Bug 448514

Summary:	KDebugSettings has bad discoverability
Product:	[Applications] kdebugsettings	Reporter:	ratijas <me>
Component:	general	Assignee:	ratijas <me>
Status:	RESOLVED FIXED
Severity:	normal	CC:	nate
Priority:	NOR	Keywords:	usability
Version First Reported In:	unspecified
Target Milestone:	---
Platform:	Other
OS:	Linux
Latest Commit:	https://invent.kde.org/utilities/kdebugsettings/commit/e3b76f4de17e098bc046dd96d9e476d5359e1b0c	Version Fixed In:
Sentry Crash Report:

Description ratijas 2022-01-15 09:33:28 UTC

SUMMARY

The app is hard to find. It is not discoverable through KRunner search by keywords. I'd expect to find it by "logging category/categories", but it does not show up even for "debug settings" query.

I used this app in past (about half year ago), and I still had troubles trying to remember the name. In fact, I found it in Telegram KDE Development chat looking for old messages containing "categories" word:

> use kdebugsettings and enable the debug output for the knewstuff categories

Also, it is not listed on https://apps.kde.org/categories/system/ page, which I think it belongs to.

STEPS TO REPRODUCE
1. Open KRunner
2. Type in "logging" or "categories" or "debug settings"

OBSERVED RESULT

No relevant results.

EXPECTED RESULT

Expected to see KDebugSettings in the list.

SOFTWARE/OS VERSIONS
Operating System: Arch Linux
KDE Plasma Version: 5.24.80
KDE Frameworks Version: 5.91.0
Qt Version: 5.15.2
Kernel Version: 5.16.0-arch1-1 (64-bit)
Graphics Platform: X11
Processors: 8 × Intel® Core™ i7-6700HQ CPU @ 2.60GHz
Memory: 15.6 GiB of RAM
Graphics Processor: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M/PCIe/SSE2

Comment 1 ratijas 2022-01-15 09:43:04 UTC

There is a relevant article on community wiki, and it doesn't mention KDebugSettings either:

https://community.kde.org/Guidelines_and_HOWTOs/Debugging/Using_Error_Messages

Comment 2 Laurent Montel 2022-01-16 16:24:55 UTC

We use "NoDisplay=true" as it's really a dev application not for end-user

Comment 3 ratijas 2022-01-16 16:26:53 UTC

> We use "NoDisplay=true" as it's really a dev application not for end-user

I don't think it's a good approach for dev tooling. If it's a dev app, and you don't wanna regular users to see it, then just don't ship it to regular users.

Comment 4 Nate Graham 2022-01-21 00:51:52 UTC

I agree with Ivan; nodisplay=true doesn't make a lot of sense for a GUI app like this. Non-developers shouldn't even have this installed in the first place; developers who do have it installed should be able to find it.

Feel free to submit a merge request to fix it.

Comment 5 ratijas 2022-01-23 13:12:40 UTC

Today I needed to use it again, and even though the last time I used it was fairly recent (hence this issue exists in the first place), I still struggled for half a minute trying to recall what was the name. Also, I do appreciate how you can find "Plasma Engine Explorer" by simply typing "data" in KRunner — that one's really cool and convenient.

Comment 6 ratijas 2022-07-10 11:15:24 UTC

I failed to find it once again, so I decided it's time for a merge request.

Comment 7 Bug Janitor Service 2022-07-10 11:16:13 UTC

A possibly relevant merge request was started @ https://invent.kde.org/utilities/kdebugsettings/-/merge_requests/7

Comment 8 ratijas 2022-07-10 16:02:48 UTC

Git commit e3b76f4de17e098bc046dd96d9e476d5359e1b0c by ivan tkachenko.
Committed on 10/07/2022 at 14:46.
Pushed by ngraham into branch 'master'.

Make KDebugSettings app actually discoverable

M  +1    -1    src/org.kde.kdebugsettings.desktop

https://invent.kde.org/utilities/kdebugsettings/commit/e3b76f4de17e098bc046dd96d9e476d5359e1b0c