Re: [rox-devel] New applet for removable media

On Fri, 14 May 2010 18:38:07 +0100
Abrolag <[email protected]> wrote:

> On Wed, 7 Apr 2010 18:40:57 +0100
> Tony Houghton <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> > I could upload a tarball I suppose, but it would be better if someone
> > else could take it over TBH. I'm afraid I lost interest in it because I
> > prefer GNOME/Nautilus to ROX these days. I fear ROX looks headed the
> > same way as RISC OS :-(.
> 
> Where can rox media be got from? How far were you able to get with it?

http://rox.git.sourceforge.net/git/gitweb.cgi?p=rox/Media;a=summary

I'd call it working and quite usable. One thing I was going to add but
didn't get round to, was a friendly way to edit the FS-specific mount
options, eg flush for FAT [1], but it uses some standard (but probably
deprecated) gconf options in /system/storage/default_options/ which you
can edit with gconf-editor etc.

It would also be nice to have options for what to do with "special"
media eg blank discs, audio CDs, DVD videos.

> I must say I disagree with your comparison to RISC OS. Rox has no
> unique hardware platform that it is dependent on. Also I find I dislike
> Gnome more and more with every iteration. Lately, they seem to be in
> competition with Microsoft when it comes to forcing their preferences
> for the desktop on the poor user :(

What it has in common with RISC OS is that it seems to have lost
developers' interest and there isn't enough work being done to keep it
competitive with the mainstream. Nautilus alone has many useful features
that rox-filer doesn't, eg browsing of Windows networks without the
extra hassle of defining cifs mount points. And I find it more usable
than ROX, because some of its conventions don't fit in when all the rest
of your applications weren't designed from a RISC OS perspective, like
encumbering the popup menu with stuff that would usually go in a menu
bar, and especially failing to replace the previous selection when you
right-click on something else.

I find I can get GNOME to do what I want, even if I have to find
"hidden" options with gconf-editor or replace metacity with xfwm4 or
compiz (although ccsm looks as if it was written to try to prove the
metacity developers were right about configurability). But that's all
easier than installing ROX TBH. And PC performance has increased faster
than GNOME bloat has.

[1] Or I could have hardwired that.

-- 
TH * http://www.realh.co.uk

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