Contributor jrusinek

It really needs one. :)

Currently it is very difficult to setup and control access to shared folders without editing conf files and reading detailed instructions on all the variables. I propose that sharing (specifically Samba) be given a well worked GUI and some real TLC to bring it up to standard with the experience on Windows or OS X.

For example, by default a share should be accessible as Read Only by anyone on the network without a username or password (guest access). While guest access should be turned on by default, it should also be easy to turn it off, and if desired to give guests read/write access to the folder.

You should also be able to specify local users who will have read/write access, and these local users should sync with smb users invisibly (ie: the user doesn't need to know that there are two password databases being used).

I propose the Properties window for a folder should contain a Sharing tab with all the options available to choose. I also propose a Shared Folders option in the Preferences menu should list the currently shared folders along with their settings, and provide a button to take you into the dialogue where you can set the options.

I guess everybody has experienced the rather long boot up times in Ubuntu (particularly with laptops). I know they are already working on it, but the change from feisty to gutsy was a pain in the ass in terms of boot up speed.
A default WinXP installation beats Ubuntu's boot up time by far!! That shouldn't be allowed fellas!!

I therefore propose to the development team (both Ubuntu and by extension Gnome)to work on the improvement of boot up times in Ubuntu systems.

First of all: What is the difference between Preferences and Administration? For example: why do I see 'Encryption and Keyrings' in Preferences and 'Keyring Manager' in Administration? What is the difference between 'Default Printer' and 'Printing'? Why do I have to disable the Tracker under Sessions and not under Search and Indexing? And why are these menu's so large? I have 24 items in Preferences (they don't even fit on my screen!) and 18 items in Administration. To put all this stuff in a popup menu is bad interface design imho. Besides, the number of option should be much smaller. A few suggestions:

- Merge 'Screensaver', 'Screen Resolution' and 'Screens and Graphics'.
- Merge 'Network', 'Network Proxy' and 'Network Tools'.
- Merge 'Update Manager, Synaptic Package Manager, Software Sources'.
- Merge 'Encryption and Keyrings', 'Authorizations', 'Keyring Manager'.


Below are all settings I can visit via the System menu. This is just way too much.


-- Preferences --
Universal Access
About Me
Appearance
Bluetooth
Default Printer
Encryption and Keyrings
Keyboard
Keyboard Shortcuts
Main Menu
Mouse
Network Proxy
PalmOS Devices (I don't have one)
Power Management

[....]

As a seasoned user of the terminal, the issue of an application having an icon embedded into it is something that I didn't even notice until I started converting others to Ubuntu. I propose adding a non-obtrusive section to ELF applications that provides this functionality and can be accessed through GNOME's thumbnail capability. This idea is meant to compliment the icons provided through the package manager and take advantage of the extensibility of the ELF specification.

Many users expect applications that they've downloaded to have recognizable icons, this icon is usually something familiar from visiting the website for the program. A good example of an application that's not already included in the Ubuntu repo is "songbird", which has a large egg right next to the download link and for its Windows icon.

In addition, provided that this technology is adopted by different segments of the development community (GNOME, automake, and developers) then icon handling will no-longer require any action for packagers. GNOME could easily check the ELF binary for an icon, so no configuration file would be necessary for the appropriate icon to appear. By storing a GUID in the binary it would also be possible to theme icons for all system applications (over-riding the icon stored in the binary) by using the GUID as a unique id for matching the application with an icon stored in a theme.

For a technology demo and screenshots visit
http://www.compholio.com/elficon/

(NOTE: Modified 03/27/08 to clarify and better explain impact)

Many users want to have Computer, Network servers, Home folder and Trash icons on the desktop, but there is no easy way to put them on the desktop for a novice.

Beagle is the better tracker.
Ubuntu changed to tracker because beagle was slow and bloated, but that's not the case any more.
http://www.cywhale.de/2007/07/12/beagle-vs-tracker-beagle/


If you like this idea, also look at my other ideas

Ubuntu does not have a true "print screen" function as people know it, but a hack; if you hold "print screen" a little dialogue appears to save the screenshot; however you can see it's a hack if you, say, right-click the windowbar to make the list of options (minimize through close) appear, and then try to "print screen": it won't and can't do it. There are other ways to see that Ubuntu's "print screen" implementations is somewhat of a dirty hack, but this is sufficient.

I read on some thread that there is some kind of clipboard functionality in either the gnome or linux code on a dev thread for firefox somewhere (they can't do "copy picture" without that) and supposedly it should be fixed by now (the mozilla team says so, I think) yet those functions are yet to appear in ubuntu...at all: the same stuff preventing a true "print screen". Linux needs a true "clipboard" for true functionality: to actually copy web pics, to actually "print screen" as in "save screen" (which we all know it as), and so on...I was wanting to copy the menu to do a mock-up for a gui suggestion to improve the interface...and can't even use this basic operation to do this!

So it's worth for those who have the ability to check into the status of those features and what they depend on. You can read about the status for the moz team here:

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=234716

and the dependency [which are solved by now...so why isn't this fixed yet!!!?] here:

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=21747


The reason this stuff has been impossible is because the clipboard didn't support images; but if mozilla fixed this...then supposedly is based on the clipboard being fixed, and so many other features (like copying and pasting throughout the system) should also be fixed by now and enabled to use this functionality and not make graphics and document-layout work a pain and waste-of-time on linux anymore!

[....]

When i change some hardware pieces i need to configure them manually, ubuntu should recognize there has been a hardware change and configure it.

It's just redundant. The Places Menu works just fine and all it needs is the Trash option to be the same.

This is just one step in cleanup and organization of Ubuntu's UI. Personally, I think it's a bit clunky at the moment, but that can be fixed.

Right now we have three package managers: gnome-app-install, Synaptic, and the .deb installer.

Why can't these be one application?

give gnome-app-install a backend to handle .deb files, or give it an administrative mode where it has all the power tools that synaptic has. Start somewhere. But end with one spot to manage every application installed on my system, no matter how it got there.

As a side note, another idea was automated install of tarballs. I know this will never be a perfect system because not all tarballs use the generic install method. But maybe push for some way to seperate and deal with those who do use the generic method.

There should be absolutely no reason for anyone to say that its easier to install, manage, and update apps on any other platform than Linux!

Now this is probably subject to free formats etc, but the Print Screen screenshot application presently only allows saving in PNG format. This is great and all, but it would also be great to be able to save in other formats without needing to load up the GIMP every time.

Also, a checkbox option to create a thumbnail image file along with the screenshot (say, 160 x 128 or user-configurable) would be hugely beneficial and could be saved with a simple "_thumb" extension to the filename, eg:

Screenshot.png
Screenshot_thumb.png

Would save many minutes of work for those who do lots of illustrated documentation sites!

Red Hat Graphical Boot provides a clean and simple interface to the boot process

It's more than just a splash screen. It's real.
It shows a real progress bar.
It also allows you to maximize a window that displays the boot log.
It actually opens it automatically if there is a failure.
The reason why it's pretty is because it is running XOrg.
It's a special Xorg just for it which is turned off after a successful boot.

Take a look at:
http://ubuntuforums.org/g/images/430615/1_rhgb.png

Introduce a on-the-fly directory navigation in Nautilus context menu. This approach has been used in BeOS and is fantastic way of fast directory access even if one is buried deep in filesystem.

Here are screenshots from BeOS that illustrate the idea:
http://tinyurl.com/3e2tyu
http://tinyurl.com/2l5jlb

Please note that accessing directories the BeOS way eliminates the endless Spatial vs Single Window navigation problem.

Also KDE guys managed to incorporate this idea in a crippled way (only for Copy/Move operations, not for navigation).
See screenshot:
http://tinyurl.com/34pjo4

Right-click navigation is super fast. It is often as fast as command line with tab-completion. If you try it, you'll love it!

Fast, easy access to applications features is a major enabler.
Hunting for features from the menus is tiresome, slow, and generally inefficient if the feature is buried deep enough in the menu hierarchy.

Please add a keyboard shortcut for every feature that an application provides.

an example screenshot:
http://aquamacs.org/latex/menu_shortcuts.png

The only way to rename a file in Nautilus is to right click a file and then choose "Rename...". It will be much much more convenient if we have the ability to rename a file when clicked upon its name.

http://www.gnome-look.org/content/show.php/Aurora+Gtk+Engine?content=56438

it's so awesome. :] I think it should at the very least be in repos, but I think it'd be awesome if we could include it as an default option in the Appearance dialog.

Many projects related to Ubuntu are using the Tango icon guidelines: GNOME, Gimp, F-spot, OpenOffice, Firefox 3... just to name a few.

Currently Ubuntu's default icon theme is Human, which in turn is not based on the Tango Guidelines. This means that applications are not integrated into the lock and feel of the whole system as well as they could. Also, Human is not 100% complete, so it still uses some Tangoish icons from GNOME. This leads to a mix of Human, Tango and Old-GNOME look.

Ubuntu should provide a minimal Tango-based theme which just replaces some of the very visible icons, like folders for example. For the rest, either the GNOME or Tango icon theme can be used as a fallback. This way, Ubuntu would keep a special branding but very much improve the overall visual consistency of the OS.

1. add a filter bar (similar to finder/ explorer)
2. add tab support (optional)
3. convert the zoom button to a slider, move to buttom left
4. move view mode to the left of the slider, convert to buttons.
5. add "eject" button next to removable media.
6. see ubuntuforums url for mock-up

Evolution is sort of nice, but needs tons of work in order to be a competitive PIM.

for example, some actions can be:

1. remove week view, it is redundant to work week view, and provides less information.
2. integrate search-as-you-type.
3. switching between views it terribly slow.
4. Imap sync is problematic - synchronizing with google's imap gets you 3 junk email folders, 3 trash folders, etc.
5. add a counter to the number of items in each category, and the number of unread items. (in the left-side view).
6. remove the word "search" before the search filter, move it to the toolbar.
7. improve sync. with mobile devices.
8. Imap synch is very slow, compared to, for example, outlook.
9. fix the weather calendar to support countries other than the US. if not possible, remove it from evolution, and use an ical subscription.
10. allow easy access to additional ical subscriptions.
11. add smart calendaring formatting (like google calendar).
12. don't change the view when selecting a day in the mini month calendar. (very annoying. when I want to see what happens in the week a month from now, for example).
13. wrap around mail headers when using horizontal mode - currently the headers are not warper, but truncated, and the headers become very hard to read.
14. add clearer separators between the message headers.
15. allow adding more data sources for eds, so it will serve as the desktop personal data server
16. allow face browsing from contacts.
17. allow separation for components, for those of use that like to be able to view tasks and mail on the same time,
communication between the components can be done by using dbus, or simply querying eds