Re: new modules consensus

["Murray Cumming" <murrayc murrayc com>]

Havoc wrote:
> The latest thinking around Red Hat is that sysadmin *settings* are
> basically nonexistent for desktop. The sysadmin *tasks* include:
>  - monitoring and assisting with desktops, e.g. remote
>    desktop sharing, noticing hardware failures, replacing machines
>  - setting up *default* end user settings
>
> So the admin UI would be around these tasks or similar. The admin UI
> should be built around managing *multiple* machines,

Of course a focus on multiple machines will not make much sense for the
home user or laptop user with just one machine and one user.

> not editing
> a single system - editing one system is creating a future management
> headache by getting that system out of sync.

Yeah, sysadmining of large numbers of systems needs to be easier. But that
doesn't need to make it difficult for single machines to be setup (I'm
sure that's not what you mean).

Is there anything about g-s-t that makes you think that it would be
impossible in future to allow
1. A sysadmin to configure multiple computers/users.
2. A sysadmin to prevent users from overriding his work, or even being
aware that they could try. (After all, those users will not have the root
password).

Personally, I don't see a conflict.

> End users having to change systemwide settings in /etc for _desktops_ is
> a bug, and building UI for doing so is not the right fix.

How will I setup my dial-up or DSL without this? How will I add a user so
that my friend can use the same computer. Those might not be interesting
to RedHat's corporate customers, but there's clearly a large group of
users who need a way to do this.

[snip]
> the end goal should be that
> nothing in the "end user setting" category should require the root
> password, it's a bug if anything does. That means that end user settings
> can just be in control center or the panel.

Some end-user settings affect more than one user.

> Of course, we could simply not include gnome-system-tools in Red Hat, so
> if people don't agree with the basic premises here that's fine. I'm just
> trying to share the conclusions we've reached because I do think they
> apply to GNOME upstream as well.
>
> These conclusions are certainly a change from historical Red Hat
> thinking, no question. We've spent a lot of effort on end user
> system-config-* over the years. And many people at Red Hat probably
> don't even agree with me. But I think it's a compelling argument.


Murray Cumming
murrayc murrayc com
www.murrayc.com
www.openismus.com