Control starting maximized via GPO? (Linux)

[mfxa]

Somewhat related to #499

Currently one can make Firefox effectively start maximized by modifying each .desktop file that starts it and setting very high values for -width and -height, but as a sysadmin having to modify any number of .desktop files that the user may currently have and have in the future, to achieve this, rather than setting a policy, is a bit cumbersome. Relying on having to modify multiple Exec lines which can have different formats depending on which options are set in it currently, isn't great either.

Could it become possible to set "start maximized" via GPO instead?
If it's simply not possible/feasible, just close this issue..

[mkaply]

Unfortunately we don't even have starting maximized with a command line, so adding policy is probably not feasible.

There's a 12 year old bug to do the command line version.

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=873618

I'd be curious as to what your use case is as we tend to prioritize things based on how common the problem is.

[mfxa]

Ah, alright, thanks for the info! I guess we can just close it then.

I'd be curious as to what your use case is as we tend to prioritize things based on how common the problem is.

Maybe not that common, but I'm remotely provisioning Linux computers mostly for use as public computers on e.g. libraries, specifically Ubuntu (GNOME).
In general a lot of non tech savvy people use those computers, and unlike with personal computers most of those users don't really run a lot of programs in parallel, but typically just a single application, and the vast majority of time that's a browser.

In Ubuntu/GNOME applications don't start maximized by default, so there's been many requests to support that, to give users a better default experience. It might be the case that GNOME would normally remember window states, ie. it would only have to be done once, but as it's public computers which should generally not remember state (for privacy reasons), we generally broadly reset everything - ie. the entire user home directory.

Now I think about it, it also be that one could instead instruct GNOME to open all applications as maximized by default, e.g. via an extension, instead of handling it per application. But then again, maybe if it's something like a calculator or even a file browser there's probably less interest in running those maximized.