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Alternative main menu
Sunday, July 9, 2006 ★ 14:11 ★ Category Gnome
After seeing the demo at the Novell Code 10 launch party last week, I decided to try the new ‘Computer’ applet Novell uses as their main Gnome panel menu and the ‘Application Browser’. The source code can be found in the slab module of Gnome CVS and I had no problems compiling the thing. (Update: the module name in CVS is now called gnome-main-menu.)
The computer menu
Overall I’m quite impressed, it certainly looks good for a first version. Some random comments:
- I don’t use Beagle so I don’t have the search entry in the menu. A fallback to search just for applications in the main menu (just like the Application Browser tool) would be nice
- To be useful as a standard Gnome (non Novell specific) main menu the “Install Software” functionality has to be wiped or adapted to use distro-specific backends
- The code uses EggRecent, which will be obsoleted by GtkRecent in the near future. Understandable of course, since Novell doesn’t ship GTK+ 2.10 and Gnome 2.16.
- The ‘Help’ item in the context menus for application entries in the Application Browser doesn’t work. The ‘X-GNOME-Doc’ entry in the .desktop files is used for this.
- The Control Center tool (Application Browser for gnome-control-center) doesn’t use top-level entries, but most entries are in there. I guess this is different in Novell’s own desktop.
- The Network entry on the bottom right prints
(gnome-main-menu:25751): WARNING **: network_status_tile_open: could not find NetworkManager's applet.gladeto the console, but I do use NetworkManager and it’s running alright.
- The disk space button on the bottom right only takes the root partition into account. I use several logical volumes for /home and other parts of my file system, but those aren’t displayed.
The Application Browser
All in all I think this applet is really promising. With some more love it could certainly replace my standard Gnome ‘Applications, Places, Desktop’ menu, but in its current shape it’s just a bit too immature and lacks a few features to be a full replacement.
Random photo from Crete (August, 2007)
Who wrote all this?
Wouter Bolsterlee, also known as uws, a postmodern geek living in the Netherlands. Read more about me…
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