[ubuntu-studio-devel] Next cycle

[Ross Gammon]

Thanks for doing this Len.

On 04/13/2017 05:49 PM, Len Ovens wrote:
> Aside from having a new -controls (I hope) there are a few things I
> would like to hear about.

I have re-targeted the last controls update that missed Zesty, to
Artful. If you spot a potential sponsor on IRC, then please point them
at the bug (I will be a bit busty this week).
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ubuntustudio-controls/+bug/1678316

>
>
> Auto mounting - we used to make sure there was no auto mounting of USB
> drives, cds or dvds. But since we have started borrowing xubuntu's
> desktop, that has come back in. IMO this is bad for audio use at least
> (anything auto is). However, I realize I am audio centric. How does
> this align with graphics/video use which are in general not real time
> or low latency tasks.
>
> Auto updating - same as above. But to add to it, I noticed that
> autoupdating installs new kernels in background. However, there seems
> to be no background old kernel clean up. I don't use efi myself, but I
> understand that efi uses a separate boot partition of minimal size and
> could become full with no warning... perhaps making updates or booting
> broken. I would guess this not just a Studio problem... though if it
> is then the solution must be hanging around already. Needs study in
> any case.
>
> whisker menu - I still hate it :) But if we are going to keep it (I
> always go back to the system menu on my systems) can we at least
> resize it so that the menu categories are all visible by default...
> and enable hover so that click on category is not needed. I understand
> that having the search window there is nice for some people... but I
> just don't seem to come up with valuable search terms ever... my brain
> and whoever sets seach data just don't match. (probably means I'm
> abnormal)
>
> Can we change the default theme to Moheli or similar? There are two
> things I like in a theme:
>     The window with focus stands out - menu bar is a different colour
>     The border needs to be wide enough to be easy to grab
>
> More than one workpace by default - I understand that I may work a bit
> different than others doing development on more than one project at a
> time. It is not unusual for me to have 30 or more windows open at one
> time. IDEs do try to make things so this is not needed... but my
> workflow is just that way. This is why being able to resize windows
> and see which is focused are important.
>
> I understand that xubuntu is aimed at mainstream either browsing or
> one other app fullscreen use and so the desktop we end up with
> reflects that. As content creators, how do the rest of us set up their
> desktops? Should changes be made? or am I really the odd one out?
>
> Also in the world of themes. Are there any high DPI or better variable
> DPI centric themes available? While I do not use a high DPI monitor
> (mine are only 1600X900), I would expect both graphics and video
> creators to use them... actually it would be very nice for mixbus-32c
> too. SO at least two themes one for low and one for high, but better
> one that can deal with making fonts visible at any dpi.
>
> Normally artwork changes for LTS releases (next year) but as things
> move slow here... maybe now is a good time to start thinking about a
> new backdrop. It would be nice if there could be one that is
> extensible where a generic version could be used on the right monitor
> in a dual monitor configuration. I am sure that I have not been plain
> here :)
>
> I am thinking of a left monitor BG that is complete in itself for
> single monitor users. Then a second BG that looks like an extension of
> the left but with no logo etc. It may even seem blank or just continue
> the right edge colours or something like that. Then build the ISO
> install for a dual monitor setup with those two BGs as default (I
> don't thnk this would be too hard). If started up in single monitor
> mode, the system will reconfigure using the left monitor's BG and look
> right in that configuration as well.
>
> -controls will make some changes beyond what it does now and I want it
> complete and well tested for 17.10 so that we have time to make
> changes in it and the rest of the system for 18.04LTS. One of those
> changes will be to upgrade the pulse-jack bridge. The main thing being
> to allow pulse to run at a higher latency than jack so that the bridge
> will take less cpu and things like skype will continue to run even
> with jackd at 16/2. Basically, I want jackd to look like a sound card
> to pulse. I would like it to show up in pulse's configuration tab for
> example so people can set it up as more than stereo if they want. But
> the main thing is that the pa-jack bridge should never cause jack
> xruns... pa xruns are ok :P  pa hides it's xruns already (but not
> their artifacts) so go with the flow. A PA replacement would be ever
> so nice, but we don't have a team of coders and 10 years to do that.
>
> My goal for -controls is to replace most of the aging qjackctl except
> the connections window (I may even be able to get -controls to open
> the qjackctl connections window) and to make it more like Cadence. I
> would use cadence if it was packaged and I totally agreed with the way
> it does things. (I am not saying cadence does things wrong... just
> that I can do better ;)  ) 

I will start turning these into blueprints over the next few days
(including the input from the subsequent emails in this thread). In
controversial areas I will phrase it something like "try ....". We can
always revert if people aren't happy. Although it will be easier to
revert if we work in a feature branch this time :-)

For me, I really want to work on a package tracker so that we have a
place to look to see when our packages are out of date or buggy. I would
also like to do some sort of Bug Hugging days where we can encourage
more people to be able to triage bugs and take the first steps to
identifying fixes. Basic bug triaging I can do, but triaging audio-video
stuff is tricky, especially when it can depend on hardware and sensitive
settings. It would be great to spend a day here and there on one of our
priority packages, and as a team sort out all the bug reports so that
they are either confirmed or rejected, passed upstream where required,
and potential patches identified that someone might turn into a SRU
(Stable Release Update).
 
Cheers,

Ross