GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 634245
remove NoDisplay=true
Last modified: 2013-03-26 13:39:00 UTC
NoDisplay=true was added in: +2005-08-11 Bryan Clark <clarkbw@cvs.gnome.org> + + * data/evince.desktop.in.in: Hide menu entry and + rename it to "Document Viewer". Fix for bug + #312399. + This made some sense in a document centric system model but doesn't really make any sense in the app centric GNOME 3. It also makes it hidden from application search.
IMHO it should stay. Evince continues to use a document centric model (one process per document), even if the shell is app centric. Also, changing the desktop file would also show it in the non-shell gnome3-to-gnome2 fallback. I think if the shell wants to show it, it can just ignore NoDisplay.
We cannot just ignore NoDisplay. It is used for all kinds of crap. You really want evince to not show up in application search ?
Yes, why would it show up? It's not an app you start to create a new document, it's a viewer which you activate when you already have a file.
Or you start and then select a recent document from the file menu or open a new one. Going forward I'd like the default view when started without an argument to present the recent documents graphically.
See bug 633501 about that. However, I thought I read somewhere that the shell was going to present 'recent documents' itself, instead of relying on the user first remembering which app he used, then open that, then search which file it was? Also, let me again ask what happens for the fallback case when using the gnome2 experience instead of shell? Changing NoDisplay would change that, too.
(In reply to comment #4) > Or you start and then select a recent document from the file menu or open a new > one. Going forward I'd like the default view when started without an argument > to present the recent documents graphically. In fact, bug #633501 is exactly about that.
If you're really sure you want the 'app centric' approach for gnome3 (which IMO is totally broken), this could be done by using "ShowOnlyIn=GNOME3;" instead of just removing NoDisplay altogether.
GNOME 2, going forward, will be designed as a GNOME 3 fallback mode. We want to minimize the differences and especially don't want to have separate interaction paradigms. When the user picks "Document Viewer" from the GNOME 2 panel they should expect the exact same experience that I've described above - getting a helpful screen of recent documents to select by default. BTW, I discovered this bug just the other day. I was viewing the Linux Plumber's conference schedule after downloading it from the web. I closed it at some point and wanted it back. I had no idea of the name because it wasn't a file that I chose the name for. We don't yet have the "Finding and Reminding" document work implemented. So I went to find the document viewer and grab the file from the recently used list there. I wasn't able to find the document viewer on my system because it explicitly hides itself from me. When the "finding and reminding" work lands there will be a bit more possibility for document centric workflows than we have now. But, there is really very little cost (none?) in showing the app in the app list and search. You are still free to work in a document based way in GNOME 2.
I've removed NoDisplay in the Fedora package for now. Should happen upstream too, though.
Why not use the suggestion from comment 7 ?
GNOME3 is not a valid value for OnlyShowIn
Well, duh! The proposal would of course mean that it would _become_ an accepted value, and that gnome-shell would interpret it accordingly.
I don't think it makes much sense, tbh. We also want evince to show up in the panel menus in fallback mode. Removing NoDisplay is the straightforward way to achieve this.
[Removing GNOME3.0 target as decided in release-team meeting on March 03, 2011. This report has an "important" categorisation for GNOME3.0 but is not considered a hard blocker. For querying use the corresponding whiteboard entry added.]
Why is this important for evince and not for eog? The rationale after adding NoDisplay=true in eog was exactly the same as far as I remember.
actually, with the new gnome-Documents, it does not make sense to me to implement bug #633501 and so probably it also does not make sense to remove the NoDisplay=true. Thoughts?
There are possible problems if evince is not shown in the application search. For example, I installed mendeley which also handles pdf, and is chosen as the default application for pdf during the installtion process. Since evince is not listed in the application search, I can't change the default application back to evince in file properties. I have to manually edit ~/.local/share/applications/mimeapps.list. Anyway, if application search can ignore the NoDisplay field at least for "Recommended applications", the "NoDisplay=true" is not a problem for such case.
*** Bug 691631 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Coming back to this old bug. I would very much like to have "NoDisplay=true" removed as I cannot use the nautilus properties to assign PDF docs to evince (by default they would have opened with The Gimp).
*** Bug 693448 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 694693 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
I agree!!! Hiding from the menu is one thing, I can understand that. But right now it is IMPOSSIBLE to make Evince as default PDF viewer without using the command line! This is in my opinion a no-go! As long as the application search hides .desktop-entries with NoDisplay set, I think it is much more annoying for users, if they can not set evince as default PDF application, than finding a more or less useless evince-entry in the menu. I wasted several hours of time to track that problem why it is not shown in the default-applications. And I am not a novice! I bet 90% of the average users would have resigned and chosen some other pdf viewer.
here is the corresponding bug in e.g. Arch Linux Forums: https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/32722#close
Fedora and Debian/Ubuntu are both carrying downstream patches to remove the NoDisplay=true line. Could we do the same change upstream instead? Seems silly to patch something like this downstream.
Created attachment 239488 [details] [review] evince.desktop: Remove the NoDisplay line The NoDisplay=true made sense in a document centric system model but in the app centric GNOME 3, we want it to show up in the menu and in app search.
Review of attachment 239488 [details] [review]: Fair enough, pushed to git master, thanks.