Ideas For A Pandora-Friendly Desktop Environment

[Vorporeal]

Anyway, I've been testing XFCE in a virtual machine, and it seems you can assign any action to the keystroke you choose. So that's one problem less.

Now, we need the nubs working as mouse pointer (left nub) and scroll (right nub), and it's been said in another thread it will be worked out (was working on a previous kernel, when the nub firmware wasn't still fixed). So it seems this isn't a problem, either.

The last thing is having a program selector that shows when the Pandora key is pressed, but:

btw, pmenu can run on fb or on X11; our current runs is pmenu running on X11 as root window, with the other option being a full xfce environment on x11; but pmenu can run without x11 just as well.

So it seems we could assign the Pandora hotkey in XFCE to run PMenu. It could be a little overkill, though. Perhaps someone could write a light, categorized GMenu2X-like launcher using GTK (preferably, as that's what XFCE uses), QT or whatever toolkit you want to use. Then, it would be a perfect environment, IMHO.

Since the PND packaged apps will appear in the menu automatically, why not just have the Pandora button open the menu? You could then just navigate with the D-pad and select a program with one of the game buttons.

 

[CoMiKe]

Since the PND packaged apps will appear in the menu automatically, why not just have the Pandora button open the menu? You could then just navigate with the D-pad and select a program with one of the game buttons.

Yep, that would be fine indeed. Although I really think a menu isn't the ideal way to start applications (small icons, too many submenus, etc).

But should be valid, of course.

 

[skeezix]

xfce has a cool little pop up app browser as well, which may be one of the thigs attached to pandora-button .. so you might be already covered

jeff

 

[renwils]

Does libpnd have the ability to use a custom xorg configuration for a particular program? Say, if I were launching a browser, I might want to map the gaming controls to a particular configuration, but in a word processor, something completely different. Or is there an easier way to do this, without restarting xserver?

 

[WizardStan]

Yep, that would be fine indeed. Although I really think a menu isn't the ideal way to start applications (small icons, too many submenus, etc).

But should be valid, of course.

There was a poll a little while ago: should PND files be listed in the organized menu, or just dumped to the desktop. The majority voted menu, but it sounds like you would have voted desktop. I'm sure someone will come up with a way to please everyone, even if it's a config switch which simply asks "menu or desktop?"

 

[Vorporeal]

Does libpnd have the ability to use a custom xorg configuration for a particular program? Say, if I were launching a browser, I might want to map the gaming controls to a particular configuration, but in a word processor, something completely different. Or is there an easier way to do this, without restarting xserver?

Xmodmap does this, right?

 

[NeuTek]

Has anyone had any thoughts on using Gnome-Do http://do.davebsd.com/ or creating something similar. I have used this for a while now and love the face that it brings the power of a terminal and gui desktop usability closer together.

For anyone who doesn't know about this check out the video on the main page.

For example I want to load firefox i do this...

Press [Win/Special Key] + [Space Bar] to activate Gnome-Do (obviously configurable) Then start typing the application name I need such as
"F" and i get the firefox application.

You can also create plugins so I could for example type in the name of something and search google, a torrent, my emails, firefox bookmarks etc.
and then i get the results in the gnome-do task bar and then can choose to download one from a list, or search etc. its super fast and easy to use.

If gnome-do or similar isn't available for the pandora or no-one is working on this i'd totally be up for working on something as i love this kind of interface and think the pandora would be awesome to use with this.

 

[skeezix]

Yep, that would be fine indeed. Although I really think a menu isn't the ideal way to start applications (small icons, too many submenus, etc).

But should be valid, of course.

There was a poll a little while ago: should PND files be listed in the organized menu, or just dumped to the desktop. The majority voted menu, but it sounds like you would have voted desktop. I'm sure someone will come up with a way to please everyone, even if it's a config switch which simply asks "menu or desktop?"

I had a brainfart right after posting that poll and ended up implementing it (may Crom have mercy on our souls.) I forked the dirs -- you put apps in /pandora/menu or /pandora/desktop and thus the decision is up to the user, and not automated based on filters (which seemed too unreliable/weird.) Piece of cake

jeff

 

[ashdjones]

I had a brainfart right after posting that poll and ended up implementing it (may Crom have mercy on our souls.) I forked the dirs -- you put apps in /pandora/menu or /pandora/desktop and thus the decision is up to the user, and not automated based on filters (which seemed too unreliable/weird.) Piece of cake

jeff

What if I want them in both? Is there a 'both' folder too?

 

[skeezix]

You could easily modify the searchpath for one or the other to include the others (or additional) directories, or other tricks. I mulled over something, but people can copy the file to both (ugh), or muddle with confs if they want to be nutty

jeff

 

[WizardStan]

/me nominates putting them in simply "/pandora/" means both

 

[WizardStan]

You could easily modify the searchpath for one or the other to include the others (or additional) directories, or other tricks. I mulled over something, but people can copy the file to both (ugh), or muddle with confs if they want to be nutty

Interesting question then, on copying them to different directories: would they still have the same config/save/whatever paths? Could you start something from the menu, play a bunch, save, and then start it off the desktop and resume? Or is that not intrinsically supported?

 

[dflemstr]

You could easily modify the searchpath for one or the other to include the others (or additional) directories, or other tricks. I mulled over something, but people can copy the file to both (ugh), or muddle with confs if they want to be nutty

Interesting question then, on copying them to different directories: would they still have the same config/save/whatever paths? Could you start something from the menu, play a bunch, save, and then start it off the desktop and resume? Or is that not intrinsically supported?

The overlay for each PND is identified by its UID, so each unique PND is coupled to its "storage space" forever.

 

[ashdjones]

/me nominates putting them in simply "/pandora/" means both

This sounds like just the ticket.

 

[dflemstr]

/me nominates putting them in simply "/pandora/" means both

This sounds like just the ticket.

IIRC, pndnotifyd scans folders recursively so that's a no-go. Or, well, that can be changed of course, but having recursive notification is pretty nice if you want to sort your PNDs into folders etc.

 

[skeezix]

I could pretty easily add a 'both' folder, but is it important? ie: just a conf change for the default setup, and couldn't hurt I suppose.

Or I could leave 'apps' as "both".

jeff

 

[dflemstr]

I could pretty easily add a 'both' folder, but is it important? ie: just a conf change for the default setup, and couldn't hurt I suppose.

Or I could leave 'apps' as "both".

"desktop" → onto the desktop + menu
"apps" → to the menu only

Sounds irrational but that's what would be more comfortable in the long run, methinks. Because as I understand it, almost nobody will want to have their apps on the desktop.

 

[ashdjones]

I could pretty easily add a 'both' folder, but is it important? ie: just a conf change for the default setup, and couldn't hurt I suppose.

Or I could leave 'apps' as "both".

jeff

Yes please. I'm an indecisive guy sometimes, so I see myself dropping them in /pandora/apps by default, then moving them to /pandora/apps/menu or /pandora/apps/desktop later as needed. Otherwise i'm forced to decide... 'menu or desktop?' every time.

 

[skeezix]

Considering your average Windows desktop, quite a few people like to keep handy stuff on their desktop. *Shrug*

Besiders, double-tap to launch, with finger, is pretty handy

 

[ashdjones]

Considering your average Windows desktop, quite a few people like to keep handy stuff on their desktop. *Shrug*

Besiders, double-tap to launch, with finger, is pretty handy

I'm likely to have a lot of apps though. I knocked up a Xubuntu based virtual machine at the Pandorea resolution, and even with small icons and text you can only fit about 25 apps on it. I have two 16 GB memory cards, you better believe i'll be downloading dozens and dozens of apps onto each one.

I notice though that .desktop files work in any folder. To make more available I made an 'apps' folder on the desktop and just opened that up in the file browser... which supports big icons and single click launching. Can the targets be changed? For example, instead of /home/me/desktop it could be /home/me/desktop/apps ? Maybe even seperate folders for catagories?