Rasterman Speaks On E17 And The Future

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Rasterman Speaks On E17 And The Future

Posted by Hemos on Wednesday August 22, 2001 @01:46AM from the peering-into-the-crystal-ball dept.

JigSaw writes: "The team consisting of TheRasterman and Mandrake (among others) are hard at work to bring Enlightenment 0.17 to the Linux desktop. E17 will be a lot more than a window manager, something closer to a complete GUI solution for X. OSNews hosts an interesting interview with Rasterman and also features some (unseen-before) screenshots of E17. Some say that E17 will be the next big thing in the GUI design (even if Rasterman states in the interview that Linux won't probably take over the Desktop), with plans to incorporate libraries like eVas, which look very modern in concept, design and implementation."

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Wow... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 01:48 · Score: 0

I don't want the next BIG THING. I want a fast window manager. I guess E just isn't for me.
Wow by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 01:51 · Score: 0

Thanks for all the information. I had been looking to move some of my applications to a *NIX platform for stability, possibly Linux, but after reading this I definitely won't be going in that direction. I'll probably get on the phone with my Sun or HP vendor again this afternoon and see what they can offer me, as it's quite clear that Linux just won't cut it in a mission-critical environment. Thanks again, it's greatly appreciated!
next big thing? by kaisyain · 2001-08-22 01:52 · Score: 2

I've read the article and I've followed E for a while. I'm at a loss as to what people mean when they say Next Big Thing.

Can someone elaborate, cause I just don't see it.
1. Re:next big thing? by BlackSol · 2001-08-22 02:07 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  I tend to agree with you.
  
  The interview doesn't give much insight over what value it adds over existing GUI's. Without indicating what its going to do better and what value this adds, there's no basis for calling it the Next Big Thing.
  
  The interview, really seems to state that the next version, available when 3d cards are the default, will be the "Next Big Thing"
  
  --
  $sig=$1 if($brain =~ /idea\s+(.*)/i);
2. Re:next big thing? by be-fan · 2001-08-22 02:19 · Score: 2
  
  Until know, people have been sitting on their desktop (Windows people anyway, the Linux people all use S3s as we all know...) with super powerful 3D cards in their computers, but kept them idle a large portion of the time. Even in Windows, only a portion of the GUI is really hardware accelerated. EVAS is a brilliant idea that lets you use the 3D accelerator that you already have to make a great looking desktop that also runs really fast. I don't know about you, but that's a pretty big thing. Maybe not CLI -> GUI big, but those only happen once every few decades, and if you reserved "Next Big Thing" for stuff of that magnitude, journalists would never be able to use the phrase. And it IS such a nice phrase, is it not?
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
3. Re:next big thing? by kaisyain · 2001-08-22 02:24 · Score: 2
  
  Actually almost all of the GUI is hardware accelerated. Just because it's not 3d doesn't mean it isn't hardware accelerated.
  
  "Making it purtier" is hardly a Next Big Thing. In any case, my desktop is already great looking.
4. Re:next big thing? by kurowski · 2001-08-22 02:39 · Score: 1
  
  "Making it purtier" is hardly a Next Big Thing. In any case, my desktop is already great looking.
  Um, yeah. And Windows 95 was pretty when it came out, compared to Windows 3.1. Or KDE 1.0 was pretty compared to, say CDE.
  Enlightenment has consistently been the "purtiest" window manager out there, and much of the beauty on the linux desktop today is due to imitations of E's innovation. It's looking like E17 will once again set the standard that everyone else aspires to.
5. Re:next big thing? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:30 · Score: 0
  
  Actually almost all of the GUI is hardware accelerated. Just because it's not 3d doesn't mean it isn't hardware accelerated.
  Let's see, what accelerated features does the Windows desktop use? DIBs, BLT copying & stretching, line drawing, fills, and a font cache. What features are not available and/or not hardware accelerated? Anti-aliasing, transparency, shading, polygon drawing, etc. On today's cards, the 3D rendering engine offers a lot more than the 2D engine does, and eVas is the first 2D rendering library to take advantage of that.
6. Re:next big thing? by n1tr0g3n · 2001-08-22 03:57 · Score: 0, Troll
  
  What of directfb and other candidates for The Next Big Thing? I think directfb is very cool from a graphics perspective, since it uses the full 2D and 3D capabilities of a card, and can fall back to software modes if necessary. It's also independent of X, has a Gtk+ port, ... Besides, we all know Rasterman couldn't code his way out of a paper bag... He could sell his code to the Olive Garden as genuine spaghetti.
7. Re:next big thing? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:33 · Score: 0
  
  Oh bullshit. Have you looked at his code lately? Take a look at the CVS.
8. Re:next big thing? by be-fan · 2001-08-22 05:23 · Score: 2
  
  Most acceleration is really just BitBlits. Take anti-aliasing for example. Most hardware doesn't do alpha blending in 2D mode. Thus, all of the nice AA text in a GUI has to be rendered in software. Then there are the transparency effects (fading menus and such). Again, since alpha-blending isn't accelerated, this effect has to be done in software. Things that are trivial to do in OpenGL (transparent windows, special effects) are really expensive on most 2D architectures.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
9. Re:next big thing? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 17:52 · Score: 0
  
  you sure got a purty mouth
Scary by blamario · 2001-08-22 01:52 · Score: 1

Their "e" logo in the bottom-left corner of the screen (and where else?) is extremely unpleasant for the eye. People tend to prefer horizontal lines and rounded edges over this sharp and pointed stuff. It looks like a hard metal album cover. I'd have nightmares after working on a desktop like that.
1. Re:Scary by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:26 · Score: 0
  
  So change the background. When was the last time you used a desktop where you couldn't change the background?
  
  Since it's inception, Enlightenment's claim to fame has been maximum customizability of look and feel. Raster has always had odd tastes, so his screenshots usually look ugly. But that doesn't stop you from changing it to look like anything you want.
2. Re:Scary by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:32 · Score: 0
  
  have you ever used E before? you can change absolutely anything you want on it such as backgrounds etc.
  
  Why would you look at someone else's desktop and say "People tend to prefer." It's his friggin workstation, I think he'll put whatever he wants on it.
3. Re:Scary by Neon+Spiral+Injector · 2001-08-22 03:05 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  So change it.
  
  That is one thing the E has going for it, everything can be changed.
  
  Granted it wasn't the easiest thing to do in previous versions. But E17 is supposed to have drag and drop theme designing.
  
  Unfortunitly every thing is now stored in EDB (databases) so I can't tweak my themes with vi. But there is a nice little database editor included. I'll just have to get used to that.
Too Late! by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 01:53 · Score: 0

The coolest GUI for UNIX goes to Apple. Mac OS X 10.1 is freaking amazing -- too bad it hasn't been released. :(
Come on Steve, get it out the door! Don't let Rasterman take the lead!
1. Re:Too Late! by fishebulb · 2001-08-22 02:02 · Score: 1
  
  except for kde2.2 has all the cutesy features that os X has, except its easy to turn off.
Confucius say: by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:01 · Score: 0

Nice GUI will not make your OS popular.
Bundling your OS with new computers will make your OS popular.
Even if the GUI is ugly.
.
Re: Good Troll by Pengo · 2001-08-22 02:03 · Score: 1, Offtopic

I will bite. ;-)

I have 10 web servers running Debian 2.2 w/old kernel and ext2fs.

Never have downtime

Never have Lost Data

.... even .. *gasp*.. my NFS works as expected.

Try running some benchmarks of Java application servers against a Windows Machine, HP-UX machine and a Solaris based system. You will be surprised on the results, the penguin screams. (Expecially with the IBM port of jdk 1.3 w/Native Threads).

Google is the (might I say?) most populare and usefull search engine on the internet. Powered by Linux.

Yahoo used to use BSD on their indexing engine. Seems odd, Yahoo also uses Java for a large number of their applications. Which JDK do you think they are using on those BSD machines? Might I *gasp* guess that they are not using BSD everywhere?

Get real buddy. Go off and play with your commercial unices or Windows, but when push comes to shove.. most of the new interesting applications for unix are going to Linux FIRST and other commercial unix second. I use Irix and Solaris and it's a hell of a lot easier to get stuff compiled and working on Linux.

Windows is just too hard to manage in a datacenter, just as linux might be dificult to manage in a corp. desktop environment.

But don't base your stupid facts on 4 year old kernel defaults, it's just plain FUD.
Not another... by Pedrito · 2001-08-22 02:04 · Score: 1, Troll

Look, the problem with Linux, and I've said this time and again, is that we don't need a variety of desktop environments. If we did, GEM (for those of you old enough to remember what it was) and OS/2 would be competing with Windows. They're not, they're dead.

Linux needs a single GUI. Be it Gnome, KDE, or whatever. Pick one, build it right. Follow Microsoft's example and do extensive usability tests, and make it easy and intuitive for the user to use it. Otherwise, you're just not going to see Linux EVER enter the desktop market. Yeah, I know, a lot of you guys use it. You represent less than 1% of the computer using market.

I've always hoped that Linux could crack the desktop market. I want to see it compete with MS. I want to be writing applications for Linux. The problem is, I just don't think that's ever going to happen. There are too many factions, and no single one appears to have a huge advantage. All of these GUIs are being written by programmers, for programmers.

I've used Gnome. I could figure my way around it 90% of the time, but I've been programming for 22 years. I'm way less than 1% of the desktop users in that regard.

Give your GUI to your mother, your father, your grandparents. If they can all figure it out, then you're on to something. If they can't, then you've really got nothing.
1. Re:Not another... by kdgarris · 2001-08-22 02:09 · Score: 2
  
  I agree with you for the most part, but I just wanted to mention that I've seen a non-technical casual Windows user figure out how to use KDE with not much trouble. Not that there isn't any room for improvement, but KDE is mostly there, I think.
  
  -Karl
2. Re:Not another... by DahGhostfacedFiddlah · 2001-08-22 02:11 · Score: 1
  
  It's getting better though. Every version that comes out takes usability into account more and more. The one thing I wish they'd fix up are those damn x* and g* filenames in the program menus. It would seriously take about an hour to go through and just give them real names.
  
  And about OS/2, GEM (no, not old enough to remember, but I'll assume...) - they weren't Windows-compatible. I don't see any reason why people shouldn't have a choice of environments as long as they can all run one another's applications. That's about all.
  
  --
  Last post!
3. Re:Not another... by mellifluous · 2001-08-22 02:12 · Score: 1
  
  I agree with you that a standard GUI is one key to widespread adoption of a desktop platform. A single GUI might be more curse than blessing, however. Would Linux users really be willing to give up their freedom of choice to gain broad acceptance? Personally, I doubt it. Once you start down the path of uniformity, forever will it dominate your destiny.
4. Re:Not another... by BlackSol · 2001-08-22 02:12 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Ahh but us programmers like our gui's to work they way we want them to. That means our gui's meet the needs of programmers. This is a result of the "scratch an itch" development model.
  
  The GUI you're asking for needs to be developed specifically for ease-of-use. Not programmer usability. That means a programmer will need to spend a lot of time working with people of little technical background to find out what works for them. The biggest problem with that is that these people don't know what they want, they only know what their used too.
  
  --
  $sig=$1 if($brain =~ /idea\s+(.*)/i);
5. Re:Not another... by lupercalia · 2001-08-22 02:14 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Both the Gnome and KDE usability groups have been very active lately. Their desktops are getting closer and closer to the point where they really are ready for your mom to run.
  
  Neither project seems to be lacking in programmers. Instead, they are advancing so fast that it is a big job just to stay on top of the improvements. Hell, the improvements in KDE from 2.1 to 2.2 were larger than those from Win95 to Win98 -- and the Windows update took 3 years while the KDE update took closer to 3 months, and was only a point release.
  
  Now, given the incredible rate of improvement in the desktops, and the increasing efforts of the usability teams, tell me why having two of them makes it *less* likely Linux will find a place in the desktop market. It seems rather the other way around to me.
6. Re:Not another... by Pedrito · 2001-08-22 02:19 · Score: 2
  
  Are Gnome and KDE completely compatible? If I write an application with Gnome specifically in mind, will KDE run the application as I wrote it? If not, that's why having two will make it less likely to succeed. If so, I stand corrected?
7. Re:Not another... by The+Troll+Catcher · 2001-08-22 02:29 · Score: 1
  
  They can run each other's apps with no problem - the only thing is the widgets might look a little different, but this is easy solvable, since KDE can use GTK themes.
8. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:29 · Score: 0
  
  I don't wan't Linux to dominate de Desktop (well, actually, I don't care). But I want to have choice.
9. Re:Not another... by Rupert · 2001-08-22 02:33 · Score: 2
  
  Linux can have as many GUIs as it wants. I think it's the role of the distros to pick one as their default, and push it. To some extent that's already happening with RedHat/Gnome, Mandrake/KDE and others. Since RedHat is the dominant distro, I would have to assume that Gnome will become the "standard" Linux GUI.
  
  --
  
  --
  E_NOSIG
10. Re:Not another... by ethereal · 2001-08-22 02:35 · Score: 1
  
  They're both compatible as X applications; as long as you have the appropriate libraries for Gnome and KDE, there's no reason you can't run apps written for either at the same time on the same desktop. I'm not sure what the status of drag-n-drop between the two is - the standard X clipboard seems to work OK though.
  I'm not sure that I agree with the frequent remark that it would be more efficient to just focus on one desktop; you might instead get a situation where all the ex-KDE folks fight with the Gnome folks all the time, or vice versa, and so even less work gets done :) In a perfect world, putting all the developers onto one combined project would result in one great desktop. In the real world, differences of ego, technical direction, user interface preferences, object systems (CORBA), etc. are probably too great to ever get the entire development community to agree on a single desktop, at least until one or the other gains sufficient market share and flexibility that the developers of the other can make the switch fairly painlessly.
  
  --
  Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
11. Re:Not another... by mancuskc · 2001-08-22 02:37 · Score: 1
  
  As Yoda would put it, anyway.
  
  --
  When I were your age, all round here were fields...
12. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:43 · Score: 0
  
  Ever tried to run KDE and/or GNOME on a 200MHz box ? Happy waiting ....
  
  My little brother(13) has one of my old boxes (K6 200MHz, 128MB....) and my only _choice_ was to install E (16.5) for him. It runs smooth. It does everything he needs and it looks so sexy that his (windows using) classmates started asking him where to get "that".
  
  I hope that linux _never_ cracks the desktop market. The quality of discussions on c.o.l. has gone so far down in the last 5 years that I even stopped bothering ...
  
  Linux does what I need, well, almost and that's all I want. Let the Windaus use Windos. At least they won't ask me stupid questions.
  
  just by personal blah...
  anti
  ps:
  I really should lookup my password to get rid of that "Anonymous Coward".
13. Re:Not another... by Vanders · 2001-08-22 02:44 · Score: 2
  
  Linux needs a single GUI. Be it Gnome, KDE, or whatever. Pick one, build it right. Follow Microsoft's example and do extensive usability tests, and make it easy and intuitive for the user to use it.
  
  Hey! That sounds like AtheOS! I havn't tried sitting my mother in front of my AtheOS box and letting her go yet, but I think i'll get IPTables set up on my Linux box and give it a go. I reckon I can have her doing the basics in a few minutes.
  
  --
  Syllable : It's an Operating System
14. Re:Not another... by tsa · 2001-08-22 02:47 · Score: 1
  
  The way I see it, we need one GUI that is so highly configurable that everyone can change it to her liking. The way it handles programs is then standardized, while everyone can work in his favorite environment. That shouldn't be too hard to make, or is it? I am not a programmer so please enlighten me.
  
  --
  -- Cheers!
15. Re:Not another... by wiredog · 2001-08-22 02:47 · Score: 2
  
  They use different libraries. You can run the apps if you have the libs, but you don't get the desktop integration. You can run plain old X apps on gnome and kde.
  
  --
  
  Best Slashdot Co
16. Re:Not another... by mbrod · 2001-08-22 02:48 · Score: 1
  
  I'd rather have choices. I just started messing with Debian and I like the fact that I can pick a very light window manager. Well some people really want it to be pretty, I just want light, fast, and stable.
17. Re:Not another... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 02:50 · Score: 2
  
  But KDE and GNOME aren't really compatible. Sure you can run programs from both environments at the same time, but they don't really interoperate at all, they just happen to exist on the same desktop. I can run X applications on my Win2K desktop, but that doesn't mean that Win32 an X are compatible.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
18. Re:Not another... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 02:52 · Score: 2
  
  Once you start down the path of chaos, you're pretty much screwed that way too. There's nothing that prevents people from making a desktop standard, then letting different people implement it (just like ICCM and the X window managers). That's probably the best trade-off, IMNHO.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
19. Re:Not another... by vrt3 · 2001-08-22 02:54 · Score: 1
  
  Ahh but us programmers like our gui's to work they way we want them to. That means our gui's meet the needs of programmers.
  Indeed. And we have to ask ourselves the question: do we really want a uniform desktop environment, useable by Joe Sixpack, his mother-in-law and his kids? Or do we want a desktop environment that fits *our* needs and *our* wishes?
  Both, presumably (we want choice!), but that is in contradiction with the uniformity.
  The biggest problem with that is that these people don't know what they want, they only know what their used too.
  Good point. I don't think KDE or Gnome is that much less intuitive compared to Windows. It is different, and that makes them harder for people switching from Windows, but I think the learning curve for novice users is comparable with the one for Windows. For simply using the computer that is; when it comes to installing new software and other system administration tasks, Windows is still easier for Joe Sixpack.
  
  --
  This sig under construction. Please check back later.
20. Re:Not another... by LordNimon · 2001-08-22 02:54 · Score: 2
  
  If we did, GEM (for those of you old enough to remember what it was) and OS/2 would be competing with Windows.
  It's funny you should say that, because one of the reasons I prefer OS/2 over Linux is because of its GUI. The WorkPlace Shell is powerful, attractive, consistent, and still light years ahead of anything else today. Almost every OS/2 application has some integration with the desktop. I can't say the same about Linux. Most Linux GUI apps don't add icons or menu items to my desktop, because there are just too many different desktops (GNOME, KDE, whatever), and it's just too hard to support them all.
  And it's not like this is a hard problem to solve. All you need to do is define a standard for adding icons and menu items, and then incorporate that standard into every desktop environment. But of course, all of the Linux desktop developers are too busy competing against each other to work together and solve to a common problem. Until that changes, Linux will never have a chance at winning the desktop.
  
  --
  And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
  To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
21. Re:Not another... by ichimunki · 2001-08-22 02:57 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  If you can figure out windows, you can figure out most any other window manager I've run across that even remotely considered itself "for the typical user". Windows is horribly unusable, especially for those of us used to Macintosh. The very design of Windows with its BS document-window-inside-application-window is a major drag on its usability, imho... If you're not in maximized mode you spend time hunting for your toolbar-- and now with Win2K you'll be clicking at the bottom of your menu to actually get to see the whole menu. Thank god for right-clicking, but that's no real compensation for a crippled menu bar.
  
  Windows is one of the worst window manager in existence. It doesn't do one thing and do it well, it doesn't have any shining features whatsoever. NOT ONE. So, my point is simple. The fact that Windows is so widespread has nothing to do with usability. The fact that many users are comfortable in Windows has nothing to do with usability. But they've learned to use it, so they consider it natural. But it's a computer. Using it is going to take practice-- and maybe even training. It's a very complex machine.
  
  Nobody expects to be able to drive a car five minutes after taking it out of the box, unless they've driven before. And yes, if you go changing all the controls radically, the driver's going to need retraining. So look at it this way. Would you expect to be able to drive an F1 just because you can drive a Ford Escort? I wouldn't. Same goes for powerful window managers like E versus crap like Windows.
  
  My biggest problem with E is that there don't seem to be any E applications. If I use E I still need to load half of KDE to run Konqueror, and then I'll need gtk for GIMP, and then there's all those applications that have pretty windows around them, but are really just ugly X applications. I cut my losses and just run KDE, but I'd rather run E.
  
  --
  I do not have a signature
22. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:58 · Score: 0
  
  Well, with KDE and GNOME rushing to see who can copy Windows the fastest, it's nice to see development continue on alternatives like Enlightenment, Xfce and WM/GNUStep. There are a lot of us who don't like the L&F of Windows and want something smaller and faster than GNOME and KDE.
23. Re:Not another... by Kronos. · 2001-08-22 03:02 · Score: 1
  
  What linux needs to crack the desktop market isn't what I want. I want choice, I want to see variety, I want to make my own decisions. The reason I use linux is because it works great as an OS and I can put whatever I want on top of it and make it work how I want. If I wanted to use graphical apps I don't want to be stuck in a single choice of how they look.
  
  Call me selfish but I not going to accept someone elses way of doing something if I don't like it, I'd just do what I can with linux and write my own way.
  
  Sure, it would help get more people using linux but unless people have choice I think we're completely missing one of the strong points of linux, freedom of choice.
  
  The whole reason we don't see dominance of one desktop over another under linux is people like one thing and don't like another (of prefer one to the other) and they exercise their choice on which to use, and forcing these people in to one choice will only turn people off, people like me, that value their freedom to chose. I'd probably end up writting my own environment(or someone else will), and because the choice is there, others will use it.
  
  The single desktop environment for linux will never happen, and I for one and glad.
24. Re:Not another... by Sloppy · 2001-08-22 03:04 · Score: 2
  
  You just explained precisely why Linux does need multiple GUIs. If you make a GUI that your mother/father/grandparents can use, then little of the existing Linux base will want to use it. There's a lot of people who think the Win9x-type interface, which Gnome and KDE copy, is somehow "normal" and ok. These people need something like KDE or Gnome just so they can avoid having to learn new things. But this results in a desktop which, just like Windows Explorer, is hard and awkward to use. There should be at least two common desktops: at least one (there's currently two) for the Win9x refugees, and at least one for getting stuff done when you're in a hurry.
  
  --
  As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
25. Re:Not another... by Bodrius · 2001-08-22 03:04 · Score: 1
  
  I wonder if that will be the biggest problem KDE, GNOME or any other Linux desktop environment that aims to the general public will face in the long run.
  
  Programmers are, as a rule and with few exceptions, lousy UI designers, making the wrong assumptions and satisfying the wrong needs. Yet programmers are the ones building the GUIs oriented not to the programmer (isn't KDE supposed to be so easy it doesn't require documentation?) but to the masses, the users.
  
  Even good UI designers need to have their efforts checked with truthful reactions from real, typical users, and Linux development just doesn't have that.
  
  Sure, the usability groups are active, and they're populated by people that may not even have any coding experience... but the fact that they are using Linux at all makes them atypical users. They're more daring and more willing to experiment.
  
  More concretely, most of them had to go, at the very least, through the original installation process. This is not something to scoff at: even though distributions like Mandrake and SuSe hide most of the technicalities behind pretty pictures, there's no escaping part of the decision-making process.
  
  Just mention the words "hard disk partition", "dual-boot", "root password" to a user and see the terror fill their eyes. If they take more than 15 seconds before giving up they show more tolerance than 90% of the computer user population.
  
  It's necessary to remember that most people don't use Windows willingly. They do not consider it easy, or fun, but a hard and necessary task to do their job, and they consider it complicated enough to take classes, buy videos, get certifications for. On the other hand, Linux users are willing users, and as such take greater responsability for the difficulties, and have greater tolerance and not-as-keen eyes for defects.
  
  Propietary shops can solve the problem by paying a bunch of people to play with their software, something which would be against their will without the check/contribution/school-donation/free-t-shirt. Or by obtaining a large user base so compromised to the system that it NEEDS to know how to use their software, and will even pay for the privilege.
  
  Linux doesn't have a desktop user base to abuse, and I can't imagine RedHat locking up hundreds of paid unexperienced users in a room to click away in despair for months, taking notes. That could get expensive.
  
  --
  Freedom is the freedom to say 2+2=4, everything else follows...
26. Re:Not another... by tjwhaynes · 2001-08-22 03:09 · Score: 2
  
  Are Gnome and KDE completely compatible? If I write an application with Gnome specifically in mind, will KDE run the application as I wrote it? If not, that's why having two will make it less likely to succeed. If so, I stand corrected?
  
  If you mean 'Can I run both Gnome and KDE applications side by side?' then the answer is a definite Yes. If you mean 'Can I cut-and-paste and drag-and-drop between the Gnome and KDE applications?' then the answer is 'Mostly'. Is it a good idea to do this if you have a small hard drive and 32Mb of memory then the answer is NO.
  
  Gnome has its own underlying architecture for communicating between Gnome apps - based on CORBA. KDE chose to build a Corba-like system called KParts. Most interoperability issues revolve around getting these two infrastructures to work together. In order to have both KDE and Gnome apps up and running, you need to have both infrastructures active (this is not a problem, it just requires more resources).
  
  There is also no requirement to run KDE apps under KWM either - Sawmill works fine. I suspect Enlightenment does too, along with IceWM, but I don't have any personal experience of those setups.
  
  Cheers,
  
  Toby Haynes
  
  --
  Anything I post is strictly my own thoughts and doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the opinions of IBM.
27. Re:Not another... by blackmerlin · 2001-08-22 03:10 · Score: 1
  
  i know quite a few parents, grand-parents and even.. wait for it.. 20 year olds who are scared shit-less of computers and have trouble enough using windows.
  although i agree with your statement (sort of), linux advertising is not aimed at the desktop user, and most people are scared of it because it is not the norm, and is not the business application standard that windows is today. it may change in the future but microsoft has a stranglehold on the market.
  you can argue why: best GUI; being in the right place at the right time, whatever. they certainly have created job security if nothing else.
  
  --
  blackmerlin
28. Re:Not another... by Andrewkov · 2001-08-22 03:13 · Score: 1
  
  I'm usually a guy who's bashing Windows, but I have to argue your point. Windows 95/2000 have excellent GUI's. I find them more consistant and faster than any Unix ones I've tried. Windows also has excellent keyboad mappings which I use heavily. For example, Alt-F4 = close window, F1 = help, Winkey-M = minimize all windows, ALT = switch focus to menubar, ALT-TAB & ALT-SHIFT-TAB cycle windows (I don't recall seeing a Unix desktop which responded to ALT-SHIFT-TAB as well as ALT-TAB). Even using text widgets, I like to use the home and end keys, hold shift for selecting text, press CTL-A to select all, or CTRL-SHIFT-END to select to the end of the text, etc. Once you are used to all this it's hard to go to a window manager that doesn't support it, or has different key bindings. Oh, and the mouse wheel only works on some widget-sets in Unix which is a pain.
29. Re:Not another... by asincero · 2001-08-22 03:21 · Score: 1
  
  > And about OS/2, GEM (no, not old enough to
  > remember, but I'll assume...) - they weren't
  > Windows-compatible.
  
  OS/2 often times ran Win16 apps better than Windows itself. And thats not just typical anti-MS FUD! At the time of Windows 95's release, the majority of Windows applications on the market were Win16 applications, so OS/2 was in a pretty good position to take over the PC desktop.
  
  - Arcadio
30. Re:Not another... by asincero · 2001-08-22 03:28 · Score: 1
  
  > Would Linux users really be willing to give up
  > their freedom of choice to gain broad
  > acceptance?
  
  With Linux, you never lose your freedom of choice so that point is irrelevant. Even in Windows its possible to radically change the look and feel of the UI; its just not as easy to do as it is on Linux.
  
  The idea here is to standardize on one easy-to-use GUI so that the non-geek can sit down at a Linux machine and get to work immediately (assuming said non-geek has already been briefed on how to use the GUI). The problem with having multiple GUIs is that you need to learn how to use multiple GUIs. And for most non-geeks, learning just one GUI is hard enough.
  
  - Arcadio
31. Re:Not another... by garver · 2001-08-22 03:30 · Score: 2
  Linux needs a single GUI
  
  So hold a book to each side of your face and look at your monitor. There. See, Linux has only one GUI. Feel better?
  
  Open Source isn't about standardization, its about choices. If something isn't quite right, you can tweak it until its what you are looking for.
  
  Assume for a minute that the entire Linux population standardized on RedHat's distribution running, say GNOME. This is good. Now when a newbies learns "Linux", s/he will be comfortable sitting down at any "Linux" box. The world will rejoice. All is great.
  
  Now assume for a minute that I, as the Uberhacker that I am, decide I'm not quite happy. GNOME sucks, I want something better. I take "Linux" and change the GUI environment and create... "GarvIX". One of two scenarios may play out:
  
  The RedHat commando squad breaks down my door and drags my ass off to court screaming "Thou shall not hold your own opinions. Thou shall use what we tell you."
  
  I'm happy and the newbies are happy too since they can still sit down at any "Linux" box and know what to do, this "GarvIX" thing though is a whole different matter. Time goes on and I show people "GarvIX" and people like it. Other Uberhackers start using. Next thing you know, we have "GarvIX" conventions. Before long everyone is using it except my grandma.
  
  The point is that with standardization, someone controls the standard. Migrations to something better only happen when the entity deems it was time. Its called a monopoly.
  
  The other point is that "GarvIX" IS different. Just as RedHat/KDE, RedHat/GNOME, Debian/KDE, Debian/GNOME, etc. are also different. If it makes you feel better think of your operating system as Redhat/GNOME/GNU/Linux or ReGNOGL for short. Go forth and make everyone use it.
32. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:36 · Score: 0
  
  It's only a common problem in your opinion, which many of us do not share. Your suggestion would leave people like me who don't want icons on the desktop SOL. The fact that UNIX platforms have a variety of different UI choices is a strength, not a weakness.
33. Re:Not another... by Corgha · 2001-08-22 03:38 · Score: 2
  
  Linux needs a single GUI.
  Perhaps I have been trolled, here, but... Why the hell does Linux need to take over the desktop market, and why does it need a single GUI to do that? Linux is doing just fine, by my book, and I really couldn't care less about the rest of the desktop market. Linux is not a product that you need to market, and it's not a business plan -- it's the result of countless programmers scratching itches. So don't presume that you can attach to it your vision of where it should go.
  
  Back to the topic at hand, one of the reasons I stopped using Windows and MacOS is that I was tired of having to do things their way. I happen to use Enlightenment and Blackbox a lot, because I like they way they work, and I don't use Gnome or KDE because I don't like the way they work. What makes you think that it is possible to make a single interface (graphical or not) that will please everybody? The fact that you can choose and then (in most cases) heavily customize your interface is one of the best things about UNIX and Linux. The window manager is just another user-level application, and it's nice to be able to run whichever user-level application suits you best.
  
  Pick one, build it right.
  Define "right". You're not going to be able to make an interface that is all things to all people. What more likely would happen is that you would force your assumptions about how computers should be used onto everyone else, which is the thinking behind many of the things that I hate about Windows. Why do you want to repeat those mistakes?
  
  Instead, try accepting the fact that people are different and situations are different, and it's non-trivial to make something that works for them all.
  
  Follow Microsoft's example and do extensive usability tests, and make it easy and intuitive for the user to use it.
  Where do you get this idea of an "intuitive" interface? (To paraphrase someone whom I forget) The only intuitive interface is the nipple; after that everything is learned. I also think that you are making the common mistake of confusing "ease of use" and "ease of learning". The many possibilities presented by the command line may be more difficult to learn than a "wizard", but in the long run it's easier to use (try aliasing or scripting or cronning a wizard).
  
  I've always hoped that Linux could crack the desktop market. I want to see it compete with MS. I want to be writing applications for Linux. The problem is, I just don't think that's ever going to happen. There are too many factions, and no single one appears to have a huge advantage. All of these GUIs are being written by programmers, for programmers.
  Leaving aside this insane idea that programmers all come together and work in harmony for free to write things that do not interest them... what is it about the existence of multiple window managers (let's not use the overly-general term 'GUI') that precludes acceptance of the operating system? Does the existence of multiple operating systems keep people from buying PCs? No, most people just use the OS (Windows) that comes bundled. In the window manager/desktop environment arena, most people will simple use the one that's presented by the distribution (RedHat, probably) that they install.
  
  So, perhaps, instead of worrying about making a single interface to please all people, we should try to make Red Hat choose a default that will look exactly like Windows so we won't scare the poor wittle new users, of whom we don't think enough to trust to figure out something new like they once figured out Windows. Fortunately, I think Red Hat knows enough about its business to work towards using a non-threatening and easy-to-learn interface as the default. Give it time.
  
  Alright, enough irrational ranting -- the "We need a single perfect (Distribution|Window Manager|Shell|Programming Language|...)" argument just really ticks me off, as I highly value freedom and diversity. Sure it's inconvenient and confusing sometimes, but I'm glad we live in a world where people are (to some degree at least) free to go their own way and choose a tool to suit the situation or their tastes.
34. Re:Not another... by asincero · 2001-08-22 03:50 · Score: 0, Offtopic
  
  > I'd rather have choices.
  
  I'll never understand why people think that just because theres a standard Linux desktop, that automatically means you are restricted to use that desktop and that desktop only. Shit, you're not even restricted to only use the Windows UI in Windows!
  
  WAKE THE FiretrUCK UP!
  
  - Arcadio
35. Re:Not another... by ReelOddeeo · 2001-08-22 03:52 · Score: 2
  
  Windows 95/2000 have excellent GUI's. I find them more consistant and faster than any Unix ones I've tried
  
  At my office, last spring, we installed a Windows XP beta on a PII 200, 64 MB. Not a *really* bad machine, mine you. And this machine is not uncommon for some people who bought their box just a couple years ago.
  
  We booted up XP. It just sat there thrashing the disk. Just logged in to the desktop. Doing nothing. No applications running. No user input. Just idling. It just kept hitting the hard disk, about once per second. Geez, I can't imagine how well it will run an application.
  
  Recently, when I brought this episode up again, the local Microsoft defenders said that all new OSes require 128 MB of ram as a minimum.
  
  (Of course, I also recently ran Mac OS X on a G3 233, with 128 MB, and it was *dog* slow. And I mean *unusable* slow. Like the 1983 Lisa was.)
  
  --
  
  Those who would give up liberty in exchange for security and DRM should switch to Microsoft Palladium!
36. Re:Not another... by Mr_Silver · 2001-08-22 03:53 · Score: 2
  
  Windows is one of the worst window manager in existence. It doesn't do one thing and do it well, it doesn't have any shining features whatsoever. NOT ONE.
  Errr, you've not really used Windows at all really have you? Windows is one of the best window managers out there. Its clean, easy to understand and completely consistent through out.
  But thats not really a surprise. Microsoft spends thousands every year with useability tests and studies. They gain feedback on their GUI from a massive number of computer literate and illiterate people alike.
  In fact, its so good and so consistent and so easy to use that much of the stuff in KDE, GNOME or whatever have been directly copied or influenced by Windows GUI.
  
  --
  Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
37. Re:Not another... by LordNimon · 2001-08-22 03:55 · Score: 1
  
  It's much easier to delete icons than it is to add them. Besides, it can always be made an option. Most OS/2 programs give you the choice, so Linux programs can do the same thing.
  I don't like icons cluttering my desktop either, which is why I don't let them clutter my desktop. They are organized in directories.
  It's ironic that you speak of choices as being a strength of Unix, but you don't want people to have the choice of installing icons. Not only that, but having lots of choices is a good only when these choices give you total leverage. For instance, if most of the GUI apps I want to use have integration with KDE but not GNOME, then GNOME isn't much of a choice any more. In such cases, the lack of choice of other platforms is becomes a benefit, not a drawback.
  
  --
  And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
  To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
38. Re:Not another... by asincero · 2001-08-22 03:59 · Score: 1
  
  > Your suggestion would leave people like me who
  > don't want icons on the desktop SOL.
  
  Well, people like you don't matter. People like you are people who "think think they are |-r4d 3|33+ for using a non-Windows OS, but still don't know jack shit about said OS thus making them no better than your typical Windows luser".
  
  The kind of people that do matter (in this area anyway) are the people who are like your typical Windows luser except they don't give a damn about what OS they are using, they just want to get some work done. These kind of people represent the majority of the desktop PC users out there. And these are the people that the various Linux desktop projects are trying to reach.
  
  - Arcadio
39. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:00 · Score: 0
  
  Sounds like you need Enlightenment.
40. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:01 · Score: 0
  
  "If we did, GEM (for those of you old enough to remember what it was) and OS/2 would be competing with Windows. They're not, they're dead."
  
  Sorry, but so far as OS/2's concerned, IBM killed it via mismanagement, it had nothing to do with the GUI.
41. Re:Not another... by LordNimon · 2001-08-22 04:03 · Score: 1
  
  Open Source isn't about standardization, its about choices.
  I think most people would disagree with you. Part of the power of Open Source is that it promotes following standards. If the source code to your program is freely available to everyone, you can't "protect" your "intellectual property" by adding proprietary interfaces, which is what companies like Microsoft like to do. And if your program is GPL'd, then you can cut/paste any other GPL code out there, so there's an incentive to use other people's work, if it's compatible.
  
  --
  And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
  To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
42. Re:Not another... by n1tr0g3n · 2001-08-22 04:07 · Score: 1
  
  KDE and Gnome both duplicate most of Windows' key mappings, such as Alt-F4, F1, ... These key bindings, however, are unintuitive, and people only like them because they've been used before. Most people coming from Windows could just as easly look at an F1 key and see the word Help right there underneath it, but honestly, it doesn't make a lot of sense. Why not put a Help button on the keyboard?
  
  As far as speed is concerned, twm and blackbox are very fast. I like some of blackbox's themes. The only problems with twm and blackbox is that they use the UNIX style bindings of ALT-F1 through ALT-F4 being used to switch to desktops one through four, which I think is equally as handy as ALT-F4 to close a window. Anyway, what is the window close keyboard shortcut on the Macintosh? It's not Alt-F4.
43. Re:Not another... by squiggleslash · 2001-08-22 04:16 · Score: 2
  
  There's always one isn't there. If the topic is about someone designing a new operating system, we get "Why oh why is there any need for yet ANOTHER operating system?". If the topic is a window manager, it's "Why oh why is there any need for another window manager?" And so on, and so forth.
  
  And bizarrely, such rants are always modded up, rather than the redundant trolls that they are.
  
  But I'll answer your question with a fairly easy response: Yeah, sure, we'll standardise on one GUI. We'll force everyone to use one window manager, and one widget set, and one suite of desktop applets, and one office suite.
  
  But on one condition: We never pick the ones you want to use. Like KDE? We'll choose GNOME, or Enlightenment. Not especially fond of using C++? We'll rewrite GNOME to use QT. Fond of WindowMaker or Sawfish? That's fine, but we'll standardise on FVWM95. Like running WordPerfect with KWhatever? We'll choose OpenOffice.org thank you very much.
  
  I'm not overly fond of Enlightenment (at the moment, but I might have a look at this new release when it comes out, seemed kinda Amigaish, and that's a good thing in my book) but I'm glad it exists. It's another choice, out there with the desktops and other systems (OpenLook, GNUStep, even Athena, etc)
  
  Now, a more useful proposal for the one-desktop zealots to get involved in might be some sort of interoperability layer, where programmers can write using the most suitable toolkit, and expect their programs to adopt the look and feel of any supported host desktop. That would be worth doing, as it makes it easier for people to choose the "best desktop" for their needs...
  
  --
  You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
44. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:16 · Score: 0
  
  Whoops, you blew it. Didn't you know that people who actually understand the concepts that make linux great aren't allowed to post here? Tsk Tsk. You obviously must not be paying attention, or you'd know that not supporting the absurd^H^H^H^H^H wonderful idea that linux belongs on everyone's computer, and that it's necessary for that to be so for linux to "survive" is always offtopic and worth a negative modertion.
45. Re:Not another... by ender- · 2001-08-22 04:17 · Score: 2
  
  Very good point. I think this also falls in with the lack of good installers for Linux apps. The installer needs to just run, install the software, add an icon and be done. When this can be done in Linux, it will be 90% of the way to being a viable desktop replacement for Windows.
  
  Other than that, it's not the 'usability' of the window manager that is stopping Linux from being a good Desktop OS. There is another ability that Linux lacks that will keep it from ever being a viable desktop.
  Take for instance my laptop. It has a built in pointer device that is recognized as a PS/2 device. If I install Linux [in this case Mandrake 8, though I use Slackware for servers], it recognizes this pointing device and configures X to use it.
  
  Now say I decide I'm sick of using the keyboard 'clit' and want to use my USB mouse. In Windows 9x/ME/NT/2K, I just plug in the mouse, and it is instantly usable. But not so in Linux. I have to edit the XF86Config and restart the X server in order to use my USB mouse. This is NOT something that a non-techie 'mom' is going to be able or willing to do, and until Linux[X] can see the switch automatically, it's not going to make much headway against Windows.
  
  There's also the "mostly non-existant, but occassionally working but quite convoluted support for wheel mice" issue. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Usually not with my MS Optical Intellimouse. These things need to be seen and configured automatically and work with ALL the apps in X. Not to mention support for *ALL* the buttons on the mouse. Even when I get the wheel support working, I get three buttons plus the wheel. The 2 buttons on the side are then useless.
  
  It's little things like this that Windows does well and automatically that keep Linux from getting any serious desktop usage from the average Joe. The main funcionality of the various window managers is NOT the problem.
  
  Ender
  
  --
  Nothing to see here
46. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:27 · Score: 0
  
  I suspect there are significantly more Linux desktop users than there are OS/2 desktop users, thus your argument holds exactly ZERO weight. Better luck next time!
47. Re:Not another... by LordNimon · 2001-08-22 04:30 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, I agree with you that X is far behind other OS GUI's in terms of easy-of-configuration. Even OS/2 has it beat. I'm running RedHat 7.1 with KDE, and I can't see any way to change the resolution or color depth via a control panel. Of course, the fact that there are about a dozen different control panels, each one looking different, doesn't help. The mouse problem you mention is probably more of a problem with the Linux kernel than with X, as I think the kernel is what provides mouse support.
  Did you know that OS/2 now supports changing video cards without reconfiguration at all? That's right, all you do is shutdown the computer, replace the video card, and turn it back on again. It will automatically work, without needing to install/uninstall anything or even tell it what video card it is. Why can't Linux do that?
  
  --
  And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
  To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
48. Re:Not another... by zulux · 2001-08-22 04:32 · Score: 1
  
  I humbley disagree, as there are some hidious behaviours that the Windows GUI exhibits:
  
  A lot of useres resize the task-bar into a one pixel high task-bar, or accidently move it to somewhere where they don't want it.
  
  The whole MDI (Mutiple Document Interface) - Baby application windows inside the parent application window. A good exaple of it done correctly is the Gimp.
  
  If you click on the time application on the task-bar, you don't get a calander to browse though. You get a calander to set the current date. Considering you only need to set the date once, this dose't make sense.
  
  Press Start to Shutdown?
  
  Shutdown to log-off?
  
  They fixed this in WindowsXP but - you can't switch running destops for different users.
  
  No mutiple desktops.
  
  We have a lot to learn from legacy GUI's like Windows, but cretainly we shoulden't blindly mimic them, as they have a lot of cruft they can't get rid of.
  
  --
  Moneyed corporations, non-working 'poor' and criminal prisoners are turning productive citizens into tax-slaves.
49. Re:Not another... by LordNimon · 2001-08-22 04:33 · Score: 1
  
  I suspect there are significantly more Windows desktop users than there are Linux desktop users, thus your argument holds exactly ZERO weight. Better luck next time!
  
  --
  And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
  To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
50. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:33 · Score: 0
  
  What the linux desktop really needs are less whiners (ie: you) and more coders (ie: people who take their apparent knowledge of all things and apply it towards solving a problem).
51. Re:Not another... by scrytch · 2001-08-22 04:40 · Score: 2
  
  Windows is horribly unusable, especially for those of us used to Macintosh. The very design of Windows with its BS document-window-inside-application-window is a major drag on its usability, imho
  
  gentlemen, our word for today is canard. microsoft has deprecated MDI since windows 95. there's lots of reasons to hate. and as someone who has supported mac and windows, no one ever had modality issues with windows menubars, selecting "file->save" in the wrong application. of course experienced mac users don't do that. experienced windows users also don't "hunt" for menubars either. that dog didn't hunt then, it sure don't now.
  
  --
  I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
52. Re:Not another... by scrytch · 2001-08-22 04:42 · Score: 2
  
  feh, should have previewed. should have read "there's lots of reasons to hate windows, this one is tired ten year old mac evangalista fodder and needs to be retired"
  
  --
  I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
53. Re:Not another... by Nephrite · 2001-08-22 04:48 · Score: 1
  
  Look, the problem with Linux, and I've said this time and again, is that we don't need a variety of desktop environments. If we did, GEM (for those of you old enough to remember what it was) and OS/2 would be competing with Windows. They're not, they're dead.
  Wrong. They are dead 'cause they ran different applications. On the other hand, some people try to make Windoze appearance a bit different. Take WindowsBlinds or LiteStep for example. Anyway, single GUI is boring and tend to come to stagnation. I myself change my window manager once in a while just to feel different.
  Also I think idea behind KDE and GNOME is corrupt by definition. They just try to clone Windows and that's quite sad. As to your point I think certain distributions will do the trick.
54. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:49 · Score: 0
  
  Ummm, can you name any modern Windows application that still runs MDI? Of course there's Opera, some text editors, and Lotus Notes that have made the specific decision to have a tabbed interface. But other than those and Visual Studio, it's pretty much entirely SDI nowdays.
55. Re:Not another... by spitzak · 2001-08-22 05:04 · Score: 2
  
  Yes there need to be standards, but a lot of users like me are scared of this copying of Windows crap because people are familiar with it. Both KDE and Gnome suffer from these (to me) fatal problems:
  
  We need consistent, tested support for point-to-type. I have never seen a single user (on either Linux or NT) who has used point-to-type for a day or so switch back. It is obviously superior and the only thing stopping it is the unfamiliarity of users with it. I would like to see point-to-type be the default in any Linux desktop. Let's see a little "innovation" instead of this sheep-like copying of Windoze and Mac!
  
  Stop raising the windows when I click on them! This is less obvious but killer problem. Both KDE and Gnome will raise any window on a click. If I want to raise the window I will click on the title or border, or on an empty area of the window!! This foul behavior forces programmers to use horrifying kludges like tiled windows or "MDI" and then everybody bitches about the poor or buggy toolkit support for these, while failing to realize that these are horrid workarounds for an extremely simple and basic design flaw! This misfeature was removed from X in 1984, dammit, and we are somehow reintroducing it by copying stupid Windows into the X window managers! All old X window managers did this correctly, this disease is killing the ability for innovative user interface designs to be made. Note that it is trivial for an application to raise it's own windows and thus act like Windows if it wants to.
  
  (Gnome/Sawfish can have the click-to-raise turned off, but it is totally mysterious how to do it and requires changing key and mouse bindings. KDE is much worse, it appears to be impossible to turn click-to-raise off without also turning it off for the title bars, I have tried quite a bit).
  
  Stop raising the "parent" when a "child" window is raised. This additional Windows-copied foul behavior is almost as bad as the click-to-raise behavior in preventing overlapping window interfaces from being implemented. For the morons out there who are designing this stuff: yes a child window must be "above" it's parent, but that does not mean that there cannot be windows inbetween them! Both KDE and Gnome have this behavior and it cannot be turned off, pretty much forcing us to make *all* windows children, or *none*. This problem seems to exist in older CDE window managers too. But FVWM got it right, and there is no reason you morons cannot do it, too.
  
  You may think I am bitching, but I think the above are simple, basic, design errors in how the window managers work, and these simple errors are the main reason there is resistance to a "standard Linux desktop".
56. Re:Not another... by MrBogus · 2001-08-22 05:11 · Score: 2
  
  "OS/2 often times ran Win16 apps better than Windows itself. And thats not just typical anti-MS FUD!"
  
  Yes it is. In the best case, OS/2 ran Windows apps exactly as well as Windows did (==not well), because it was by-in-large the same codebase. The advantage was that you didn't have to reboot after one of the frequent crashes, and that you could run multiple WinOS2 partitions.
  
  Of course, the best case wasn't all that common. Many apps didn't like WinOS2, there were videodriver issues with the environment, and the 'seemless windows' mode tended to hang the entire OS due to the single input queue issue.
  
  I'm not posting this to knock OS/2 -- it's Win16 environment existed as a minor transition feature. Just that the whole "Better Windows than Windows" marketing line was a bunch of bullshit. (I ran OS/2 in production as both clients and servers, but lots of dabblers that sprung for the cheap retail copies can attest to this.)
  
  (The WOW feature in NT actually was a better Windows environment because it dumped all of the shite Win3.1 code and thunked API calls directly to Win32, thus resolving the 'resource pools' issues as well as general stability issues. Too bad it required so much memory [32MB!])
  
  --
  
  When I hear the word 'innovation', I reach for my pistol.
57. Re:Not another... by zulux · 2001-08-22 05:15 · Score: 1
  
  Ummm, can you name any modern Windows application that still runs MDI?
  
  Yep - Microsofts Access XP is pure amature MDI. You would think that the user interfce for Access would be decent, considering they diden't spend any time on the database part of it.
  
  --
  Moneyed corporations, non-working 'poor' and criminal prisoners are turning productive citizens into tax-slaves.
58. Re:Not another... by tsa · 2001-08-22 05:56 · Score: 1
  
  Ha ha. Maybe you're right, but I use fvwm2 and I like it, so I won't bother trying something else.
  
  --
  -- Cheers!
59. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 05:58 · Score: 0
  
  It's ironic that you speak of choices as being a strength of Unix, but you don't want people to have the choice of installing icons.
  
  No, I never said that. You suggestion was that all desktop environments support a standardized way of adding icons to the desktop. What I object to is dictating that "all desktops must do ...", which takes away choices. I don't care if the environment you use supports desktop icons, I just don't want you dictating that the one I use must support it too.
  
  For instance, if most of the GUI apps I want to use have integration with KDE but not GNOME, then GNOME isn't much of a choice any more.
  
  Don't you see that the more integration there is between the apps and the desktop environment, the fewer choices you will have? Right now, for the most part I can run GNOME and KDE apps side by side with Motif apps under GNOME, KDE, E, WM, Blackbox, FVWM, etc. As soon as you make GNOME & KDE apps dependent on certain support from the desktop/WM, you either render them unusable by some people or you start forcing all desktops & WMs to behave in ways that users may not want (e.g. putting icons on the desktop).
60. Re:Not another... by asincero · 2001-08-22 06:16 · Score: 1
  
  > Yes it is. In the best case, OS/2 ran Windows
  > apps exactly as well as Windows did (==not
  > well), because it was by-in-large the same
  > codebase. The advantage was that you didn't
  > have to reboot after one of the frequent
  > crashes,
  
  Well, yes. You are right. I suppose I should've mentioned how running Win16 applications under OS/2 was better.
  
  - Arcadio
61. Re:Not another... by WNight · 2001-08-22 06:29 · Score: 2
  
  > Why does Linux need to take over the desktop?
  
  Well, that depends. If you mean "take over" literally, as in, be the only one, then I don't think it does.
  
  But if you mean, why does Linux need to get easy to use, and be reasonable replacement for Windows, then I think this is very important.
  
  1) Much of the world is far poorer than North America/Western Europe/Japan. An old P75 with 32MB would be server-class to much of the world's population. MS-Windows will never cater to this market. If you run Windows on that hardware it's either pathetically slow, or pathetically obsolete. Linux makes this hardware capable of connecting to the modern internet (perl, php, apache, postgreSQl, IPv6, and more).
  
  2) Monopolies are bad. MS wants .NET to take over, and likely to provide all content on a pay-per-use basis. They also want a piece of all online financial transactions. If the only platforms out there are Windows, people aren't going to have much choice... Ditto with things like office suites, and control over your work. If the only way to edit a file is Word 2005 over .NET, what'll you do when MS decides you've violated a license and shuts you down remotely until you prove otherwise? If there's a perfectly functional alternative that you can place generic office staff at, this type of control is much harder to exert.
  
  3) Freedom. Microsoft's only complaint about hardware-level content-access-controls is that they didn't have enough say in the implementation. Today, DVD players only come for Windows (and Mac, a bit) because of market forces. It's possible that in five years they would only be legal on an MS platform. (To legally access the access-control circuits, you'd need to send the right auth codes, which thanks to the DMCA, only an MS OS can send...) If another platform takes hold and a significant number of users adopt it (10% or more) companies and governments will think twice before making something Windows only.
  
  I'd never think of forcing someone to run Linux, or any other OS. My only concern is that in a few years they might not have a choice.
  
  I can honestly see MS making a case that "Any content protection can be cracked, on a general purpose computer" and getting government support for a computer than contains Windows 2005 in ROM, preventing anyone from having any direct access to the hardware. It'd also be likely that any attempt to swap the ROM, or bypass the OS would be a DMCA violation because, of course, the only reason to access the hardware directly is to do something the manufacturer didn't intend and that's obviously illegal.
  
  Then there's the whole economic thing... Today I can get a mobo and CPU for about the same price as a 10GB HD, the smallest I can find. If I leave out a HD, it chops the cost of a basic system to 2/3. Thus a cheap Duron system, with 128MB of RAM, is around $300. Toss in an ethernet card with boot ROM and you can remote boot. Run apps off of a remote X-Server, and you can bypass CPU limitations of the client PC.
  
  Thus for $350 or so, in total, I can setup an office workstation with a word processor, spreadsheet, database, 3d model editor, 2d graphics editor, email, browsing, compiler/IDE, etc.
  
  I couldn't even buy a copy of MS Office for that price, or the OS, let alone the hardware required to run either 2k or XP (9x OSes aren't stable enough, imho).
  
  This will only be possible (and legal) if MS doesn't get its way. To prevent that, we need to get people using Linux, so you aren't looked at oddly when you suggest a non-MS solution.
  
  btw, just to smack anyone who says something about MS's terminal services... Think of the costs. Unix is cheaper to run, cheaper to buy, and cheaper to admin. While technically MS could do this, it wouldn't work as well, as quickly, or cheaply. Setup time on the unix version is also much lower.
62. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 06:43 · Score: 0
  
  Well, people like you don't matter. People like you are people who "think think they are |-r4d 3|33+ for using a non-Windows OS, but still don't know jack shit about said OS thus making them no better than your typical Windows luser".
  
  I beg to differ. People like me matter because we write applications for *nix systems.
  The kind of people that do matter (in this area anyway) are the people who are like your typical Windows luser except they don't give a damn about what OS they are using, they just want to get some work done.
  
  1. Just because somebody uses Windows doesn't mean they're a "luser".
  2. People have been getting work done on *nix systems for a long, long time. My company is a 100% *nix shop (perhaps 20% being Linux) specifically because we can get work done on this platform. There is a fallacy in thinking that everybody has to be using the same desktop to get work done.
  These kind of people represent the majority of the desktop PC users out there. And these are the people that the various Linux desktop projects are trying to reach.
  
  I have nothing against GNOME or KDE. What I have a problem with is people like you trying to squeeze out other window managers and desktop environments. If you want a Windows oriented desktop, that's fine with me. Just don't try to shove it down the throat of people who prefer other alternatives.
  The UNIX/X philosophy has always emphasized user choice, even when it comes at the expense of integration & cohesion. If you don't like that, maybe you should use something else, because you and your fellow Linux desktop zealots aren't likely to change the minds of the majority of the *nix community.
63. Re:Not another... by mbrod · 2001-08-22 06:52 · Score: 1
  
  That's why I want it to be light, I very rarely have any need to use a GUI but for some things it is nice.
64. Re:Not another... by ichimunki · 2001-08-22 06:53 · Score: 1
  
  I use Windows every weekday for at least 8 hours with a variety of MS and non-MS applications. Have for the last four years. I think I've used it enough to have a valid opinion. And in my opinion it's not intuitive or friendly or particularly clean or nice to look at or easy to use. If your opinion is different, then we disagree. You can't really prove this stuff.
  
  Personally I don't think MS has done anything to attempt to improve their UI-- so whatever they're spending is largely wasted, the few changes I've found between Win95 and Win2k are not necessary and do not improve usability. Some of their basic architecture is pretty cool (what with the way they support drag and drop and cut and paste), but the UI itself is not top notch.
  
  As for your "directly copied" assertion: prove it. Name one thing that KDE or GNOME has taken directly from Windows that wasn't either obvious or that Windows didn't take from Mac or some other existing GUI. It's not like Windows is the place where GUI progress is made.
  
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65. Re:Not another... by ichimunki · 2001-08-22 06:59 · Score: 1
  
  How can you say it's deprecated when I'm still seeing it in every Office 2000 application I use? Only now they've decided to put a taskbar button for each document. Ugh. Even worse.
  
  Your point about the modality issue on Macs is taken. I guess that's something you get used to early on. Which kind of supports my original point, the GUI is something you have to learn to use and when it comes to learning curves, Windows' curve is at least as steep as any other GUI I've seen.
  
  --
  I do not have a signature
66. Re:Not another... by MrBogus · 2001-08-22 07:05 · Score: 1
  
  Maybe I should have mentioned that exiting and restarting Windows 3.1 could be done in under 10 seconds. Meanwhile, in not uncommon case when WinOS2 brought down or locked OS/2, you would have to wait thru it's interminable boot sequence.
  
  Face it, if WinOS2 was a compelling environment, OS/2 might have actually gotten popular.
  
  --
  
  When I hear the word 'innovation', I reach for my pistol.
67. Re:Not another... by LordNimon · 2001-08-22 07:24 · Score: 1
  
  Don't you see that the more integration there is between the apps and the desktop environment, the fewer choices you will have?
  No, actually I don't see that. Integration is always an option (unless you're Microsoft). What I want is for every application I install to give me the option to create icons on the desktop. Even if the app forces the icon, a quick drag to the trashcan will solve that problem. This is how every other OS works, and it's something that is expected of a desktop operating system. If we could make a Top-10 list of things Linux needs to be accepted as a contender to Windows for the desktop OS, this item would be on that list.
  
  --
  And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
  To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
68. Re:Not another... by scrytch · 2001-08-22 07:51 · Score: 2
  
  > How can you say it's deprecated when I'm still seeing it in every Office 2000 application I use?
  
  Maybe it's inconsistent across Office2k then. All I have is Word2k, and it indeed is very much SDI. I don't even see a way to change it to use MDI. I imagine Access2k does use MDI, where it actually makes some sense to do so, but I haven't seen it.
  
  --
  I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
69. Re:Not another... by Pedrito · 2001-08-22 07:57 · Score: 2
  
  You can argue that Microsoft sacked the competition, and I wouldn't disagree with you. I mean, the justice department isn't after them for no reason at all.
  
  Windows is better than Gnome (I won't speak to KDE because I haven't used it) on usability, and certainly better than X by itself on a number of points. With the exception of developers actually going out of their way to make their app not follow the standards, 90% of all Windows programs have almost identical functionality for standard functions: File/Load, File/Save, File/Print, File/Print Preview, Edit/Cut, Edit/Copy, Edit/Paste, etc... The Window menu is consistent, the Help menu is consistent.
  
  The toolbars are consistent between applications and how they work. The status bar is very consistent. The fact that you can turn these on and off is also consistent.
  
  When I hit ctrl-F S, I know I'm going to get File/Save, in almost any applcation. If I hit F1, I know I'm going to get help.
  
  I'll grant that the thing about dragging the task bar around was a stupid idea. I don't know anyone who has ever changed it on purpose. I'm also not saying to blindly copy Windows. What I'm saying is, do it as good as Windows, or do it better, but more importantly, at least TRY to enforce it to be consistent across applications.
  
  When I create a new application in Visual C++, I automatically get the File, Edit, View, Window, and Help menu items, fully populated. I get a toolbar (if I want it), I get a status bar. I even get a basic help file started for me. Now, granted, that's a development environment, but it's also the primary Windows development environment out there (along with Visual Basic), and it helps to enforce consistency.
  
  Read any book on user interface design, and you'll find that Windows is, in many respects, a model of good design. There are definitely problems with it, I won't argue there, but it's also the standard with which Gnome and KDE have to compete. They need to do what Windows can do, and do it better, or they'll never be the GUI of choice by the masses.
70. Re:Not another... by simm_s · 2001-08-22 08:24 · Score: 1
  
  I think you are making the wrong argument. No one is forcing you to use elightenment or any other desktop. I don't believe there is any way KDE/GNOME can compete agaist microsoft who dedicates 100% of its time to figuring out what the other 99% of people want. They also have the resources to provide dynamic content to their customers through there alliances with large companies.
  
  Example: you can open up microsoft money and get live stock quotes as well as business news or advice from msn money. You cannot do this from gnucash because the maintainers cannot supply the information to you. That is a problem you cannot solve with code alone!
  
  I always wanted to know why we should compete on the desktop? I don't think there is a need for grandma to be using *BSD or linux. The whole concept of the desktop PC is a dying concept anyway. That concept is being replaced by a decentralized computing environment (cell phones, pdas, tivos, etc). This is where the *nix community should strike providing backend support and embedded support.
  
  Even microsoft is strategically positioning itself away from the desktop market (dot net, xbox, etc). By the time linux makes a crack in the desktop environment the desktop environment will not even be an issue worth fighting for.
  
  Having a diverse environment of GUIs is great for open source because it give engineers plenty of options for implementing *nux on an console. i.e: If I wanted to implement a tivo like device on the linux kernel, I have tons of GUI environments to choose from each with a different functionality.
71. Re:Not another... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 08:43 · Score: 2
  
  Wow, that's out there. Doing what you're doing is like loading up that poor machine with a debug builds of Linux 2.4.x-pre1, XFree86 4.1, KDE-2, GNOME 1.4, and E16. Let me tell you, that's not a fast config either. First of all, XP is a RAM hog. Hell, so is KDE-2 and GNOME, so deal with it. Second, That's an XP beta. What were you thinking? How can you possibly base an opinion on a BETA release of Windows?
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
72. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 08:55 · Score: 0
  
  I've been using XP RC2 for some days now, and it's really *really* fast. From boot menu to login screen takes me 3 secs, from login to full usable desktop another 3. Okay, so I'm using it on a PIII 800 with 128 MB. Win 98 takes 30 secs on the same box. Don't even get me started on W2K...Don't really like the looks of it (XP) but in my experience (no pun intended) it's pretty solid (so I only have had a few days - been using RC1 before that - didn't mess up either).
  
  Anyway, not like I want do sell you on some MS propaganda (bet I had you going:) but I agree with the original poster about MS GUI usability. I think it shows that the amount of cash they throw at user testing, lab monitoring of first time users, psych input and stuff is probably only second to the amount they'll throw at the marketing monster that is about to hit us in October.
  
  And yes, you still have to push start to stop. In gnome, you have to click a foot to get any work done...
73. Re:Not another... by Error27 · 2001-08-22 09:13 · Score: 2
  
  Windows , kde and gnome are all crap as window managers.
  
  The person who invented the start menu will be first against the wall when the revolution comes.
  
  So you move your mouse down to the bottom left. Then the menu pops up above and to the right. So you start moving your mouse up again. Then the next menu goes down. Then up. By this time you've run out of space and so the menus start going left instead of right. And up and down again. And then finally you can start the stupid application.
  
  In windows 90% of the time you have to navigate 4 submenus (normally one of the submenus has more than 30 items) and click 4 times to start an aplication. In enlightenment 90% you navigate one menu and click 2 times.
  
  There is a reason why microsoft came out with the fade away start button bar and that's because people hate it wasting their desktop space. The people who don't use the fade away bar also hate it but they hate having the menu bar keep popping up in the middle of what they are trying to do all the time. What I end up doing is changing the configuration back and forth between popping up and standing around. And it's not because I love messing around, it's because Microsoft UI is utter crap!
  
  I could go on... but the point is most drunken hobos could design a better window manager than windows 98.
74. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 10:04 · Score: 0
  
  You're confusing two issues. Compatibility is a library issue, not a desktop problem. If you want to argue for a standard set libraries I'm with you all the way. As an end user I'm sick of having to download and install tens of megs to get one simple little program running (the latest being aviplay demanding installation of KDE). However, I have no desire to switch from fvwm 2.4, which does everything I need at twice the speed of Gnome or KDE.
75. Re:Not another... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 10:06 · Score: 2
  
  As far as speed is concerned, twm and blackbox are very fast.
  >>>>>>>>
  Yea, and they have none of the features of Windows. Windows has the features of KDE and GNOME without being as slow as them. And I use Win2K on a PII-300, so its not my hardware that makes Win2K seem fast!
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
76. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 10:09 · Score: 0
  
  Pendrito opines:
  Look, the problem with Linux, and I've said this time and again, is that we don't need a variety of desktop environments. If we did, GEM (for those of you old enough to remember what it was) and OS/2 would be competing with Windows. They're not, they're dead.
  OS2 had only the one "window manager", yet it still failed. So either you're saying it failed because it didn't emulate the Windows desktop, or your argument is incoherent.
77. Re:Not another... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 10:11 · Score: 2
  
  Actually, programmers use vi, so its a non-issue. Seriously, though, I don't see legions of Windows programmers up in arms over Windows being bad for programming. All Linux window managers and Windows work mostly the same way, so what exactly is the difference? I'd just like some concrete examples of when the configurability (or multiplicity) of Linux GUIs has allowed somebody to do something really useful.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
78. Re:Not another... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 10:15 · Score: 2
  
  You know, BeOS treats ALL hardware like that. The only time you have to step in and do configuration is cases where something goes terribly wrong.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
79. Re:Not another... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 10:21 · Score: 2
  
  Don't you see that the more integration there is between the apps and the desktop environment, the fewer choices you will have?
  >>>>>>>>>
  No, that just gives developers power. Take a hypothetical user using Linux for development. He loves VisualC++, so he uses KDevelop. So, who decides what desktop he uses? Not him, no. The guys who wrote KDevelop get to decide that. He can either run KDE-2, or he can live with a desktop that doesn't mesh together. If all these DEs interoperated perfectly, he could erase KDE2 and Qt from his harddrive, and still run his favorite app in HIS choice of desktop environments. THAT'S real choice.
  
  PS> No, this is not a KDE vs. GNOME flame. They both suck...
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
80. Re:Not another... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 10:24 · Score: 2
  
  Now assume for a minute that I, as the Uberhacker that I am, decide I'm not quite happy. GNOME sucks, I want something better. I take "Linux" and change the GUI environment and create... "GarvIX". One of two scenarios may play out:
  >>>>>>>>>
  Actually, in the ideal scenario, it would be the APIs that would be standardized, not the desktop environment. So you'd just write GarvIX to implement the standard API and then distribute it to all your followers. This is the same concept as OpenGL, btw. You write to the API, and the implementation is totally up to you. Of course, if you don't like the API, you just have to deal with it. After all, you don't see people rewriting OpenGL do you? (D3D is a subject for another discussion...)
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
81. Re:Not another... by ichimunki · 2001-08-22 10:40 · Score: 1
  
  Except that the article is about E, which is head-and-shoulders above Windows, except that it hasn't been able to force a bunch of application developers to behave. And I will grant that getting developers in line is important. It pisses me off to no end when I run across applications running under Windows which violate the conventions (which are heavily borrowed from Mac anyway).
  
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  I do not have a signature
82. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 10:41 · Score: 0
  
  Funny, I use KDE2 on an AMD K6 350 and it's a lot faster than win98 on a 700mhz p3. Perhaps the situation is more complex than "KDE SUX ITZ SLOW"?
83. Re:Not another... by ichimunki · 2001-08-22 10:42 · Score: 1
  
  It does make some sense with Access, which is my primary MS application, and Excel still uses it (above and beyond the worksheet model-- which is a fine UI within a document). But I see now that you've pointed it out to me that it is gone in Word, which I avoid. There is a version of emacs for Windows, y'know. ;)
  
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  I do not have a signature
84. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 10:43 · Score: 0
  
  Hey, can you please explain to me the reason for the Start menu being taken away from me if some application decides to open or close a window on the other side of the screen? This bug has been around since 1995.
85. Re:Not another... by Andrewkov · 2001-08-22 11:46 · Score: 1
  
  I'm pretty sure ALT+[Any F Key] changes desktops ... (Don't know about KDE.)
86. Re:Not another... by Coryoth · 2001-08-22 12:58 · Score: 1
  
  Most people don't complain about their GUI 'cause they don't know any better. I play around with a lot of different systems (I've used FVWM, Blackbox, Windows, GNOME, E, and Windowmaker extensively), and inevietably I find things that are good about some systems that I really miss when I move on/back. That's why I'm mostly with E now - It does almost everything I want (except it's still not quite as functionally configurable as good old FVWM). I've hacked my windows GUI to suit my needs (as best I can). I'm a lot more efficient using my system than what MS provided. More importantly, people that bother to take a little time to try my system out generally want me to hack their system too.
  
  It's lack of awareness of any other way of doing things 90% of the time. I can't believe so many people still use click to focus (except that the focus follows mouse hack is so badly broken in windows).
  
  Jedidiah
  --
  
  --
  Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
87. Re:Not another... by odaiwai · 2001-08-22 13:19 · Score: 1
  
  errr, if you hit ctrl-f, s you bring up a find dialog and start looking for the letter s. I think you mean alt-f, s or just ctrl-s.
  
  Incidentally, it used to be possible to set up the help system in office to only show you the tips and not the animations. This would give you an occasionally updated list up keyboard shortcuts and general usability tips for whatever you were doing.
  
  dave
88. Re:Not another... by Coryoth · 2001-08-22 13:23 · Score: 1
  
  Please mod the parent post up!
  
  I admit that some people (mysteriously) hate focus follows mouse (point to type), but in general it is far superior. As for raising windows when they are clicked in, I've been trying to turn that off in Windows for years to no avail. Some people find the switch hard, (they hate hunting for titlebars to raise windows), but I find binding an ALT-Click or something to "Raise Window" (easy to do in any decent window manager (E, FVWM, Sawfish, etc. - but not windows)) does the job while they transition.
  
  Why are we following such broken standards?!
  
  Jedidiah
  --
  
  --
  Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
89. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 17:58 · Score: 0
  
  Perhaps you didn't understand the part where he said "Win2K".
  
  Perhaps you're a fucking idiot or a liar.
90. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 19:40 · Score: 0
  
  Amen!!! This guy is not a troll, he speaks the truth. I was usuing RH 6.0 and was able to get around kde somewhat. Now I'm using RH 7.1(KDE) and I can't even figure out how to change the resolution of the damn screen. The older version was similar to windows, right click, and properties. Now I have to try and find out what f**cking text file I have to edit to change the damn resolution. This is why LINUX will NEVER be a mainstream OS. Unless of course they get their collective s**t together or Bill Gates takes over the world. The latter may just happen.
  
  I feel the pain that this guy is saying. I want to use Linux for it's stability but it's just takes too much time to learn all the in's and out's that change every 4 to 6 months.
  
  Someone put out a standard and stick to it. If there was a GUI that never changed or only changed slightly over time, I would use it!
  
  BTW, GEM ruled!!!!
91. Re:Not another... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-23 02:30 · Score: 0
  
  A button is a button is a button. Why do you need a single GUI. Just because we have MSWindows GUI on most peoples computer destops doesn't mean that this is successful formula for good GUI design. Id say its more about successful marketing of a product. I don't think that Linux making it to the desktop is much about its GUI but more about its appications and supported hardware and how it is setup. Maybe the problem is that people learn how to use Windows NOT how to use GUI interfaces... after all no matter what the GUI a button performs an action when pressed a scroll bar in gtk+ does the same thing in OSX or Windows..
92. Re:Not another... by spitzak · 2001-08-24 05:14 · Score: 2
  
  Thanks for your support, I sometimes feel this is a hopeless cause...
  
  The "searching for the title bar" problem can be solved by raising windows when the user clicks on dead area, such as background or labels, where the click has no other meaning. On X this requires toolkit or application support to implement. In my experience people used to Windows do not notice any difference in function, since they always search for such a "dead" area to click when they want to raise a window without using any other function.
  
  Applications are also free to raise themselves if they really think they should. Some people think a word processor should do this if the user clicks to place the insertion cursor (but not if they drag to select text or if they move any other controls). I'm uncertain, but at least now the application can decide!
  
  Ideally I would like clicks on this dead area to do all "window manager" stuff, i.e it can drag the windows around and resize them and bring up window manager menus. This would probably allow us to get rid of title bars and window borders. Unfortunatley support for this requires changes in how window managers are implemented on X.
Re: Good Troll by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:08 · Score: 0

Ok. I will bite aswell.

You are making one big mistake.

FreeBSD is 100% Linux binary compatible.
Most commercial Linux software is supplied in binary code. So I don't see a problem with that.
Groan - more alpha blending by Matthias+Wiesmann · 2001-08-22 02:08 · Score: 5, Insightful

While it might rejoince some that everybody is jumping the alpha-blending anti-aliasing bandwagon behind Apple's OS X, what annoys me it that they do not copy the intelligent concept behind Aqua: display PDF.

What Apple has done is define an abstraction for graphical applications. What other copy is some of the nice uses of those abstractions: anti-aliasing and alpha-blending.

It's really a shame the only thing they understand is the surface...
1. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by kurowski · 2001-08-22 02:35 · Score: 1
  
  Hey guy- people were doing alpha blending and altialiasing long, long before OS X came out. Believe me, "display PDF" is not the origination of those concepts. Further, Raster was demonstrating early working concepts of how alpha and antialiasing would work in E17 long before OS X was available.
2. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:48 · Score: 0
  
  What Apple has done is define an abstraction for graphical applications. What other copy is some of the nice uses of those abstractions: anti-aliasing and alpha-blending.
  
  What do you think eVas is? It's more that just alpha blending and anti-aliasing. It's an abstraction for building GUI elements too. It doesn't provide a unified interface for both printing and screen display like DPS & Quartz, but it does innovate in other ways. In particularly, eVas is the first 2D rendering library built on GL primitives for full hardware acceleration of advanced effects.
3. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Alan · 2001-08-22 02:49 · Score: 1
  
  True, but not really the point. The original point (IMHO) was that copying or borrowing, the idea of using PDFs as a display (or however osx does it) would be better than making cool looking alpha blending using the current technology.
  
  Don't get me wrong, I love E and I think alpha blending and anti-aliasing looks great, but I've also got a guy at work who does stuff on an iMac with OS/X and even though we razz him, the display just looks AWSOME. Everything with drop shadow, transparancy and anti-aliasing (in tasteful amounts) looks incrediably sweet. I'd love to see that look WITH the same type of technology behind it (talk to any mac guy who has tried to make X look like OS/X and he'll tell you it can emulate it a bit, and kind of look like it, except much worse :)
4. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Neon+Spiral+Injector · 2001-08-22 02:57 · Score: 2
  
  The original point (IMHO) was that copying or borrowing, the idea of using PDFs as a display (or however osx does it) would be better than making cool looking alpha blending using the current technology.
  
  Why not use a technology that was designed for layering and alpha blending on a screen? OpenGL does that, and that is what E17 uses.
5. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by pabs · 2001-08-22 03:02 · Score: 1
  
  Display PDF is a successor to the Display PostScript system in NeXT/OpenSTEP. There is a Display PostScript extension for X Windows; you can read more about Display PostScript and the X Windows Display PostScript extension here.
  
  Alpha blending (eg transparency) between windows is being addressed with the X Render extension. While neither Evas nor E17 currently make use of the Render extension, and Raster hasn't said much about it on the E-develop mailing list, he has made few posts to the XFree86 Render mailing list indicating preliminary work on a Render backend for Evas.
  
  --
  Odds of being killed by lightning and winning the lottery in the same day: 1 in 2^55
6. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:09 · Score: 0
  
  Is that anything like display postscript on the Suns? We all know how nice and fast the text console is on a Sun!! rofl!
7. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:42 · Score: 0
  
  Do you seriously think Apple is going to freely license Quartz?
8. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:48 · Score: 0
  
  Hey, C'mon. You could get that hack - tconsole, was it? That sped up the console text and made it really fast. Definitely a great hack.
  
  Of course it didn't help me the first time I crossed paths with a shared-library machine.
  
  Trying to free up disk space by mv'ing files around in /usr/lib on my 386i was *not* one of my better ideas or better days..
9. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Alan · 2001-08-22 04:05 · Score: 1
  
  Oh, that'll never happen of course, but it's a nice thought isn't it?
10. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Matthias+Wiesmann · 2001-08-22 04:40 · Score: 2
  
  The point of using pdf is that there is a world outside the screen, using the same technology for screen display, printing and distributing documents is a nice feature.
  
  OpenGL seems overkill to handle stuff in 2D, and misses some feature that are very usefull in 2D arena and document storage: color correction, advanced font handling, font inclusion, compression.
  
  I see OpenGL and display PDF as two complimentary technologies with complimentary uses. I would not want to implement a 3D game using display pdf, and I would not want to implement a page layout program using OpenGL...
11. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Matthias+Wiesmann · 2001-08-22 04:44 · Score: 2
  
  Do you seriously think Apple is going to freely license Quartz?
  
  Quartz is a implementation of display pdf, whose spec is available freely from Adobe. Some say Apple choose this technology because they did not not want to pay a license to Adobe. In any cases, you don't need to license display pdf, you can implement it freely - the spec is open.
12. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by HydroCarbon10 · 2001-08-22 05:01 · Score: 2
  
  The GL stands for Graphics Language. Just because the primary use of it is for 3D rendering doesn't make the 2D side of it non-existant. What you mention isn't included in OpenGL (I don't think, at least), because OpenGL is meant to _draw things on the screen_, you have to tell it what to draw. Display PDF on top of OpenGL would be a perfectly natural combination.
  
  --
  The best way to accelerate a windows box is at 9.8 meters per second square.
13. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Rimbo · 2001-08-22 07:06 · Score: 2
  
  What do you mean, brought on by OS X? Windows has had anti-aliased fonts for at least a couple of years now.
14. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by flimflam · 2001-08-22 07:13 · Score: 1
  
  Yeah, so has the Mac. But there wasn't a system-wide graphical subsystem with a good API for doing anti-aliasing and transparency on everything -- not just fonts.
  
  --
  -- It only takes 20 minutes for a liberal to become a conservative thanks to our new outpatient surgical procedure!
15. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 07:14 · Score: 1, Informative
  
  First, PDF is an open specification, but there is no such thing as a Display PDF specification. The closest thing is Apple's Quartz specification, and I'm not sure whether that is readily available or not and what restrictions might be attached. For one thing, there are patents pending on various parts and I have a feeling Apple's lawyers might take issue with an independent implementation of Quartz.
  Second, Quartz is merely based on PDF. There is more functionality there than in plain PDF, so the PDF spec alone wouldn't be sufficient to build something with equivalent functionality.
  Third, simply having the spec wouldn't help much when it comes to implementation. What would really help is source code. It sure would be nice if Apple were to license Quartz like they do Darwin, but they're not going to do that because it's a key feature of OS X.
16. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Rimbo · 2001-08-22 07:34 · Score: 2
  
  Ahhhh...I see. I remember a couple of friends of mine a while back trying to do something with alpha blending. They wanted to make a transparent overlay on top of the Windows desktop. They used TNT2's and one of the 3D API's to turn the Windows desktop into a texture on a flat rectangle that would then have varying degrees of transparency. They then made the picture they wanted into a another texture, and could get the two to fade back and forth by varying the alpha levels on each.
  
  The real magic in their code was how they convinced Windows to make the desktop into an interactive texture displayed on the screen.
  
  It was a neat hack, but lacked anything resembling portability. I think it really only worked on one or two of the machines they tried it on.
  
  Oh, well...now that system-wide transparency is becoming available as part of the API, maybe something like this can be done more easily?
17. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by flimflam · 2001-08-22 07:41 · Score: 1
  
  Yeah -- with Quartz on OSX it's pretty easy. I've got 2 translucent terminal windows up right now -- it's surprisingly convenient -- for instance I use it sometimes to keep a dump of a database schema in a term behind my main terminal, and slashdot open behind that!
  
  --
  -- It only takes 20 minutes for a liberal to become a conservative thanks to our new outpatient surgical procedure!
18. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by be-fan · 2001-08-22 08:09 · Score: 2
  
  Actually, GL 1.2 have pretty nice imaging extensions. And, with newer cards, all of those are accelerated, something that can't be said of PDF.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
19. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by UberLame · 2001-08-22 08:38 · Score: 1
  
  First, OpenGL is not overkill for 2D. High end 2D software on SGIs (like paint programs and compositing/effects software) has been written using GL for years. Further, I believe GL has color correction. I'm not sure what you mean by compression, but there is texture compression (sorta), and through the imaging extensions, I think there is support for other forms of compression. Font's aren't really supported under GL as such. If you represent them as lines or bitmapped textures, your fine, though not as easy.
  
  But really, it isn't an either or thing. GL is really low level, and the whole glory of Display Postscript (and presumably DisplayPDF) is that it is quite high level, and handles fonts, and string displaying, and curves, and fills, etc. The ideal would be to lay DisplayPDF on top of OpenGL.
  
  --
  I'm a loser baby, so why don't you kill me.
20. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 09:32 · Score: 0
  
  Actually, GL provides rudimentary support for bitmapped fonts, but not stroke fonts.
21. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Khalid · 2001-08-22 14:40 · Score: 2
  
  The is already a PDF extension currently in development for XFree86, though not very active : http://sourceforge.net/projects/dps/. The description of the project in Sourceforge says this :
  
  An extension largely compatible with Display PostScript(r). The implementation is targeted at XFree86, and is based on L. Peter Deutsch's ``Ghostscript'' interpreter.
22. Re:Groan - more alpha blending by Error27 · 2001-08-26 09:48 · Score: 2
  
  Actually openGL has rudimentary support for both...
  
  through GLUT.
Re:Linux facts! by kin_korn_karn · 2001-08-22 02:10 · Score: 1

First off, congrats on having the balls to post this on Slashdot.
EXT2FS may not be crash-tolerant, but at least the kernel does RAID. Still, as big of a Linux fan as I am, I would never put it in a 99.9% uptime environment, because of its shortcomings in that area. Linux is suffering from featuritis and hype disease right now, and nobody's doing the 'boring' work of hardening the filesystem and kernel for reliability. It takes a lot of knowledge and resources to test and code such things, and since Linux development is a hobby for most of the people that are key to it, that's just not going to be an option.
IMHO, Linux' place is in all those areas where you'd like to have Unix for preferential or homogeneity reasons but don't want to pay Compaq/Sun/HP/SGI/etc. a bunch of cash to have it. Situations like file and print servers (using Samba), departmental nameservers, intranet http servers, and the like. Non-mission-critical stuff, to use the buzzword. It's also getting a lot of use in embedded systems because half the work is done when you download the linux kernel - you modify the existing code, not build an OS from scratch, like embedded work used to involve.
I'd love to see Linux supplant every form of commercial Unix, but there will always be old-guard curmudgeons out there, that are at the CIO level now, who don't trust anything they don't pay for. And let's not talk about support.
- JW
YAWIMP? by stew77 · 2001-08-22 02:10 · Score: 1

I'd be interested in that, too. All I could get so far from the interview and the screeshots is that it's nothing more than the 23876th incarnation of a WIMP-Interface. From what I could get so far, Natulius is more of a Next Big Thing than E17. Looks a bit like the Amiga's Workbench to me.
1. Re:YAWIMP? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:27 · Score: 0
  
  Well, Raster is and ex- Amiga hacker. Seriously though, the Amiga workbench was extremely easy to use, and much more logically designed than windows. Directory Opus 5/Magellan was better again, of course.
2. Re:YAWIMP? by Alan · 2001-08-22 02:53 · Score: 1
  
  No offense dude, but nautilus is just a file manager, and a slow one at that. Don't get me wrong, it's nice, and works relativly well, but IMHO the prototype filemanager for E17 (shit, I forget it's name ATM) was a far larger step forward than nautilus, which is like a poor mans explorer or konqueror, but not as well implemented. No offense to the guys at eazel, but I don't think a file manager is that big a deal, or shouldn't be, if Linux is as close to getting into the desktop market as some people would like to think.
3. Re:YAWIMP? by Neon+Spiral+Injector · 2001-08-22 02:59 · Score: 2
  
  Enlightenment's File Manager?
  
  EFM of course. :)
4. Re:YAWIMP? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:11 · Score: 0
  
  EMF rocks. I like their song "Unbelievable".
too late, sorry by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:11 · Score: 0

The E crew seems to have taken a two year break. In that time, there has been tremendous progress on both GNOME and KDE, the associated widget sets, the underlying window managers (sawfish, window maker), even the standard icon sets (both ximian and eazel).

Why did E completely loose forward motion? Why are only a couple of people working on it? What's up with the lack of developer community? To me, this does not bode well for its future. How the hell can VA justify spending money on E when they have corporate survival to think about?

Is it just me or is the iconography for 'E' becoming increasingly cluttered? It's always been a bit baroque, but the addition of anti-aliasing capabilities doesn't seem to have pushed Raster towards 'less is more' or a clean, non-cluttered look. Even his check boxes have embossed edges for his embossed edges. Oh well. Sorry, but I think the default configuration for eazel/ximian GNOME is much easier to work with.

hand waving about speed is just lame. There's no point in saying E is faster than nautilus without providing specifics, or talking about the versions involved. Especially when E is not released. Whatever.
1. Re:too late, sorry by Ded+Bob · 2001-08-22 03:09 · Score: 2
  
  Why did E completely loose forward motion? Why are only a couple of people working on it? What's up with the lack of developer community? To me, this does not bode well for its future. How the hell can VA justify spending money on E when they have corporate survival to think about?
  
  Just one question: are you the "*BSD is dying" troll? ;)
2. Re:too late, sorry by virion · 2001-08-22 05:12 · Score: 1
  
  The E crew seems to have taken a two year break.
  they never stopped coding! they improved e16 over years. then it was EFM, imlib2. No they working on evas, efsd and many more
  check:
  http://www.enlightenment.org/pages/components.html
  
  before it was more backend work where now we can see results of it.
  did you ever tried evas demo written by raster!? your jaw will drop
  The new e is great!
3. Re:too late, sorry by skurken · 2001-08-22 05:13 · Score: 1
  I can see several reasons as to why E17 is taking so long. I briefly considered taking part of the effort since E16 was my wm of choice for a long time, but I gave it all up. A slightly condensed list of why:s include:
  
  Suffering from Not-invented-here syndrome. The E team spends a _lot_ of time re-implementing things that already exist. They don't even make use of eachother's code as much as they could.
  This of course takes lots and lots of time.
  
  Abstraction mania. Imlib2, Evas, Ebits, Etox... the list of abstraction layers grows longer for each time I check out Raster's website. I'm not sure why all these layers need to exist since E17 (actually it's just Efsd I think... at the moment) need to be run on top of a (patched) Linux kernel to work. It's not like they're aiming for portability. I wonder when they're gona be content with what tools they have and just finish the damned thing, as I presume there will be an E18 eventually.
  
  Politics. Many don't agree very much with a lot of the design decisions made by the core E team and they're not always very gracious when telling you they don't like your suggestions either. It's of course Raster's god given right to do as he pleases with his code, but it's a strategy that doesn't really attract a lot of contributors.
  
  Additionally, I'd like to agree with several other posts to this discussion: most people don't care if one wm/desktopshell is 5%, 10% or even 50% faster than the other (we're still talking about fractions of seconds here) or if their buttons are semi-transparent and anti-aliased. They care about applications, and last time I looked, "most people" are going to be the ones that decide what the Next Big Thing will be.
4. Re:too late, sorry by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 06:43 · Score: 0
  
  I'd really like to put this in a more polite way, but you're talking bullshit about things you don't know the truth about it seems.
  
  The Not-Invented-Here syndrome, ok, you are right there. There have been lengthy discussions on the E mailing lists about things like reimplementing something basic like doubly linked lists instead of using GLib.
  
  Abstratcion. Yes, there is abstraction. But hey, doesn't 'good' programming *need* abstraction. They're pulling of quite some heavy stuff here, which will easily result in the most customizeable and *fast* WM up til now (so that shoots down your possible abstraction->slower argument which is the only thing i can imagine you might have against abstraction layers). And efsd does *NOT* require a patched kernel to work. You can use the imon patch, but afaik it works well without.
  
  Politics, you are *dead* wrong. There are clashes between developers sometimes, where Raster tries to inforce his vision on the rest, but rest assured, in many (if not almost all) instances the majority of the team DOES provide enough incentive for raster to go with their design decisions instead of his. This has happened on countless occasions.
  
  My two cents...
5. Re:too late, sorry by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 07:29 · Score: 0
  
  But hey, doesn't 'good' programming *need* abstraction.
  
  Good programming needs good abstraction. But there is good abstraction and bad abstraction. Apply abstraction layers where the problem is easily separable. Make the interface clear and simple. It is nice to be consistent but avoid "foolish consistency." Don't implement features that no one will/should ever use.
6. Re:too late, sorry by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 07:36 · Score: 0
  
  1. NIH syndrome. I agree to a point, but it's a double edged sword. If you rely too much on external code, you end up in dependency hell like the GNOME project.
  
  2. Abstraction mania. This isn't just a WM we're talking about. In large development efforts like this, more abstraction is usually a good thing. I've followed E since DR11 and even contributed a little code here and there. Up until 0.14, one of my biggest complaints about Raster's coding style was the lack of abstraction.
  
  3. Politics. Yes, Raster is more hesitant to accept new contributors than most project leads. But this just emphasizes the need for abstraction, which allows different contributors to work more independently.
7. Re:too late, sorry by skurken · 2001-08-22 09:08 · Score: 1
  
  Nothing wrong with abstraction and my point is not the speed of the application, but to constantly rewrite an application just 'coz you thought of a new way to abstract something will get you nowhere. In my experience, it's better to abstract a little each release. You never really know for sure where you have to go next time and if you're unlucky, all that extra abstraction will just end up in the way. On account of the imon-issue, last time when somebody asked Raster about that and I was around he pretty clearly stated that he didn't care about other kernels and that if anyone had an interest in using efm on another OS than Linux, they could port Enlightenment themselves. This might have changed since then, which would be about a year ago.
  
  As for the politics thing, that might also have changed since I checked the e-devel list last so I'll drop the attitude point. That still doesn't change the fact that the application they're creating is somewhat radical in many ways (not saying it's bad) and that many design decisions are accordingly radical and as such easy to be disliked by someone from a diffrent school of development. For instance, I wouldn't be caught dead with creating a unix application that used non-text config files (which was the direction Raster was heading a couple of re-writes ago atleast), not because binary files don't have any advantages but because text config files are somewhat of a tradition (a working one at that) in the unix environment and breaking that tradition doesn't buy me all that much in the end.
8. Re:too late, sorry by perlyking · 2001-08-22 22:32 · Score: 1
  
  A link from that page shows why people think that there isnt any progress on E.
  
  http://www.enlightenment.org/pages/enlightenment.h tml
  
  If people dont hear anything they they tend to assume nothing is going on, I used to checkout the various development releases of E, but after 0.16.5 and the "mythical" E17 I stopped. If there was the odd DR release for people to check out then people could see the project is still very alive.
  
  --
  no sig.
Re:Linux facts! by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:14 · Score: 0

"I can go on and on and on, but the message is clear. In this world, there is no place for Linux."

"It's not an option for any one who seeks a professional OS with high performance"

Maybe you should seek professional help aswell ? o:)
Sexy. by be-fan · 2001-08-22 02:15 · Score: 3, Interesting

E17 very well might be the technology that makes advanced drawing APIs popular on desktop applications. NeXT never really made it very far into the market, and OS-X, while popular, is still pretty slow. I know 10.1 is supposed to be faster, but there is only so much you can do with software rendering! My only concern with EVAS is whether or not it will hurt the performance of windowed 3D apps (like 3D modelers).

As an aside, this Rasterman guy is the only person in the OSS community that has any asthetic sense. While the Mandrake guys are busy designing lavander icons, the SuSE people are busy with the (ugly) Lizard motif, and the KDE2 guys are trying to make their desktop look like something out of Mattel, E genuinely looks good. I know there are themes, but the "look" of KDE or Mandrake are unescapable. Mandrake freezes you into installing their freaky purple desktop by making every X app depend on mandrake_desk. (No, I don't have the time to try to figure out the menu config file format and change it back!) And with KDE2, everytime something SIGs out, a cute little dragon comes up to inform you that your app crashed. Here's my theory. The KDE project is trying to capitalize on the success of the PaperClip from Hell (TM).

--
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
1. Re:Sexy. by xanadu-xtroot.com · 2001-08-22 02:45 · Score: 1
  
  Here's my theory. The KDE project is trying to capitalize on the success of the PaperClip from Hell (TM).
  
  BUNK!
  
  The PaerClip was a damn annoying thing that sat on top of everthing you did and bothered you everytime you tried to do something simple. The Dragon (damn I forget his name...) is there as a "mascot". Nothing more.
  
  --
  I'm not a prophet or a stone-age man,
  I'm just a mortal with potential of a super man.
2. Re:Sexy. by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:02 · Score: 0
  
  Hey, your ignorance is showing..
  
  I know 10.1 is supposed to be faster, but there is only so much you can do with software rendering!
  
  After all, they woudln't dare optomize Aqua to use the Altivec unit on the G4 processor.
3. Re:Sexy. by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:12 · Score: 0
  
  I don't like Raster's tastes myself, but I agree with your main point. The default appearance of SuSE is downright horrid, and Mandrake is only slightly better. And KDE desperately needs some decent artists - especially to work on buttons & icons. Mosfet was the best themer they had, and even his stuff is pretty bad. GNOME, on the other hand, seems to be consistently pleasing.
4. Re:Sexy. by psaltes · 2001-08-22 03:34 · Score: 1
  
  > As an aside, this Rasterman guy is the only person in the OSS community that has any asthetic sense.
  
  While I agree with you that many of the OSS developers do not seem to have any aesthetic sense, I disagree with this statement. I have always found the default e themes extremely garish, overly showy, and rather clunky. This complaint in my mind extends to a lot of recent interfaces and themes for linux.
  
  Looking at one of the screenshots from the article (the last one), I see that most of the text is very difficult to read - much of it is shadowed, against a complex pixmapped background, all in shades of gray. Part of this is probably because the image is way scaled down, but I still prefer simple text with a readable font on a clean background.
  
  The graphical tricks that e seems to use to get attention caught my eye when I was looking at screenshots 5 years ago when I was in high school and before I'd ever tried linux, but now they seem as subtle to me as a sledgehammer, and they detract from my experience using the computer. This is all my personal experience, and I am sure many will disagree.
  
  Perhaps it's because of this that I use a macos9 theme for sawfish and an aqua theme for mozilla - interfaces based on extensive user interface testing/research, rather than showiness. If you want what I think to be a seriously aesthetic file manager, try the Rox file manager (http://rox.sourceforge.net), which has got to be one of the most elegent OSS programs I've seen in a while.
  This comment may seem a little bit flameish, but it's actually meant to be a meaningful comment on how I perceive the visual design of many opensource programs - letting garishness, graphical tricks, and flashiness get in the way of actual use of the computer, and of the long term 'pleasantness' of the interface to use. Screenshots of E may be fun to look at in the short term, but most of them I'd never want to actually use.
5. Re:Sexy. by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:50 · Score: 0
  
  No, your ignorance is showing. Even if Quartz is optimized for AltiVec, it's still software rendering. EVAS uses the 3D engine of the graphics card to render the fancy effects.
6. Re:Sexy. by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:15 · Score: 0
  
  Yeah that smelly foot icon is a real masterpiece. Just what I want to see on my desktop.
7. Re:Sexy. by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:21 · Score: 0
  
  > Yeah that smelly foot icon is a real
  > masterpiece. Just what I want to see on my
  > desktop.
  
  The foot is only smelly if your monitor is smelly.
  
  Clean it up!
  
  ;-)
8. Re:Sexy. by Cyph · 2001-08-22 06:00 · Score: 1
  
  When the article says that Rasterman and Mandrake are working on it, it doesn't mean that MandrakeSoft is the other developer. "Mandrake" is the name/nick/whatever of the other person that's developing e (www.mandrake.net)
9. Re:Sexy. by be-fan · 2001-08-22 08:17 · Score: 2
  
  What? I used Mandrake (as in Linux Mandrake) as an example of a company that had no asthetic sense, due to their lavander icons. I wasn't confusing them with Mandrake the programmer.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
10. Re:Sexy. by be-fan · 2001-08-22 08:20 · Score: 2
  
  Using your logic, an engine that uses MMX is "hardware accelerated." As nice as Altivec may be, it still can't compare to the 57 million transistors on a GeForce3 that are dedicated to graphics work. Atlivec is (because it has to be) much more general than the ASIC on the GeForce3, and by that virtue is slower.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
11. Re:Sexy. by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 19:26 · Score: 0
  
  yeah yeah yeah
  Enlightenment is the one that brings me to Linux.
  I have let this wm for a while (using on my P200 sawfish which got some little ports from E). But I'm really glad to see E stays on the road.
  If the promisses are exact, I 'll switch back to the E-desktop. And once again, Rasterman is the real artist! It's a GUI-Lord!
Right pew wrong church by dar · 2001-08-22 02:17 · Score: 2, Interesting

Easy to use is not the issue for Linux. Most users could get used to E or kde or whatever manager. Heck, lots of people got by with DOS for years before Windows 3.1 came along.
The problem with Linux is that it's just too darn hard to install - if you want sound, scanner, email, games etc. working.

--
My other Slashdot ID is much lower.
1. Re:Right pew wrong church by ethereal · 2001-08-22 02:39 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  I'd have to agree with that - my wife easily figured out the Gnome panel and menu system which is more-or-less a W95 workalike (OK, OK, there's a lot more neat stuff, but for her it's W95 all over again) and she has no problems using Linux for email, web browsing, and word processing, but installing it would be something that she would never do. Not that she'd install Windows either, but of course most Windows users never have to.
  
  --
  Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
2. Re:Right pew wrong church by AstroJetson · 2001-08-22 04:06 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  but of course most Windows users never have to
  
  Bingo! So why hold Linux to the same standard as Windows when it comes to ease of installation? In my experience, as of RH 7.1, Linux has surpassed Windows in both ease of installation and time to install. Yes, there are some hardware combos that will trip up even modern Linux distros, but the same can be said of Win2K & XP. On average I find Linux easier to install than Windows.
  
  I suspect that almost anybody can pop an install CD into the drive, boot the box, click the Install [Gnome|KDE] Workstation button and click OK. That's just about all it takes nowadays given that you don't have any hardware that it doesn't recognize. I know that most of us would want to tweak our install quite a bit more than that, but doing a base install is pretty trivial these days.
  
  I think this whole "Linux-is-hard-to-install" myth needs to die. It was once that way, but the times they are a-changin, folks.
  
  --
  Admit nothing, deny everything and make counter-accusations.
3. Re:Right pew wrong church by mgpeter · 2001-08-22 04:47 · Score: 1
  
  Also once it is installed it is a pain to keep it updated.
  
  The distribution companies are totally dropping the ball on end user support. Why doesn't companies like Red Hat supply RPMs for *ALL* of the packages for their systems. I like to use linux, but I also don't like to reinstall the entire distribution every 6 months!
  
  I know this is kind of off topic, but I would pay RedHat their $10 a month service if they would keep the entire system updated when new packages are released. (Example - release Xfree 4.1 and KDE 2.2 rpms for redhat 7)
4. Re:Right pew wrong church by MrBogus · 2001-08-22 06:10 · Score: 2
  
  "Bingo! So why hold Linux to the same standard as Windows when it comes to ease of installation? "
  
  The whole installation issue is a non-issue. Windows XP still uses the scary DOS5/Win3.1-style text mode bluescreens for example, and that won't hurt it's sales one bit.
  
  Another non-issue is the GUI itself. Both KDE and Gnome are pretty much more than 'good enough'. Don't forget that people happily standardized on Windows 3.1 back in the day, even though it's GUI was terrible compared to all alternatives. (Examples of your wife/girlfriend/little sister using a Unix GUI are pointless because they are not doing any admin.)
  
  The huge issue affecting Linux/Unix adoption is post-install configuration. This is where the ease-of-use advocates are running smackdab into the Unix traditionalists' love of vi and flatfiles and custom compiles. Until someone can plug a printer/scanner/mouse in and have it 'just work', the OEMs that ship most copies of Windows will want nothing to do with Linux because they will get destroyed on support costs.
  
  --
  
  When I hear the word 'innovation', I reach for my pistol.
Re: Why Yahoo runs on FreeBSD by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:20 · Score: 0

Why Yahoo runs on FreeBSD:

"Yahoo! began life at Stanford University on a DEC Alpha box running OSF and a Sparc 20 running SunOS. They served us well for the first year but we learned that neither system was really designed for handling a large number of HTTP requests. "

Read on here: http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Bay/6986/ya hoobsd.htm
The more the marrier by X-Nc · 2001-08-22 02:25 · Score: 1

It's nice to see E still moving along. The more Desktop/WM's we have the better off we'll be. One of the things that seems to be lost in the ranting^H^H^H^H^H^H^H discussions about "The Linux Desktop" is that with all the different GUI options available we can make Linux look like anything we want and thus it will fit into any environment. If you need it to look like WinXX, CDE, Mac or Bob The Builder's desktop it can.

--
-- If I actually could spell I'd have spelled it right in the first place.
Re:Slashdot & GNU/Linsux by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:28 · Score: 0

Yeah, I always wondered how a license that imposes restrictions on what I can do with code is free-er than one that lets me do whatever I want. Holding a gun to one's head to enforce a certain view of freedom is not freedom in my book.
Mandrake is making impressive strides by Perianwyr+Stormcrow · 2001-08-22 02:32 · Score: 2

As long as your machine is relatively recent, Mandrake's installer seems to handle it with grace.

Scanners, email and games are actually no harder under Linux, I've seen... most problems stem from a flawed system base that's being built on, and a good installer should take care of that.

--
What we call folk wisdom is often no more than a kind of expedient stupidity.-Edward Abbey
1. Re:Mandrake is making impressive strides by crawling_chaos · 2001-08-22 02:59 · Score: 1
  
  I dunno. My VAIO Z-505 is on the supported hardware list, but the Mandrake 8.0 installer hard-locks at "Configuring PCMCIA". I think the problem is with the 2.4.x PCMCIA support in the kernel, since I've seen some odd PCMCIA problems on this laptop with any 2.4 distribution, but Mandrake is the first one to refuse to even install.
  
  --
  You can only drink 30 or 40 glasses of beer a day, no matter how rich you are.
  -- Colonel Adolphus Busch
Kudos to E! by Zues1 · 2001-08-22 02:33 · Score: 4, Insightful

I have been using "e" from Dr14 on, Even when trapped in WIN32 hell, I emulated the Look and feel of "E" under Litestep.(even thought there was a win32 port E-Seance) DR17 is really really fast. And very impressive. If you do a CVS build and give it a honest go, I think you will find that it is much faster than your current windows manager. Even runing evas_test app shows you the differance in rendering technics. I am very Impressed with the latest offerings from the E team, But I agree that new logo blows!

My two Cents!
Sort Of... by xanadu-xtroot.com · 2001-08-22 02:34 · Score: 1

If you write an app for Gnome, KDE will indeed run it PROVIDING the KDE user has the Gnome libs installed. That is one of the VERY few things I don't like about Linux. One needs to have all of BOTH's (for the sake of arguement) libs installed.

--
I'm not a prophet or a stone-age man,
I'm just a mortal with potential of a super man.
1. Re:Sort Of... by Tim+C · 2001-08-22 02:41 · Score: 2
  
  That's just the same under Windows, where any program requires that you also install all the dlls that it requires.
  
  You can think of the GUI "part" of Windows as being like KDE or Gnome. If you wanted to run a different Win32 GUI, but still run software written for Microsoft's GUI, you'd still have to have all the dlls installed for that one too. Of course, there isn't an alternative GUI/desktop shell and set of libraries, so that situation doesn't happen under Windows.
  
  That's just the way software is written these days - you put useful, reusable chunks of code in libraries, and install them once on the machine, rather than as part of every application that requires them.
  
  It increases app start up times a little (as these files have to be loaded and linked agaisnt), but decreases disk usage and promotes code reuse, which, as a programmer, I consider to be a Very Good Thing Indeed.
  
  Cheers,
  
  Tim
  
  --
  It's official. Most of you are morons.
2. Re:Sort Of... by xanadu-xtroot.com · 2001-08-22 03:42 · Score: 1
  
  Well, yes and no. THere's only ONE Windoze language (for the sake of arguement). There's multple languages under Linux. Ech GUI uses what they feel to be best. Does gnome use QT's code? Nope. Does Gnome use C++? Nope. It different.
  The best thing I can think of along the lines you're thinking is (I'm sure there's better, but...) Java. Java is supposed to work on ANY platform; one you have the RIGHT libs installed.
  
  --
  I'm not a prophet or a stone-age man,
  I'm just a mortal with potential of a super man.
3. Re:Sort Of... by Panaflex · 2001-08-22 05:09 · Score: 2
  
  Actually that is not wholly true.
  
  For instance, Macromedia uses their own GUI toolkits. MS Office doesn't use the system ctrl3d stuff, they have their own GUI library as well.. They still use alot of the underlying COM/OLE stuff, though.. so it's a mixed bag.
  
  And Lotus Notes is just silly..
  
  Pan
  
  --
  I said no... but I missed and it came out yes.
4. Re:Sort Of... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 08:35 · Score: 2
  
  That's just the same under Windows, where any program requires that you also install all the dlls that it requires
  >>>>>>
  Actually, its two totally different things. All the GUI libraries I know of on Windows use the underlying Win32 services. They use the same drawing services, the same printer services, etc. While it may be true (as the replyer to your post said) that there are different GUI libraries on Windows, the fact that they use the same underlying services makes it a moot point. The fact that loading both kde-libs and gnome-libs uses up an ass-load of resources is regretable, but not the main problem. The main problem is that apps using the two different systems don't interoperate perfectly with each other. On Windows, this problem doesn't exist, since there is only ONE object model, ONE printing system, ONE clipboard system, etc.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
5. Re:Sort Of... by nitehorse · 2001-08-22 09:16 · Score: 2
  
  If you wanted to run a different Win32 GUI, but still run software written for Microsoft's GUI, you'd still have to have all the dlls installed for that one too. Of course, there isn't an alternative GUI/desktop shell and set of libraries, so that situation doesn't happen under Windows.
  
  wrong. and yes, it's just as ugly to do this as it is to run KDE programs in GNOME or vice-versa.
Two things I want to see by zdzichu · 2001-08-22 02:35 · Score: 1

First, Enl. has a beatuful feature - translucent windows while moving them.
Second, MacOSX has another beautifle thing - translucent windows while working normal.
No fake-translucent like gnome-terminal (dimmed root window pixmap), but really, really translucent.
I hope that I will be able to see xterm with tcpdump running through xterm with BitchX soon.

--
:wq
1. Re:Two things I want to see by Neon+Spiral+Injector · 2001-08-22 03:12 · Score: 2
  
  As I understand in the past this was very hard to do with X. The program itself would have to do screen captures and blend itself with the windows it was over.
  
  The way E does the translucent move, is when you start to move a window, E does a screen grab of that one, unmaps the real window, then you move the screen grap, when you put it back down it remaps the real window in the right place. Try moving a window that has some motion in it. All action stops when you start to move.
  
  With the render exention now in X11 it will be a little easier to do blending, saw Netscape with translucent menus at the 2000 ALS. But will all E17s widgets being rendered in OpenGL they should be able to neat things with eachother, but I still think there'll be some limits between windows.
2. Re:Two things I want to see by Shillo · 2001-08-23 05:35 · Score: 1
  
  The necessary support for this is in the XFree86 CVS already. There is a screenshot (check the Hello World! window) and the source code for this. Don't worry, Keith Packard has thought of everything. ;)
  
  --
  I refuse to use .sig
3. Re:Two things I want to see by raster · 2001-08-23 12:42 · Score: 1
  
  well actually x doesnt do alpha channels for windows - the window you see there just as "no background" for isn't background which means if you map the window it inherits the current framebuffer contents. you are only seeing x doing alpha compositing.. and no - keith hasn't thought of everything. he's thought of a fair bit.. but not everything. currently image transforms are unimplimented. there isn't even an api call for them. i'm tryng to get at last this fixed :)
  
  --
  --------------- Codito, ergo sum - "I code, therefore I am" --------------------
The GUI by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 02:37 · Score: 0

Why invest so much effort in building flashy GUI's ? I still use FVWM.

Having the perfect Desktop is not The One And Only Solution (TM) for getting people to use Linux.

OS/2 had a more advanced GUI than Windows, still people used Windows. Why ? Because having a great GUI doesn't automagically solve the "problem".

I believe KDE2 has reached a good level of what a GUI for new users should be like.
I think we should invest more time in making PnP and stuff like that better now.
1. Re:The GUI by Mark+Bainter · 2001-08-22 03:44 · Score: 1
  
  Why invest so much effort in building flashy GUI's ? I still use FVWM.
  Because some of us /like/ having a gorgeous desktop. Some of us like being able to tweak everything about our systems, including our shell or gui environments.
  Having the perfect Desktop is not The One And Only Solution (TM) for getting people to use Linux.
  Despite the comment in the article posting here, this is not one of E17's goals. It is not about getting people to use linux. It is about raster scratching an itch. In this case, it just happens to be an itch shared by a lot of other people. Which is, of course, the hallmark of successfull OSS projects.
  OS/2 had a more advanced GUI than Windows, still people used Windows. Why ? Because having a great GUI doesn't automagically solve the "problem".
  I dunno why people keep bringing up an OS/2 v windows comparison. I fail to see it as relevant. perhaps someone can explain this tendancy?
  I believe KDE2 has reached a good level of what a GUI for new users should be like.
  And? Who cares? E is not trying to be a great new gui for new users.
  I think we should invest more time in making PnP and stuff like that better now.
  Huh? You act like there are limited resources available for working on linux issues. This is just silly. I mean, it's like saying "Hrm. I think the body and iterior design of this car is great, but the engine performance needs some work. Lets get those interior guys working on that."
  
  --
  "No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
  --James Madison
2. Re:The GUI by entrigant · 2001-08-22 06:53 · Score: 1
  
  Well put. I was going to reply to this post in about the same manner until I saw that you did it twice as good as I could have. Thank you for saving me some time =)
Re: Good Troll by Pengo · 2001-08-22 02:40 · Score: 2

Hmm... try making any serious java application with JDK > 1.2 in binary compatibility mode work and you will have a rude awakening.

I have a BSD machine at home and we use BSD based firewalls. I like bsd for what it is, but appreciate what it isn't.

Cheers
Ha. Now I know. by Chris+Burke · 2001-08-22 02:44 · Score: 2

I used to say that I thought it unlikely that Windows was truly any easier to learn or use than KDE/Gnome for the truly computer illiterate. That the perceived difficulty in using linux desktops was because the user was used to Windows, and anything different would seem hard to use. I would point out how so many Windows users say Macs were hard to use, while Mac users think Windows was hard to use.

But now, I have seen the proverbial mother (not mine, since she is quite computer literate and happy in both windows and linux environments), and I can say for certain that the Windows GUI is NOT easy to use, easy to learn, or at all obvious for useful definition of the word. By your own account, Windows is a failure.

But clearly that is not the case (that Windows GUI is a complete failure), but so it would also be that the linux desktops are not either. They are in fact not easy to use for your computer-illeterate grandmother, but nothing is. They suit quite nicely for anyone who is capable of generalizing enough to drive both a Tercel and a Suburban.

And this is true, despite the multitude of GUIs for Linux. So, in three words, you're completely wrong.

--

The enemies of Democracy are
3dwm by Ex+Machina · 2001-08-22 02:53 · Score: 1

THis seems to overlap quite a bit with 3dwm. Perhaps they could merge their efforts? Nice to see something done with OpenGL!
evas? displayPDF? instrumentality! by Laxitive · 2001-08-22 02:57 · Score: 2

Taking a look at Raster's EVAS (Neon Genesis? Perhaps he's trying for GUI instrumentality) - it looks like a less ambitions version of Apples' DisplayPDF and NeXT's DisplayPS. Both of those systems go further than what raster suggests with evas.

Evas proposes "canvases" as core objects that store information about the state of a graphical object - so that when redrawing needs to be done, the graphics displayed by a window may be easily and quickly redrawn without the client application worrying about it.

This is exactly what DisplayPDF/PS does in a more elegant way. Postscript is a powerful complete (as in turing complete) language which is optimized to express the structure of graphical objects.

In the interview, Raster calls OSX "pretty". Either he doesn't know about Apple's display technology, or he doesn't want to comment on their system - which is very similar, and more advanced, than what he is suggesting with evas.

-Laxitive
Cloning OS/X by Reality+Master+101 · 2001-08-22 02:59 · Score: 2

Just out of curiosity, are there any movements out there to clone OS/X's interface? I've sworn never to give money to Apple, but I might be interested in playing around with a clone someday. :)

--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
1. Re:Cloning OS/X by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:36 · Score: 0
  
  I don't know of any, but even if they existed they would be immediately sued out of existence by the monopolist Apple corporation. They are, in fact, worse than Microsoft... only they don't have the marketshare to causea ruckus.
2. Re:Cloning OS/X by topos · 2001-08-22 06:59 · Score: 1
  
  Check out gnustep.org, or more specifically their page about Display Ghostscript.
before the FUD by metalhed77 · 2001-08-22 02:59 · Score: 1

yeah, there is mandrake which is easy to install supposedly but an installer can only do so much, take for instance my sound card, an aureal vortex. I had to search around sourceforge for a driver, dl it, and compile/install it myself. another thiung is the dependencies issue, once you dl one rpm (noobs will be using rpm) u need to download 40 others because you need the latest version of libfoo. Mandrake can make their one click installer, and i applaud them for that, but when it takes an expert to do anything in the os THAT's when u have problems.

--
Photos.
1. Re:before the FUD by WNight · 2001-08-22 07:05 · Score: 2
  
  You know, not much is different between Linux and Windows.
  
  I went from 98SE to 2k Pro, my computer would hang either when playing the startup sound, or in the first 30s of some program playing sounds. If I completely avoided anything making noise, it'd stay up all night.
  
  I suspected the sound card, removed it, and the computer worked. Replaced it with an old ISA Awe64... Still worked.
  
  I looked for docs on the Aureal Vortex under 2k... None.
  
  I looked for message-board discussion on it. Very little, all negative.
  
  Eventually, I found a site describing how to get it working with a slightly modified binary of the original driver, and a bunch of registry mods.
  
  I left the Awe 64 in...
  
  In fact, Windows was much harder to get working than Linux, because Windows doesn't support much user input. You double-click the exe, it installs. If it doesn't, you have no idea where it failed. (Without running filemon from www.sysinternals.com, or something similar.) At least in Linux you usually know what failed, and if someone tells you how to get it working it's only a matter of copying their config file or installation steps.
Yet another one .... by seletz · 2001-08-22 03:04 · Score: 1

Gee, yet another "Super Fast Widget Library Which Will Make Your Eyes Pop Out" sort of thing (no offense meant :).

Yes, looks Sexy.
Yes, definitely is good code.

BUT:
Why keep people re-implement the wheel all over again and again and ... ? Why not use a existing Widget Lib and _extend_ it? Look at QT, look at GNOME!
1. Re:Yet another one .... by Mark+Bainter · 2001-08-22 04:37 · Score: 1
  
  Why keep people re-implement the wheel all over again and again and ... ? Why not use a existing Widget Lib and _extend_ it? Look at QT, look at GNOME!
  Why do we keep making new engines? Why don't we still use steam engines? Because concepts can be improved upon. I doubt very much that trolltech or the GTK development group would've been real interested in letting the E guys rewrite their widget libraries to take advantage of evas (and thus hardware acceleration/etc). And that's assuming they would even WANT to rewrite it.
  
  --
  "No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
  --James Madison
2. Re:Yet another one .... by Nephrite · 2001-08-22 05:07 · Score: 1
  
  Why keep people re-implement the wheel all over again and again and ... ? Why not use a existing Widget Lib and _extend_ it? Look at QT, look at GNOME!
  Well... That's not that simple question. In short: we get a old thing and improve it (in your words 'extend') when we need it, and we 'reimplement the wheel' to have fun That's one side of free speech and Open Source.
3. Re:Yet another one .... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-23 02:34 · Score: 0
  
  Yep your right QT and GNOME are perfect we have reached the peak of GUI development we can now all relax and sit back with a cold frosty one
It's called a theme. Check into it. by Chris+Burke · 2001-08-22 03:04 · Score: 3, Interesting

I'm sick of these damn "E looks ugly" comments... Look, yes, the themes Raster comes up with are ugly. Yes! Ugly! But since the whole point of E is themeability, it's just idiotic to condemn the program because of the graphic design preference of one theme maker.

And don't give me crap about the default theme. The first time an E user clicks on the desktop they're going to see the "themes" menu item, and they can change it. There are some very fine and minimal themes for E, and a couple actually come with the download.

As to the time delay... Well, it has been a while, though the team obviously hasn't been sitting on their thumbs. Since everyone else had so much to do to catch up with where E was, they really aren't behind at all.

--

The enemies of Democracy are
Re:next big thing? I can see it. by King_TJ · 2001-08-22 03:17 · Score: 1

After reading the article, I think the main reason the new E could be the "next big thing" is because it's a really good attempt at building a fast AND asthetically pleasing desktop environment - *without* trying to bundle it with a set of applications. KDE and Gnome are both great projects, but they include a slew of applications and utilities, meant to make the desktop feel more "complete" out of the box. I think Enlightenment is saying "Hey, we're simply trying to make something really nice to work in, which lets you run any and all of those existing Gnome/GTK apps and existing KDE apps. They're not just defaulted to being slapped onto sub-menus below a list of "primary apps" made for E.

With all the current wars over "KDE vs. Gnome" as the best desktop, I'd really like to see a new entry that tops both of them, while seamlessly integrating the apps from both.
Slashdot effect at work by Glyndwr · 2001-08-22 03:20 · Score: 1

Someone sent me this link, and I was surprised to find osopinion.com down. Then I thought to check /.s front page. Total lack of surprise when I saw the link ;o)

On the subject of Yet Another Linux Desktop: well, I'm excited to try it out, but I'm starting to get annoyed by it too. I've spent the last year and a bit flip-flopping back and forth between Gnome and KDE because neither has all the fetures that I want; I feel like I'm being offered a compromise, not a choice. I'm not entirely sure a third option is going to help things unless it REALLY kicks ass. Time will tell.

--
You win again, gravity!
1. Re:Slashdot effect at work by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:29 · Score: 0
  
  idiot.
  
  first, its osnews.com, not osopinion.com
  
  second, E has been around as long as KDE/Gnome.
  
  dumbass.
2. Re:Slashdot effect at work by Mark+Bainter · 2001-08-22 04:00 · Score: 1
  
  On the subject of Yet Another Linux Desktop: well, I'm excited to try it out, but I'm starting to get annoyed by it too. I've spent the last year and a bit flip-flopping back and forth between Gnome and KDE because neither has all the fetures that I want; I feel like I'm being offered a compromise, not a choice. I'm not entirely sure a third option is going to help things unless it REALLY kicks ass. Time will tell.
  Perhaps this was not your intent, but you make it sound like enlightenment is a newcomer to the field. This is not the case. E has been around for a long time. I've been using it since 0.13 which was..uh.. I'm terrible with dates, but I think it was around 5 years ago? Maybe someone can help with that. And I followed E for awhile before that.
  E is not trying to be a comprimise, or another option to those two. Enlightenment is what the people using it want it to be. Generally speaking. If it isn't what you want, and no-one else is providing what you want, you really have two choices. Get involved in a project that's close and try to contribute. See if you can get int hte changes to make it what you do want (by contributing code, not by whining and complaining. That that I think you necessarily would, but you aren't the only one that'll read this.) Or, alternatively, starting your own project.
  Just don't call E YALD. It's not. It's been around since before Gnome, Before KDE, before sawfish, most of the current windowmangers. And it's always been ahead of the curve on features, configurability, and functionality. And of course, last but certainly not least, beauty.
  
  --
  "No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
  --James Madison
3. Re:Slashdot effect at work by Glyndwr · 2001-08-22 04:31 · Score: 1
  
  first, its osnews.com, not osopinion.com
  Oopsie, well spotted, that'll teach me to rely on my memory.
  
  second, E has been around as long as KDE/Gnome.
  I know, I was using it before Gnome existed... But I'll save my comments on this to the next reply I'm about to write, to someone who isn't a flame-happy troll.
  
  idiot.dumbass.
  
  Both sound conclusions.
  
  --
  You win again, gravity!
4. Re:Slashdot effect at work by Glyndwr · 2001-08-22 04:42 · Score: 1
  
  Yeah, my mistake, I phrased that comment badly. I'm well aware that E is actually very old; I was running it before Gnome even existed, and possibly before KDE, although my memory is hazy.
  
  The point I was clumisily driving at is that, at least from the tone of the /. story (I still can't get through to osnews.com), E seems to be shifting focus slightly, from windows-manager-with-knobs-on to full-fledged desktop. Admittedly, you could turn it into a full-fledged desktop before, but it took time and effort; however the amount of time and amount of effort drops all the time. And, with E's history of power and configurabilty, I have fairly high hopes that it will have all the features I want from Gnome, and all the features I want from KDE, and then I can stop having difficult choices to make about which desktop to use.
  
  As for contributing... I'd love to, and hopefully, once I'm a few months into my PhD my C/C++ skills (which are currently pretty ropey) will have advanced to the point were I can. And I will, because I'd love to be involved in something like this.
  
  --
  You win again, gravity!
Age of Enlightenment by evilMoogle · 2001-08-22 03:20 · Score: 1

bring Enlightenment 0.17 to the Linux desktop.

You know, Enlightenment 1.0 for RealWorld came about in the 18th century, and I think they're on Enlightenment 3.66 by now.
Why is Linux so far behind?

--
Erik
"You," Bite me.
"Each and every one of you." Bite me.
Re:evas? displayPDF? instrumentality! by jonathan_ingram · 2001-08-22 03:24 · Score: 1

The problem with Postscript is also that it is turing complete -- leading to the possibility of malicious code.

I'm in favour of domain specific languages being non-Turing complete -- it makes them simple to analyse, and much easier to optimise (the classic example being SQL).

If it wasn't based around the bloated monstrosity that is XML, I'd suggest SVG as an interesting alternative to DPS as a good way for a graphic layer to describe its objects.

--
-- Help Digitise the Public Domain at DP.
Re:evas? displayPDF? instrumentality! by raster · 2001-08-22 03:30 · Score: 5, Informative

the fact that evas has is "canvas" is nothing new. it's an ancient idea. the fact that i did start it off simple and dind't go completely bezerk with abilities and features (display postscript, display pdf) - just kept the core and basics, meant that i could actually finish it in time to use it for writing the app i needed it for: e 0.17 AND it menat i could also accelerate it via multiple back end rendering paths. it's quiteodd too the apeolpe assume it is ONLY opengl - in fact i woudl not suggest using the gl backed rendering engine on anything but an nvidia driver because so far no driver i have found comes even clsoe to being stable enough or complete enough. but nvidia is about the closest. my own software rendering (imlib2 does that for evas) which is quite fast is what i normally use for evas - so you don't NEED hardware. you can use normal X11 pixmaps and X primitives as a rendering back end for evas too. this keeps it simple - but still makes it able to be extended easily, and has allowed me to make it work and work well in a relatively short period of time with a relatively small amount of resources.

that is what the power is.. and it can be easily extended. new object types can be added - new things like having clipping paths could be done, extra object attributes can eb added that affect their display.. but the more complex the feature the harder it is to support in the back end rendering... and the less likely it is to be able to be hardware accelerated and instead have to be done more slowly in software - even the software optimizations are lezz liekly to be effective the more complex it is. thus i choose to only impliment what i really need - and that can go a surprisingly long way :) the end result is a canvas that is fast.. hardware accelerated or not, that does its primitives well and does the job i need... and can be improved in time with no effect on the programs using it other than positive ones (new features... or faster & better quality rendering etc.)

evas solves the problem in an elegant way... and rememebr it isn't the same as dps/dpdf - its a canvas. that is a different concept.

i also know a bit more about apples display technology than you think - it defintiely is pretty - and yes... i'm not going to comment much in detail on it as i dont, imho, think i know enough details to make a very concise sumamry of it and get it right 100%. but i know enough to know what they are doing (approximately) and why etc.

evas is a different technology - it is much closer to the java canvas, tk canavs, gnome or qt canvases. it can be extended and wrapped and made more pwoerful with layers ontop that use it as an optimized rendering system... and that is incendentally one of the side projects happening right now :)

anyway.. just thought i'd comment a bit - don't want to flame - just want to fill in the gaps ininformation that wasn't provided for you before :)

--
--------------- Codito, ergo sum - "I code, therefore I am" --------------------
That's not enough.... by King_TJ · 2001-08-22 03:32 · Score: 1

I'm not disagreeing with you that usability is critical if you want mass consumer acceptance.
I just don't think that a supremely usable desktop is enough. Quite frankly, no matter how nice the windowing environment/desktop is running on top of X - you're still dealing with a Unix system that's designed by and for "power users".

Until you make a Linux install so simple that it no longer makes users decide issues such as "do I want to format my drive with ResiserFS or ext2fs?" and "How do I know what my SCSI tape drive is called? /dev/st0? How the h*ll am I supposed to know it was assigned device name st0??" - you'll still have some problems.

All hardware peripherals need to be automatically recognized and become usable by graphical icons that appear on the desktop. I don't think we're there yet. I added a 7-disc CD-ROM changer to my RedHat 7.1 box the other day, and you know what? KDE and Gnome still don't show me 7 new icons for the new drives. If I was an average user, how would I use it?

I think BeOS took a hell of a stab at being usable, and we can all see how far that's gotten those guys. I don't know about you, but I don't see Palm being the ones who get BeOS pre-loaded on most new PCs sold, either. BeOS is living proof that a great desktop GUI doesn't equate with popularity.

There are many issues, really. I think Linux is still to "young" in the marketplace to start complaining about multiple desktop environments ruining it. Nobody really has one that's "complete" yet. Even Microsoft had to revamp their concept of a GUI several times over, before hitting on one that worked for them and for the public. Who really used Windows 3.0?
1. Re:That's not enough.... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 10:28 · Score: 2
  
  I think BeOS took a hell of a stab at being usable, and we can all see how far that's gotten those guys. I don't know about you, but I don't see Palm being the ones who get BeOS pre-loaded on most new PCs sold, either. BeOS is living proof that a great desktop GUI doesn't equate with popularity.
  >>>>>>>>>>
  Actually, I think the reason BeOS tanked is because it didn't have Linux's open-ness. No big company has the balls to compete with MS on the desktop, and no little company has the resources to compete with MS period. BeOS lacked an OSS community that could keep improving it even without profits rolling in. Linux, on the other hand, is missing many of the features of a good desktop GUI, and is thus not taking over the desktop for a different reason.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
Re:Ha. Now I know. by asincero · 2001-08-22 03:43 · Score: 1

> I used to say that I thought it unlikely that
> Windows was truly any easier to learn or use
> than KDE/Gnome for the truly computer illiterate

I don't think the issue is whether or not the Windows interface is truly easy to use or not. Because no matter how easy you make it, there will always be some idiot out there who won't be able to figure it out.

The issue is whether or not having multiple desktops is really a good idea. If Linux had one standard desktop, then theres only one thing to learn. It almost doesn't matter if said desktop is unintuitive and hard to use (but of course, you should endeavor to make it as easy to use as possible), because you only learn it once. If theres multiple desktops available, then that means you have to learn how to use multiple desktops. And most people can barely manage to learn one.

And the argument that standardizing on one desktop removes freedom of choice doesn't hold any water, imho. Any Linux user with a clue will know how to change his desktop to look and feel any way he or she wants. And any clueless Linux user most likely doesn't even give a damn that you can change the look and feel of your UI; they just want to get their work done.

- Arcadio
But what about the bugs.. by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 03:43 · Score: 0

I use enlightenment. I just wish they'd fix the damn bugs and stop worrying about The Next Big Thing.
1. Re:But what about the bugs.. by entrigant · 2001-08-22 06:45 · Score: 1
  
  e17 is a rewrite. 'nuff said
And for some real fun with this by Adler · 2001-08-22 03:53 · Score: 1

Use the old "screen shot set as wallpaper" trick on your friends with the screen shots. Be the first no your block to use E v.17!

Adler

--

Everybody denies I am a genius--but nobody ever called me one!
Re:evas? displayPDF? instrumentality! by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 04:02 · Score: 0

For those of you moderating, wondering if this is really raster, it is.
His writing style is unmistakeable, and unimitable.
Re:evas? displayPDF? instrumentality! by CaptnMArk · 2001-08-22 04:07 · Score: 1

SVG yes.

But let's not repeat the mistake of mozilla: writing too much stuff in javascript and overdoing the CSS with themes.
Anyone doing any real UI innovation? by omf · 2001-08-22 04:29 · Score: 3, Insightful

Although pretty desktops are a nice thing, I haven't seen anyone do anything really new in user interfaces for some time. Microsoft keeps hiding more features behind right-mouse-clicks and animated menu pop-ups. Apple, sadly, emulates Microsoft more and more every day. Linux UIs are splintered into so many variations that it's impossible to keep track of which are going to go anywhere.
So - the question remains: who's doing anything more than cosmetic work on modern user interfaces? Several people have commented on the fact that it's a huge hurdle for a truly non-technical person to understand any of the existing UIs. I completely agree.
Raise your hand if you've tried getting your parents to understand how to use a desktop UI (those with parents younger than 40 need not apply...) And I don't mean just to memorize how to perform a particular action, but to really know it well enough to go off and do things you may have not taught them how to do. I've tried, and friends of mine have tried, and we've all come to the same conclusion: UIs have gone virtually nowhere since early days of the Macintosh.
So we've got alpha blending, anti-aliasing, 32-bit color, and more fonts than you can shake a stick at. That makes things very pretty, but it doesn't actually help you accomplish much more. It doesn't make computers any easier to understand for anyone, techies or non-techies.
I don't think anything will deserve the title of "Next Big Thing" until it actually does something new, and prettier graphics ain't new...
1. Re:Anyone doing any real UI innovation? by bartle · 2001-08-22 06:53 · Score: 2
  
  So - the question remains: who's doing anything more than cosmetic work on modern user interfaces? Several people have commented on the fact that it's a huge hurdle for a truly non-technical person to understand any of the existing UIs. I completely agree.
  All these UI designs are natural extensions of previous ones. It's probably better to extend a flawed interface that everyone's familiar with instead of building a better one from scratch. Anyone looking to build an interface should probably keep one eye on Microsoft's manual of style regardless of the platform. They key thing is to keep things easy and the users at ease.
  The most important connection between contemporary UIs is their reliance on the screen/mouse/keyboard combination. Compare how you use a computer to how you do anything else in life and it becomes obvious how much of a burden these UIs place on the user. It really isn't natural, we've just adapted. And so to answer your question, I don't think we'll see a major jump in usability until an avenue appears that will allow us to at least ditch the mouse. Touchscreen or similiar is probably the next step - as this technology becomes cheaper and more common, applications will start to be written to better deal with this kind of interface. Beyond that is probably voice recognition, that alone would make the Microsoft Start menu almost unnecessary. Beyond that... I can't even guess. It's Sci-fi territory.
  For the forseable future, those of us who work with computers in a technical capacity will probably keep our own interfaces just out of habit. The rest of the world will most certainly move in a simpler direction, towards computers you can talk to and poke at.
2. Re:Anyone doing any real UI innovation? by AeiwiMaster · 2001-08-22 08:27 · Score: 1
  
  Here is a link to pie menus for gtk+
  
  Knud
3. Re:Anyone doing any real UI innovation? by be-fan · 2001-08-22 08:28 · Score: 2
  
  Thank you! That's what nobody seems to understand. Windows's interface is the easiest for the sole reason that that's what everyone knows. I'm not sure that most /.'ers remember this, but an entire generation of normal people used CLI machines to do regular business work. It wasn't any more difficult for them than GUIs are today. What is easy is what you understand, its as simple as that.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
4. Re:Anyone doing any real UI innovation? by rneches · 2001-08-22 10:02 · Score: 2
  
  Well, can you think of anyting new? Xerox/PARC basically invented this whole GUI thing eons ago, and there haven't been any significant changes to that paradigm. Buttons, menues windows and icons - everything else is just details.
  
  Look at it this way - we have two kinds of interfaces; GUI and command line. What innovations have people made with command line interfaces? We have all sorts of new shells since the first VT-100 terminal rolled off the production line. With some nifty utilities, bash is more than good enough for doing just about anything with a computer (except looking at pictues and such, but there are framebuffer viewers nowadays). But shells like bash, and the utilities they use, are still regular old command line systems. They work just fine on VT-100 and 320 terminals. The paradigm hasn't changed, and it doesn't really need to.
  
  It's possible that the same is true of GUIs. We can dress them up and build new utilities, but the underlying assumptions have remained the same for more than two decades. Given the history and continued usefullness of command line systems, I predict that GUIs as we know them will exist for a long, long time to come. When something new comes along, it will not be a GUI - it will be something else entierly. Maybe it will be a 3D enviornment, like in Snow Crash. Maybe it will be a speech based system, like in Star Trek.
  
  But even in Snow Crash and Star Trek, GUI and command line enviornments still exist.
  
  The GUI was invented because command line enviornments had weaknesses. GUIs never (at least not in enviornments that should be taken seriously) replaced command line systems because GUIs have their own weaknesses, and those weaknesses happen to be where the command line way of doing things is strong. When something new comes along, it will probably be to get around the weaknesses of GUIs, but if it really is different, it will have it's own weaknesses where GUIs are probably strong. Some people might bemone the new thing, as people bemoned GUIs because they waste resources and whatnot, but those people are probably users of systems that don't let you choose the style of interface for the problem at hand (*caugh* windows *caugh*).
  
  --
  In spite of the suggestions and all the tests that I have made, I have not cavato a spider from the hole.
Macintosh standard key bindings by yerricde · 2001-08-22 04:35 · Score: 1

Anyway, what is the window close keyboard shortcut on the Macintosh? It's not Alt-F4.

On Macintosh computers, Cmd+N is New document, Cmd+O is Open document, Cmd+W is close Window, Cmd+S is save, Cmd+P is Print, and Cmd+Q is Quit. Cmd+Z is undo, Cmd+X is cut, Cmd+C is copy, Cmd+V is paste, and Cmd+A is select All, and Cmd+I is properties (short for get Info).

--
Will I retire or break 10K?
1. Re:Macintosh standard key bindings by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 17:55 · Score: 0
  
  command-I is usually Italic [ for most text editing apps, anyhow]
Alias and cron in a GUI environment by yerricde · 2001-08-22 04:48 · Score: 1

(try aliasing or scripting or cronning a wizard)

Alias? Make a shortcut. In fact, Mac OS's shortcuts are called aliases.

Cron? Try dragging it into the Scheduled Tasks Manager app and then choosing the calendar values.

Yes, I believe that wherever possible, all features should be accessible through a GUI, through a scripting language (be it Python, AppleScript, or whatever), and through an interactive command language (possibly based on a scripting language). This would also help people with disabilities to use the system.

--
Will I retire or break 10K?
Re:evas? displayPDF? instrumentality! by Nephrite · 2001-08-22 04:57 · Score: 1

Evas proposes "canvases" as core objects that store information about the state of a graphical object - so that when redrawing needs to be done, the graphics displayed by a window may be easily and quickly redrawn without the client application worrying about it.
As far as I can remember, similar concept of canvases was used in Sun OpenLook widget set. And their canvases was a little bit cooler because they included scrolled canvases and multiple views (i.e. in multiple windows) of same canvas.
Difference between "hardware" and "software"? by yerricde · 2001-08-22 04:58 · Score: 1

Even if Quartz is optimized for AltiVec, it's still software rendering. EVAS uses the 3D engine of the graphics card

And why do you consider a second CPU running software 3D not a graphics card? Whether the rendering happens on the same chip as the application or on a card plugged into AGP does not matter as much as decreasing execution time of rendering, that is, getting a faster frame rate.

--
Will I retire or break 10K?
1. Re:Difference between "hardware" and "software"? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 07:19 · Score: 0
  
  Fundamentally, the distinction is arbitrary. But in the graphics world, "hardware acceleration" refers to operations that are implemented by dedicated, special purpose logic off the (general purpose, software driven) CPU.
2. Re:Difference between "hardware" and "software"? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 09:01 · Score: 0
  
  in the graphics world, "hardware acceleration" refers to operations that are implemented by dedicated, special purpose logic off the (general purpose, software driven) CPU.
  
  So if "hardware acceleration" does not include dedicated, special purpose logic on the CPU die (e.g. Altivec and SSE/3DNow!), then please treat "hardware acceleration" as a mere buzzword.
3. Re:Difference between "hardware" and "software"? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 09:43 · Score: 0
  
  SSE, 3DNow!, and Altivec are nothing more than floating point SIMD instructions. Like the rest of the CPU's instruction set, they're still general purpose instructions. Not only are they used for 3D graphics, they're used in audio encoding & decoding, video encoding & decoding, photoshop filters, scientific computations, etc. The 3D pipeline of the graphics card has but one purpose - to render polygonal 3D scenes to a 2D framebuffer.
  
  "Hardware acceleration" may not be the most technically accurate or descriptive term, but it's meaning is well understood by anybody doing any 3D graphics work.
Oh right by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 05:00 · Score: 0

Could you figure out how to set up security, install drivers, set the refresh rate of your monitor, remap a key board, set up power settings, change fonts, change languages all? I don't think so. But I can do all that from MS windows 2000 no problem.
E17 means something different to the English by Andy_R · 2001-08-22 05:07 · Score: 1

E17 was a successful boy-band a few years ago over here, so the story casued me a bit of a double take! According to mtv, their lead singer is going to be working with Eminem
(http://www.mtvasia.com/News/International/Items /0 007/0007078.html if you feel like decending into pop culture).

Americans wishing to comprehend how odd this story looks to us should imagine a Slashdot headline of "NKOTB to be the next Big Thing" for roughly the same level of 'huh?!?!"

--
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
Bug the hardware manufacturers by yerricde · 2001-08-22 05:08 · Score: 1

The problem with Linux is that it's just too darn hard to install - if you want sound, scanner, email

Red Hat's and Mandrake's installers do a good job configuring devices. The problem with Linux is not necessarily with Linux but with hardware manufacturers not providing documentation to free software developers. Just look at some of the winsoundcards, winscanners, and winmodems available today. Back in the day, a printer came with a reference card detailing every single escape code you could use to change its fonts or draw graphics. Now they come with a black box Windows 9x driver.

games

Lots of games come with both KDE and GNOME. Not everybody in the world is a fan of first-person shooters, but even then, Doom Legacy runs on Linux.

--
Will I retire or break 10K?
E is faster then everything else ? by sashav · 2001-08-22 05:09 · Score: 1

Surely it is great that speed it so high on priorities list of E, but dismissing the rest of the world as being much slower ? With no real comprehensive benchmarking? Isn't that the kind of arrogant behaviour so hated about Microsoft?
Just for kicks I tried to compare ImLib2 to libAfterImage, and guess what - its not really all that fast, but it is definately bloated at the same time.

--
Property of AfterStep Window Manager.
Re:It's called a theme. Check into it. by NonSequor · 2001-08-22 05:09 · Score: 2

I think people wouldn't make those comments if there weren't some people who think that E is the most beautiful thing they have ever seen.

--
My only political goal is to see to it that no political party achieves its goals.
Don't like the binary format? by Cardinal · 2001-08-22 05:10 · Score: 1

Write a quick tool to wrap around vi that turns the DB into a long ini-file style string and feeds it into vi, then when vi saves, parses it back into db format.

Not difficult, and you can use any editor you please.
ReYour using the wrong distro by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 05:11 · Score: 0

apt-get update
apt-get upgrade

2 commands and everything is upgraded .. hmm guess what distro?
1. Re:ReYour using the wrong distro by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 06:49 · Score: 0
  
  2 commands and everything is upgraded
  Yeah, everything is upgraded to what was new a year ago.
2. Re:ReYour using the wrong distro by WNight · 2001-08-22 07:08 · Score: 2
  
  No, he said "updated". That means, up to date.
  
  If he wanted the packages he'd get from doing "apt-get ..." he'd simply install Redhat 6.2
  
  Debian is ... stable. That's like saying it has ... a nice personality.
  
  The apt-get interface is very nice though, and an up-to-date distro could make good use of it.
3. Re:ReYour using the wrong distro by moZer · 2001-08-22 19:43 · Score: 1
  
  I can't believe no one has pointed this out...well anyway:
  
  Debian is three distros, not one.
  
  1. Stable: Most things are a year old, but more or less bug free. Probably the most stable (GNU/)Linux distro available.
  2. Testing: Comparable to most ordinary distros, reasonably recent software although quite stable.
  3. Unstable: Development version. _Very_ recent material, 5 min behind Freshmeat.
  
  So you have choices within the choice. Debian is not old. Debian stable is old (but reliable).
  
  How the fsck did that post get score 2 anyway?
  
  --
  Hello, my name is Robert Lerner, and I pronounce Lernux as "99% cpu"
Configuration and consistancy are bad in Windows by tsa · 2001-08-22 05:21 · Score: 1

That's all well and good, but I also find Windows really crappy and horrible to use. Let me give you two examples. In IE, you can browse websites as well as directories (as in any other browser). When browsing websites, clicking the right mouse button brings up a 'back' option. On some websites, you can click a link and move to a directory, of which you see the contents listed in the browser window. Clicking the right mouse button now brings up a totally different set of options (the same as when using Exploder), and NO 'back' button! That's very inconsistent and very hard to get used to, because it's never what you expect.
The other thing is the 'clicking in a window moves it to the top' option that you can not switch off. With TweakUI you can switch on the 'focus follows mouse' option, but still all windows pop up when you click on them, which makes focus follows mouse almost unusable in Windows.
In short, it's just not good enough. I can't even define all the colors I see on my screen. It's barely configurable. It's crap.

--
-- Cheers!
E is Amazing by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 05:57 · Score: 0

I love eye candy and E is at the top of this list. Congrats to Rasterman and Mandrake they do a great job, I have been using E since it came out when Rob Malda praised its existance. Using E made me aware of Slashdot. I use Dr16.5 which came with Mandrake and I look forward to E17. I will get a new machine when E17 comes out and be elite once again.
fork() and exec() object model??? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 06:22 · Score: 0

Sorry, but those E guys just flunked the bozo test. They're trying to be futuristic in many areas [e.g. using a proper DB for the registry] and then they say "we're not using anything like COM, we're going to use fork() and exec() for the object model"??? WTF?!

Can someone explain how fork() and exec() qualifies as an object model in any meaningful sense?
Link please? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 06:41 · Score: 1, Informative

I would like to see this Display PDF spec.
Re:Slashdot & GNU/Linsux by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 06:52 · Score: 0

BSD is Freedom. GPL has severe limitations.

Yeah.. big bad limitations like: "NO, you can't sell MY code and not give anything back to the community."
I don't want Microsoft using my code. If for no other reason, that is why I use the GPL.
DBrian
I had a drink the other day
Opinions were like kittens
I was giving them away
-Modest Mouse
Well gee, I hope it meets my needs. by dwlemon · 2001-08-22 07:09 · Score: 1

Whenever something new comes around in the GUI arena, that's always what I say. Right now, E16 doesn't really meet my needs.

Right now at home I'm using IceWM because it's very fast and themeable with bitmaps. It's a good style to speed ratio. I don't use any programs that use GTK or any other toolkit other than Mozilla. (all I do with this machine is browse the web and develop Java and C++ which is mostly in emacs)

The only thing I kinda want is a good file manager, but have never found one that didn't suck (for me). Though I find that even when I'm using a file manager it just sits there on my desktop and I never use it because the shell is a lot more useful. dfm was just ugly and I didn't feel like setting up commands for all the file types I used, GNOME's old file manager (what we use at school) has issues with doing anything useful. I havn't tried Nautilis and don't want to. Perhaps E17's "desktop shell" is more what I need.. but I sure hope it has the ability to do transparent backgrounds on the file browser windows (so they match my terminals... seems logical to me!)

If it does, i might even consider buying the hardware to make it fast. (this coming from me.. the guy who refuses to buy a sound card)
Re:evas? displayPDF? instrumentality! by Plugh · 2001-08-22 07:16 · Score: 1

There's something wrong with Slashdot when Raster himself posts and gets modded up only to a "4". C'mon people -- this guy has done more than 99.999% of you to make the X environment ROCK!!

But then again, I'm Rabid E fan who doesn't give a s^&*! what your grandmother can or can't figure out ;->

--
Part of the Second American Revolution!
Who's supposed to define the standard? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 07:24 · Score: 0

Besides, there are no radical differences between any window managers that are available.

Same old hamburger, except some have cheese, some have a kaiser roll instead of a bun, some have catsup. Nothing revolutionary, are even significant between them.

Now, if there were some sort of revolutionary WM or GUI that became available that had significant merits, that'd be a different scenerio where your argument would have more merit. But for now, having a standard WM would just be inflicting one's petty preferences upon everyone else, while accomplishing nothing.

Perhaps you meant standardization of applications, so their functions were accesable in a unversal way. That would be worthwhile but things seem to be evolving that way naturally.
Um, right... by festers · 2001-08-22 07:33 · Score: 1

So when I told my friend to "just reinstall windows 98" she was able to do this all by herself? Try again. Here's what wasn't correctly configured after a win98 install:
sound card
video driver
56k modem
10/100 NIC

Those look like pretty essential items to me. Sure the computer boots, but you have to look at a 640x480 16 color screen with no sound or network. Without the knowledge of what drivers to download, where to get them, and how to install them, Windows is just as hard to install as Linux to the average user. Please, spare me the BS.

--

-------
"Every artist is a cannibal, every poet is a thief."
Too much emphasis on Window Managers... by Hornsby · 2001-08-22 07:45 · Score: 1

I find it ironic that there is so much debate over the speed of various window managers and desktop environments when they're all at the mercy of X. Some of you may take this as a flame, but I'm going to say it anyway. The raw performance of the XFree86 architecture is grossly inferior to any other modern architecture out there. Granted, I love Linux, and it's my favorite operating system; however, if you compare the responsiveness of X to say BeOS, Mac, or Windows, it's marginally slower. I've used X on many different computers including a dual PIII-450 with a 32 Meg video card, and regardless, refresh rates are slugish on anything that requires a redraw. I know that we're tied to X due to the fact that just about every graphical toolkit that runs under linux is tied to its deprecated API, but if it wasn't for the thousands of features that X provides that one application or another depends on, we could probably produce a drop-in replacement that utilizes modern concepts and provides a sleek, elegant, trimmed down, and easy to program in native API. We all know that will never happen, but that's also why we'll never have a standardized look and feel throughout applications. I'm all for diversity, but if we're going to tout linux as the next big thing and try to take it to the next level(The Desktop), we'll never make it given our current state of affairs. At the moment, XFree86 is the cement shoes that will drag linux on the desktop to the bottom of the ocean.

--
A musician without the RIAA, is like a fish without a bicycle.
1. Re:Too much emphasis on Window Managers... by be-fan · 2001-08-22 10:40 · Score: 2
  
  Actually, GTK+ and Qt both have a sizable base of applications. They have also demonstrated themselves to be extremely portable. Wouldn't it be possible to design a simple windowing system (maybe on top of some of the EVAS work so as to get hardware acceleration) and port GTK+ and Qt to it? The only thing that would really be needed (aside from writing said window system) would be to port driveres, but both XAA and DRI seem very modular, so I don't know how hard it would be to port the interface. Of course, I have never touched a bit of X code, so I'm just hypothesizing, but from here, it looks entirely doable.
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
2. Re:Too much emphasis on Window Managers... by glitchvern · 2001-08-23 02:39 · Score: 1
  
  Go and check out the The Berlin Project
3. Re:Too much emphasis on Window Managers... by CAVE^MAN · 2001-08-23 10:21 · Score: 1
  
  if you had bothered read read the article you would know that evas, which e17 is built on top of, IS significantly faster and more responsive because it uses hardware acceleration. I'm not talking about that wimpy XAA for doing bitblt's I'm talking about using OpenGL 3D card stuff, if you recall OpenGL is a grahpic library that happens to be quite good at 3D but it's not limited to 3D(check out the blender interface for an example, of evas:). From what I've read so far evas has three modes for it's backend, OGL, XAA, and plain X. So you complaint that the speed is limited by X it self is plainly not true, if you are using the OGL mode with hardware accell.
4. Re:Too much emphasis on Window Managers... by raster · 2001-08-23 12:46 · Score: 1
  
  well just a correcttion. evas has several rendering engines:
  
  1. software (it uses your cpu and does all the work in the program, not in X. it will use mmx if you have it - its fast and usable and is the default)
  2. x11 (xaa - uses normal x calls - all of which go through xaa. it uses normal x lines, polygons, rectanlges, pixmaps etc.)
  3. image (again software - client side - but renders to local client side memory too as a final output - handy for being able to save the canavs to a file such as a png or jpg, or being able to do other thngs with it)
  4. render (uses xrender extension - so far i only have stubs. i have some of it going locally here - but not enough to bother committing to cvs)
  5. hardware opengl (uses opengl for the back end rendering - you take it from there)
  
  the application gets to ask evas for the rendering engine it wants to use. if its not available (no opengl on the display system or it wasn't compiled in, or the render extension is missing etc.) it will always fall back to software rendering.
  
  anyway. hope that clears things up a bit.
  
  --
  --------------- Codito, ergo sum - "I code, therefore I am" --------------------
It is you who is looking at the surface. by Error27 · 2001-08-22 08:07 · Score: 2

Perhaps you have not heard of the Render extension?

Alpha-blending and anti-aliasing are just some of the symptoms of a more powerful back end.

It is you who is looking at the surface.
Stop complaining about speed!!!! by HanzoSan · 2001-08-22 09:20 · Score: 1

Get off of your 486's and upgrade!

I'm sick and tired of the one guy with a 200mhz pentium keeping the desktop the same because its too "Slow" to run on his machine.

Force people to upgrade, the tech stocks go up when people buy more hardware, and the economy improves.

MAKE people upgrade.

People, Upgrade your machines.
Linux runs fast, on a fast machine, dont expect it to run fast on a peice of junk.

People who dont want to upgrade, should not have state of the art code.

--
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
1. Re:Stop complaining about speed!!!! by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 11:11 · Score: 0
  
  Sure, i'll happily upgrade. You paying? =D
  
  Heh.. you putz...
2. Re:Stop complaining about speed!!!! by HuguesT · 2001-08-22 12:03 · Score: 1
  
  1- Linux runs fine on a 486, keep it that way
  (think of schools, 3rd world and fun hardware
  projects)
  
  2- When you force people to upgrade the economy
  might improve but the landfills get crowded. It's
  true not just for PCs, but PCs contain
  toxic materials and requires special landfills.
3. Re:Stop complaining about speed!!!! by PimpBot · 2001-08-22 12:16 · Score: 1
  
  Well then, give me a job, or give me money ;-)
  
  I'm stuck with my Pentium 200 for now because college has drained me, and I'm having tons of trouble finding a job because of the economy. Sucks to be me.
  
  <unprovable, flame-batish observation>
  WinNT runs fairly well on my machine, even with 64 MB or RAM. X runs slower, even when its just running WindowMaker. Personally, I think whatever the Linux and X interface is, it needs lots more work.
  </unprovable, flame-batish observation>
4. Re:Stop complaining about speed!!!! by be-fan · 2001-08-23 03:20 · Score: 2
  
  Actually, I think you miss the point entirely. The Win2K UI look decent (even nice with litestep), is very functional, has tons of features, and is FAST. KDE-2 or GNOME look good, are very functional, have lots of features (but not as many as Win2K yet), and are SLOW. I think that's the point everyone complaining about speed is trying to convey. If MS can make a powerful desktop that runs quickly, why can't the OSS community do the same thing?
  
  PS> MS isn't even the fastest. BeOS and QNX have desktops that are even faster! When you're competing with MS for last place, you know you have a problem!
  
  --
  A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
ooh yay by RestiffBard · 2001-08-22 09:24 · Score: 2

thats all i can say. i use enlightenment all the damn time and have been snapping at my bit to see it ready. the one thing that i love most about E is that it is as minimal or monstrous as i need it to be. the icon box alone was a stroke of genius. in my opinion anyway (which doesn't count for much)

--
- /* dead coders leave no comments */
E17, Evas, Innovation by anakog · 2001-08-22 10:09 · Score: 1
I've been using Enlightenment 0.16 for more than a year now and must admit that I found it the most comfortable window manager I've seen so far. Every now and then, when a new version of KDE or Gnome comes out, I download it and check it out to only discover that it is not as functional.

And, to reply to a previous post, I think E16 includes innovative features. Here are some, which I really love but haven't seen on any other WMs:
- Moving windows across desktops: Most WM's approach is to go to the title bar, right-click, choose Move to Desktop i (very slow). A faster approach is to use a pager, but it is typically too slow and then you need to go to the desired desktop and adjust the window.
  
  In E16, what you do is "grab the window" (click and hold the title bar) as if you are going to move it (which you are really doing) and then press Alt-Fi to switch to desktop i and release the mouse button. That's it. If it needs adjustment, it comes naturally, since you are moving the window anyway.
- Have you heard of eesh?. This thing is really cool. It is a shell to the WM itself. You can use it to send commands to the windows and do such things as shade/unshade, iconify, move, resize..., everything you want. From a script! I wrote a small Perl script that uses the titles of the windows to arrange them in various predefined configurations. This is much more powerful than session-management!
- I know it was not E that introduced the concept of small applets (I think Gnome had those before E) but have you even looked at the source of an epplet? It is rarely more than a page or two. Why? Because, they are so easy to write... Just #include "epplet.h" and you've got a very powerful API in your hands...
I am also impressed with the code that the E folks are producing as part of E17. I happened to use Evas for visualization in one of my projects. I needed sometinng that was easy to learn and will help me do the job quickly. Evas was (and still is) in beta and probably incomplete but functional enough. When I downloaded it and saw the sample code, I just loved it. It is so incredibly easy to develop with it. I finished that visualization tool in a matter of hours.

To summarize: I've been extremely happy with the stable version of E and am very excited about what the future E17 has to offer.

Keep up the good work, E team!
1. Re:E17, Evas, Innovation by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 11:58 · Score: 0
  
  with sawfish, you can assign a keybinding to move a window to any workspace (i set mine to ctrl+alt+1-9). also, sawfish has it's own scripting language called rep.. which is basically just lisp. im sure if you're masochistic enough you can write scripts in rep to move, iconify windows, but most people just use the sawfish-ui gui to do that to windows that match a certain property.
Just use KDE or Gnome on top of E then by Mandelbrute · 2001-08-22 12:00 · Score: 1

Linux needs a single GUI. Be it Gnome, KDE, or whatever.
Then just use KDE or gnome on top of Enlightenment. It's a window manager with a few extra bits and pieces, it's not CDE or the entire win* GUI. It's up to IT departments to choose a common interface and install it if you want consistancy across a workplace, the rest of the world will go the way it will go.
Also the current version of Enlightenment has themes that act like win*, macOS* and IRIX style GUIs, which may make things a bit easier for those that are transfering from another system. A win* interface isn't that consitent either, I'm sure that you all have seen confused looks on the faces of people that can't find the hidden taskbar on someone elses win* machine, or get confused by the start menu entries moving around. People don't come from a consistant background, so a consistant interface won't help.
All of these GUIs are being written by programmers, for programmers.
It has been very easy to create and modify themes in Enlightenment in the past, it required artistic talent and modifying a few lines in configuration files - not a task for a programmer.
Display postscript by Mandelbrute · 2001-08-22 12:05 · Score: 1

what annoys me it that they do not copy the intelligent concept behind Aqua: display PDF.
Check out the evas docs at Enlightenment, that looks like the way evas is going.
Re:evas? displayPDF? instrumentality! by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 12:45 · Score: 0

or when you're metamodding and at least twice you come across a post by John Carmack about graphics hardware or games programming and the fuckwit moderator thought that it was intended to be a troll!
It's meant to be showy - it's a demo by Mandelbrute · 2001-08-22 13:10 · Score: 1

I have always found the default e themes extremely garish, overly showy, and rather clunky.
The purpose of raster's themes appears to be to show off every single feature of the window manager, so that you can see what the thing is capable of. There are a lot of themes available for each release, and each time E is released there is a lot of info on how to do your own and modify the existing themes. I used to run E on a pentium 60, and have run enlightenment 0.16.5 on a pentium 75 with 24MB. With the right theme(s) and option choices it can run without any noticeable lag on a low end box and still give you multiple desktops, a pager and an iconbox.
Bad example.. by SectoidRandom · 2001-08-22 15:29 · Score: 1

I had the same problems, (i have since thrown my MX300 card) thats what happens when company go bust! Aureal died, and so it seemed did all traces of their drivers / support. As you would expect, unless of course the company is bought out. Unfortunatly to make it that much worse Aureal went under just before they finnished their Win2k drivers properly, as i understand at least, In particular the SMP friendly drivers.

Reason its a bad example is that the only real support left is Linux support, because that was never done by Aureal (as i understand) so it wasnt affected...
Re:Linux facts! by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 17:50 · Score: 0

yeah, and your mom may not take it up the ass, but at least she has AIDS. And lets not talk about good looking.
try icewm by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-22 22:50 · Score: 0

it has Alt+F4, Alt+Shift+Tab, etc...

Ctrl+A, Ctrl+Shift+End, wheel are application/toolkit issue and it pains me too.
Huh? by Anonymous Coward · 2001-08-23 01:40 · Score: 0

psst ... try rhn_register and set rhnsd to run in your system services.
Of paradigm shifts by be-fan · 2001-08-23 03:44 · Score: 2

I think too many people focus too much on "big" things rather than things that work. The next "big thing" will not be a desktop environment with objects that can be remotely embedded into PalmPilots over an infrared link. The next "big thing" will not be a totally different graphics model ala DPDF. The next "big thing" will not be a 3D interface with force feedback effects. All of that BS is just intellectual masturbation for programmers who have no real work to do.

The next big thing will be a users desktop. A desktop that is configurable enough, powerful enough, easy enough, nice looking, cohesive, efficient, fast, and stable. To date, no such desktop exists. KDE and GNOME are slow, Windows is unstable and (fairly) ugly, QNX and Be lack useful features like object models, and all of the X window managers are not cohesive enough. The guy who manages to make a desktop which does all of the above will be a hero to the masses, even if the intellectuals chide him for having no vision.

--
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
installation & hardware by TeknoDragon · 2001-08-25 16:19 · Score: 2

I've found that linux's install is easy because of the better hardware support out of the box!

Q: how many windows boxes have you installed which require *NO* driver downloads?

Q: how many linux boxes have you installed which need a patch to work?

sure there's ata100 and such... but compare the set of hardware devices that linux 2.4 installs on compared to win2k with no driver downloads