i think i officially owe the list an apology (this is long)

i am very sorry for my post about galeon last night, i think a lot of it
was due to high expectations and  that i didn't have any galeon web
browser available.  i switched to fedora about feb. 2 because the data
structures class that i'm taking is done completely in java and that the
eclipse ide didn't run reliably in an un-updated rh7.3 install, since rh
stopped supporting 7.3; up2date doesn't work for 7.3 anymore.

that was an explanation, not a justification.

so, i very sincerely apologize for my post and i would like to thank
michael torrie for his post explaining some of my misgivings and also
for the tone of his post, which, given the acerbic tone of mine, was
remarkably restrained and at the same time, very informative.

thank you, michael, you are asset to the galeon community, and to gnome
and open source, also, i imagine.

i would like to ask, however, why galeon didn't pick up any icons?
 everytime i bookmarked a website in galeon 1.2.14, that icon was there
when i went to the bookmark editor, and the bookmark editor also had an
function that said "fetch icon for website".

the places that i bookmarked last night were:
ar15.com, fulton armory, the university of maryland, blackboard.umd.edu,
paypal,
sourceforge. none of these pulled an icon from the respective site. nor
did the website icon show in the address bar.  i was expecting that.

i have a topped off, up to date fedora core 3 install, with the
exception of open office and a couple of (32) i18n kde language
packages. 
i installed galeon 1.3.19 after everything was updated.

granted, my knowledge of gnome and how it interacts with gtk and apps
isn't the most extensive.

i do think that if it something like a bonobo setting doesn't get set
and it merits inclusion in the readme, given the esoteric knowledge of
the developer, (by 'esoteric' i mean knowledge that is typically
beyond the scope of an average application user, not in the pejorative
sense) this task should be taken care of during the installation of the
application, not after the user has installed it in the default location
chosen by the developer, and created a custom launcher and clicked on it
and then be confronted with an error message stating that a setting is
missing and then have to go back and track down the source and solution.

my bonobo installation is in the place where it was supposed to be. 
one of the things that is stressed in my cs classes is what should be
left to the user and what shouldn't, and in my opinion, the bonobo
setting is something that shouldn't be left to the user.  the only
indication that i got that galeon relied on bonobo was in this error
message and in the readme.

to my discredit, i don't know what bonobo is, and the only thing i know
about it other than the fact that galeon needs it, is, when i shut down
my computer in runlevel 3, that there are a couple of error messages
that say bonobo leaked a couple of object refs.

again to my discredit, i failed to read the readme.extraprefs.  when i
did that today, i felt that, if there were this many extra prefs that
were 'settable' in a configuration file,it would be better suited to
have these included in a gui-based preferences panel, like galeon 1.2.14
did.

these setting are significant settings, and, these are all set in a
directory:

apps/galeon/UI
apps/galeon/Browsing
apps/galeon/Advanced

this seems to contradict the fact that these are global gnome settings:
(this is a section from the readme.extraprefs file)

Downloading and Mailing
-----------------------

Automatic downloading:

	/apps/galeon/Handlers/Downloading/ask_for_download_dir (bool)
	Ask which directory to download files into
	(default=true)
	
	/apps/galeon/Handlers/Downloading/download_dir (string)
	The default download directory
	(default=<users home directory>)

External Download program:
	
	/apps/galeon/Handlers/Downloading/external_downloader (bool)
	Set to TRUE to use an external download program
	(default=false)

	/apps/galeon/Handlers/Downloading/external_download_command
	The command to run to download a url (%s is replaced with the url)
	(default="darxget %s")

	/apps/galeon/Handlers/Downloading/external_download_terminal
	Whether to open the downloader in a terminal
	(default=false)

Alternative Mail program:

	/apps/galeon/Handlers/Programs/gnome_mailer (bool)
	By default the GNOME mailer will be used, set this preference
	to FALSE to use an alternative.
	(default=true)

	/apps/galeon/Handlers/Programs/mailer (string)
	The program to use for handling mailto links when not using
	the gnome-mailer (no default)
	(See documentation for support % expansions)

Misc
----

History expiry
	/apps/galeon/Browsing/History/expire (int)
	The number of days to keep the history for
	(default=30)


Misc Mozilla prefs
------------------

Cache compare:
	/apps/galeon/Advanced/Network/cache_compare (int)
	When to compare cached copy to web copy
	0: once per session
	1: every time
	2: never
	3: automatic (default)
	(mozilla pref: browser.cache.check_doc_frequency)

HTTP Version
	/apps/galeon/Advanced/Network/http_version (int)
	0: HTTP Version 1.0
	1: HTTP Version 1.1 (default)
	(mozilla pref: network.http.version)

Proxy keepalives:
	/apps/galeon/Advanced/Network/proxy_keepalive
	Whether to enable keepalive connections through proxys
	(default: true)
	(mozilla pref: network.http.proxy.keep-alive)



again, i would like to say that i am sincerely sorry for my post to the
list,  much of what i said was poorly thought-out and thought-through,
badly formatted, and generally disrespectful, and probably the biggest
crime of all, down right rude.  for this last offense, i accept complete
responsiblity, and i admit a grave failure to my fellow users and
teachers, for although i have been using linux for about 5 years and am
a complete linux nut, i remain a newbie at heart and in spirit, because
i learn something new each day, and sometimes those lessons are painful
and embarassing, like today, they are most valuable.  the greatest
strength and aspect of this community is that even though you can ask
the simplest question, someone is always willing to help and teach.

so, finally, i humbly ask your forgiveness and your permission to remain
part of the list.

sincerely,
philip dahlquist


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