GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 331919
Change Totem's entry in the GNOME menu
Last modified: 2009-06-06 19:52:57 UTC
Totem's menu entry is currently "Movie Player". The name of the program appears to have been intentionally removed: "Totem is the default GNOME media player so no need to say its name" (from changelog) The problem I have with that is that it is not consistent with a number of other entries in the same and other menus. Examples are: Rhythmbox Music Player Serpentine Audio-CD Creator Gaim Internet Messenger Evolution Mail Epiphany Web Browser I totally agree that in compliance with the HIG guidelines, the menu entry should be descriptive, but I think that it is also important for the menu entry to contain the name of the program (unless the program doesn't have a identicative name (as with Image Viewer, Sound Recorder etc). The problem becomes particularly intense when the user has another Movie Player installed. For example I have Xine installed, and so I have "Movie Player" and "Xine Movie Player" in the menu. I really think that consistency is important, and I don't think that the fact that Totem is the default player makes any difference here. Lastly, it is nice to know the name of the program you are using, it gives you a sense of association with the app. As long as the entry has a functional description as well, I feel this is a good approach. I therefore propose that the menu entry for Totem is changed to "Totem Movie Player". The string is already present in the po files, so there shouldn't be any need for a string change exception, if the developers agree with me. Thanks for reading! Matt
It will say "Epiphany Web Browser" because Epiphany isn't the default browser chosen by your distribution. The stock version will say just "Web Browser". If you use a Fedora Core, you will also see "Instant Messenger" for Gaim (which might collide with Gossip), "EMail" for Evolution (which might collide with KMail, or Thunderbird), or "Archive Manager" for file-roller (which might collide with Karchive), etc. The bottom line is that programs in the GNOME desktop release should not brand their application name. If you think that's wrong, feel free to bring it up on the desktop-devel-list, or simply change it locally on your system.
Where is it stated that the default app has its name omitted? So far as I can tell the HIG (specifically http://library.gnome.org/devel/hig-book/stable/desktop-application-menu.html.en) clearly dictates the form "AppName Description" (modulo removal of unnecessary words like "GNOME" and "Client") unless 1) "AppName" and "Description" are the same (modulo common sense e.g. gedit "Text Editor"), or 2) there's no "Description" appropriate for a menu entry (e.g. most games). Neither of these apply to Totem and nowhere does the HIG mention default apps.