Some desktop updates for this cycle

[Tim]

On 06/11/13 06:06, Sebastien Bacher wrote:
> Hey everyone,
>
> There has been quite some discussions happening, on lists/IRC/conferences, about LTS plans. Since not everything happening at the same place,
> it might be useful to have a status update... so here we go (the plan concerns mostly Ubuntu/Unity)
>
>
> We most likely are going to:
>
> * update glib to 2.40 (tracking 2.39 during the unstable cycle)
>
> rational: we have active maintainers, upstream and downstream, and glib tends to be stable (good record, well tested)
>
> * update webkit to the current version
>
> rational: the new version is needed to unblock updates/other work, it's also going to be easier to maintain in the LTS. There is a
> software-center bug which was listed as blocker, but it seems we already have issue in the current, so we mgiht not stop on that one to be
> resolved
>
> * GTK: the default option is to stay on 3.8, we are looking at updating to 3.10 though
>
> rational: 3.8 is stable/tested. Updating to 3.10 would makes app developers happier (and we expect some of them to want to stay on the LTS for
> some time), and unblock some work for Ubuntu GNOME. It should also bring performance improvement to our unity menus.
Right, Gtk 3.10 is quite important for Ubuntu GNOME, without that 14.04 will be rather unexciting and more or less Saucy with a few bug fixes.
>
> We are still looking at updating the patches to have a build of the new version to test (that works is going to be useful, even if that's not
> this cycle). Then we expect to have some theming issues to resolve (as usual with recent GTK update). Once those are resolved we can give some
> testing to the new version and see what are the costs/benefits of the update
 I believe its mainly just the custom menu hack that needs updating?
>
> * GNOME 3.8: We are going to stay on the current saucy version (3.8) and fix bugs/stabilize it.
>
> rational: the current version is solid and should work fine for a LTS. GNOME 3.10 is bringing quite some changes to the look of its
> applications, we feel like that we are better off mixing styles for the LTS. We also have limited resources, due to Ubuntu Touch work, so we
> feel like we can't do a proper job of bringing new version and dealing with the extra work that would require to stabilize things.

> * gnome-settings-daemon/gnome-control-center
>
> The new versions bring an increasing design shift and extra depends on gnome-shell. We plan to "fork" those 2 packages for Unity and stay on
> the current version there, doing that should unblock the GNOME remix/users who want to run the new versions (it should also means less
> patching/closer upstream experience for those users).
Big +1 for this, however the changes also affect gnome-desktop3, which now depends on mutter for display config and idle manager. Maybe that
needs to be forked as well?
> * New "GNOME style" apps
>
> The new "GNOME style" (having no menubar/using GtkHeader/client side decoration) doesn't work well under non gnome-shell desktops. We only
> have a few of those so far and we plan to make them more integrated in Unity again.
>
> We are going to add menubars back to e.g evince, gnome-calculator, nautilus, etc (the plan is to upstream those patches, and to make the
> menubar be displayed in a conditional way depending of the environement, that's what is done already in gedit).
I thought the GtkHeader was introduced in gtk 3.10, does that mean some apps have just gone and mimicked the look, without using the proper gtk API?
>
> We are looking also at a way to make the GtkHeader/client side style app work in a more consistent style with the other applications we are
> using (while they are great, they look different from any other app at the moment). The idea is mostly to turn on wm decorations again for
> those and to hide the close button from the bar. We still need to look more into details on how we can do that only out of gnome-shell sessions.
>
>
> That's mostly it for this cycle I think, let us know if you have any question or comment
from Ubuntu GNOME perspective we would like to see

- update cogl/clutter to atleast 1.16, or preferably 1.18
- gtk 3.10
and assuming gtk 3.10 lands (otherwise can wait for 14.10)
- update to BlueZ 5
- update of g-s-d/g-c-c/gnome-desktop3 to 3.10 (mostly a non-issue if you fork here though)

Tim

>
> Cheers,
> Sebastien Bacher
>
>