Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Sun Mad Hatter Linux Desktop Revealed

Posted by timothy on from the this-is-not-your-father's-cde dept.

magellan writes "Sun has released screenshots of its upcoming Mad Hatter Linux desktop. Mad Hatter includes GNOME, StarOffice, Evolution, and Mozilla. Sun has made minor modifications to Gnome to make it more familiar to Windows users. Sun's Mad Hatter, along with SuSE's new push on the desktop, could make Linux on the corporate desktop and laptop a bigger reality."

30 of 663 comments (clear)

  1. Windows... by corkhead0 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If windows is so bad why do we keep trying to copy it?

    fp

    1. Re:Windows... by xyvimur · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Maybe just to `convert' people. People are not willing to change their habits easily - so it's kind of bridge between `worlds'.
      On the other hand I'm sick of all attempts to make WM's look'n'feel like windows environment. It's reasonable to a point, but `copying' every tiny detail is too much.

    2. Re:Windows... by Gyorg_Lavode · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The problem with windows was never it's gui. (Well, not for most users at least.)

      --
      I do security
    3. Re:Windows... by 0x0d0a · · Score: 5, Informative

      There are a lot of good reasons.

      First, we tend to focus on the flaws in Windows. Windows contains a lot of good ideas (which originated at many companies over many years...Apple, for instance, is a major contributor). Just because it isn't as good as it could be and isn't improving doesn't mean that it doesn't have value.

      Second of all, many of the flaws in Windows are not UI-related. Windows has stupid file locking semantics...but that doesn't affect how you double click on an icon.

      Third, even if Windows is a nonoptimal way to operate, many, many people know how to use Windows and Windows software. They're familiar with Windows interface conventions, and anything different from Windows will face an immediate barrier. Once folks are on Linux, we can continue working on making the environment better.

      Fourth, many of the things that suck about Windows only affect folks that are writing software or do lots of network work. So Windows may be a poor OS choice for a typical Slashdot user, but that doesn't mean that its flaws are a big issue for a typical office user, which is who Sun is targetting.

      --
      May we never see th
    4. Re:Windows... by dtfinch · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I like the simplicity of it. I'm not a fan of the new XP look and feel though. 98 was a good year.

      My main problems with Windows are the bugs, the licensing, and the built in limits meant to encourage home users to upgrade to their $4000 enterprise edition, which gives you comparable functionality to Linux and other free operating systems.

    5. Re:Windows... by Spellbinder · · Score: 5, Insightful

      i think that it is a problem if you copy the windows guy for users used to windows
      most user will think "Ohh, this looks like windows, so it has to work like windows!"
      like on a cd player or a vcr all the buttons look same
      and i think may will get angry if it does not
      if the UI clearly differs from the windows the user will realise "Ohhh, this is something else, maybe i should make the tutorial that pops up, or look at some documentation!!"
      i think a move away from windows would be a real chance to change and improve the UI dramatical
      we should not keep things because users are used to them but because they are the easiest way to do the job

      --


      stop supporting microsoft with pirating their software!!!!!
    6. Re:Windows... by kasperd · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The problem with windows was never it's gui. (Well, not for most users at least.)

      At least the GUI is not the major problem with Windows. The Windows GUI is not bad, but there are a few things I dislike about the Windows GUI. For example the virtual desktops available in most Linux GUIs should have been standard in Windows by now. In an earlier comment I told about some of the reasons I like the average Linux GUI more than Windows.

      --

      Do you care about the security of your wireless mouse?
    7. Re:Windows... by 0x0d0a · · Score: 5, Interesting

      That sounds like the most "optinal" UI to me.

      It's not -- it falls prey to the same issues of getting trapped that running simulated annealing without keeping things hot enough long enough runs into.

      People *do* seek minima, but they will seek out local minima, not just global minima. If they're offered a feature that will make things easier and better with no cost to them, they'll take it. However, if they have the option to use something better but there is significant relearning time, they may well choose not to put out the effort.

      In the case of Windows, many people know Windows. There are known issue with Windows where it does not fit with current best practices in human interface research. Take...oh, say, the use of pie menus, for instance. However, people are familiar with Windows's current linear menus, and even if there was a long-term benefit to changing to a different interface, they are going to be unhappy with the sort term cost.

      I believe that the same thing is true of Linux.

      How will Linux UI become "better" in the future? Why isn't these things implemented now?

      The UI on Linux has been *steadily* (and compared to competitors, extremely rapidly) been improving. About twelve years ago, Linux didn't even exist. About ten years ago, you needed to be a bit of a kernel hacker to consider touching Linux. Seven years ago, a fairly serious techie experimenter, comfortable with poking around with your bootloaders. Five years ago, you had to still be a pretty decent power user, be comfortable not having a GUI for configuring much of anything, and be able to deal with lots of incompatibilities with Windows software, much less little hardware support. Four years ago, you had to be willing to deal with pretty alpha-ish, flaky or archaic desktop environment software, and still had to worry pretty constantly about hardware compatibility.

      Frankly, Linux as a general user desktop environment has essentially gone from zero to threat #1 on Microsoft's worry list in the last three or four years. In some areas, UIs on Linux have surpassed their Microsoft equivalents. KDE's use of detachable panes or GNOME's complete user-configurability of keyboard menu equivalents are pretty neat. Four years ago, Linux multimedia was a pretty sad thing -- there was a commercial mpeg player called mtv and a couple of projects. Today, properly set up Linux boxes smoke Windows in latency. Microsoft has not adapted will to the tougher security requirements of an Internet-connected age, as Linux has.

      Linux still has issues that keep some people from using it. A lack of entertainment software (most traditional video games do not make very good open source projects) is significant. Poor inter-distro binary and library compatibility is also an issue. If I had to ship something in binary format that I knew would run on Linux boxes, I'd probably ship it in PE format, because Wine can provide stronger guarantees about binary compatibility than Linux itself can. Linux also does not currently, IMHO, cater as well to the power-user-but-not-techie as Linux does. The light user, who uses a spreadsheet, word processor, email program, and web browser (oh, and Solitaire), has little problem with Linux other than an inability to interact with Microsoft Office file formats reliabily, and enjoys increased stability. The techie loves Linux's ability to be remotely administered, its performance, customizability, scriptability, huge (and free) suite of development tools, and availability of source to fix irritating bugs. The almost-techie-power-user, however, runs into problems. Linux has a thinner layer of GUI over the internals than does Windows. They're probably going to have to interact with the CLI. The power user may want to install unusual software, the sort of thing that doesn't come packaged, but be incapable of dealing with any problems in compiling that software.

      So I believe that Linux is getting better for most desktop users much faster than Windows is, but there are definitely categories of users that will not be happy with Linux.

      --
      May we never see th
    8. Re:Windows... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny
      They need a toggle setting in the preferences:
      ( ) Works like Ass (default)
      (o) Works the way it should
    9. Re:Windows... by 0x0d0a · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Open a terminal window in Windows to a directory. Then try to move or rename that directory (or a parent directory). An error will come up -- sharing violation. Linux will let you move the directory and simply use the new location.

      Open a file, and try to move or rename that file while it's open (drives me nuts when using less in cygwin). Sharing violation. Doesn't happen in Linux.

      Try running any kind of update or setup program. You generally get told to reboot. Why? Because Windows forces you to close all libraries, which means closing all programs using libraries, before they can be removed and the new versions of the libraries slapped into place. Linux uses UNIX file locking semantics, so the files can simply be deleted. They won't actually go away until the library is closed, but any new instances of programs started after an upgrade will use the new libraries. These poor file locking semantics are the reason for almost all of required Windows reboots.

      I was particularly irritated when I noticed Microsoft's (IMHO dangerous and complexity-inducing) workaround for this. In XP, some MS exec realized that constant sharing violation error dialogs coming up when users tried to rename or delete files or directories containing open files or directories were pissing off users, so they ordered that this be fixed. Instead of fixing the NT kernel to be more capable, they made a workaround in XP's Explorer. From now on, failures in moving or deleting files and directories would be silent. Furthermore, to provide the user the illusion of his operation succeeding, XP's Explorer will even remove the directory's icon from any open windows. However, it is not actually deleted, and upon refreshing a window showing the directory's icon, you will notice that the icon returns.

      I use about six Windows machines operating off of a single share on a regular basis. Since I frequently have consoles open in a directory (or Explorer windows open to a directory on other computers), I constantly get sharing violations. This is annoying and time-consuming, but harmless. However, Microsoft trying to play work around poor kernel design choices in Explorer is, IMHO, pretty awful.

      I could also mention the poor workaround in Explorer for another NT kernel shortcoming -- the lack of support for symlinks (Shortcuts), and a host of other technical issues I have with Windows. (Remember the 8.3->long filenames issues?) The thing is that Microsoft isn't as interested in issues internal to Windows as Linus and friends do. Microsoft developers work to get a paycheck, and don't care what happens as long as end users don't see any obvious flaws. Linus is trying to produce a code showpiece, and if people can use it to help themselves out, fantastic. As a result, most Linux failings are due to the fact that developers weren't interested or motivated enough to deal with some issue that was of interest to end users but not developers, and most Microsoft issues are due to the fact that Microsoft made a customer-driven poor engineering decision in the past.

      --
      May we never see th
    10. Re:Windows... by Pharmboy · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If windows is so bad why do we keep trying to copy it?

      Excellent question. I see two basic reasons.

      1. We are already familiar with it, so the learning curve is less steep. Although the Windows desktop is not perfect, it IS pretty good, and the flexibility of Linux will allow more configurability under all circumstances, so it can be made less like Windows and more like what you want it to be, if you know how. If you don't know how to configure it, then the "Windows like" look is probably the best desktop anyway.

      2. The closer the Linux desktop looks to Windows 9x/xp, the more people will be willing and/or able to use it. The more people that use it, the more likely that popular applications will get ported to it OR some group will form to develop an open source application to replace the proprietary software. Linux doesn't need 97% to be successful. 20% of the desktop market is more than enough for this to happen. We are about 17%+ at this time.

      In business, a company that want to compete with larger companies in the same industry will often compete on the lower price part of the market. Units are less expensive to stock, and you can gain "economy of scale" at a lower investment level. You make the cheap stuff and sell it for less, then work your way up the ladder, eating away your competitor's market share. The same holds true for Linux.

      As an advocate of Linux, who uses Windows and Linux, I have faith that the applications and commercial support for Linux will continue to grow. Broadening the appeal of Linux to mainstream users will excellerate this process, by increasing the potential financial returns for companies who are considering developing or porting applications on Linux.

      You may or may not like software from Adobe, Macromedia, and the like, but many DO, and they will be more willing to switch if they can get their favorite software (or free alternatives to a degree). Me, I just want Photoshop on Linux so I can work up CMYK stuff. But we need less technical minded people using Linux before we will get broader support by developers.

      It is in our own best interest to welcome the broadest range of Linux users, an open tent that all are welcome in. This includes people who don't want to know how the OS works, they just want it to work. When all is said and done, Linux has the best potential to do this.

      --
      Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
    11. Re:Windows... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      Just for the record: NT lets you move FILES that are open, but not delete them. You are entirely correct about directories.

      As for symlinks, the NT kernel certainly does support symlinks (fsutil hardlink in XP from the command line), it's Explorer that doesn't use them. In general with Windows there's a lot of confusion about "Windows" vs. the NT kernel. "Windows" certainly has a lot of legacy design (such as shortcuts) in it that predates NT, but the NT kernel does the same sort of attention as the Linux kernel.

      But the Linux & NT teams also have entirely different design philsophies. Linux obviously comes from Unix, which of course was a rebellion from Multics; the goal being to Keep It Simple, Stupid. But NT comes from VMS, and NT is partly a rebellion from Unix (remember all of the NT is going to kill Unix stories from a decade ago?).

      Just to give you some concrete examples of what I mean, the NT kernel supports things such as a threadpool, IO completion ports, and a very robust synchronization API where many kernel objects (files, processes, threads, all represented in user space by handles) can all be "waited" on. Another good example of how NT is more advanced than Linux is that it doesn't kill processes "by heuristic" when it runs out of memory. It just quitely denies memory allocations in a reliable fashion, allowing programs to attempt to handle the OOM condition.

      As for the file deleting issue, I think there's some interesting arguments about program integrity here. But first let me point out: Windows offers a FILE_SHARE_DELETE flag when opening files, that allows other processes to delete that file. Given that flag I think it becomes obvious that guaranteeing an application's file will be there is actually a feature to enhance program integrity, rather than some weakness in NT.

  2. Re:Hats? by bersl2 · · Score: 4, Funny

    People aren't wearing enough of them.

  3. There's more to it than just that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Over at LinuxWorld, Sun was demonstrating the Mad Hatter desktop. However, it wasn't just Mad Hatter on a single computer, rather it was set up on dummy terminals connected to a network computer, with a login simply being a smart card inserted into a reader within the terminal. So, what's special about that?

    Well, now imagine if your work (well, porn watching) was interrupted by a nosey boss (or mother). All you have to do is yank the card out, the screen locks itself and renders itself ready to other users. You can go on to another more private terminal and simply stick your card in, and presto - everything you were doing is now displayed on the new terminal. (back to porn!)

    Cool stuff, but fairly much in competition with LTSP.

  4. Why would anyone support this? by OS24Ever · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I always think it's great when another hardware manufacturer sees the light of open source software. But when it's coming to sun the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is saying.

    Here we have Scott McNealy telling people ""Don't touch open-source software unless you have a team of intellectual-property lawyers prepared to scour every single piece" of open-source code. " yet they're also releasing an open sourced distribution of Linux.

    What's the deal with Sun? One minute their CEO is in a penguin suit extolling the world starts with open source, then it's Solaris will save the world, then it's Linux is doomed because of the SCO thing, etc.

    I wouldn't want to support someone so wishy washy

    --

    As a rock-in-roll Physicist once said, No matter where you go, there you are.

  5. Re:Kinda skimpish, by 0x0d0a · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm not so worried about Sun being a nice player. They've contributed some to GNOME development already.

    The idea is to let Sun do the not-so-fun-but-profitable work of pulling people over to GNOME from Windows. Sun goes after Microsoft, and we get to keep making fun software.

    A lot of the folks Sun's after aren't coders. There's lots of good software for coders out there, because OSS people like writing stuff that they can actually use themselves. Sun likes making money, so Sun does their thing.

    I wish Sun had more of a Linux movement, but I suppose Solaris and BSD are really the only things out there that can compete with Linux and more, and Sun wants to keep their sunk investment in place.

    --
    May we never see th
  6. Yes, but will it run on SCO? by LazloToth · · Score: 4, Funny



    Heh heh. Just checking your reflexes.

    --


    It's only funny until someone gets hurt. Then, it's hilarious.
  7. Gee... by Mark_MF-WN · · Score: 5, Interesting

    An OS can have a great UI (like Windows), but still be terrible in most other ways (like Windows).

    Microsoft Windows is the bimbo that everyone wants to date -- great looking exterior, but nothing underneath the surface. It's it only real purpose is to fuck you over.

    Linux is like the mousy looking girl who works at the library. Smart and fun as all get-out, but not necessarily as pretty as the bimbo.

    Now Sun is trying to offer a library girl with bimbo good-looks. I say more power to them.

  8. Re:You press start to stop the computer by fault0 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I really doubt that a company that current has more than 90% market share, and focuses it's products on 90% of the populace are going to worry about an obscure feature such as regular expressions that only 1% of the populace uses.

    But hey, that's just me.

  9. by your analogy by SweetAndSourJesus · · Score: 5, Funny

    Mac OS X is the hottie who goes all night long and makes you breakfast in the morning.

    Mmmmm...I like that.

    --

    --
    the strongest word is still the word "free"
    1. Re:by your analogy by FunkSoulBrother · · Score: 5, Funny

      OSX is the hottie who doesn't share any of your interests and wants a credit card so she can go shopping at the mall.

      Great to look at, but expensive as fuck and not much to do with her.

  10. But is it safe by pen · · Score: 4, Funny

    Is it really that safe to stick your card into so many terminals?

  11. Re:Looks to much like Windows 95 by ratfynk · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Read Suns position they are right to make it simple. Looky and feely is stupid for offices. Make it work and not have bunghole dep and debug problems. Keep it simple and functional for business they will love you! That is why MS is not selling to small business the way they want. XP, 2003, need 256meg of ram minimum or they will run like a dog on an old hp P2 or P3 slot one! Get rid of all the anime and flash and bells and whistles if you run thin clients and you want to reuse your 3-5 year old machines! Microsoft is bloatware and businesses know this. By MS trying to be Nervana for gamers, music and movies they have lost track of business big time. Sun is right on with this approach, they see the throut and they are going for it, so is IBM. Linux and freedom for the business people right on brother!

    --
    OH THE SHAME I fell off the wagon and use sigs again!
  12. Re:Launch = Start = Sigh by garcia · · Score: 4, Insightful

    this is Insightful?

    People do NOT care about "freeing themselves from MS", they don't care about speed (we have insanely fast CPUs now), and they certainly don't want anything other than what they already are used to.

    People HATED XP when it first came out (and most still do) because it was "different" and they couldn't find anything.

    We have seen plenty of articles on here about how people are finding applications easily when switching from Windows-based OSs. They find the "start menu", they then find applications that are "familiar".

    You think that a "freed desktop look" is going to have easy to find applications that are familiar?

    We want people to switch but we don't want to make that switch easy? Get real.

  13. Annoying that it's Gnome by soloport · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Ok, I know I'm going to be flammed for this one, but here goes:

    Please, Gnome developers, switch Cancel and Ok to a consistent Ok(LHS) and Cancel(RHS)... Please?!!!

    So annoying! I'd use Gnome, be proud of it and recommend to all, if not for this one, single, pull-my-hair-out irritation.

    As it is, every time I try to introduce Gnome to someone (Mac or Windows user), that's the first place they stumble. Then I have to say, "Well... Eheh... Why don't we try KDE. Mk?".

    Look, it sure seems that the whole left-to-right-reading world thinks this way. I think Gnome is a terrific windowing environment, otherwise.

    [puts asbestos suit on, real fast]

    1. Re:Annoying that it's Gnome by babbage · · Score: 5, Informative

      Actually, as at least one other person has noted, the correct way to do it would not be with simplistic "yes/no/cancel" dialogs, but with verbs. This is part of Apple's UI guidelines for the Aqua/OSX interface, and one of the commenters below notes that apparently this is a rule for Gnome as well (if, apparently, and ignored one).

      Think about it, which is clearer --

      Positive / negative assertions:

      Would you like to quit without saving?

      [YES] [NO] [CANCEL]

      Verbs:

      Would you like to quit without saving?

      [QUIT] [SAVE FIRST] [DON'T QUIT]

      Can you even parse out how "no" and "cancel" are different, or what would be the expected behavior if you chose one? Usually you end up seeing silly hints such as this:

      Would you like to quit without saving? Hit NO to save first, hit CANCEL to not quit the program.

      [YES] [NO] [CANCEL]

      Note to UI designers: if you have to add explanatory footnotes to your dialogs, your dialogs are broken .

      You can argue all your want about the sequence of the buttons. Some of the people responding have alluded to UI research suggesting that "NO" "YES" is more intuitive for people than "YES" "NO", but I'm not familiar with that research so I won't get into it. I do know, however, that people are very good at unambiguously interpreting what simple verbs mean, and don't have to think through the consequences of a simple "do this" or "do that". On the other hand, figuring out what "yes, no, maybe" in response to a seemingly simple question, like the one above, can be annoyingly ambiguous. Quit making this mistake!

      Yes/No/Cancel may be the UI model that Windows is stuck with, but there's still enough wiggle room for Gnome & KDE to avoid that trap. I hope that they manage to do so. Don't you agree?

      [I AGREE] [I DON'T AGREE] [I DON'T CARE]
      --
      DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
  14. Re:You press start to stop the computer by leonardop · · Score: 4, Insightful
    ... are going to worry about an obscure feature such as regular expressions that only 1% of the populace uses

    All flammable opinions aside, this is a very sad fact (I don't know if 1% is correct, but the point is still valid).

    To some extent, regexps suffer from the same problem many Free Software projects do, and it's that a lot of people simply don't want to get very far along the learning curve. We tend to live the moment and try to get the job done as fast as possible, so investing time learning something useful is usually pretty hard, no matter how blatantly obvious the potential benefits are.

    Imagine how much efficiency could be gained from teaching at least some basic regexp skills to secretaries, just to mention one example.

    Actually, many of us who use regexps everyday, still do it poorly sometimes.

    Jeffrey Friedl put it clearly in his book "Mastering Regular Expressions":
    You might think that with their wide availability, general popularity, and unparalleled power, regular expressions would be employed to their fullest, wherever found. You might also think that they would be well documented, with introductory tutorials for the novice just starting out, and advanced manuals for the expert desiring that little extra edge. Sadly, that hasn't been the case.
  15. Re:Why is OpenOffice *NOT* FREE? by luispo123 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    GPC is indeed a requisite for building OpenOffice.org for Linux (see http://tools.openoffice.org/dev_docs/build_linux.h tml#GeneratingtheBuildEnvironmentandBuildTools ) .
    According to the GPC site, http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/aig/staff/alan/software//i ndex.html, "This software is free for non-commercial use. Anyone wishing to use the gpc library in support of a commercial product please email gpc@cs.man.ac.uk." OpenOffice.org is non-commercial. It is not sold but obtainable for free from the website, http://www.openoffice.org/. But, of course, it would be more in keeping with open-source work methods if all the tools needed were open source. Thus, if you can create such a tool, or persuade the owner of GPC to open-source his tool,or point us to a satisfactory open-source equivalent, please go ahead. It seems a better strategy than to complain that OpenOffice.org is a sham.
    Louis
    OpenOffice.org

  16. Re:You press start to stop the computer by Pseudonym · · Score: 4, Insightful
    You press start to stop the computer.

    So? I've been quitting programs for a decade or so using the "File" menu. Since when has quitting a program been a file operation?

    The semantics of "Start" is that to do anything, you "start here". That actually makes more sense to me than putting Quit under the File menu.

    --
    sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
  17. Re:Too many flavours ... by AKnightCowboy · · Score: 5, Informative
    I know of two - Windows XP and Windows 2003 Server.

    Windows 2000 Professional, Windows 2000 Server, Windows 2000 Data Center, Windows XP Home, Windows XP Professional, Windows NT 4.0 Server, Windows NT 4.0 Workstation, Windows Me, Windows 98, Windows 98SE are all still in wide use. In fact, I've yet to see anyone running Windows 2003 Server, especially around work, since none of our software is certified for anything but Windows 2000 (SP 3 at that). We only got rid of the last NT server in our group last fall after one of our vendors finally certified their product for Windows 2000. I would imagine they'll support Windows 2003 Server sometime in 2005.