hi. if the debian 'menu' package [ http://www.debian.org/doc/packaging-manuals/menu.html/ ] does offer console-support , this email can probably be disregarded.
( having a need to stay booted to ms-w right now, i can't check this myself, yet. also, the following.... ) if it ('menu') doesn't offer console-only support: this email will hopefully be taken as a request for that feature, and as a presentation to the forum for the opening of discussion about how some console-support could be implemented. ( on a tangent is a question that has been pending for a while, here. would people like|support a (probably, very minor) degree of regulated parliamentary procedure, on the mailing-lists? , and i'm not meaning anything like what might be used by the freemasons or congress or the UN, by that. but it seems like there would be a few general classifications of mailing-list traffic: - request-for-feature - intent-to-package ( to be directed to debian-devel , no?) - bug-report ( debian-bugs ? ) - usage-question - general question - others? ... and certain ways that a list-post of each type would be handled. ( and the option to develop some software-ish things to handle the posting and managing of such list-posts ) and this should maybe be stated in a seperate email, but i like to present it when there's an example of something that it seems relevant to. namely, the intent of this email . also, kind of like pinging people with the idea, to see what comes back in-reply. ) if 'menu' does not have console-support yet, here are some initial ideas about how this might be implemented. feel free to disregard the following if your time is short and|or if you're not a developer and|or if you're not interested in it, but i'm still working my way into development, and would like to hear what some experienced people would have to say about the following, time-allowing . ( ... 'community' . ) 1) i'd installed the 'screen' package. it seems like this might be used as a route towards implementing a console-based menu system. a) problem-issues: 1) something about the way the screen would flash at times. ("ech" and a feeling of something that might be fishy in or about the code or method-of-implementation . ) 2) i don't know how to rate 'screen' on resource-usage, or if it might have any other problems that i'm not yet aware of. 2) i know that there are already some console-based menu systems that have been developed. saw one of them somewhere in the debian package-tree. ( as well as suggestions on what their names are ... it was a while ago that i saw them ) any help with deciding about which is the better of the options, would be appreciated. 3) the following tasks would seem to be worth inclusion as functions accessible via a menu-system: -- mailing-list posting, categorized by the purpose of the post -- package-management, probably just something to start-up dselect, but maybe otherwise. -- system-management. (e.g.: easy access to config-files, as a means for the new user to get acquainted with "what's where" and "which files and paths are for what purposes" ) -- help-doc access. maybe just an interface to dhelp. maybe otherwise. ( when 'otherwise' is meant kind of like a stub-code for some pending reports, proposals, and work ) -- debian-tips , when that finally gets developed and released. -- maybe something for new-users. sort of an ("interactive") walk-through, towards familiarizing someone with the Linux environment. and a 'debian-devel' module to handle things like: -- debian-rules -- CVS-functions -- (insert-[helpful|time-saving]-thing-here) ( I still haven't made it throughly into debian-devel, packaging, and updating of out-of-date packages. ( pppoe , for example ) . i don't know what's out there for development-tools, yet. ) ...and that might be enough, for now. hoping that the statement, "feel free to disregard the following", was enough to keep this from seeming like some excessive text, -- s.c.