Add developer docs?

[peteruithoven]

Problem

It's not obvious how to run a custom version of Wingpanel. The readme simply states to run io.elementary.wingpanel which won't work.

Wingpanel used to be started and kept alive by Cerbere.
I don't think it's managed by SystemD?

• I can't find .service files in the repo.
• I can't find a wingpanel service under cd /etc/systemd/system.
• systemctl list-unit-files | grep wingpanel returns no results.

There are no wingpanel docs under https://docs.elementary.io/develop.

Simply killing it and booting it from terminal freezes my whole system.
killall io.elementary.wingpanel && G_MESSAGES_DEBUG=all io.elementary.wingpanel

Proposal

Add a few lines to the readme on how to start a custom version. This would probably mean including how it's currently managed and how to stop it from automatically restarting when it's killed.

Prior Art (Optional)

No response

[danirabbit]

The process is kept alive by Gala these days as are all shell components.

We probably should implement glib.application's replacement functionality the same as we've done in a few other projects

[peteruithoven]

The process is kept alive by Gala these days as are all shell components.

Good to know. But I can't find documentation on Gala and shell components either.

[peteruithoven]

Can someone please share how to debug Wingpanel?

I'm experiencing issues like #600 and elementary/gala#2506 which have gone unanswered. I'd like to look into them but don't know where to start without some minimal docs.

[danirabbit]

If by "debug" you mean "see logs" you can use journalctl

Personally when working on the panel or indicators I just install it 😅

[peteruithoven]

But then we can't set G_MESSAGES_DEBUG=all?
Also I couldn't find gala or wingpanel services? (ystemctl | grep gala) So I'm not sure what to follow using journalctl?

[lenemter]

Closing because it's not currently possible to launch wingpanel from terminal. If you need live logs, you can see them with journalctl --no-pager --follow | grep io.elementary.w

[peteruithoven]

Thanks for sharing how to get to the logs. That would be a great item to add to the Readme (dev docs).

But what about increasing the debug level?

[lenemter]

@peteruithoven You can add arguments and environmental variables by adding them to wingpanel's entry in /etc/xdg/io.elementary.desktop.wm.shell

[peteruithoven]

Great. Another non obvious thing that would be great to add to dev docs 😇