On Wed, 2005-03-30 at 18:26 +0100, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 30, 2005 at 09:04:26AM -0800, Casey Schaufler wrote:
>
> > Yes, and I'm sure that you can do a configuration
> > of most application defaults that will be good
> > enough to demo. Application developers tend to
> > have their own ideas regarding data storage and
> > it is a bad idea for a system developer to
> > interfere with said application developer's
> > freedom to inovate.
>
> ... application developer's freedom to impose insecurity,
> through ignorance on the part of the app-developer, upon
> the users?
>
> no offense intended: freedom in an abstract concept [e.g. "the american
> way"] _always_ has limits - laws / rules / policy is defined to confine
> that freedom, for good or worse.

I don't understand what this has to do with the application developer. This is a discussion of desktop applications that manipulate content relevant to the user - not internal settings. The settings that go under /home are another issue - that would require changing the app, but they don't have to be changed all at the same time.

All those apps *ask* you where to store the content. You create a document of some sort, and you have a choice of where to put it. This has nothing to do with the app developer. It's just another restriction imposed on the user. Hopefully there's a way to get away with it, while staying user-friendly. That's why I'm suggesting content folders be introduced and integrated w/ GNOME's Places menu, for example. That seems like a small first step to improving things... no?

Ok, some apps like gift don't ask where to save the content, but that's the exception and not the rule.

-- 
Ivan Gyurdiev <ivg2@cornell.edu>
Cornell University


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