Unity Dash can't understand "logout", "reboot", or "shutdown"

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

@Andrea Azzarone

Why did you mark this as "Incomplete" in Unity? This is absolutely complete and can be verified by any existing user of Unity.

I guess you are saying that this is more specific to Ayatana Design than Unity as a whole?

It should be possible to solve this by providing a '.desktop' file containing entries for 'shutdown', 'logout', and 'reboot/restart'; and then it's not a Unity dash issue.

Because it needs design feedback.

Install attached to:

  ~/.local/share/applications/logout.desktop

and a "Logout" icon will appear in Unity when typing "logout".

Install attached to:

  ~/.local/share/applications/shutdown.desktop

and a "Shutdown" icon will appear in Unity when typing "shutdown".

My intent, in reporting this bug, is not to find a work-around for me specifically, but is to propose a default behavior for the masses. We want to maximize the user-friendliness to a brand new user of Ubuntu Unity, without harming the work-flow of a seasoned professional.

This proposal is intended as a usability completeness, in keeping with the goal of achieving tasks via the Unity Dash.

The designers of the Unity Dash, have taken great effort to allow new users (and old) to achieve numerous tasks by hitting the super key and typing a short phrase. They've designed several scopes allowing a user find almost anything on their computer (and even scopes that search for things on the internet).

So, it seems unusual to me, that (out of all the things you can do with the dash) you cannot search and find such fundamental task as : logout, reboot, suspend, or shutdown.

I'm proposing additions to the *default* dash lookup scope, that not only make these tasks available (via the dash), but also activate the corresponding alias-phrases mentioned previously:

  - Reboot ("restart" is another good alias for this)
  - Shutdown (other intuitive aliases: "shut down", "turn off")
  - logout (aliases: "log out", "log off" and "logoff")
  - suspend/hibernate

While were looking into this, I've added a couple more dash additions to the original description (for completeness sake):
  - Lock Computer
  - Switch User

Lonnie: being familiar with the Design team (having worked in it…), my suspicion is that this class of feature improvement often gets bogged down for (very) long periods of time. Therefore a method that can be deployed (or at least prototyped) immediately using existing external mechanisms is far more likely to succeed and get deployed.

The example ".desktop" might not be the ultimate solution, but being text files that are immediately deployable without needing system-level privileges I would hope are something yourself, or anyone else, could use for developing a fuller prototype and proposal.

Ok, I'm think the best place to fix this is in unity-lens-applications. We don't need design feedback to do that.
I'll add that to my todo list, if you want to contribute let me know.

It used to be possible to do this via the HUD (see Bug #1165420), but not anymore.

I agree with making these options available from the Dash (the "Hibernate" option could give some trouble because hibernation is disabled by default; maybe, when disabled, it could open the Help document on how to enable it?).

The best place for these options would probably be in a new "System commands" scope (or in the "Alt+F2" scope, if it was accessible from the "Home" scope and from the normal Dash with the Super key).
But, for now (Unity 7), I agree with putting some ".desktop" files in the Applications scope, and leaving a "better" solution for Unity 8.

This is now done via a new session-shortcuts package

session-shortcuts is now in main:
$ ./change-override -S -c main session-shortcuts
Override component to main
session-shortcuts 1.0 in xenial: universe/gnome -> main
session-shortcuts 1.0 in xenial amd64: universe/gnome/optional/100% -> main
session-shortcuts 1.0 in xenial arm64: universe/gnome/optional/100% -> main
session-shortcuts 1.0 in xenial armhf: universe/gnome/optional/100% -> main
session-shortcuts 1.0 in xenial i386: universe/gnome/optional/100% -> main
session-shortcuts 1.0 in xenial powerpc: universe/gnome/optional/100% -> main
session-shortcuts 1.0 in xenial ppc64el: universe/gnome/optional/100% -> main
session-shortcuts 1.0 in xenial s390x: universe/gnome/optional/100% -> main
Override [y|N]? y
8 publications overridden.

I do see reboot, shutdown, and logout in the dash now. That's great!

However, the alias-phrases proposed for each are not included. For example:

"restart" does not lead to reboot
"turn off" does not lead to shutdown

Such things are mentioned in the bug-description and comment 9:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unity/+bug/1403293/comments/9

Also, I notice that these items still do not lead to their respective actions in the dash:
  - Suspend/hibernate
  - Lock
  - Switch User

I do see that the dash leads to their respective settings, but not the actual actions of: locking the screen, suspending or hibernating, or switching user.

The released fix is a great start, but it doesn't fulfill everything prescribed here.

Ultimately, I'm grateful progress has been made toward the completeness of the Unity Dash. Thank you.

The solution of this bug report,
caused this regression to all other desktop environments except Unity:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/session-shortcuts/+bug/1551670