Re: Templates directory looks pretty bare

[Jeff Waugh <jdub perkypants org>]

<quote who="Jamie McCracken">

> > Please see previous threads (and most usefully, the original thread) about
> > Templates support for some discussion about why this won't happen. We will
> > end up with the same kind of complicated mess we have with menus if we ship
> > templates by default and allow applications to 'register' their own.
> 
> But apps can "register" anyhow by simply copying a blank file to the
> templates folder when they are installed. The only thing missing is a
> user friendly description of the file (having things like "unknown.txt"
> is not as friendly as "Create Text File") 

Any app that installs to /home/*/Templates/ (obviously a stupid guess in
itself) is EVIL. Whether it was an app (bad) or an admin/user (good) doing
the install, there's no reason why they couldn't use sane names. These
issues are not connected.

> > That's why only ~/Templates is read, and why it's left entirely up to
> > the user (in their home directory), admin or distribution (in
> > /etc/skel).
> 
> It would be nicer if the Home Templates folder was hidden (in say
> ~/.nautilus/Templates) and a menu entry for "Add to Templates" was added
> to the selection popup in Nautilus - its not obvious at all to users what
> the Templates folder in the Home folder does nor is it obvious how to add
> such templates to Nautilus. I'm happy to do the work for this if Alex
> agrees it would be useful.

a) it's up to the admin or distro as to whether Templates is in /etc/skel

b) the Templates folder is visible so users can interact with it easily,
same as Desktop

c) perhaps the 'Create Document' menu could include a menu item to open the
'Templates' directory (the existence of the 'Create Document' menu item is
based on the existence of the 'Templates' directory to begin with), and I'm
sure the previous discussions about templates support covered this issue

d) changing the location of Templates would be an interface breakage anyway

It would be nice if it were more discoverable, but if it's in the docs, and
up to admins and distros to provide if they want to, the current system is
fine. Like the scripts support, it's a cool trick people can learn about
GNOME as they get more familiar with it.

- Jeff

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