Having sugarized proxy setting UI

[alsroot]

The feature page is  http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Features/Proxy_Settings

[sascha_silbe]

The proxy settings should be managed by NetworkManager since they are needed to provide connectivity and will also differ between different connections. There has been talk upstream about adding proxy support directly to NetworkManager, but  no implementation so far. A web search turned up the following (partial) solutions:

* A third-party add-on package called  proxydriver distributes proxy settings to logged-in users, using custom config files in each users home directory to store the proxy settings for each connection.
* Use a NetworkManager hook to update an additional gconf source file in the users home directory. The mail threads ( thread 1,  thread 2) don't address where the proxy settings come from, only how the users GConf settings get updated.
* Running a minimal local proxy and  configuring it to use different upstream proxies based on the current connection. The (upstream) proxy settings are stored in system config files.
*  libproxy has a plugin that triggers wpad / PAC (i.e. automatic proxy settings) updates after NetworkManager has brought up a new connection.

For automatic setups, something like libproxy, maybe combined with a local forwarding proxy, is probably the way to go. No user intervention required, it just works. We can achieve a similar result by setting the gconf proxy settings to automatic, but I doubt the automatic update on connection change would be done in that case.

[sascha_silbe]

gnome-control-center supports multiple different proxy settings by grouping them into "locations" (as mentioned in the NetworkManager ticket referenced above), but these settings are stored in a separate GConf subtree (/apps/control-center/network/<location>) and AFAICT get propagated to the active settings (/system/proxy) by manually selecting the location from within gnome-control-center.

[manuq]

Script that outputs the current proxy settings from GConf

[manuq]

Script that outputs the current proxy settings from GSettings

[manuq]

Script that cleans the proxy settings from GConf

[manuq]

Script that cleans the proxy settings from GSettings

[manuq]

Script that sets an example proxy to GConf

[manuq]

Patch that uses GSettings exclusively. Based on patches from Sasha and Ajay

[manuq]

Patch that also uses GSettings only, and a more convenient way to bind widgets and settings

[erikos]

There are a few differences UI wise to the GNOME settings:

- order of options: GNOME has the order None, Manual, Automatic

- Manual: no 'use authentication' checkbox

- Automatic: not exactly the same string, it has no "(WPAD)"

Can we elaborate on the rationale behind those?

Do you have a good way of testing this in a non real proxy environment (probably with squid  https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/Proxy)?

[manuq]

Adjusted patch after discussing with erikos