Dear everyone,

Just wondering, is KDE going to "standardize" the way applications manage user data? Would be nice to have some kind of standard (the best would be at the linux desktop level of course, but KDE would be quite a good start I guess), so that we can monitor what data is stored by each application, applications can share data, we can select which data we want in the cloud, etc. I will be happy the day I get a new device, install KDE Plasma, log into something, wait a little bit, and have all my applications/data ready to use—and everything open source of course. Is that just a dream?

Martin

ginette wrote:I will be happy the day I get a new device, install KDE Plasma, log into something, wait a little bit, and have all my applications/data ready to use

hum.... beside it is not possible to install applications without root-previlegs, i will hope that this would not be standard. Some KDE-applications are allready using the internet to retrieve informations without asking, or informing, the user about this behavior...

Storing, potencially personal, data somewhere in the "cloud", maybe without informing the user about, is horribel to me.

Maybe i am to overage to understand such feature-wishes

Thanks Franku.

Well, what I meant was that it would be nice to have a way to see all the data stored by all applications, and a way to synchronise that among different computers. But of course, KDE is freedom, and freedom is control, so I'm absolutely not saying that should happen in the back of the users; my point is exactly to give the users the control over their data.

Martin

If I understand correctly, you want something like a database application that:
<> stores all the user data you want to share
<> supplies selected user data (that you choose) to various applications (that you choose)
<> and let's you see a list of which applications store and share which bits of user data

The System Settings application already has a User and Personal Information module - perhaps that could be enhanced somewhat to do what you suggest. So you could control from one place the information that Kontact, Rekonq (maybe even other browsers) use and share.

Am I on the right track?

Thanks for giving some thought about this. Yes, you're definitely on the right track! What I was wondering, is if someday we will have some way to track all our data (i.e., my music library, maybe another music library of song I wrote, with both source files and output files, bookmarks, research articles, photos, etc., but also applications installed on my machines, the configurations, etc, basically everything that defines me in my computers) in a kind of systematic way. But maybe that's just a dream. Thanks again. Martin

ginette wrote:Thanks for giving some thought about this. Yes, you're definitely on the right track! What I was wondering, is if someday we will have some way to track all our data (i.e., my music library, maybe another music library of song I wrote, with both source files and output files, bookmarks, research articles, photos, etc., but also applications installed on my machines, the configurations, etc, basically everything that defines me in my computers) in a kind of systematic way. But maybe that's just a dream. Thanks again. Martin

I think the nature of the many types of data you want to track - and all in one place - makes it difficult to create an application like that. Git is about as close a tool as I can think of that could possibly handle that - you can track a variety of file types and even various versions of them. If you were restricting your data to just your system user and personal information (about you), that would be one thing. That said...

Digikam helps me track my photos. Amarok helps me manage my music. Tellico (which I don't use) can help you track collections - music, books, etc. - but I think your all-in-one application is a bit of a dream.

I think a one application for everything is a bit problematic as the requirements are hugely different across the board. An address book needs completely different approach as a music collection. The closest thing I can imagine would be something like the current Kontakt application, where you can switch between the different applications.