[Panel-devel] Plasma desktop/groups/roles/privs/security/etc

[Wade Olson]

Sure, mostly.

Personal:  Let's say that p0z3r has the coolest plasma/desktop setup
around (highly unlikely, but stick with me).  Not only does
GetHotNewStuff allow applet downloads, but it allows for
full-configuration downloads (with necessary security sandboxing).

You download p0z3r's config file, and it sets itself up, and will
automagically pull any needed applets to complete the configuration. 
Most likely the conversion has some new gaussian blur effect that
refocuses when the new plasma layout is in place.  The kids go crazy.

Or it's a family machine, and you want the kids to get their SpongeBob
plasma applet, but not Wade Olson's Playmate of the Month image
viewer.  Or you freeze the start menu and desktop icons for the other
family members because your wife just deleted the shortcut to FireFox
for the 12th time this month.

Business: Let's say that Novell finally wakes up and realizes that
they need to go with KDE for Novell Linux Desktop (NLD), their basic
business productivity desktop.  The system administrators/desktop
support people think about:
* having more ACL/chmod access than you do as a user
* Want to lock you into 1...n virtual desktops, 0...n applets
* Want to have a standard plasma default for new installs/new users
* Want to allow some applets (weather), force some (RSS for example to
get company news), and blacklist others (aseigo's CPU-intensive
hamsterdance applet)
* Want to lockdown the start-menu or other Active Directory things
that kicker currently does
* Want to preconfigure and freeze the desktop because they're having
user work through a terminal server/thin client setup
* Want to do AD-boot things like hide the kicker all-together and
launch Firefox/Konqueror for their web-based app and launch Kontact,
and nothing else, because you lazy $9/hour employees don't deserve
anything else.
* Want to cap kick-arse accelerations and effects at a certain point,
because most dekstops come with lame shared-memory graphics
controllers.  So small effects (let's arbitrarily call them level 1
intensive effects) are ok, but Zack's virtual desktop cube rotation is
right out (maybe level 5 intensive effects).

Or Replace Novell with RedHat and replace NLD deployment with Kickstart.

http://www.novell.com/documentation/nld/index.html?page=/documentation/nld/nld_deployment/data/front.html

In other words, corporate security, predployment packaging and
configuration, deployment flexibility and post-deployment control. 
The types of things Novell might recommend for desktop flexibility so
they can conquer simple mass deployment markets like basic business
desktops and school installations (terminal and otherwise).

Wade


On 9/12/05, Aaron J. Seigo <aseigo at kde.org> wrote:
> On Monday 12 September 2005 01:08, Wade Olson wrote:
> > I apologize if this topic has already been discussed, but is anything
> > being considered for Plasma from a roles/privs level?  In particular,
> > I'm thinking about Active Directory/Kiosk type features.
> 
> kicker already supports locking down individual panels, buttons and applets as
> well as the whole configuration. we will need to continue to support such
> configuration requirements in kde4.
> 
> > But is this the layer to do some AD-type "stuff"?  Maybe not desktop
> > deployment "stuff", but restrictions on kicker and preconfigurations
> > and such?
> 
> the one area that isn't covered very well right now is preconfigurations. it
> would be very nice to be able to save and restore applet configurations so
> that one can switch between plasma layouts quickly and easily.
> 
> this may actually become a requirement for the multiple desktop layout feature
> that is planned.
> 
> does that cover what you were thinking of, or did you have other thoughts as
> well?
> 
> --
> Aaron J. Seigo
> GPG Fingerprint: 8B8B 2209 0C6F 7C47 B1EA  EE75 D6B7 2EB1 A7F1 DB43
> 
> Full time KDE developer sponsored by Trolltech (http://www.trolltech.com)
> 
> 
>