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GNOME: Possible Recovery Strategies
An anonymous reader tips an article from Datamation about several suggestions for the GNOME project to answer user complaints and boost developer morale. From the article:
"... with very few changes, GNOME 3 could be much more acceptable to most users. A moveable panel, panel applets, desktop launchers, user control of virtual desktops, menu alternatives that would remove the need for the overview -- all of these could be added easily as options. Together, they would reduce at least ninety percent of the complaints against GNOME 3. ... If GNOME is having trouble as a desktop environment, one obvious solution is to find new niches. Lopez and Sanchez suggested following KDE's lead and producing a tablet, while Lionel Dricot recently suggested a suite of cloud-based services. ... The one strategy that GNOME has never tried is asking users what they want. Instead, the project has preferred to rely on usability theory, treating it as an exact science instead of a collection of competing ideas supported by usually inconclusive studies that could be mustered to support almost any design. In GNOME 3, testing with actual users did not occur until near the end of the development cycle, when the chances of any major changes were remote."
Because 3 sucks and they don't listen to real users. Theory ain't the same as practice, in practice.
Why guess when you can know? Measure!
Make a cute little maskot that looks like one of those lawn gnomes. Maybe it could be a penguin or something. Totally the key to success. User comfort is waaayyy overated.
The one strategy that GNOME has never tried is asking users what
Almost all software has that problem.
"Maybe this world is another planet's hell"
Aldous Huxley
Is a big button on the panel that says "Make it Work Like Gnome 2" Or FVWM, I'm not picky.
The requested functions are already mostly available via gnome shell extensions, allowing users to customize gnome to their preference.
Can You Say Linux? I Knew That You Could.
GNOME devs are not going to aknowledge their mistake. No, for them, it's everyone else who are mistaked about the way they should handle their work. And, of course, it's GNOME devs who know it best. Their design is marvelous, all that is left is for user to bend himself to it.
That's why GNOME 3 is stripped of so much functionality, deemed "unneeded" by devs on the basis of them not needing it. And they continue upon this path: http://blogs.gnome.org/mccann/2012/08/01/cross-cut/
KDE has it, too, but to a lesser degree and most of the time they let user configure his environment.
GNOME 2 wasn't broken when ivory tower developers decided to fix it.
Why not spend development resources optimizing accelerated graphics performance and squashing bugs?
Don't screw up the perfectly fine UI because you have nothing else to do. (GNOME 3)
Don't bloat the whole DE beyond belief and require users run multiple heavy daemons with a questionable approach to privacy. (KDE)
Don't be an incomplete and lacking project borne of frustration with other ones. (Xfce)
The one strategy that GNOME has never tried is asking users what they want. Instead, the project has preferred to rely on usability theory, treating it as an exact science instead of a collection of competing^W contradictory (fixed) ideas supported by usually inconclusive studies that could be mustered to support almost any design.
And thus we are also stuck with Metro^W "The Interface That Dare Not Speak Its Name."
Gnome's insistence on "the one true way" sound so much like the justifying of putting a touch interface on a desktop operating system I've been hearing for months. "LOOK AT THE HEAT MAP!!!#$!@#$ONE!"
Fuck heat maps. Ask the users what they want. The only reason why Jobs got away with what he got away with at Apple and being the sole final arbiter of what what went into an Apple device was that he actually understood what people wanted. That's a rare talent that people think they have but don't. The rest of us have to ask.
--
BMO
All they need is to have a default background as a semi-naked Adriana Lima photo, then all the user complaints will go away in no time.
The best thing the Gnome project could do is start cutting features. Get rid of the bloat. Cut out of the complexity. Drop most of the "features" and come back when they have a simple, well designed, reliable and FAST desktop environment. After that, purge the people who got the project into the state it's in now.
The problem with freeware is that people will only volunteer to contribute stuff they're interested in. That normally means stuff the developer thinks is cool, or that they think is clever (more to do with personal vanity and bragging rights than any consideration for the end user). As it turns out, most users don't want that garbage - they just want something that does the basics, does it well and doesn't mean they need a multi-cored processor just to provide enough cycles to run the UI.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
I don't need great big things wasting pixels I paid for. I don't have the first touch screen in my home. Hard to see how I could even reach most of the usual 4 23" monitor setups if they WERE touchscreens. I don't need to explore my computer on every boot - I know what's on there because I put it there.
I create things, not consume them. Why should I have to put up with a screen manage for consume-only types that really does not fit my needs and which wastes my time by removing the few features I actually do use all the time. I don't give a shit about someone saying G2 looks antiquated, because I almost never even see anything of it - I use the pixels I paid for for my apps - many of which I wrote, not to just screw around in the opsys, but you know, actually USE the damn computer to do something useful.
Why guess when you can know? Measure!
Why does GNOME have to find new niches? It's the de-facto desktop installation for an awful lot of distributions and has been the primary choice for an awful lot of people for the past 10+ years.
It seems to me that they already had a huge user base and many more coming on-board through the likes of Fedora, Ubuntu and Linux Mint. They had a good thing going with a consistent toolkit (GTK+2), LGPL and some really nice software. From my humble perspective, this is a great starting point.
Instead they released GNOME 3. I have no idea who it's for? I remember GNOME 1.x and the thousands of configuration options - it was definitely overkill for a standard desktop environment. I think GNOME 3 is bad for exactly the opposite reasons - completely no customisation. I have no idea why they can't get this right and understand their target audience.
Fortunately, there are solid alternatives. However, I find it a great shame that GNOME seems to be determined to lose its userbase to meet some CS/HCI textbook ideal.
Now there's one hoopy frood who really knows where his towel is!
Frankly I'm surprised something like this didn't happen long ago, considering the higher-than average occurrence of aspergers among computer folks.
From wikimedia stats we see that Linux users on the desktop aren’t growing. Only Android on tablets and smartphones is doing good. Linux is stagnating at 2%the only change is about users that switch to anoter distro.
Is it important that Linux isn’t growing on the desktop?
I think it is and we can’t just say: “oh I’m fine with my OS. Who cares about the rest of the world?”. The reason is that while on the servers you can choose to use whatever software you want. For example you want to use mysql, apache, python etcfor your website? It’s fine! Do you want to deliver videos in ogg/theora format? Yes you can. Who can stop you? That is because on the server you’re the king and the users must take what you give. It’s one of the reasons why Linux had not problem to grow in popularity on the server side.
But on the desktop you (as user) don’t decide everything, because in many cases you’re just a passive actor. The Linux market share is only 2%? Well the consequences are that Adobe stops delivering the Flash Player (while before was delivering a flash player that was crap). Netflix doesn’t ship his client for Linux. Games are not made for Linux (yes I heard about Steam but we’ll see how it goes). Maybe the Olympics in your nation will be streamed using a DRM that is not available for Linux . And most important: many professional programs will never land on Linux. So not only Linux won’t attract any new users, but also this will have the consequence to cut you out from many different things that will make Linux an inferior OS choice for the Desktop.
Then some Stallman’s fan could jump out and say: but I don’t want those things! I want to stay pure and do what Stallman says: use only software that respects my freedom. Yes suretoo bad that I don’t see a lot of the Linux people using gNewSense, having no proprietary drivers installed, no proprietary codecs and watching youtube videos without using the Adobe’s flash player (probably there are better examples) . I believe that most of the Linux users are not so strict to desire a 100% open source software on their machines. They love open source, but they also don’t want to be marginalized and they care about being able to use their computer to satisfy their needs
So I said all this to explain that:
a) The small market share has side effects on users on the Desktop and so is very bad that doesn’t increase
b) Most of the people want to use Linux not because they’re crazy about Free Software, but because they want an alternative between Microsoft and Apple
c) You can’t increase the market share if you have less to offer in respect of the other operating systems
So how do you increase the market share? In my opinion: You need to make great software that is not available for Windows and OSX.
Is it possible to do that with open source software? I’ve no idea. Probably not. Also I’m sure many open source developers don’t even like it.
I think most of the Gnome developers just don’t care if Linux is at 2% of if there are some annoyances, especially because I believe most of them don’t use Linux as their primary OS. They just love working together on Gnome, but they don’t have the pressure to reach real pragmatic goals. Because that would require some compromises.
So the only way to create an alternative to Microsoft and Apple (that is what I care most) will be to hope that one day some big company creates a new brand and ships computers with Linux and at the same time makes available some of the coolest proprietary programs you’ve ever seen. That someone could only be Google. Not like Dell and HP that keeps selling hardware with Linux as a third class choice, with no marketing and no ideas behind.
Once Redhat has sufficiently fucked up Gnome enough to kill off any distros based on Gnome, both free and commercially oriented (we're coming for ya, Canonical!), then RH will start listening to users and give us back our precious panels.
> find new niches. ... tablet, ... cloud-based services.
>
If only someone had said "social media" also, we'd have had the whole set.
How inappropriate to call this planet Earth, when clearly it is Ocean.
What people tend to forget about GNOME is that a large chunk of the developers are employed by Red Hat. GNOME isn't worried about losing users because regular users aren't supplying their pay cheques, Red Hat is and that's why they get to call the shots and you don't.
Ok, let's keep this clear - it's just free software, boys. There are multiple ways to branch it and make it work your way, release it and name it "True GNOME" or whatever. No, GNOME developers have never been fan of "LEGO constuctor" type of desktop enviroment. They have been improving their software and technologies steadily, within their means and in ways they deem reasonable.
Don't like their vision? There is so much to choose from - starting from using old GNOME 2 stack (without support from outside, of course), use many of "alternative remixes", use distribution with bunch of enabled extentions, etc. - you name it.
From my expierence, is there any worth of complains, GNOME developers will get it. But they will see this as whole different vision than you. Accept that and move along.
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
You mean by fixing the standard issue list of complaints and noticing that linux nerds are NOT using their computers like large cellphones, would reduce almost 90% of complaints?
What took you so fucking long Sherlock?
Will I return to gnome even if they do what they say? I dunno ... On one hand I do like spiffy new UI's, on the other hand I dont like wasting CPU and GPU power on dumb shit like windows and special effects I never pay attention to.
Work on gnome 2, make it faster. It's just a desktop anyways.
I don't want to hear any of this cloud crap either...... bunch of fairy princesses.
Actually listen to your users and do what they say. It's so radical it just might work.
Just stop telling people how to work and think.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Users have no idea what they want. Nothing good was ever built by committee.
There's an extension for that..
Many extensions do that.. it goes against what gnome say, but they work. I've got my unread mail count in my panel..
Urgh.. I'm sure someone could write one. I always turn off "file manager on desktop" because having to move a window out of the way to start something is a waste of time. I normally use my desktop space with, er, windows... you can already put files on the desktop. You can turn it on with the tweak tool. KDE got it right by adding a desktop widget, so it didn't take over the entire desktop. If I want to start an app, I go "t..e..r.." ooh, a terminal in 5 key presses!
There's an extension for that, although once you get used to it, the "new desktop every time you use the last" option is something I really don't want to go back from. It's really efficient once you've mapped better keys to desktop switching. Especially once you have 2 monitors and you CAN'T switch desktops on the other one. It acts like a sort of main work screen while all the web/email crap is the stuff you switch. Of course, there's an app to enable switching on the other screen.
there's an extension for that. Although i'm not sure of the "remove the need". I prefer the overview - you don't have to use the mouse in it.
They ARE options. Try http://extensions.gnome.org./ There's even a single click on/off button for each extension to turn them on and off.
Honestly, people use it for 5 minutes and suddenly think they're an expert on desktop design by saying "lets make it like gnome 2!"
I wrote my first program at the age of six, and I still can't work out how this website works.
The top bar is about 16 pixels high, and with the overview replacing the windows-95-esque taskbar, I've gained about 48 rows from the bottom of the screen. I've got more screen space than ever. I run it on 2 1080p monitors and I'm not aware of anything using the space. Besides, it would need serious work to be a tablet interface. You can move windows round and resize them, while there's no clicky thing to switch desktops. that's either keyboard shortcuts or the top corner. If you want tablet, try metro.
I wrote my first program at the age of six, and I still can't work out how this website works.
So out of the box every control is a switch under the instrument panel but you can install your own extensions with steering wheels, pedals, etc if you want.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
The first thing that would get everyone's attention is an apology and/or acknowledgement that they did it wrong.
There was nothing wrong with wanting to create a tablet friendly UI... nothing at all. What was wrong was trying to foist it onto desktop users. Wanna make a tablet UI? Great! Do that in ADDITION to what you already had *AND* make them compatible with each other so that a user or a program can work easily in either.
The desktop isn't going away any time soon. The very notion that people are ready to move on into the tablet hype world is ridiculous.
It's understandable that no one would want to be left behind or to have a fear that you might be considered late to the party or irrelevant if you don't have one ready when the market wants it, but to push it onto the market before it wants it? What were they thinking?
And I'm sorry developers might have low morale, but that bad smell they've been wondering about isn't coming from the breath of the users complaining, it's because they had their heads up their asses... which might explain why they couldn't hear the users...
...are doing what they choose.
Developers don't need users so they don't need to give a fuck about what users want.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Let me share my experience with "listening to the customer" from a different perspective. In the 90s I was in the Air Force. I joined after the Tailhook scandal but it's impact left a mark on service culture. No one wanted to hang out after work lest their behavior be deemed offensive in any way, no matter how remote. Before this, most young and single personnel would party in the dorms (barracks) or at the base NCO club. Back in the 80s they even had Airmen's Clubs. The more senior people could provide rides home and deal with potential scuffles internally. Was it perfect? No. But it didn't involve permanent legal actions and it didn't have to negatively impact anyone's careers. If you lived on base (dorms) hit the base club and got drunk so what? You walked home. In some ways the old military base culture was like my college experience. I never drove to drink because everything was close.
As the service culture changed, more people went off post to party and base clubs started closing. So to counter this, base leadership created councils to "give the people what they wanted." What they got was a wish list that didn't translate into an increase in business. Those who choose to participate didn't understand customers or how to run a Club so things got worse instead of better.
Then we had a new Club manager. A civilian who didn't care what these "councils" said. He knew how to run a Club and that's what he did. He reached out to Wing leadership and obtained the flexibility to change the clubs, then he showed up at the clubs on Friday nights and built support with his customers. Suddenly families were going to the NCO club (all ranks in the restaurant) for Friday dinner. The enlisted-only bar side had a brisk Friday business and a decent turnout on Sundays for football. Delivery and take out service was started and it proved successful, especially when we burned the midnight oil. No need to meet the pizza guy at the gate. The Pizza guy was on base.
My point? The problems with Gnome 3 aren't about customer feedback. Customer feedback can kill. This boils down to guidance and how change is implemented. Gnome 3 was a bigger departure than DOS to Windows or OS 9 to OS X. A completely different interface. No cues or guides to direct new users. Just a blank slate. Windows 8's opening screen is similarly flawed. Apple may be slowly merging OS X and iOS, but over a period of years, not in one release. Apple, out of all OS vendors, has managed to replace core components of its OS and change its user interface without large scale demolition. Gnome's governing council could learn a lot from Apple's example. It's too late for Gnome 3 to go back. Now it's time to heal the wounds with the user base. Time to show them they can do better. Gnome is in a "Vista" state. They need to implement a "Windows 7" initiative.
Only the dead have seen the end of War. - Plato
Get rid of the people who put GNOME in this condition.
I get the feeling that Gnome and KDE, and Unity, are designed in their garage by a bunch of nerds hankering after peer approval, bragging rights, and coolness. Almost all serious linuxers I know have switched to lxde or xfce in desperation at the bloat and bugs; and newbies just need something windows-like.
I've given up on desktop linux. The best that can be hoped for is that Android will tack on a nice-enough desktop "personality", with competent mouse, multitasking and keyboard shortcuts, in time.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
It only takes one word to refute your argument about proprietary software companies doing a better job of listening to their users:
"Ribbon."
Actually, I can think of a few others, too.
Let's try, "Metro."
I hated having to search for applications before being able to use them. Being able to search is fine, but I found the menu structure (eg. administrator tools vs applications) in earlier Gnome was actually better at helping me find what I want than an ab initio search (which assumes I know and remember all the often-bizarre names of all the programs now on my system).
I also hated how the control panel was dumbed down to the point of being unusable. A lot of configurability that was present in Gnome 2 was removed. So when I went to change a setting I couldn't. Einstein said "As simple as possible, but no simpler". Notice how there are two parts to that sentence. The Gnome 3 crew designed by the first part of it only.
I'm a Mac user these days and I *loath* the single menu. Gnome 3 is cursed with this also. One of the things I missed when going from Gnome to Mac is that each application window could have its own menu. When you are doing stuff on two or more screens then moving back to the main screen to access the menu is a PITA. And no, I use so many programs for different purposes it is impossible to memorize all the menu commands for each application - so menu use is essential.
Reliability matters more than anything just about else. Unfortunately with Gnome 3 being new it hadn't got to a mature point where stuff works flawlessly and reliably. It's nice if the backend is "teh new shiney" and will support stuff in the future, but if you are continually reinventing the core all the time then the system never gets to be stable (plus, it takes time for applications to be built on new core tech, so every time you change the core you lose applications - and it is the applications that end users actually care about).
Just because you want to work on tablets don't forget your existing userbase. Making a better tablet workflow at the expense of smoothly working (fewer clicks) with mouse, keyboard and multi-screen is of no use to me. Hence, bye bye Gnome ol' pal.
I think one of the things that often gets forgotten was that Gnome 3 ended up in a war with Canonical in March 2011. Canonical represented somewhere between 50-80% of the user base. Once Canonical came to believe that the Gnome foundation simply would not listen to their point of view and their only alternative was to fork things went downhill badly. I think its time for Gnome to admit they lost this war.
Canonical instead of pushing the advantages of Gnome 3 focused heavily on the minus. Instead of easing their customer base into Gnome 3 they moved them away from it towards their Unity / Wayland vision. Canonical could have helped to soften some of the rough edges and at the same time Gnome thought deeply about consistency and functionality issues which have haunted Canonical.
The most popular Gnome desktop is now Cinnamon which is a fork. The second most popular is Mate which is a rejection of Gnome 3 entirely. KDE developers consider Gnome to have bullied and lied to them about cooperation so Gnome is likely to see less cooperation.
There are some brilliant aspects of Gnome 3. And I could see it evolving into truly the best desktop OS around. But it won't have the time or support to do that, in the current state of alienation. They have minor technical problems but large political problems. It is time to address the politics and compromise a bit to get back to a situation where they aren't decaying rapidly.
In all fairness the reason behind Gnome 3 was a push towards growing beyond 2% (and I don't even think its 2%). They did care, and they did try. And Metro might create an opening on the low end for Linux.
I'm sure lots of good things have happened under the covers in Gnome and the libraries etc are likely fine. The objections in Gnome 3 are mainly to the rather radical and unnecessary changes to the UI. But reverting that to something that resembles a UI people are used to shouldn't be so hard: just change the top-level graphical shell to use panels, menus, and window management in the traditional way.
Anything else would just prolong th agony.
These developers have vital ios apps they could be writing instead.
Want my support? Simple - remove all traces of tracking my online presence. I don't want the OS to know my "Status". I don't want to tell Google, Facebook, Twitter anything if I am online or not. It is offensive to ask, a user should be protected from 3d party sites by default. I am willing to deal with all kinds of stupid desktop widgets as long as I can trust the OS. Gnome 3 crossed a line.
A while ago I was going to post the ideas that follow in the comments of one of the Gnome developers, but I decided it was a bit impertinent, but here is less so.
As a Gnome user, it seems to me that Gnome lacks vision.
So, here's what I want: I want an environment that travels with me. I want it to work nicely on my desktop computer, my laptop, my large screens, my tablets, and any other devices I use, in public and private. I want a consistent interface - it doesn't have to be the same on all these devices, just consistent. I want my environment tailored to the device it's on at the moment whilst remaining familiar. I want my workspace to be available across all my devices - my gnomespace.
I want it to know about work and about play, and to be context sensitive.
When I'm using my work PC it should know that my entertainment folder is not something that needs to be available in an instant. If I'm sitting on the sofa at 7pm, interacting with my gnomespace using my tablet, then work is not important, but entertainment is. So, I want my devices to understand that there are levels of appropriateness according to the device, the location, who is around, and the screen. It should know that my screensaver with a family portrait is not appropriate during a business meeting, and definitely not when I am making a presentation.
We are going to live in a future where screens are plentiful - rather like pens and pencils now - they used to be expensive, now if you mistakenly walk away with a pen, it's no biggie. Screens will be everywhere - the interior walls of your house will be screens. So my devices need to know that they may be sharing the screens with other devices. Again - the context.
So, I want my gnomespace to have context awareness of the screens it is using... When I have my notebook to work with my gnomespace near a large screen in a public place, then the sensitive work documents that shouldn't be displayed on the public screen without checking. But I don't want to spend a lot of time dealing with this - the system should be able to figure it out.
I'm not an island and neither is my gnomespace. I should be able to share parts of my gnomespace. My gnomespace should also understand various relationships - for instance, if I work for a company then part of the gnomespace should belong to my company too, meaning that they should be able to access that part. And if I work for two companies then neither should be able to access the work of the other: gnomespace needs to be smart about relationships.
Gnomespace also needs to understand that people make mistakes: if I put the wrong thing in the wrong place then it should not be instantly visible to my company unless I permit it - maybe the lag should be 5 minutes. Similarly, permanent deletion, and other irreversible acts.
I own more than one device, that they should all work together as one, should be context aware, should understand my relationships.to people and places, and it should be tolerant of my mistakes.
That's a vision of what will move the idea of the desktop forward, making it more useful, and it's this sort of vision that I think that Gnome needs.
The one strategy that GNOME has never tried is asking users what they want. Instead, the project has preferred to rely on usability theory
What is the theory they are using? Are there document about it? Perhaps their UI will make more sense if we are explained the rationale behind it.
Let's admit it; computerized devices are no longer an adult-dominated user-arena. They are used by everyone from seniors to children. Digital curriculum is likely to become only more and more popular, especially for children. At this rate, it won't be long before some sort of digital interface enters the baby market on a wide scale. This is truly where I think GNOME[3] should focus all their efforts. After exhibiting such puerile aptitude and genuine passion for infantine interfaces, I really think they should go with their bliss and corner the baby market. They shouldn't have to deal with any feedback, babies can't run away effectively, nor do they have any expectations beyond the very basic -- just pure love and acceptance, and just what GNOME[3] needs. I also think GNOME[3] and Unity would have a great a chance in the seniors market, but it would take a little more work and a few less bubbles.
You have to admit, it would be pretty cool to honestly say "My baby uses Linux!" - that is, if "Linux" is the right word.
Forward! -- Emperor Norton, 2012
in Japan, to launch Gnome shell,
1. click "Dash" or hit Windows-key.
2. check IME is disabled.
3. Alt+Space to disable IME.
4. wait a moment.
5. double-check IME is disabled now.
6. type "Tanmatu" and hit Space.
7. check IME suggests "" ("terminal", in Japanese) properly.
8. hit Enter twice.
9. Alt-Space to disable IME.
What's a great userbility!!
There are no shortcut like Windows, type "term", Enter.
and additionaly, Japanese users must guess which translated words associated to what one want to get.
Terminal, shell, command-prompt and many other words may be translated to "". Accept both English and Japanese in launcher does not help us.
It's not the first time Gnome guys set some high goals and fail. However for 2% I didn't mean GNOME users base, but all the Linux users.
If you check wikimedia stats you see that during the years Linux users base never grow:
http://stats.wikimedia.org/archive/squid_reports/2012-06/SquidReportOperatingSystems.htm
It's stagnating, there are only distros that become more popular and "steal" users from other distributions.
btw Why the downvoted the post to "troll"? There wasn't any trolling in my post. It was my opinion baked by some facts. They just read the title...
In Gnome2 you could've set multiple panels on auto-hide and wasted about 4 pixels total.
In Gnome3 you get the designed method only. Don't forget the space at the edges of the screen I effectively lose due to gesture support.
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
Sorry about those down votes, I don't think it was a troll. Some of what you said could have been taken that way but I suspect that's lack of experience. You should get an account you will get treated fairer.
I agree the Linux desktop user base isn't growing. Gnome 2 when Gnome 3 started was the dominant Linux GUI. They were the ones pushing to broaden most aggressively. Its also important to realize they had just lost a broadening opportunity with Nokia.
"GNOME 3 developers" is Yoda-speak, it should be
3 GNOME developers, 'cause that's all they are going to have left!
It's the attitude of the Gnome developers
They are too arrogant
As TFA also has pointed out - they _never_ even bother to listen to the users - as if they (the developers) are "higher grade human beings" while we users are made of "lower grade materials"
That's what really sux
The "sux-ness" of Gnome 3 is but a by-product of the arrogance of the Gnome developers
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Granted, the cube was better than the current desktop switching mechanism, but Gnome 2 is so dated it made Windows 7 look innovative. I think Gnome 3 expanded the usability gap between Gnome and Windows, (i.e. Gnome is winning handily) and completely left OSX behind, whereas Gnome 2 was merely an competant alternative.
(Yes, I know that OSX has hotspots and works similarly to Gnome 3. But Gnome 3 is better, if only because it lacks Apple's old usability mistakes, and is the perfect layout for laptop, tablet or phone. (Not that I ever expect to see a Gnome 3 phone).
It's a DESKTOP, not a multi-media show. Looks are secondary to function here. A lot of us can go long periods of time without ever even seeing the desktop. In my case, the only parts that I regularly saw were the applets and status messages in the toolbars.
If they really felt the need to improve it, they should have spent more effort on making it aware of how we work so that it could tune itself to the user's needs. Instead, they went the opposite way: ignored users altogether and made it "cool". Even if cool meant removing common popular functions.
Oh, are you in a hurry to pay your bills before the end of the business day?
Let me grind away moving your icons, checking for updates, running popularity-contest and zeitgeist spyware and break your log-in by changing the client ID.
The error messages will be displayed in animated 3D dialog boxes with sparkles.
You'll give up eventually and get a Mac.
Don't be an incomplete and lacking project borne of frustration with other ones. (Xfce)
It isn't fair at all to single out Xfce as reactionary. KDE was borne out of frustration with CDE, GNOME out of frustration with KDE.
Isn't nearly all software created to fill a need that similar software couldn't meet?
Both of these interfaces decided that desktop was dead and that the non-existent tablets of the time would rule the world by the time they were gold standard code.
Forums lite up like Xmas trees. People were not happy. Yet both camps stuck to the same line. "When we go live you will love it." Guess what, very few people do. It's been a couple of years of this now.
As a result the Linux as usable desktop got set back at least 2 years. Possibly longer if recovery time is factored in. Meanwhile the computing landscape is changing. Which is going to take even more effort to catch the change in direction consumer computing is taking.
Time to listen to the communities. Take down a list of what people actually liked in all variants of shells. Pick a reference set of code and branch with the community requests. The reference set of code could be gnome2 or 3. This reference code base could also be from one of the already in place forks. Saying woops, we are sorry will go a long way to help as well. It doesn't even have to be from the "team" responsible. If key players in the construction of these interfaces go. "Guess what, I was wrong in more support of gnome3 as a standard". This will help.
... to allow the desktop to switch to the look of any of the DEs out there - Gnome2, LXDE, XFCE, Enlightenment, FWWM, Awesome, Sawfish, Cinnamon and whatever else is out there (that can be done in GTK3 - don't try KDE or Razor-qt). Also, GNOME needs to eliminate the Fallback option - if it requires 3D video accelaration, that should come w/ the software. It's not like there's a gazillion GPUs - there are just 3 or 4 in the market, so do a proper job in implementing it fully. The other thing it could do is go GPL3 so as to attract the RMS fans.
All this dev is on the wrong path.
1. Window managers should be kept simple, but highly flexible, but should not contain applets/menus etc..
2. All control panel stuff, should be really part of the OS and be not tied to any window manager, but run in all of them. Just like windows, can code for win32/.net/wpf/metro, just like the main linux UI api, aka gtk or qt. A WM should not be tied to those two. But perhaps have a higher level abstracted api that can use either. Apps/Applets can communicate to other apps or the WM via the DBUS, or via a core common api that is not tired to a WM.
2. It sounds like both Gnome&KDE need to work together to create a new layer thats common to all linux's, perhaps like a linux core desktop layer spec. XCORE perhaps. And their cute custom Wmanagers can sit on top, where a commonly written control panel system (part of XCORE) can run on both WMs.
3. Linux needs to redesign how X + WM + GNU work together. X11 + XCORE(qt+gtk+scriptbased api) + WM on top.
This way, the WMs can be more like 'theme styles' with applets.
Any way , too late, nothing will happen, and googles Chrome Desktop OS in JScript/Dart might take over, or some sort of hybrid Android 5 GUI with full desktop features might end up killing both GNOME/KDE if it + ADK can run inside any linux.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
I'm an old core GNOME developer, around for the 1.4 - 2.x days. I haven't been involved in GNOME 3, but I think they're on to some really cool things, even if there are serious problems now. These flamewars make me sad.
Many (most) of these comments remind me of the same slashdot.org discussions between GNOME 1.x and GNOME 2... I should remember; I was one of the core GNOME 2 devs who was flamed to hell.
Now people are talking like GNOME 2 was some sort of epitome of Linux desktops, and couldn't-we-just-stick-to-that-pretty-please. It also reminded me of the flack that KDE 3 developers took. Talk about whiplash. I don't think many people comparing GNOME 1.4 to GNOME 2.32 would prefer the former, and yet, to hear the cries on slahdot at the time, GNOME 2.x was doomed and nobody used it, and nobody would ever use it. Dooooooooomed. Doooooooooomed I say.... because we were all such complete idiots that we couldn't tie our shoelaces without shitting our pants. ;-)
I notice two things:
1) Free software desktops are often a little half-baked between major UI revisions. This does suck, but I think its a outcome of volunteer hackers... sometimes its hard to wait long enough to add all the features people like and miss before doing a major rev. Frankly, an effect you often see is a decrease in hacking if a project goes too long without a release (makes sense psychologically, right? sort of related to delayed gratification....).
For example: GNOME 2.0 was stinky. People flamed the hell out of us (in many ways, rightfully, it was half-baked), and not JUST about our current state, but speculatively that this represented some insane mis-step for the project. Instead of imagining what the negative-changes could allow in the future, they pretended like we were retarded, and driving the ship as fast as possible straight to hell. No benefit of the doubt. Now I don't want to apologize for this, I think free software should be held to the high quality standards of commercial software, but I mention this because its important context to the sort of panic-reaction people are displaying, assuming GNOME 3.0 betrays some fundamentally flawed direction rather than viewing it as "released too early, too half-baked, before certain necessary things happened".
By GNOME 2.6 it was pretty awesome. By GNOME 2.12 pretty much everyone just shut the fuck up. A number of users found GNOME 1.x more to their liking and moved on to other desktops, but we picked up Waaaaaaaaaaaaay more users than we lost. Today, I think most people would cringe if they had to use GNOME 1.4 instead of GNOME 2.12 (or whatever).
So: GIVE GNOME3 SOME TIME, and view GNOME releases with a fresh eye. GNOME 3.8 might rock your world, and the 6-mo release cycle means changes happen faster.
2) I think if you asked the average slashdot reader, they would like to think they are more "open to change" than the average citizen. In fact, I find the entire *nix culture extremely resistant to change, automatically viewing change they don't understand as "change for change's sake". In a way, its sort of unique and cool.... most of the western world is swept up in a progressivist notion of time, always viewing the future as "better" than the best. In contrast, *nix culture often has a distinct note of Indian-style views of time: the gods used to walk the earth, and since then, its mostly been decay. The downside is that its not a very fun community to develop UIs for: instead of focusing on "what's gained", people pull out flamethrowers immediately at the slightest hint of something being lost. CHANGE USUALLY REQUIRES LOSS because DESIGN IS BALANCE. Sometimes the balance is wrong, and sometimes tradeoffs are made when they needn't have been. I think just like GNOME 1.x to GNOME 2, sometimes the first-couple-passes you lose more than you needed to, and this gets balanced out over time.
As a bystander to GNOME 3, I see many ways they could achieve their goals while minimizing the (very real) losses hackers are experiencing whe
Which is why we've all moved on to either other DMs, or forks like MATE or Cinnamon.
I remember a few years ago when my dad started using Ubuntu. He'd previously used Windows all his life but was sick of all the spyware on his computer.
At one point he called me and said "all my windows have disappeared!" Once I saw what he'd done, it was obvious - he'd changed workspaces and his all windows were on the previous workspace. But he had no mental model of how workspaces worked, and he wasn't even sure if his documents were still open. When I fixed it for him, he remarked something about Linux being really complicated.
When I installed Compiz and enabled the Desktop Cube animation, he mentioned that workspaces suddenly made sense. If he accidently switched to the workspace on the right, it was obvious how to "fix" it - you just need to rotate the cube back in the reverse direction.
Sure, it's eye candy to us, but animations can be used to help users understand what is going on in a desktop. Most Slashdotters are probably familiar enough with workspaces that they don't need to think about them, but keep in mind that it is a completely abstract concept. Animations can help communicate to new users how UI elements have been, and can be, manipulated.
Not waiting on the gnome to get it's acts straight...I have moved on to Xfce and never looking back
2. It sounds like both Gnome&KDE need to work together to create a new layer thats common to all linux's, perhaps like a linux core desktop layer spec. XCORE perhaps. And their cute custom Wmanagers can sit on top, where a commonly written control panel system (part of XCORE) can run on both WMs.
In that case, it could become a part of Wayland, so that all DEs can benefit from any Control Panel/Configuration settings. Or if it is a part of the underlying OS, it can be something in Wayland that enables the WM to make that tool available to users. That way, it will work the same no matter what the DE.
3. Linux needs to redesign how X + WM + GNU work together. X11 + XCORE(qt+gtk+scriptbased api) + WM on top.
This way, the WMs can be more like 'theme styles' with applets.
Any way , too late, nothing will happen, and googles Chrome Desktop OS in JScript/Dart might take over, or some sort of hybrid Android 5 GUI with full desktop features might end up killing both GNOME/KDE if it + ADK can run inside any linux.
You seem to be suggesting for Qt/GTK/... to be a part of Wayland, which currently is just OpenGL plus some basic compositing functionality. I'd think that adding another layer on top of X would be just increasing the bloat, which is another complaint that people have about Gnome3, Unity and so on. I agree that the roles of who does what need to be better demarcated, but beyond that, adding more layers or standards is just going to confound the issue.
As an example, if the OS already offers a way to configure a network, why should KDE or GNOME come out w/ something new, like kwlan? These sort of functions, which are handled by the underlying OS, should be there in a graphical interface, but in one common to the DEs, which is why I was thinking that it would be a good thing to have in X or Wayland (preferrably the latter, since who knows what changes will have to happen to X) But for the individual DE functions, I don't think that Qt or GTK libraries need to be a part of Wayland, particularly since you now have different DEs based on different versions of the same libraries i.e. Mate based on GTK2 while Cinnamon on GTK3, KDE on Qt4 while Trinity on Qt3, and so on. If they are to support all versions, that would create needless bloat. So just have the DE bring w/ it whatever library it uses, and don't include those libraries w/ the base userland install.
They released a 4.0 that quite simply _did not function at all_ and then were surprised when people got upset about it.
As a very serious Linux+KDE user (KDE since 1.0 beta 3) at the time, I stuck to 4.0 trying to make it work for the better part of a month. It routinely required the complete erasure of all KDE dotfiles just to log back into the desktop.
It's not just a matter of "it's still a bit buggy," which people expect in a "point-oh" release, but the fact that you could not do work in it. Panel and window management would inelegantly disappear or crash without any elegant handling of the issue (how about an auto-restart?) and quirks would leave you unable to access your applications even to save data. One moment you're typing, the next moment it's CTRL-ALT-BKSP or even holding down the power button on the laptop because the X server is totally wedged and after logging in remotely via SSH you can't find a single damned thing you can do about it. All work gone. Then you boot back up and graphics mode fails to start or you can't log in and you're back at your VC removing all dotfiles in root+user and then starting over yet again.
I wasted time on 4.0 for weeks because I had such an investment in the KDE workflow up until 3.x, but finally it was just "fsck this" and off I went to GNOME 2. Shortly thereafter I started reading blog posts about the upcoming 3.0 and the controversies surrounding it.
I literally started hackintoshing because I believed I needed an "escape route" from Linux.
And several others in my work circles are now Mac users as well. Yet people here and in the OSS community still defend both KDE and GNOME and condescend to users that didn't want to go along for the ridiculous ride.
If you're going to change the fundamental, system-wide UI that most people rely on *for their livelihoods*, you'd better:
1) Test it well and be damned sure the majority of your users will find it to be acceptable
2) Not release a point-oh until you're sure that the "instability" they experience won't lead to data loss as a result of UI bugs (-- should NEVER happen)
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
you obviously just don't get it
"my name is gaylord, and this is how we made gnome 3 'better'"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSGfS6K7pI0
No offense, but I hope I never have to use your software.
"No offense, but you're so ugly & dimwitted that I wonder if you are the product of incest rape between your mother and your grandfather/father."
This is one of my pet peeves. Of *course* what people say after this disclaimer is *always* offensive. If you really feel the urge to acknowledge the fact you are planning to be rudely direct, then perhaps say "Sorry to be blunt, but..."
I mean, fuck, I even *agree* with your point in the post. Obviously, this just pushed my buttons this evening.
"With all due respect, I think you have the intellectual capacity of a FUCKING MONGOLOID! Have a nice day!"
Find yourself a Delorean (or Train! :)), Flux Capacitor and some plutonium (or a Mr Fusion! :)) and we're in business!
...why it is necessary to have 3d graphics to run a desktop. It shouldn't be mandatory, and there should be a way to switch all this crap off, because I definitely have no need for it.
As it stands, it's impossible to use Gnome 3 when using NX. The only option is to fall back to classic mode, which allegedly might be removed from future releases.
worldmobilenet.com -- World Prepaid Wireless Internet plans
Don't be so quick to judge in regards to who loves it or not. Don't get me wrong, I hate! I run xfce and xmonad but you know, thats how I roll. But when I introduce people to Ubuntu and Unity (usually people with minimum interests in the working of PC's), they love it.
Remember, not everyone works with 10 or 20 applications open at the same time, let alone 6 or 8 active windows on one screen (at least!!). Most people don't even use keyboard shortcuts other than ctrl-{z,x,c,v}!
Whilst listening to communities is one thing, sadly your Mum, Dad, Uncle, Auntie and your friends who actually have more of a life from the PC than we do don't participate on said forums. I wish they did. I bet the Gnome Devs wish they did also, that way they could build an DE that appeals right down to the lowest common denominator.
Just remember, the humble PC isn't just for nerdlingers, it's for people in all frames of work and play.
I'll be honest and say I really like GNOME3 [shell]. I loved GNOME2, and I dislike Unity. Granted the first thing I do on a new GNOME3 is add the frippery bottom taskbar, but other than that GNOME3 does an excellent job of:
1. Staying out of the way! It's not big and fat and ugly.
2. It's fast. Hitting the super key gets and immediate response, the effects are smooth and clean. I rarely have to move my fingers from the keyboard so there's no human-time loss when I switch between apps (and the overview is fantastic for finding the exact window that I want quickly). Even alt-tab behavior is enhanced so that I can quickly find which window on which deskop I want and immediately switch to it - and there's no lag like you get in Unity.
Of course I do have my complaints, but many can already be fixed with extensions and others I assume will be fixed/refined at some point. But essentailly it doesn't feel at all complete or refined. Theming is a crapshoot, configuration is obscure, options are missing everywhere and plugins only sometimes work. Still, it's easily upped my work speed. The decision to get rid of the bottom task bar is stupid, and the "current activity" thing in the top still serves no real purpose (though I could see it doing quite a bit of neat things depending on how they extend it). Control over desktops isn't really needed because you can add dynamically anyway, so I don't care about that and I guess I actually like this way better. The notifications panel thing is totally incomplete and gets in the way often.
First of all, skimming forums for feedback about the changes in Gnome3 gives you zero people that appear coherent throughout their posts that actually like the changes, apart from some Gnome3 developers. Go figure. The amount of people bitching about not being able to do things window managers have given people since TWM and CDE were the latest thing is simply overwhelming.
Second of all, tablets may be getting more popular, but you're replacing desktop user interfaces so at the very least, retain the features, possibly configurable, that make up a decent desktop window manager. For instance, no screen saver configuration or selection? What?? No hot corner selection? You need third party plugins to get you an icon you can click once to open applications?
You may be right about making assumptions, but it's not this guys task to do research in to what users want and how they like the changes. That task is for the gnome development team and they haven't done that ever. Not before, not during and not after the release of Gnome3.
Now what case can be made for gnome3 changes? I haven't seen one tablet manufacturer that adapted Gnome3 as their UI, I've seen literally hundreds of users complain, I haven't seen more than a handful people that like the changes, most of them being Gnome3 developers and thus biased. If you want a case to be made for the Gnome3 changes, why don't you do so yourself instead of blaming other people they're not doing it for you? What are those merits you are talking about? How much users has "gnome" gained since the introduction of Gnome3? I'm willing to bet the absolute number user base has dropped, while both Win7 and OSX have grown, so comparing Gnome3 to those makes Gnome3 look bad.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
Hit ctrl when you click the launcher icon and you don't have to select "new window".
And I'm totally with you on this one, I wish I could mod you up. Hopefully I won't be modded down into oblivion too :(
If GNOME is having trouble as a desktop environment, one obvious solution is to find new niches. Lopez and Sanchez suggested following KDE's lead and producing a tablet
These guys are complete idiots. GNOME isn't working as what it is, a desktop environment, so let's turn it into something completely different, only with the same name.
That's right, these advertising geniuses would similarly suggest one company drop out of the canned food business to produce "Chef Boyardee Automotive Parts."
If you're going to make something completely different, come up with a different name and a different project. Don't hideously warp something that already exists in order to steal the name recognition and produce something that is "Marketable."
"The desktop isn't going away any time soon. The very notion that people are ready to move on into the tablet hype world is ridiculous."
Exactly! Tablets have their place, so do smartphones (but not as much so as tablets). Neither can replace a desktop or laptop for those who need to get real work done, or even just need to enter more than a short document. Add any kind of keyboard to a tablet, and its a Netbook.
I have a tablet. I also have a laptop and a desktop. The tablet is much easier to take with me than the laptop (its a 7 inch), but it cannot run the programs that my laptop or desktop can run, and is not good for entering more thn a few lines of text. It is used for web surfing, playing games and a few other things.
And no, the tablet cannot replace my Kindle either! The Kindle is smaller, lighter, easier on the eyes for reading for any length of time, and the battery life is much better.
My travel kit is my Lenovo A1 tablet, Kindle Touch, Samsung (basic) cell phone (its not a smartphone), and a tiny Sandisk MP3 player. I have a small carry bag that they all fit into, including ac adapters and data cables, a booklight with spare batteries, and spare glasses. This goes with me to my 3 times a week dialysis treatments, doctors offices, hospital visits and trips.
Gnome haven't made a tablet friendly UI. There's nothing tablet friendly about it at all.
The entire centre concept of the new UI - the Overview, relies on a very Mouse based gesture that's impossible to do on a tablet.
I think you're thinking about Unity - you could argue that they at least attempted to make a tablet friendly UI. If putting big square buttons on the side of the screen is considered tablet friendly.
Even if the shininess doesn't get in the way of functionality (eg. Vista), there comes a point when making it more animated and smoother is just playing around, and only raises perceived productivity at the cost of actual productivity.
I've used Gnome2, Unity, Gnome3, then LXDE and Xmonad. The first three progressed from ordinary desktop managers to shiny desktop managers, and Gnome3 was very fun to use (provided the hardware requirements are met). But then I switched to XMonad and just got more shit done. Obscure keyboard shortcuts and configuration notwithstanding. Non-resizable windows messed up some applications, though, so now I'm on LXDE.
>>> They ARE options. Try http://extensions.gnome.org./ There's even a single click on/off button for each extension to turn them on and off. >>>
Please find me an option to rightclick the mouse for a context menu. And just in case you have problems understanding: the Alt key should not be involved.
While everyone else forks it and the original project is left to shrivel.
The core of the problem is that GNOME developers have the habit of releasing as 2.0 or 3.0 something, which is of beta quality at best. It's quite possible that GNOME 3 contains some great ideas, but trying to attract users to software, which will need a year or two more to reach usability of the previous version, is not going to win anybody's sympathies. Exactly this has already happened with the release of GNOME 2.0: its usability was nowhere near that of GNOME 1.x, but still, it was presented as a replacement of 1.x. The users were rightfully complaining. One would have hoped that GNOME developers have learned something from that fiasco...
As of culture resistant to changes: For most people, the computer is a tool. And as with many complex tools, it takes time (sometimes years) to learn how to use them in the most efficient way. The learned experience is very valuable, but a part of it is necessarily lost when the tool suddenly starts behaving differently (people are not used to their screwdrivers changing shape overnight). Sure, changes are necessary for progress, but you should not ignore that changes come with a high cost to the users and radical changes of basic concepts even more so. Changing details is usually fine, removing functionality is worse, and radical changes of established products should be done only in cases, where the benefit is an order of magnitude larger than the loss. GNOME developers seem to ignore this fact of life for years.
That's exactly the way I view it. I'm just a user that started using Gnome somewhere around 2.0 because this serie started to be usable for me, just when other users where leaving. I like clutter-free desktops and that's why I don't cringe much at the lack of settings, I'm more interested on the improvements in common use cases.
It's really sad to read about all the nosense whining. I don't see why the forks, hackers could work on the fallback mode to make it the next Gnome2. I just see a desire to hate and destroy. It seems that taking the lead on GUI design means becoming the most hated. Leading change is like riding to hell for some communities.
I think there are a lot of positive thinking people that likes to learn new ways and is more positive about change but they're not so vocal about their oppinion as the negative thinking people are.
If you want to know what's wrong with the mentality of the GNOME 3 developers, a quick trip to the gnome3 website should bring it home. The videos feature treacly "baby crib" music and some metrosexual dude going on about the wonders of type-to-search (but no menu) application launching and minimal concentration-breaking instant messaging.
And everyone complained.
Irony much?
Or you can try actually learning the new system - it really is better.
Meaning: We know better what's good for you
Move forward, not back.
Meaning: And we define for you where forward is
People put a lot of time into engineering and designing GNOME3 to be an elegant desktop solution that works great. What they did not account for was pig headed, stubborn, unwilling to learn users who wanted their knock-off of Windows XP back.
Meaning... Uh, I better don't translate this one.
See?
Thanks, I'll pass.
BTW: I switched to FVWM.
> A moveable panel, panel applets, desktop launchers, user control of virtual desktops, menu alternatives that would remove the need for the overview -- all of these could be added easily as options.
most of the listed points would be more or less major changes, nothing easily added.
The best and easiest thing would be to start again working on gnome2, releasing a gnome4 which is based on 2.
try to find out, why kde 4.0 was a huge fail and with 4.1 or at least 4.2 everyone migrated, while gnome 3 was a fail and still is a fail.
nothing against some fresh new ideas, which change a lot. But make it good, and make it better than the version before.
Today, I think most people would cringe if they had to use GNOME 1.4 instead of GNOME 2.12 (or whatever).
GNOME 1.4 was before my time - but, looking at some screenshots, it seems to have the same basic paradigm as GNOME 2. I strongly suspect that if I did use it, I'd be up and productive in minutes, versus the hours of frustration and annoyance at GNOME 3 before I dumped it and reverted to 2.
That was the result of a study by Sun ( I think ) in the middle of 1990, ie that using animation ( like the one used in cartoons ) helped people to figure the motion of object on the screen. However, I cannot find it anymore :/
http://articles.latimes.com/1989-06-09/local/me-1430_1_chernobyl-reactors-nuclear-explosion-radioactive
http://www.nctimes.com/news/local/sdcounty/article_6b8be5be-7239-5731-b5a0-4e2590e062bd.html
Thorium bed reactors are at best a useful stop gap not a replacement for fossil fuels that stopped forming 300 hundred million years ago when microbes learned to digest wood.
We at some point must settle on solar or geothermal. We should do this prior to polluting arable land in an inevitable chain of profit over prudence "mistakes".
15TW = 15,000 Nuclear Reactors. (Approx. one accident a month.)
This is like watching a train wreck. I really should just go do something else.
When you look at a tablet, it's a relatively small image at a fair distance, so a screen display that is zipping and popping just looks animated, and maybe even nice (Gnome 3.) When you have a close up monitor on a desktop, that zipping is dizzying and disconcerting. A more stable UI is needed that isn't quite so animated.
Gnome 3 gave me a headache to use because of the excess animation and screen flipping going on. (A migraine, literally.)
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
If only GNOME3 actually _had_ vi key bindings instead of windows key bindings?
I work in a company that used Linux on desktop for close to 15 years. We try to make money here, and we do not really have time to learn all this new whimsy flimsy workflow nonsense that current *ix desktop developers wants us to do - WE ALREADY HAVE AN EFFICIENT WORK FLOW THAT FITS US - the types like you ruined it, so we said bye bye to Linux and jumped to Apple and OSX. Result is that production speed has rocketed, efficiency has improved, we no longer waste time on figuring out how the heck to do mundane tasks, the all-over expences has lowered alot. How ironic.
The good thing about Linux is that you have lots of choice. I decided I wanted to try and use Gnome 3 today.. All I had to do was:
[fa2k@blackhole ~]$ su
Password:
[root@blackhole fa2k]# yum groupinstall 'Gnome'
Loaded plugins: langpacks, presto, refresh-packagekit
[...]
Warning: Group Gnome does not exist.
No packages in any requested group available to install or update
[root@blackhole fa2k]# yum groupinstall 'Gnome Desktop'
Loaded plugins: langpacks, presto, refresh-packagekit
Warning: Group Gnome Desktop does not exist.
No packages in any requested group available to install or update
Search Google
[root@blackhole fa2k]# yum groupinstall gnome
Loaded plugins: langpacks, presto, refresh-packagekit
Warning: Group gnome does not exist.
No packages in any requested group available to install or update
Search Google more
[root@blackhole fa2k]# yum groupinstall "GNOME Desktop Environment"
Loaded plugins: langpacks, presto, refresh-packagekit
Resolving Dependencies
--> Running transaction check
---> Package NetworkManager-gnome.x86_64 1:0.9.4.0-9.git20120521.fc17 will be installed
--> Processing Dependency: NetworkManager-gtk = 1:0.9.4.0-9.git20120521.fc17 for package: 1:NetworkManager-gnome-0.9.4.0-9.git20120521.fc17.x86_64
--> Processing Dependency: libnm-gtk.so.0()(64bit) for package: 1:NetworkManager-gnome-0.9.4.0-9.git20120521.fc17.x86_64
--> Processing Dependency: libgnome-bluetooth.so.10()(64bit) for package: 1:NetworkManager-gnome-0.9.4.0-9.git20120521.fc17.x86_64
---> Package PackageKit-command-not-found.x86_64 0:0.7.5-1.fc17 will be installed
---> Package PackageKit-gtk3-module.x86_64 0:0.7.5-1.fc17 will be installed
---> Package aisleriot.x86_64 1:3.2.3.2-2.fc17 will be installed
--> Processing Dependency: libguile.so.17()(64bit) for package: 1:aisleriot-3.2.3.2-2.fc17.x86_64
---> Package at-spi2-atk.x86_64 0:2.4.0-2.fc17 will be installed
---> Package at-spi2-core.x86_64 0:2.4.2-1.fc17 will be installed
---> Package baobab.x86_64 0:3.4.1-2.fc17 will be installed
--> Processing Dependency: libgtop-2.0.so.7()(64bit) for package: baobab-3.4.1-2.fc17.x86_64
I realise I'm probably not in the target audience of Gnome3, but it will be interesting to try it for a day...
Some of the reason for this with open source projects is that they come out of a user's desire to do things and fill an niche they see so the teams building the solutions believe they know and understand the end users (they are them). Many of the projects are actually started by gifted but none professional programmers.
It doesn't mean that they can't lose touch with the user base or that the project teams cannot become overly arrogant but I appreciate where they are sometimes coming from or where they can be hostile to complaints. We shouldn't forget that the people doing open source development are often doing it as volunteers. The usual response I give to someone who criticises what I've spent a lot of my time and effort doing for nothing is - if you think you can do better go away and do it yourself or instead of complaining try helping.
After painfully migrating from Gnome 2 to KDE, I am sure not going to migrate back! Gnome blew it.
Sorry, but I have work to do. I don't have time to give to a broken piece of desktop interface that gets in the way and stops me from working. Maybe if they fix it, but I don't have time to migrate back to Gnome from KDE, either. I only went to KDE under the extreme duress of Gnome 3's unusability for professional software development. I don't buy the argument that Gnome 3 is actually superior, and people haven't given it time.
"For example: GNOME 2.0 was stinky. People flamed the hell out of us (in many ways, rightfully, it was half-baked), and not JUST about our current state, but speculatively that this represented some insane mis-step for the project. Instead of imagining what the negative-changes could allow in the future, they pretended like we were retarded, and driving the ship as fast as possible straight to hell. No benefit of the doubt. Now I don't want to apologize for this,"
BUT YOU WERE RETARDED AND YOU GNOME DEV EVEN ADMITTED TO IT WHEN YOU SWITCHED NAUTILUS BACK TO A FILE BROWSER RATHER THAN SPATIAL CRAP.
YOU PUSHED CHANGES IN GNOME 2.0 LIKE THE SPATIAL NAUTILUS THAT NO ONE WAS ASKING FOR AND YOU PUT THE OLD WAY BACK WHEN YOU SAW THAT NO ONE WAS HAPPY WITH YOUR SHIT.
http://www.bytebot.net/geekdocs/spatial-nautilus.html
http://lwn.net/Articles/78476/
http://slashdot.org/story/04/06/13/175252/why-users-blame-spatial-nautilus
SPATIAL NAUTILUS IS NOT THE DEFAULT CONFIGURATION IN ANY LINUX DISTRIBUTION THAT MATTERS NOW. NEW LINUX USERS DON'T EVEN KNOW IT EXISTS. IT'S THE KIND OF BULLSHIT THE GNOME COMMUNITY WAS PUSHING HARD AND LOST THE BATTLE AGAINST DISTRIBUTION LIKE UBUNTU.
Now Ubuntu is making Unity because they know Gnome is going to suck as much as when they made Gnome 2.0 and ignored their users. Debian is switching the default desktop to Xfce. Mint created a replacement for gnome shell called Cinnamon. And some people who loved Gnome 2 forked it, calling it MATE, and maintaining it just enough to let it compile in a modern distribution.
ONLY A SMALL PERCENTAGE OF IDIOTS WANTS GNOME 3.
I can't believe people get so worked up about something like a desktop environment... come on, it's just a place that lets you lauch your programs, and manage some common settings. You can do that with Gnome-Shell (GS) or with any other desktop environment, only the details differ a bit. Nothing to grow grey hair over.
If your happiness depends on having launchers on your desktop, themes, or various indicators in a panel, there are extension to that with GS as well. Some people seem to get angry about that -- they don't agree with the GS developers what should be default behaviour and what should be an extension.
Sure, people can disagree. But, consider that it only takes a few minutes to install those extensions -- probably less time than writing some vitriolic comments. So maybe just do the former? Cool down. Life's too short already.
Dude. It doesn't work. It sucks insanely. It's more likely to buy Microsoft a decade of Apple kicking its ass (that is, assuming Apple doesn't go too much further down the rabbit-hole of making OSX more IOS-like.)
It's about discoverability. So I install Ubuntu 12.04. It offers Gnome whatever. Sure, Gnome was ok, I think. I pick it. The install runs. The machine boots. Here's my new machine and its desktop. I don't recognize anything in front of me. I play with it for a few minutes, and I am appalled at the lack of functionality. My reaction is, in fact, OMG, I'd like to replace this with the old stuff -- I knew how it worked, and I could get things done in that environment.
Now -- how exactly am I supposed to get from this brain-dead "thing" on the left, to a replacement for Gnome3? Which button do I click?
Because that's the absolute question for most users. If it's not accessible and discoverable, it doesn't exist. We want something that works. Not something we have to figure out. We have stuff to do already. You know. Jobs. Hobbies. This desktop lands with a thud and a squish and a funny smell. It's not helping me with my work or my hobbies: Instead, it's in my way.
Not just the desktop: This goes for basic features, too: Such as, how do I switch to 256 colors so my desktop chipset can run at speed? Is there is discoverable way to do it? I don't think there is, because I tried hard to find it. But there sure as heck ought to be.
So you know how I manage my new Ubuntu 12.04 machine?
Through the shell. Because it's the only thing on the darned desktop that works right. I have literally given up on the desktop portion of 12.04.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Disband the GNOME Foundation and replace it with INTELLIGENT people who are not egomaniacs with a chip on their shoulder.
They use it ... but they don't control it.
> From wikimedia stats we see that Linux users on the desktop aren’t growing. (...) Linux is stagnating at 2%the only change is about users that switch to anoter distro.
Total number of desktops in the world gradually increases, so if Linux has the same percentage it means there is a constant influx of new users. Also, if I remember correctly some time ago it was 1%, but even if not, my point is still valid.
It's clean, the multiple desktop system is the best I've used, and the hot corner is good.
Still; I when windows users use my computer they have trouble with the hot corner; then again windows 8 is coming so they'll be used to a similar system.
boost developer morale
I know how to do this:
Get all the GNOME developers together, forcibly storm the offices of those who are making these decisions about GNOME, and scream at them for hours and hours about the terrible damage they are doing to GNOME.
It won't change anything, but I think that cathartic release is the best that can be done to help improve the morale of the developers.
The only real solution is a complete housecleaning at the top-most levels of the organization.
So: GIVE GNOME3 SOME TIME, and view GNOME releases with a fresh eye. GNOME 3.8 might rock your world, and the 6-mo release cycle means changes happen faster.
GNOME is not going to change so radically with 3.x series. Do not even dream about it. They have spent so much time to "re-invent the wheel" and they are not going to throw all that away.
CHANGE USUALLY REQUIRES LOSS because DESIGN IS BALANCE
Actually: no.
When I look at the progression from Window 3.1 to Windows 7, I don't see loss. I see lots of change, and lots of gain.
In fact, I can't think of a single thing I "lost" in the move from Windows 3.1 to Windows 95, or any other major Windows upgrade.
The complaints about GNOME 3 are entirely the result of taking choice away from the users. That choice is what's being lost. So I can only conclude that you are saying that taking choice away from users is a necessary price to pay for balance in design. Well, I simply don't buy it. Sorry, but adding a few checkboxes deep down in a GNOME 3 control panel to restore the lost GNOME 2 functionality is not going to upset some delicate artistic "balance".
Those options don't exist in GNOME 3 because the GNOME 3 developers think that their users want to use their desktops incorrectly. That's not the outcome of some delicate "design balance" decisions. That results from pure, haughty arrogance.
It's not the quality, it the *DESIGN*!!
It wouldn't matter how perfectly the broken design was implemented. I haven't actually run into any bugs, but I find the *DESIGN* too atrocious to use. This is the same problem I had with KDE4, only much worse. KDE4 is actually usable. I've used it for a week or two before giving up. I didn't give up because of bugs. I didn't encounter any. I gave up because the DESIGN was bad. But it's not nearly as bad as the Gnome3 design. That one I haven't even been able to try for a week, because it's essentially unusable.
When my distro stops supporting Gnome2 (which I switched to when KDE3 stopped being supported), I'll switch to either Xfce, Mate, or, possibly, Cinnamon. Unless Trinity is available. If it is, I might choose that.
And saying that I can fix the problems with Gnome3 by using unsupported extensions is not as satisfactory answer. Particularly when it has been previously announced that support for extensions will be terminated in the future.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Seth,
I want to believe you, but I'm not hearing much about how the balancing that went on for 3.0 will ultimately help me. What are some features that I wouldn't have had, that I now do have?
I totally agree with you: breaking people's tools sucks, and breaking people's tools because you couldn't keep-it-in-beta long enough to work out the issues sucks double hard. And once again, this isn't just Gnome, this is a frequent problem with major feature revs of open-source software.
But focus on that. Focus the energy on: "Hey gnome-weenies, this stuff is alpha quality, fix some shit and get back to us".
That's not the energy I'm seeing here. The energy I'm seeing here is awfully melodramatic and pitchforky: "Gnome developers are ignorant assholes who don't give a fuck about anyone, are hopelessly doomed, and couldn't design a UI to save their lives". We can go on and on with the "free software developers should be just as professional as commercial developers", but you know what? I think that's pretty silly. I think it /should/ be more wild, it /should/ be more fun, it /should/ be more messy, and because its open source people can and SHOULD maintain forks of Gnome2 when they don't like Gnome3. I think that's the system working in a pretty healthy and awesome way, a way not enabled (easily or at least legally) by commercial software.
But all these things can be done in a respectful, fun, and supportive atmosphere without all the virtriol, rhetoric and lack of basic trust that makes volunteer hackers and paid-to-write-free-software hackers alike want to throw in the towel and go home.
Where's the good vibes in that?
As to the idea of "don't make a change unless its an order of magnitude better".... I don't really buy that. The Win95-style panel/taskbar has been around a looooooong time, and faced a lot of valid issues and criticisms from day one. Its not the best the software world can do. I think they're heading in a better overall direction, and even if it isn't an order-of-magnitude gain, its a significant gain, even if it feels unfamiliar. They clearly aren't transitioning people very well, and this change probably could have been made piecewise instead of in one giant irritating gulp, but I personally think the direction is pretty solid.
People also thought the GNOME 2.x direction was also "too little gain for too much cost", but in the end, I think it proved itself out as pretty awesome. Sometimes you do need to break things to make 20% improvements, and sometimes you simply don't have the hacker-time to make the transitions as smooth as would be awesome (like the way each Zelda game gently teaches you what's changed in the controls between games... stuff like that is totally rad, and totally a part of doing really really good UI, but its a struggle to have enough hacker engagement to get that done in free software, and I'll take jumpy improvement over stagnation.... because the source is available, you can always take a breather on the old version that was really awesome and wait for the new version to get good).
-Seth
Gnome 3 already has most of the *wanted* features in that list.
When I started with Unix too long ago, the philosophy was to develop a tool box that let people customise the box to their liking. FVWM was like that. It was flexible enough to turn something that looked like Windows 95 and OSX, but configuration was not for the feint of heart.
What I expected to follow FVWM was something even more flexible, that solved the configuration file from hell problem. Something so flexible that you could have emulated the current Android, Windows 8, and OSX interfaces. So, for example, you could decide whether you wanted the applications menu bar to be per part of each window like Win 95, or have a single global one like OSX, or not display it until a button press like Android. Where you could decide whether you wanted to run every application full screen, or in its own window, or something in between split over multiple virtual desktops. FVWM already came with a collection of menu, dialogue, and panel and task manager widgets - I expected this to be expanded in the usual open source way so there were 1000's of them, most of them useless, but spurred on by the toolbox mentality that made experimentation with news ideas was easy. I expected to a fight between API's that allowed you to play with touch and multi-touch, so that someone could in principle make an upward five fingered swipe with pike launch vim, or a three fingered back swipe would invoke the browsers back function, or a two fingered circle would do an Alt-Tab, the direction depending on the direction of the circle.
But that is not what we got. In fact, the reverse happened. As others have pointed out, instead of making Gnome 1.0 more flexible, the Gnome developers decided to solve Gnome's configuration problems by removing most of the configuration. In Gnome 3 it got to the point that when I decided the fonts Gnome were using were too big even the ability to edit that was taken away. (You have to install some tweak program.) Worse than that, not only can you not configure the layout and behaviour of Gnome 3 for the platform you are working on, it seems to be optimised for a platform no one uses it on - a small screen with a keyboard ?!?!
Look boys, I'll spell it out for you - the world is NOT converging to one platform everyone uses. The reverse is happening - it is splintering. Whereas a few years ago you could safely assume all your users has a large screen, mouse and keyboard, that assumption makes no sense today. At one end people have 3 x 27" 2880x1440 screen hooked to a single computer with a mouse, keyboard and stylus input device. And then we smoothly move through a number of form factors end up at some 3" screen has a touch screen without a keyboard. In this world you can not dream up the one true interface and expect everybody to be happy with it. The very idea is insane.
In the world we have today, the Unix way of providing toolbox people can use to customise to their environment should be having it its time in the sun. Sure it's more complex than iOS, but unlike iOS it could be made to work on everything, and unlike iOS we don't have to cater to unsophisticated users. Instead we it seems we have lost the original Unix philosophy we started with, and the result is rejection by the only people who used Linux on the desktop - the people who were attracted by that philosophy.
I submitted detailed bug reports and did a lot of repository code testing for KDE, and submitted code myself during the 1.x and 2.x series to a few parts of KDE. No, I wasn't a major contributor or developer—I had/have a real job and it wasn't KDE—but I considered myself just another tech-literate community member that could help out with a snippet of code here or a bug fix there.
I anticipated doing the same with 4.0.
But there's a level of "not ready yet" at which you can't even operate at the level of "if I see a bug I'll try to fix it and send it along" because you can't even stay logged in long enough to encounter a single thing that could be isolated as a "bug." KDE 4.0 was released at the "general framework is still under heavy development and really doesn't even work level," the level at which the things that go wrong aren't about bug reports or about bug fixing but are at the level of deep familiarity with the evolving codebase in large chunks.
They shouldn't have said that KDE 4.0 was a test release not ready for prime time. They should have said it was alpha-level code that was more or less guaranteed to break early and often, and should be installed only by those willing to help bootstrap a codebase that was just to the point equivalent to "kernel now boots on the device but no userland yet and/or highly unpredictable/unstable userland guaranteed to come crashing down within 10 minutes of boot." Because that's basically where KDE 4.0 was as a graphical environment. It wasn't ready for beta testing or development of apps. It was only ready for people that wanted to seriously bang on core KDE.
That would have accurately described what they released.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
Hey Seth, nice to see you on here. Yeah, I remember all that. in fact, read the slashdot articles before gnome 3's release and you'll hear the exact same bitching as you see in these threads today. For years, slashdot slammed gnome rehashing the same damn butthurt they got from 1.x -> 2.x, replaying the same faults, the same tirades like it was groundhog day.
After GNOME 3 was released I was shocked to suddenly see that GNOME 2 was the cat's meow. It's hard to take feedback from a community that is more than ready to throw you into the river and not look back.
Looking forward to you at least lurking on the mail threads at least, buddy. :-)
sri
Is there any real hard evidence that gnome 3 is somehow a failure? I know the loud minority keeps hating on it, but I've seen no hard numbers to indicate anything.
These posts are nothing more than "I hate it, so they should do this and fix it for me."
Fork the code and compete, feel free.
GNOME is following the usability guidelines the best way they know how, which means if users are having issues with GNOME3, they're not using it correctly.
I wish I could upvote you to Score 6: Mindreader
But in that case it would be really nice if they could have kept up two trees for awhile. I know it's a bit more of a PITA, but at least being able to choose *one* of either gnome2 or gnome3 would be nice.
I don't personally see a need to have both installed, but think that most would prefer not to have had gnome2 yanked up from under their feet.
The best thing the Gnome project could do is start cutting features. Get rid of the bloat. Cut out of the complexity. Drop most of the "features" and come back when they have a simple, well designed, reliable and FAST desktop environment.
Yeah, but *which* feature to cut? As soon as you remove anything, you'll get hundreds of complaints from users to whom THAT specific feature was vital, which will complain that Gnome is re-inventing the wheel by removing the way they do stuff, lots of power users will complain that the end result was "playskool"-ified due to over simplification. Users will require complex configurability and plug-ins support to be able to bend thing to the ways their are used (so good bye to a lean and simple system). They will try to abuse plugins to shoehorn absolutely everything they used to find nice before (and here goes the nice consistent look. Instead of getting some unified look, people will try to bend that gnome successor into a clone of Windows UI, Mac OS X UI, or one of the numerous Linux UI they've used in the past).
And if you look, that's part of what happened with Gnome. They sought to make a single simple interface. But by doing so cut out tons of options, configurability and alternatives. Also the simplified/coherent end result looks like what developers think of as optimal. Which has some interesting nice qualities (I love the searchable full screen application launcher mixed with window/desktop switcher). But doesn't look like what every other power user hold as his/her own personal ideal DE.
Cue-in the complains about number and location of bars, virtual desktops, the "I hate the launcher, I want my 'Start'-like menu", the "I want to put all my shit on the desktop, I hate menus or launchers", etc.
All this because unlike the "one size fits all (thank to über configurability)" of GNOME2, GNOME3 is made simpler and is restricted to 1 single paradigm.
Add to that the fact that people just *hate* change, because they have to relearn everything. Even if something might be superior, they just prefer sticking with the old ways.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]