Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

A Look at the Upcoming GNOME 2.6

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the stuff-to-read dept.

unmadindu writes "GNOME 2.6 is just around the corner, and I figured out that many GNOME users would like to know what's in store. So I installed GNOME 2.5 (development version for 2.6) in my box, and came up with a list of the new stuff that are coming up. (and just in case, copies of the article are also available here and here)."

15 of 428 comments (clear)

  1. Almost as interesting... by starseeker · · Score: 5, Interesting

    as the Gnome desktop itself is the fact he's using the freedesktop xserver to run it. I had no idea it was so far advanced.

    --
    "I object to doing things that computers can do." -- Olin Shivers, lispers.org
  2. Gnome 2.6 beta 1 release by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    If you want to help Gnome 2.6, then you are in luck! The Beta release is here and it needs testing

    More details here

    Don't forget to report the bugs!

  3. Re:Windows Longhorn renders all this obsolete by grennis · · Score: 5, Informative
    Did you read the article?

    GNOME ... catches the SVG fever ... quite a few of the games have switched to SVG based graphics, which is a really nice thing, and a move towards the right direction

    FYI : SVG = Scalable Vector Graphics

  4. New File Selector - WOO HOO by starseeker · · Score: 5, Informative

    A new GTK file selector. FINALLY. I can't wait to use the new one - the old one was one of the great warts of the free desktop world, IMHO.

    But they have decided to remove the text entry box??? Eeep. I guess having the Ctrl-l shortcut to get one is OK (after all, it will most likely be geeks that want direct text on a file open) but thats one they need to document WELL.

    On the whole though, it might be a good thing. I guess we'll have to wait and see. But text box or not, it can hardly be worse than the old one.

    --
    "I object to doing things that computers can do." -- Olin Shivers, lispers.org
    1. Re:New File Selector - WOO HOO by ultranova · · Score: 5, Insightful
      Since there is already a file browser such as Evolution

      Isn't Evolution a mail reader and not a file browser ? Or did you mean Nautilus ?

      To open a file, just view its directory and click on it; the application loads automatically and there is no real need for the two-step 'load application then use the Open menu', which dates from a time when computers didn't have a single GUI and there was no means to just open a file directly.

      Or you could leave both options open and let people use whichever they want. Like it's done now.

      Besides, if I have both mplayer and xine installed, how does the One File Browser know which one to launch ? Or Emacs and Vi ? Or whatever ?

      And yes, I realize you can set this in preferences; but suppose you want to use different tools for different tasks, despite the file format being the same ? Or if I just want to try out a new program ?

      To save a file, why not drag it from the application to the directory window.

      Because that would mean resizing application windows to fit them besides the directory windows, and be a lot more hassle than simply using a selector window ?

      Matthew Thomas pointed out better than I could that the separate file-picker is user interface cruft left over from an earlier age.

      No, it's a useability feature. Lacking a separate file selector would give users unneccessary grief.

      Let's just have one file browser in the desktop and make it good enough to use for everything.

      The more features you bundle into a single program, the less likely it performs any of them well, simply because different features (such as useability and low learning curve) conflict with one another.

      --

      Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.

  5. Performance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    When will we start to see serious performance improvements? Currently, GNOME doesn't feel much better than Windows XP, and it needs at least 128M to run acceptably with other apps.

    Linux is supposed to get us off the upgrade treadmill, but as far as I can see, GNOME just keeps getting bigger, slower and more complex. I've switched to XFce; it's so much faster. KDE is a hog too, but at least they're concerned about performance and efficiency as the 3.2 release shows.

    Really, this is something we should think about. When gconfd is eating up 20 megs (resident), just for a configuration back-end, it's evident that we're getting sloppy. A faster Linux could work wonders in terms of corporate and home adoption, but we just seem to be chasing Moore's Law and copying Microsoft for bloat.

    I'll try GNOME 2.6 when it arrives, but to give a better impression to newcomers we need to make things noticably faster, more elegant and more efficient than Windows. Companies have to support all this code into the future, after all...

    1. Re:Performance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Part of the problem is that developers, being geeks, tend to have all the latest kit. So the GNOME hackers working on their 512M / 1G 3 GHz box won't be concerned about performance, but the millions of desktop users running lower-spec machines will.

      Let's be clear about this: the vast, VAST majority of machines on the planet, in homes and in businesses, have 32M, 64M (and occasionally 128M) RAM. That's nowhere enough to run GNOME/KDE, OpenOffice.org and Mozill at a realistic and usable speed. When did we become just as bloated as Microsoft?

      If the GNME developers don't step back, look at the problem and concentrate on efficiency and clean design (rather than flashy features and bloat), it'll lead to long term damage for Linux on the desktop. They're doing a great job bringing Linux to the masses, but the masses are going to be less enthusiastic about Linux when it keeps requiring hardware upgrades...

    2. Re:Performance by FooBarWidget · · Score: 5, Informative

      "When will we start to see serious performance improvements?"

      With GNOME 2.0 and 2.6. Nautilus 2.0 got a huge speed boost compared to 1.x. Nautilus 2.6 is spatial and has because even faster. Windows appear instantly.

      "Linux is supposed to get us off the upgrade treadmill, but as far as I can see, GNOME just keeps getting bigger, slower and more complex."

      Not true. GNOME (and KDE!) have only gotten faster and faster. The exceptions are KDE 2.0 (which is slower than 1.0; but 3.0 is faster than 2.0 and 3.2 is even faster than 3.0) and GTK (which has become a little slower but also smoother because of extensive double buffering). On this system (Athlon 1.4 Ghz 390 MB RAM) I can definitely say GNOME 2.x is faster than 1.4. And GTK 2 feels smoother than GTK 1.

      "When gconfd is eating up 20 megs (resident), just for a configuration back-end, it's evident that we're getting sloppy."

      OMG not this again. I will repeat it *again*. Don't trust memory reports! The 20 MB you read includes shared memory! In reality it uses a lot less than 20 MB, somewhere around 6 MB on my system.
      People who think software x is bloated by looking at the system monitor's memory report are just deceiving themselves.

      And sometimes you need to use more resources in order to make things faster. Low memory usage doesn't always equal fast and high memory usage doesn't always equal slow!

    3. Re:Performance by Malc · · Score: 5, Insightful

      According to Google's Zeitgeist", Windows XP represesnts 45% of the market out there (well, of their customers/users). Windows 2000 represents 18%, and although it will run in 64MB, I don't view anything less than 128MB realistic. Therefore, I would guess that the majority of people are already using machines with 128MB or more.

  6. Wow... by unknown_host · · Score: 5, Funny

    "and now it is much easier to manage one's wallpaper collection".
    That does it. I am shifting to GNOME.

  7. File selectors? Why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    They go to all the trouble of creating a decent filer, Nautilus, and then ignore it for opening and saving documents by sticking with stupid file selectors. Again. Do any GUI developers bother challenging tired, illogical concepts? (Check out ROX for true drag and drop opening and saving: here)

  8. Re:Gnome and KDE interoperability by dominator · · Score: 5, Informative

    There's quite a bit of inter-operability work going on at freedesktop.org. There's a lot of shared specifications and software there. Plus there are software libraries that both DEs use that aren't listed on FDO, like libxml2.

    The KDE folks have also worked on some Qt-GTK toolkit inter-operability stuff. See also:

    GTK-Qt
    Ditto
    Glib/Qt main loop integration

    amongst others.

  9. you guys are so mean by tuggy · · Score: 5, Funny

    triple slashdotting??
    are you trying to break a new record or what? ^_^

  10. About spatial navigation by mst76 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Some people have the misconception that "spatial navigation" is about having one window per folder, but that's not really the point. In explorer-like navigation, every window is a partial view of the filesystem. Every window can be used to navigate the fs with browser-like controls (forward, backwards, folder up, folder down). Two windows are just two views of the fs, they can point to the same folder.

    The defining characteristic of spatial navigation is that a folder window IS the folder. That's why there cannot be two windows on screen that show the same folder, and why there are no navigation controls. The fact that folders open in the same place as when you left them is just a result of the fact that the position is an attribute of the folder itself, not of a windows which is a viewport of a folder. It's a subtle difference that people who have worked with explorer-like browsers for too long may have some difficulty adapting to.

    Personally, I feel more comfortable with an explorer-like fs browser, maybe just because I'm used to it. It seems easier to manage large trees this way. But I can easily see why new computer users would be less confused with the spatial model. It's hard for some people to understand (and remember!) that a dozen of shortcuts to "My Documents" in different places all point to the same folder "underneath".

  11. Spring loaded folders by unoengborg · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This new spatial apperance of the new Nautilus reminds me of old MacOS finder. I liked it back then and I will probably like it in Nautilus.
    But I am a bit worried, some folder hierachies in Unix is quite deep.

    Perhaps they should introduce something like the Mac spring loaded folders.I.e. if you want to move a file down in the hierachy you just drag and hold it over a folder, after a short while the window opens, and you hold the file over a folder in that window, until that opens and so on. When you finally reach the right folder you drop the file, and all windows you encountered on the way is closed automatically.

    --
    God is REAL! Unless explicitly declared INTEGER