| Name: |
AUI Follow-ons
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| Answers: |
Are there high value, low cost mini-projects worth pursuing to
carry forward the work of the Athena User Interface Project?
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| Timeframe: |
Some value might be added in Athena patch releases soon after 9.0
is delivered. Some, like Nautilus involve waiting for third party
software to mature, and then making the effort to do the user-visible
migration and integration at the next regularly scheduled Athena
release.
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| Impact: |
Enhance Athena's ease of use.
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| Deliverables: |
The Athena User Interface Discovery and Delivery projects made
extensive review of what could be done. Summary information is
available in the AUI For Athena
9.0 Mini Project Plan. Details on the prioritization and
rationale behind components can be found in AUI
Components.
Item 8 was deemed too much effort for insufficient value for mention
in the 9.0 Mini Project plan, but would be the next item an interested
student could be assigned to work on.
Proposed in priority order:
- File Browser -- Integration of a mature and stable Nautilus
file browsing GUI into Athena release.
- Printing -- A GUI application for printer control.
- Zephyr -- A GUI application for Zephyr control and
communication.
- Configuration Tool -- Easy Athena account configuration
(printing options, lockers to add, etc.)
- XMH Replacement -- A better mail reader than xmh. See Email Client mini-project.
- Kerberos -- An applet for monitoring Kerberos ticket lifetime.
- Discuss -- A GUI application for reading Discuss.
- Moira -- GUI-based Moira control (mailing lists, etc.).
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| Resources: |
- File Browser
- From 2 weeks to 6 weeks (most likely 4 weeks) programmer time
for integration into Athena and making sure required functionality is
robust.
- Expect a 4 month testing period where addressing issues in Nautilus
consumes between 25% and 50% of the bug fixing resources on Athena.
(Nautilus is big, and has many libraries.)
- Printing -- drag and drop printing would be part of the File
Browser work. A GUI lprm/lpq tool would be 2 - 6 weeks (most likely
3 weeks) student programmer time.
- Zephyr -- From 4 to 12 weeks (most likely 8 weeks) student
programmer time.
- Configuration Tool -- Scope is an issue here. Something simple
could be done with two weeks of student effort. But putting a lot of
effort into changing the user experience might take as long as 16
weeks of student programmer effort.
- XMH Replacement -- See Email
Client mini-project.
- Kerberos -- 1 to 3 weeks (most likely 2 weeks) to produce this
simple tool. grenew program is done. Notifier is under development.
- Discuss -- 2 to 6 weeks (most likely 4 weeks) student developer
time to write, and test this.
- Moira -- 2 to 6 weeks (most likely 4 weeks) student developer
time to write, and test this.
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