Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

GNOME 3.0 Delayed Until March 2011

Posted by timothy on from the so-little-time-until-2012 dept.

Julie188 writes "GNOME 3.0 was scheduled to be released in September but during the developers conference, GUADEC 2010 in Den Haag, the organization had to face facts: the much ballyhooed GNOME Shell really wasn't ready. The Shell is supposed to bring 'a whole new user experience to the desktop.' So now, in September, what users will see is GNOME 2.32, distributed as a new stable release. Next target date for 3.0: March 2011."

30 of 201 comments (clear)

  1. Smart by DoofusOfDeath · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Better than releasing the Gnome equivalent of KDE4.

    1. Re:Smart by Just+Some+Guy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Better than releasing the Gnome equivalent of KDE4.

      ...unless it ends up as the Gnome equivalent of Vista - late and not what anyone wants.

      --
      Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
    2. Re:Smart by Beelzebud · · Score: 2, Insightful

      That's what I was thinking. No need to rush it out. If they feel it needs more time in the oven, then so be it.

    3. Re:Smart by akanouras · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Devil's advocate here - two things they have over KDE are:

      1. Telepathy
      2. gvfs-fuse

      Apart from these two, I'd prefer they took the HIG and the other design principles and built a new GNOME over KDElibs.

    4. Re:Smart by shawn(at)fsu · · Score: 3, Insightful

      What was wrong with releasing KDE 4.0? Yeah it sucked but it's not like once they sent out KDE 4.0 they also removed KDE 3.x from 'the internet'. You have to make a choice at some point esp in an open source product where you you should send it out so at least you can get user feedback on it. I like how OpenSuse handled it. You could install KDE3.x and KDE4.0.

      If you try to make it perfect and keep putting it off and putting it off you run the risk of it becoming vaporware.

      --
      500 dollar reward for tip(s) leading to the arrest of the person(s) who stole my sig.
    5. Re:Smart by Etriaph · · Score: 3, Insightful

      KDE has never been impressive during it's initial releases of new major versions, and I admit that as a KDE user.  However, overall, once you reach a stable KDE version I find that KDE is miles better than GNOME.  I've tried, many times, to get into GNOME to see what others find special about it and all I ever find is that it's still the same old GNOME.  The only single benefit I credit to GNOME over KDE is speed; however, on a modern PC the only noticeable speed increase in GNOME over KDE is startup time.

      If you haven't yet, download Kubuntu 10.04 and patch up to the latest version of KDE.  Once you see how the plasma desktop can be configured I'm confident that you'll begin to reconsider.

      --
      "It's here, but no one wants it." - The Sugar Speaker
    6. Re:Smart by akanouras · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Funny you should mention that - a lot of the newer apps are definitely influenced by it.

      Apart from that, I think KDE should keep aiming for flexibility in the UI just as GNOME aims for extreme minimalism - both have their place for different types of users.

  2. Learn Lessons From KDE4 by SlashdotOgre · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I truly hope the Gnome folks observed the KDE4 fiasco and learned some good lessons. They really need to make sure the product they release is stable and doesn't include significant feature regressions (although knowing Gnome, they'll probably call them usability enhancements...). There's certain types of software that can be unstable, and a desktop environment isn't one of them. I'm very much in favor of them holding off as long as it takes.

    --
    Sadly, PS/2 was yet another victim of USB, which doesn't care what you plug into it, the electrical slut.
    1. Re:Learn Lessons From KDE4 by oddfox · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Is gnome a product?

      Yes, it is. GNOME is a product (software project) that is included with various other products into a meta-product (for-pay distributions, as well as distros that offer support contracts). Matter of fact, a product doesn't have to cost money or be proprietary in order to be considered a product, but the GNOME project has to push their product or they risk losing relevance, market share and mind share if they appear to be dragging their feet and lagging in progress.

      Its delay proves gross incompetence to whom?

      The core GNOME developers and maintainers of the project along with various sub-projects which have fallen behind schedule quite a bit are to blame.

      I'm not personally of the mindset that any of these delays constitutes anything more than very bad management and planning.

      Isn't this what open source was suppose to be about? No shareholders to answer to, the software is realeased when it's done?

      No, it's not what OSS was supposed to be about and it's not what it is about. The shareholders in the F/OSS world are not only the community members but any businesses which have a significant stake in releasing a solid product. Don't think that if GNOME falls far behind KDE or anything else that major distributions won't drop support for it, or simply remove it entirely from its repositories. Case in point -- Slackware. GNOME failed as a product to satisfy the Slackware developers (Meaning Patrick Volkerding, primarily, if I recall correctly) and was thus dropped in favor of KDE. If it becomes a pain in the butt for RedHat to support a GNOME desktop on RHEL because GNOME feels old and/or crusty they will look for other options.

      In short, GNOME can take as long as they want getting to 3.0, but other software projects (especially desktop environments and window managers) are not stopping and waiting for them to play catch-up. The lesson to take away from this is to be a little more conservative about estimates for getting projects needing more attention out the door. Maybe they lost a few or many developers or volunteers, but the most likely explanation to a lot of people will appear to be that they underestimated how much time and how many developers and testers were needed.

      FWIW, as someone who wants to see GNOME Shell and 3.0 finished, I am at least glad they have recognized publicly that GNOME Shell is absolutely nowhere near ready. I've tried it out a few times in various distros and it's about as disappointing as can be as far as performance and stability. If they would have stuck to their original release schedule this would have been far worse than the reaction to KDE4 when it landed. It would be like the Four Yorkshiremen skit with the GNOME 3.0 early adopters scoffing at how much easier the KDE 4.0 early adopters had it.

      --
      "We invented personal computing." - Bill Gates
    2. Re:Learn Lessons From KDE4 by IrquiM · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I don't see KDE4 as a fiasco. It was clearly stated by the developers that they didn't recommend using it in any distro.

      The failure wasn't by KDE but the people maintaining the distros!

      --
      This is blinging
    3. Re:Learn Lessons From KDE4 by Tetch · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Well ... yes ... but KDE4 did carry on being a fiasco for rather a long time, which has freaked a lot of people out. It's only just reaching a decent state around about now (V4.4.5 / V4.5) - which has been unfortunate - and many of its users consider the many allegedly release-quality previous V4.x versions have been only beta-grade ... and should have been flagged as such.

      Distros which included it did so largely in response to user demand, which itself occurred because users were given the impression the beta phase (labelled V3.9.x) was now over, and that "V4" meant "usable for serious purposes".

      It's all water under the bridge now, but many users got bitten, and many people think the move was a mistake.

      --
      If you don't pray in my school, I won't think in your church.
    4. Re:Learn Lessons From KDE4 by JohnFluxx · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If you call a product version number "4.0" then people expect a certain level of quality. And people will demand that their distro carries it.

      I'm a KDE developer, and IMHO we should have simply called it "KDE 4 BETA 1". And 'released' that. That would have given a platform for app developers to target, while not putting pressure on distros to provide it.

  3. Probably a good thing by MBGMorden · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm a pretty dedicated Gnome user, but I'll admit that the new shell isn't something I'm looking forward to. It's too non-traditional IMHO. Some basic designs have evolved in the computer UI world because they work very well, and this seems to be trying to shake things up for the sake of being different.

    IMHO, the current Gnome UI with the taskbar replaced with a dock (I use Docky for this) is nearly perfect from a useability standpoint. Rather than major UI shakeups, what I want is polishing work. Smooth out the eye candy. Font rendering. Better artwork on default themes and icons. Performance tweaks. More work on specific apps.

    All in all, the BASIC system is is perfect. Now's not the time to be changing it. Focus on the little things.

    --
    "People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
    1. Re:Probably a good thing by oatworm · · Score: 1, Insightful

      I actually kind of understand the need to rework the UI. The file/folder metaphor was a good starting point back when the contents of a computer system were simple enough where you could organize them by hand. Nowadays, it's pretty trivial to have enough documents, music, videos, photos, and so on lying around where the whole metaphor breaks down because there's just no way you can keep track of everything. Consequently, ditching the file/folder metaphor and instead pushing forward with a "what type of stuff do you want to work with?" approach would be rather beneficial, and is something that Windows and Mac have been slowly but incrementally pushing for quite a while.

      Think about it this way - does it really matter where things go specifically, so long as you can get there easily? Do I really care that I can find and open a picture at ~/Documents/Pictures/2010/07/28 in seven double-clicks and nearly as many context changes, or do I care that I can go to "Pictures"->"Sort by date"->double-click on today's photo in four mouse-clicks and get a more holistic view of what's on my machine at a given moment? Do I care that I can find some music at ~/Documents/Music/Artist/Album/trackname.ogg, or would I rather just be able to "Play all songs in album Foo by artist Bar"?

      Having said all that, I do think that GNOME and KDE (okay, especially KDE) are jumping a bit ahead of the curve on this, which is fine by me. A lot of computer geeks are only starting to come around to the idea of a "semantic desktop" (oh, how I loathe that term...), or, if you prefer, a desktop that functions more like a local search engine than a filing cabinet, in no small part because the people "in the know" are calling it silly things like "semantic desktop", "NEPOMUK", and so on, then ranting about the power of tuples, metadata and RDF. You can just imagine how the rest of the world feels on the subject. I do think that, over time, this is the direction we're going to end up going, though. If you stop and think about it, it's a little strange that we interact with the Internet in one fashion (search for something->load it->bookmark it if I want to come back to it) and our computers in another fashion (traverse a pile of directories->find something?->load it->create a desktop shortcut if I want to come back to it, unless I overload my desktop with shortcuts, in which case I'll need a shortcut to the folder containing the shortcuts...). Since many people are spending more time on the Internet than on local content, doesn't it make sense to use the same mechanisms used on the Internet to find local content? Might as well, right?

    2. Re:Probably a good thing by MBGMorden · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Think about it this way - does it really matter where things go specifically, so long as you can get there easily? Do I really care that I can find and open a picture at ~/Documents/Pictures/2010/07/28 in seven double-clicks and nearly as many context changes, or do I care that I can go to "Pictures"->"Sort by date"->double-click on today's photo in four mouse-clicks and get a more holistic view of what's on my machine at a given moment? Do I care that I can find some music at ~/Documents/Music/Artist/Album/trackname.ogg, or would I rather just be able to "Play all songs in album Foo by artist Bar"?

      What you seem to be describing is a meta-data based filesystem. Believe me, I have NO issue with that. The filesystem itself I see as outdated. HOWEVER, that's not what Gnome will be acheiving with this. They're shaking up the desktop metaphor, and needlessly IMHO.

      I mean, seriously, look at this:

      http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/97/GNOME_Shell.png

      Do you realize how much of that screen is wasted by unneeded UI clutter? And none of it is really doing some great revolution in the way we store or perceive our data. It's just goofing around and shaking things up.

      As to your statement about the different between the way we perceive information on the net vs locally, I've always viewed that more as a side effect of the limitation of HTML pages. I know that personally, I can typically find something much faster, and have it presented in a cleaner fashion, if it's on my local system vs a web page. Granted, I like the centralized storage options (hence, I do use Gmail), but that goes but so far.

      --
      "People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
  4. Re:Not a huge loss... by nyctopterus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I like the looks of the new interface, but am rather concerned it might put people off by being too different from Windows.

    The market for Linux is not mostly made up of newbs who want Windows that isn't Windows, but of power users and people who care about free software. These people are already trying to move AWAY from Windows. Making Linux more Windows-like is no good for usability or differentiating Linux. Gnome should move in it's own direction.

  5. Re:New GNOME Shell design by MBGMorden · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Totally agree. It's like they all got together and said "Alright guys. People think Gnome is boring. Lets do something REVOLUTIONARY!!!!!". And they then set off to make something that was as "different" as they could. Not useable, not actually "revolutionary" - just different. Personally, I have no qualms with using an old desktop metaphor if it works well, and the current one does. Refine what works - don't topple the whole thing just to try to build a better one.

    --
    "People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
  6. Havoc Pennington? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    Have they got rid of that guy yet? When he took over he destroyed GNOME and I quit using it. If he's gone I might consider switching back from XFCE.

    1. Re:Havoc Pennington? by pavon · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If you didn't like the UI simplification that occurred in GNOME 2.0, you will positively hate the new Gnome Shell that is being introduced in GNOME 3.0. Just stick with XFCE.

  7. Re:Not a huge loss... by MBGMorden · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Making Linux more Windows-like is no good for usability or differentiating Linux. Gnome should move in it's own direction.

    While true, I also think that it shouldn't go in a different direction just to be "different" from Windows. Windows isn't like the anti-christ. Sure, it's got some things wrong with it from both a technically and political standpoint, but as an OS it also does many things right (as painful as that might be for many of us to admit).

    Those things that it DOES to right I have no issue with doing the same way in Gnome/Linux. Afterall, the whole POINT of OSS is sharing ideas and avoiding reinvention of the wheel. We can't do that with Windows' code, but we most assuredly can do it with good UI elements (same with UI elements from MacOS). If what they're doing works, then our own direction should be the same way they're going.

    --
    "People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
  8. Re:What about GNOME 3? by Beelzebud · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Using a marketing slogan like "it just works" doesn't describe anything about the new features Gnome 3 has... What is it with Mac users and their eagerness to repeat ad slogans over and over again?

  9. Re:Not a huge loss... by socrplayr813 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    That depends on perspective. Personally, I would love for Gnome to be completely unique (as long as its usability is good). However, among the people that I help with computer issues, there has been a lot of interest in free (no cost) software and I've fairly easily transitioned them to open source Windows apps. A 'close enough' interface for Linux would let a lot of them switch without a significant learning curve, which would reduce their computer problems, make my life easier, and possibly extend the life of their hardware.

    Again, I don't disagree (something other than Gnome should fill that gap), but there are people with a different perspective that's perfectly valid.

    --
    The confidence of ignorance will always overcome the indecision of knowledge.
  10. Re:New GNOME Shell design by xxdinkxx · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Granted, these mocks look awesome. However, could they possibly rip off OSX any harder? I am really surprised that Apple hasn't tried to sue Gnome.

  11. Re:What about GNOME 3? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    What is it with Mac users and their eagerness to repeat ad slogans over and over again?

    It's called brainwashing.

  12. Re:What about GNOME 3? by H0p313ss · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It would make Linux Environments less scary.

    You might chuckle at this notion, but the longer the thought sits there, the more it creeps in and you know it's right.

    Sometime around Christmas I showed my brother gnome-shell running on Ubuntu 9.10 ... my brother is a mech. engineer and really couldn't care less about operating systems but does care about computing in general since trying to be a physical engineer these days without a computer is like trying to live on the far side of the moon.

    I have never seen him react to anything from Linux in that way: "Damn that's cool... "

    I strongly believe that it will be a game changer for Linux desktop UI.

    --
    XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
  13. Re:Not a huge loss... by LWATCDR · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How about this.
    I want an UI that isn't totally different from Windows, Gnome, and OS/X?

    Frankly I am begining to feel that OSs are getting to much eye candy at the expense of usability.
    What I want from an OS is really simple.
    Fast
    Reliable
    Launches applications
    Manages files
    Handles IO.

    Wall paper is nice and attractive icons are also nice.
    Clean readable fonts is a must.

    Oh and use the CTRL and ALT keys and not some stupid Windows or Apple key to do stuff. If you start using a stinking TUX key for commands like copy and paste I may have to hurt people!

    --
    See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
  14. Re:What about GNOME 3? by Draek · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Repeat a lie often enough...

    --
    No problem is insoluble in all conceivable circumstances.
  15. Need to look like windows by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    If someone wants his/her desktop environment like windows, then use windows. Gnome is not developed to imitate windows.

  16. Re:"just to be different"... by lennier · · Score: 3, Insightful

    There seem to be a lot of people 'round here now for whom Windows is a universal and sole reference point.

    That is entirely practical and will continue to be as long as Windows is the dominant legacy system.

    But Windows Vista/7 have really broken some of the UI design which made Windows 95 and up great, so as long as GNOME isn't following Apple and Microsoft's trend toward making interfaces more obscure and less powerful, there's certainly room to improve.

    (Seriously, Microsoft, wtf. You removed the 'go up one directory' button in the Windows Explorer, and why? I *use* that button! A lot.)

    --
    You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
  17. Re:"just to be different"... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    (Seriously, Microsoft, wtf. You removed the 'go up one directory' button in the Windows Explorer, and why? I *use* that button! A lot.)

    Because address-bar now allows selecting "directly-above" and "x-levels-up" using one click so removing unnecessary button reduces clutter.

    It's small change in how to use explorer but IMHO is more powerful and usable now.