GNOME 3.0 Delayed Until March 2011

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GNOME 3.0 Delayed Until March 2011

Posted by timothy on Wednesday July 28, 2010 @07:29AM 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."

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Smart by DoofusOfDeath · 2010-07-28 07:33 · Score: 5, Insightful

Better than releasing the Gnome equivalent of KDE4.
1. Re:Smart by Just+Some+Guy · 2010-07-28 07:42 · 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.
  
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  Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
2. Re:Smart by akanouras · 2010-07-28 09:08 · Score: 4, Insightful
  Devil's advocate here - two things they have over KDE are:
  
  Telepathy
  
  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.
3. Re:Smart by shawn(at)fsu · 2010-07-28 09:50 · 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.
4. Re:Smart by Etriaph · 2010-07-28 10:36 · 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
Learn Lessons From KDE4 by SlashdotOgre · 2010-07-28 07:37 · 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 JohnFluxx · 2010-07-28 15:28 · 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.
Probably a good thing by MBGMorden · 2010-07-28 07:54 · 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.

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"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
1. Re:Probably a good thing by MBGMorden · 2010-07-28 08:58 · 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
Re:Not a huge loss... by nyctopterus · 2010-07-28 07:58 · 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.
Re:New GNOME Shell design by MBGMorden · 2010-07-28 08:00 · 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
Re:Not a huge loss... by MBGMorden · 2010-07-28 08:08 · 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.

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"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
Re:What about GNOME 3? by Beelzebud · 2010-07-28 08:08 · 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?
Re:New GNOME Shell design by xxdinkxx · 2010-07-28 08:20 · 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.
Re:What about GNOME 3? by Anonymous Coward · 2010-07-28 08:22 · Score: 3, Insightful

What is it with Mac users and their eagerness to repeat ad slogans over and over again?
It's called brainwashing.
Re:Havoc Pennington? by pavon · 2010-07-28 08:23 · 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.
Re:What about GNOME 3? by H0p313ss · 2010-07-28 08:27 · 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
Re:Not a huge loss... by LWATCDR · 2010-07-28 09:02 · 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.
Re:What about GNOME 3? by Draek · 2010-07-28 09:15 · Score: 3, Insightful

Repeat a lie often enough...

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No problem is insoluble in all conceivable circumstances.
Re:"just to be different"... by lennier · 2010-07-28 10:32 · 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