Features/Gnome3.4

= GNOME 3.4 =

Summary
Update GNOME to the latest upstream release

Owner

 * Name: Matthias Clasen
 * Email: mclasen@redhat.com

Current status

 * Targeted release: Fedora 17
 * Last updated: 2012-03-28
 * Percentage of completion: 100%

GNOME 3.3.91 is included in the F17 beta. An update to 3.4.0 is ready to land once the beta freeze is lifted. Most of the new modules have been packaged and gnome-utils has been obsoleted.

Detailed Description
GNOME 3.4 refines the GNOME 3 user experience in a number of areas, from improved search in the shell overview, to theme improvements, to application menus. In the control-center, the network and user panels will see major work, and Wacom tablet support will be improved. The application that have been introduced in 3.2, gnome-contacts and gnome-documents, will gain more features (e.g. collections in gnome-documents). A new application, gnome-boxes, will provide easy access to VMs.

For detailed descriptions and designs of the features that are being worked on for GNOME 3.4, see the feature list.

Benefit to Fedora
Fedora stays in sync with upstream.

Scope

 * Keep existing GNOME packages updated
 * Package newly independent submodules of gnome-utils
 * baobab ( bug 770615 )
 * gnome-search-tool ( bug 754191 )
 * gnome-font-viewer ( bug 755054 )
 * gnome-dictionary ( bug 752993 )
 * gnome-screenshot ( bug 756636 )
 * gnome-system-log ( bug 755141 )
 * Package new applications and new dependencies of existing GNOME packages:
 * libwacom (control-center) ( bug 768800 )
 * gnome-boxes (new application) ( bug 770152 )
 * libvirt-glib (gnome-boxes) ( bug 754436 )
 * libosinfo (gnome-boxes) ( bug 756772 )
 * gcr (gnome-keyring) ( bug 753016 )
 * seahorse-sharing ( bug 800526 )
 * seahorse-nautilus ( bug 807350 )
 * When all gnome-utils successor packages are in rawhide, dead.package gnome-utils, and adjust comps (done)

How To Test
Generic 'desktop testing' is always appropriate for a major new desktop version.

Specific testing for new features: TBD

User Experience
Overall experience should be largely unchanged from F16. Noticeable changes in the details:
 * Applications can have an app menu containing more than just 'Quit'. We expect at least some of the new apps (gnome-documents, gnome-contacts, gnome-boxes) to make use of this
 * Maximized windows can gain more screen real estate by hiding their title bar. We expect some of the new apps to use this option
 * Unfocused windows will have an 'attenuated' appearance

Dependencies

 * Features/Gnome_shell_software_rendering will be nice to have to get the GNOME 3 user experience on more platforms, but not a hard requirement

Contingency Plan

 * If GNOME 3.4 does not happen in time for Fedora 17, ship a release candidate like 3.3.92
 * Upstream will also look at dropping individual features if they are not ready in time

Documentation

 * GNOME 3.4 planned features
 * GNOME 3.4 schedule
 * GNOME 3.4 release notes (will appear at a later point)

Release Notes

 * Fedora 17 includes the latest version of the GNOME desktop, 3.4. For more information about what is new in this GNOME release, see the release notes.

Comments and Discussion

 * See Talk:Features/Gnome3.4