Gnome drop-down menus?

[ZiaTioN]

Does anyone know how to stop gnome from alphabetizing the menu items in the Applications menu? I am using Alacarte to edit the menus but when I place the menu items in the order I like, gnome tells me to shut up and orders them how it wants to (alphabetically).

[Void Main]

It works for me. What version of Fedora are you running? I think you might need FC5 (or higher). I believe GNOME 2.12 or higher might be required based on this thread:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=67782

I am running GNOME v2.14 in FC5.

[ZiaTioN]

I am running FC4 still so that is probably it. I will try to upgrade my gnome in FC4 if I can. If not, I will just have to suffer the sorting until my mac comes in...

[worker201]

I am running FC4 still so that is probably it. I will try to upgrade my gnome in FC4 if I can. If not, I will just have to suffer the sorting until my mac comes in...

...at which time you can install a PPC Linux and have the same Gnome problems all over again!

[Void Main]

I would upgrade to FC5 before upgrading GNOME by itself. That's a piece of cake.

[ZiaTioN]

FC5 really craps out on a dual head setup which is imperative for my job. That is why I have to run FC4 for now. Now that I think about it, FC4 is not much better with a dual head setup but at least it works where it doesn't work at all in FC5.

[worker201]

What about FC5 makes it "crap out" with a dual head?

[Void Main]

FC5 really craps out on a dual head setup which is imperative for my job. That is why I have to run FC4 for now. Now that I think about it, FC4 is not much better with a dual head setup but at least it works where it doesn't work at all in FC5.

What exactly are you having trouble with?

[ZiaTioN]

Well, when a dual head is configured, you can not drag windows (guil shell's web browsers, etc) from one screen to the other unless you have it set to spanning. When set to spanning the desktop is split in two and spread across the two monitors. This looks extremely gay if you have a desktop wallpaper set. If you choose not to have to look at such a monstrosity every day and not use spanning, the two monitors are treated as basically two seperate users on two seperate desktops. So if you launch FireFox in one and try to launch it in another, the lock file gets in the way and FF asks you to create another user profile.

Now your bookmarks will be different (except for the fact that I just symlink one to the other to get around this). This is the same for most apps, like Thunderbird email client. When I save something to desktop, it doesn't show up on either desktop until I restart X and then and only then it shows up on the primary desktop only (which is fine for me). But when I shut the system down and start it back up I have to disconnect the extended vga cable and let my laptop boot up completely, then plug the cable back in and then log in to X and reconfigure the dual head each and every time. I then have to log out and log in like 2 or 3 times before the dual head is treated as a dual head again. Until this happens, the second head shows an exact replica of what is going on on the first head. If I move my mouse on the first screen it moves on the second screen, when it shouldn't even be there until I drag it across heads.

The task bars always freak out on me too. You know how in FC3 and above, you have the dual task bars. One on top and one on bottom? Well every time I go through the process of starting up my system and plugging and unplugging the cable and logging in and out of X, my tasks bars both jump to the top. Now I have competing tasks bars one on top of the other and it takes a surgeon's hand to get the one that is suppose to be on bottom to show without the one on top so I can send it back down to the bottom.

There is more than just this but these are some of the things that annoy me the most. My co-worker runs FC5 and he says that he can not even get FC5 to support a dual head setup. He uses it mainly to enlarge his viewing area by using his lcd screen for a monitor because FC5 always shows the exact same thing on both heads, kinda like FC4 does upon intial startup.

I am not sure if he has gone through the "stand on one leg and bark like a dog" routine I have to go throgh every time I start mine up. Maybe if he did he could get it to limp along like FC4 but it sounds like there have been no major improvements from 4 to 5 so there is no need for me to upgrade. This whole situation is the exact reason why I have to abondon my Linux laptop for a mac. The mac dual head support is simply flawless.

[Void Main]

What graphics chipset are you running? Are you running the Xorg drivers or proprietary drivers?

[ZiaTioN]

Yeah I am using the default xorg drivers and am not sure what the chipset is. It is a crappy IBM thinkpad. Is there a way to show the chipset?

[Void Main]

Yeah, I'm using a Thinkpad as well. "lspci" shows the chipsets. This is what I have:

Code: Select all

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon Mobility M7 LW [Radeon Mobility 7500]


I see there were issues with the xorg ati driver but the updated driver is supposed to fix some things. It's funny that a guy I work with just set up dual head on his thinkpad yesterday but on FC4. I will see what I can do with FC5.

[Void Main]

Ok, I give up. Dual head on a Thinkpad with the version of Xorg that comes with FC5 sucks. The same card in another Thinkpad on FC4 works fine.

[ZiaTioN]

Yep, same chipset:

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon Mobility M7 LW [Radeon Mobility 7500]

When you say it works fine on FC4, do you mean that you do not have to do the song and dance I outlined above when starting the system?

[Void Main]

Nope, it starts right up as far as I know. I'm sure he would have told me if he had those kinds of problems. He comes in every morning and docs up and his onboard LCD comes up and then his external LCD comes up without pleading with any gods. Do you have your BIOS set to boot with both internal and external ports active? Not that I think that should matter. Do you see any odd error messages in your /var/log/Xorg.0.log that might lead to the source of the problem?