Fix the broken Window List in Vertical Panel

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cb474

Fix the broken Window List in Vertical Panel

Post by cb474 »

There is a long standing bug in Gnome, that the window list does not work correctly in vertical panels. If the panel is vertical and less than 30 pixels wide, the buttons display no useable information, just a ".." that makes every button look the same. There are also other problems with how the window list functions in vertical panels. This bug has existed without being fixed since 2002. See:

http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=86382

This really is my one great ongoing frustration with Linux, regardless of what distribution I use. I prefer Gnome as my desktop, but the window list has always been useless to me, since I want to orient my panels vertically and keep them as thin as possible (so as not to waste space on my laptop screen). I've just gotten into playing around with Linux Mint, after starting as an Ubuntu user and then shifting to Debian. I would be so grateful and love Linux Mint forever if it fixed this problem with window list and vertical panels.

I wish the text oriented vertically in the window list buttons, when the panel is vertical (or at least that there was an option for this) and displayed even when the panel is at its minimum 23 pixel setting.

I've tried applying the patch that is available in the bug report. But I'm not that sophisticated of a user and it's never worked out for me. I think it would be a great addition to Linux Mint to be the only distribution (as far as I know) that resolves this long standing bug in one of the most basic elements of Gnome.
Husse

Re: Window List in Vertical Panel Broken

Post by Husse »

This is something we have to live with because if we changed the behaviour it's gone with the next update to gnome....
And is really the difference between the minimum of 23 pixels and 30 when it starts behaving as you want really significant?
I would never want to use a vertical panel, but that's me :)
Topic moved to the suggestions section and subject slightly changed
cb474

Re: Fix the broken Window List in Vertical Panel

Post by cb474 »

Well, the behavior even at 30 pixels is pretty bad. At 30 pixels, you can see an icon, but not text, because it's still oriented horizontally.

That said, yes the difference between 23 pixels and 30 pixels does make a difference to me, because I'm working on a relatively small laptop. You can see in the Gnome bug report that a lot of other people care about this too. In any case, I know this isn't Mint's problem, but leaving it as is, as Gnome has chosen to do, seems pretty ridiculous to me. I can't imagine something more elemental than the window list, in a desktop. And to have certain conditions in which it is completely useless seems crappy on the level of something like Windows 95.

Again, I realize that this isn't really Mint's problem. I guess I'm turning to the Mint community on this one, just because when I was looking at the Mint website, it talked about how Mint can be very responsive to incorporating users suggestions fairly quickly. And it is clear, unfortunately, that the Gnome developers have completely abandoned this issue. I mean the bug report has existed since 2002!! So I was just hoping someone else might want to address it, even if it means having to put in the fix each time Gnome gets updated.

Ultimately I guess I just don't understand how something so basic can remain so broken for so long.
Husse

Re: Fix the broken Window List in Vertical Panel

Post by Husse »

The sad story is that there are a few upstream bugs we have to put up with and if you have an eeepc or some such I can understand that every pixel is important
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