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Ubuntu Moves Away From GNOME
An anonymous reader writes "It's official: Ubuntu has, with its ironically named 'Unity' interface, chosen to move away from GNOME for Ubuntu Natty Narwhal. Or at least move away from GNOME Shell. Mark Shuttleworth says that Ubuntu will still be 'GNOME,' even if it's not using GNOME Shell. Do you agree?"
From TFA:
"GNOME Shell is the interface being developed for GNOME 3.0, which was delayed to spring 2011."
There is going to be some questions about this decision in relation to GNOME. I want to make something crystal clear: Ubuntu is GNOME distribution, we ship the GNOME stack, we will continue to ship GNOME apps, and we optimize Ubuntu for GNOME. The only difference is that Unity is a different shell for GNOME, but we continue to support the latest GNOME Shell development work in the Ubuntu archives.
Jono Bacon from http://www.jonobacon.org/2010/10/25/ubuntu-11-04-to-ship-unity/
From TFA:
"GNOME Shell is the interface being developed for GNOME 3.0, which was delayed to spring 2011."
On the plus side: there are now also ordinary people using Ubuntu - people that don't know anything.
On the down side: they still don't understand what a shell is, even after that explanation (see quoted text).
To me, it's not really clear where GNOME starts or stops... So there's at least one Ubuntu user who is quite clueless what this is all about.
The value of this post? I show you all that there are people able to use Ubuntu without even the basic knowledge of the processes or even the names of them running on the computer. I always think of myself as the target group for Ubuntu. The wizkids can use the other Linux systems.
I agree that the summary is far from unbiased. It's making it sound like Ubuntu is dropping Gnome, which isn't quite what's happening.
A more reasonable way to look at it, in my opinion, is that Gnome is currently undergoing a large set of changes in the 3.0 release. The people running the Gnome project are planning a radical shift from the current UI to something called "Gnome-Shell". Ubuntu is apparently not sold on this dramatic redesign, so instead they'll be going their own way with a UI that is, in some ways, closer to the current UI.
Having tried Gnome-Shell out for a little while, I have to say I'm not excited about the change. I appreciate that they're trying something very new and trying to be innovative, but at the very least it didn't feel ready for use.
"Not a clue what any of this means. I'll just stick with Windows or Mac. You buy it, turn it on, and it works." - Joe Q Public
"I hope my neighbour's kid can make my damn Windows machine work again." -Joe Q Public, 2 weeks and 10 malware infections later
Random? They're in alphabetical order and they alliterate.
There never was an 8.0 or 8.1. They're all x.4 and x.10, since they're released in April and October. Though they used to be x.6 and x.10 when they released in June and October. That bit seems to confuse the most people; the numbering scheme.
Also the Mac Gs refer to the hardware, not the OS.
I want something that looks like Windows...
Well, if that's what you want, you have plenty of choices. If you want something full-featured, both Gnome and KDE will fit the bill, and you can download themes that even make the icons and windows look similar to Windows.
Though they used to be x.6 and x.10 when they released in June and October.
The only June release was 6.06, and that was only because it wasn't ready for release in April. The goal has always been releases in April and October.
Wait a minute, have you ever tried to configure gnome-screensaver? They basically removed ~all configuration besides "which screen saver do you want and when do you want it?" It does have better encapsulation than xscreensaver, but ironically enough, all the settings that they nicely encapsulated are now hidden behind various semi-standard text files.
</rant>
Gnome != Windows
$ make available
Plasma Desktop (the KDE project underwent a rebranding a year ago -- that's now the name of the DE) looks in its default layout somewhat like Windows but behaves actually very differently. The differences begin with the use of a single click to open files and end with Activities, newspaper views, etc.
You are confused. Nowhere in the article it says that this is for netbooks (indeed, Ubuntu already ships with Unity for Netbook Remix, so this wouldn't be news). Heck, the second sentence of TFA is:
Moving to Unity as the default interface for Ubuntu Desktop with Natty Narwhal (11.04), rather than GNOME Shell.
Ever seen this? https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation/MinimalCD
There is no need to spend time with packages you won't use.
Artix
Your Linux, your init.
The Samba shares feature is the big reason they're still using Ubuntu at this non-profit where I installed it on some Pentium M notebooks.
For my personal use though, I think features like not opening a new Nautilus window when you click on a folder, should be configurable though options (without having to fire up gconf-editor). But that beats a crashing KWin any day.
KDE 4.5 is to KDE 4.0 as a Maglev is to a trainwreck.
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