ubuntu-phone team mailing list archive

[Jamie Strandboge <jamie@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On 07/18/2013 04:37 PM, Jamie Strandboge wrote:

> Another thought that I meant to mention before: this clearly works really well
> for the click package/Ubuntu SDK model, where everything is designed to work
> with this and all applications are confined, but what about the converged device
> with a non-Ubuntu-designed but otherwise perfectly useful application? Would it
> use standard desktop mimetypes? What about Ubuntu derivatives that may not share
> our application lifecycle, will click packages not work as well there?

Always fun talking to myself (part of the fun of designing a new system I guess)...

This should all work fine:

a) for apps designed for Ubuntu running in other desktop environments on
derivatives, the apps continue to use the Unity API. If the URL handling API is
using DBus, the app continues to use this API (likely via a library call so it
all happens transparently) regardless of DE and DBus service activation is used
for the URL handling service to launch the application (said service could
continue to use the upstart job, or could maybe do something different when run
under a different DE if that DE wanted to do something different), and it all
just works.

b) for "non-Ubuntu-designed but otherwise perfectly useful applications" (eg,
skype, libreoffice or firefox) on the converged device where they are designed
to work within a different security model (ie all applications within a user's
session are trusted as opposed to our appstore model where every application is
untrusted), they can always use the existing system which will continue to exist
and work (note, the existing system still allows for application confinement,
just usually with more permissive profiles). The software (or the underlying
libraries that the software uses) can always be patched to use the Unity APIs
(eg, for content picking or URL handling) when running under Unity/Ubuntu to
provide better desktop integration and to make them work within the confinement
model for appstore applications. These patches would also be upstreamed.

So, in talking myself through this, I'm convinced that though there is work
still to be done for the converged device, the design works fine there too. :)

-- 
Jamie Strandboge                 http://www.ubuntu.com/

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