that the only way to check that automatically is to run
> "df" and parse its output. This is not very elegant, but I cannot
> think of a better solution.
In some cases, IIRC, /tmp is RAM.
> Here is how it could be done: run "df $TMPDIR", "df /tmp" and "df
> $HOME". Ignore the result if "df" fails or if the second line of the
> output does not start with "/dev/" (which indicates that the directory
> is mounted from another host). If there is anything left, then use
> the directory that has the largest value in the "available" column.
> If there is nothing left, then use the old default value. The user
> will still be able to edit it anyway.
df? It will vary if the user have installed today, or has been using
the machine a lot and is just about to do a clean up. Also, size is
not the only important thing, speed too (think two disks, not local
and remote).
But oooh, well, seeing how default installs work, and how others do
partitions, I understand why some people get doggy slow systems ("do
you placed swap where?"), and other snappy ones. Somebody said disk
layout was an art, and it is true, at least until computer become
really smart.
The dialog should point that non obvious details: use a place where
you can get more free space if you want, and in a disk that is fast.
And where to change them.
GSR
