Move "About" to quicklist

[Danielle Foré]

Move the About dialog to the quicklist like Files

[Harvey Cabaguio (harveycabaguio)]

I can't think of where else it could go, unless we really want to hide it and put all the about dialogs in the about plug.

[Cassidy James Blaede (cassidyjames)]

Can confirm this is the intended location. (Someone was asking in chat)

[David Gomes (davidgomes)]

So should we remove it from the context menu on the Terminal and have it solely as a quicklist? I think that kinda sucks because Terminal is currently made to work on different DEs. I'd like to have both options.

[Danielle Foré (danrabbit)]

AFAIK, quicklist items are now part of the XDG standard. They are at least supported across GNOME, Unity, and Pantheon.

I don't think it would be necessarily bad for Terminal if it appeared in both places. I wonder if there's a way to check your DE and show the menu item for legacy environments.

[Nathan Dyer (nathandyer)]

Piggy backing on what David was saying earlier, I'm not sure how I feel about this either. Does anyone actually look at quicklists? It almost seems like moving the About menu item there would be like hiding it from users unless they knew the right place to look.

[Danielle Foré (danrabbit)]

The main problem is this: We have apps (like Terminal, Files, Eidete, Audience, etc) that don't have an gear menu. We need a standard place to put the About dialog that works with any app design.

As it stands now, the About dialog contains mostly developer-facing information and actions: Version numbers, licensing, copyrights, translations, bug reports, etc. So arguable it's okay if this dialog isn't super obviously available in the app UI. However I do think it's important to be consistent about its location. Once somebody discovers it, they shouldn't have to rediscover it per app.

I'm open to other suggestions about where this dialog should go.

[Cassidy James Blaede (cassidyjames)]

To build on what Dan said, we're planning on also showing quicklist items in Slingshot. This means any time a user sees an "app," whether it's in the launcher or the dock, they can right-click it to get to the About dialog.

[Shawn McTear (syst3mfailur3)]

Just a lowly user (for now), but I agree that adding the About dialog the the quicklist is a good idea for all apps. Not only for consistency, but it also gives users an easy way check information about an app, regardless if the app as a appmenu or not. Same goes for adding it in slingshot.

Another possible thing to add to this is allow for it to be launched without the rest of the app loading. This way if an app happens to be misbehaving, a user can still easily get the app version and a link to report bugs.

Just my 2 cents.

[Julián Unrrein (junrrein)]

We would need to standardize on the string used. Eg "About $APP" versus simply "About".

[Julián Unrrein (junrrein)]

The "--about" command line option isn't recognized in Pantheon Photos, even though it uses Granite.Application. We need to check how it handles command line parameters.

[Cameron Norman (cameronnemo)]

@davidgomes So should we add a quicklist and keep the context menu action?

[Cody Garver (codygarver)]

Photos bounty: https://www.bountysource.com/issues/3710915-elemantary-photos-still-has-a-menubar