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GNOME 3.8 To Scrap Fallback Mode
An anonymous reader writes "Via LXer, an article at Phoronix tells of GNOME's plans to eliminate 'fallback mode' (GNOME classic) in the 3.8 release."
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my permanent move away from GNOME. I am learning to like XFCE!
Gnome seems hell bent on alienating what little user-base they have left
That way, recompilation/patching isn't needed when a GNOME developer arbitrarily blacklists a chipset and goes out of their way to avoid fixing it (such as with the ATI R100 series).
It's one thing to have llvmpipe, it's another when the developer puts large amounts of effort to keep something broken.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
When GNOME Shell began to sneak in to Debian testing I gave up on GNOME and switched to XFCE. Good riddance.
...does this mean they think GPU support on Linux is great?
Will they fork, or will they stick with the dippy new interface? Because I have to say I tried the new interface. And I find it doesn't help me much. First thing I do on a new system is to "sudo apt-get install gnome-session-fallback" and login under the old system.
Oh, and don't think I'm in curmudgeon mode and simply don't like new things. I really tried to like the new system, I really did. But having to right click on Terminal and select "open new session" to get a second shell up is ANNOYING AS FUCK. Come on guys! You know that's not how we work. If you don't have half a dozen command prompts up you're not busy. Why make it harder to do that?
So for me, this is the end of Gnome. I need something that helps me work, not gets in the way of work. I like the system but if you ditch the "classic" aka "useful" mode, well sorry. Gotta go find something else.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
BOO!
They tried to shake, but not to stire. This will be their Skyfall.
At first I thought it was creative editing on the part of the submitter, so I did the unthinkable, and RTFA - and it's fucking there, right smack at the beginning:
Matthias Clasen on the behalf of the GNOME Release Team has announced that they have decided to eliminate GNOME's "fallback mode" with the upcoming 3.8 release
Ya know? KDE is looking better every day, thanks to the Gnome developers.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
This is preposterous! I am going to Windows 8! Year of Microsoft! etc.
I've been using KDE for about six months now since the Unity fiasco drove me away from Ubuntu (with a year's Debian use on the way, with GNOME 2.3x before the more-recent KDE/openSUSE install).
However, I've reached that point in my life where I just want things to work, and since the Mac OS is not hostile to most of the open-source tools I use every day (and will continue using), switching to a desktop that "just works" means I should get the best of both worlds. I won't have to hunt down special repositories to get essential things installed any more, and I won't have to read lengthy HOWTOs to get some basic things working. I've been using my brother's Late 2011 Mac Mini for a day now and I'm very happy with the polish, the smoothness, the speed, and the complete lack of fuss. I doubt I'll ever really love the Finder, and the Dock has never impressed me much, but everything else will be a joy to use.
Sorry, Linux, but after more than a decade of "Is this the year of Linux on the desktop?" predictions, the old adage about doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results applies. Linux is still Balkanised and I still have to fight to get simple things to work. I'll still keep Linux for a LAMP server (bare metal or VM, haven't decided) and you'll have to pry Mythbuntu from my cold, dead, hands in the lounge room, but sadly there is no longer a place for Linux as my main desktop operating system. And now that Microsoft are doing their best to drive away their loyal user base, I see an even brighter future ahead for the Mac ecosystem. I may as well stop fighting it.
What, were they drawing it by hand before?
Maybe it "just works" for you, but every time I've tried to use MacOS X, I had to give up in a short time and go back to KDE. This thing is just too infuriatingly dumbed down. For example I need focus follows mouse and absolutely detest the "active window is top window" mode. It always amazes me how "power users" can actually stand the MacOS X desktop, but I guess everybody is different.
Removing "fallback to Gnome" mode from my desktop. From now on just XFCE.
Some users (especially shortcut-heavy users) just want to get the cursor out of the way and focus follows mouse effectively wrecks that.
After 15+ years Linux usage I'm sticking with GNOME3 because I also want things to just work, and it gives me what I want, a clean desktop which stays out of my way most of the time. I simply did the GNOME2 to GNOME3 transition without stopping at Unity in between.
If I didn't like GNOME3 then there are so many alternatives that are simply an apt-get install away that I simply can't understand all the whining. I'd likely go back to WindowMaker or fluxbox.
I very much like the gnome 3 shell. When I run windows7 because of Autodesk Inventor I continue to press the os key. Which is the awsome feature of gnome 3, zoom out and you see all programs you are running. Why all you people are so negative, I dont get it.
Really loving the Ubuntu GNOME Remix. I'm still using Gnome fallback with Compiz (the irony) every now and then, but Shell and it's extensions are really catching up to the level of tweak-ablity(?) I like.
Like many others, I switched from KDE to Gnome 2 as soon as it actually became usable several years back.
I still hate KDE for the stupid controls and weird menu things, I still have no idea what they are for.
XFCE is certainly looking good but I am hoping Enlightenment starts to gain traction, all they need to do is include a handful of good themes built in from the get go and Enlightenment would become my primary desktop.
Anything but Unity or Gnome3 their devs must be on another planet to think those are progress.
I completely agree with you. Personally I'm not a fan of docks so I used the frippery bottom pannel extension but at the moment I'm not even bothering. Honestly if people would take the week or so to get used to Gnome Shell they'd realize how efficient it is and how great it is at keeping things you don't need out of the way and putting them right where you need them when you do. I find the windows I need faster, I lauch applications faster, and I spend much less time in general dealing with the window manager itself. As a bonus it never fails to impress people when I give demos - for someone who's only seen Windows and OSX it's looks like magic.
Direct proof that users are creating multiple accounts and modding themselves up.
Gnome just announced its dell knell. The developers have now decided that they, not the users, are the ones who are more important when it comes to what goes intp the desktop environment. Sadly this is an issue with most opensource projects that get big. Either the devs get cocky and arrogant and start acting like primadonnas towards the very people that made their project popular, or the attention whores/control freaks jump on board and weasel their way into a project and force their views and visions into the project, and will override everyone else's ideas and ignore complaints, drive their own ideologies, etc. Knowing DAMN FULL WELL that no one is interested in said ideas in the first place, just to foist them upon others.
I dont know why everyone keeps complaining about gnome. The move they made to develop for tablets has made XFCE awesome. I've seen more progress in XFCE since gnome 3. So I say keep on making a a tablet OS, XFCE will use the apps you create and we will still have a usable desktop.
Focus follows mouse does actually work with Terminals (even when another application is on top), you have to enable this though. I believe someone also made a utility that implements this for the whole os, but I haven't bothered with it.
Not just of CPU/GPU/WPU cycles.
It's a waste of user attention to the things that matter!
How often in a day do you "enjoy" your 3D desktop with 3D rotating/rolling/whatevering windows and gadgets?
Maybe I'm an outsider, but a have no more than 3 windows on the screen: 1 is the web browser, 1 is a local terminal, 1 is a remote terminal on the development server.
I don't see any need for 3D stuff here.
How many windows do you have in use at the same time? How often you switch among them? How much fun you have in waiting for the fancy 3D stuff to complete?
Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.
Which is why real OSes allow the user to choose how their UI works, rather than forcing the "best" configuration on them.
i havent used it because heard everyone bitching about it , then i read about the developers attitudes toward the users from several places with many different examples shown. so it seems to me that the developers are just setting this thing up for themselves, the way they want it. are not supporting even the slightest deviation from thier MASTER PLAN in any way. have removed a lot of the functionality that people used it for, and kinda sorta acted a little bit "dickish" toward anyone questioning their project. i use gnome 2.2 on lucid for work and with a lot of configuration i can get it just like i like it, i have always found fedora much too bloated for daily usage . at home i run slack with xfce or puppy . its sad when a group of developers takes the tools you use and "improves" them to the point where they are unusabe . but to also remove the function to revert back to previous versions, its like they are saying "fuck you, all of you, do it our way or GTFO" now we know how well that is going to fly dont we?maybe they just need to be forked.
Good luck buddy. Some people are just afraid of change. In my case I actually love Unity and consider it one of the best things to happen to Linux as well as the perfect display of a desktop that is compatible with both standard mouse+keyboard interfaces and touch and it actually increased my productivity. Sure there are things to improve but the same can be said to all other GUIs in the planet. Just ignore them and support the devs.
What a hoot! Dude, it's not only your nose that is brown, it's all over your face.
This is why the KDE Terminal and other programs make the mouse pointer disappear once you press a key - no need to push it around. Correctly implemented focus-follows-mouse works perfectly with shortcut-heavy usage: It only changes focus if you cross the borders of windows. If, on the other hand, you open a window with a shortcut, the new window is active, whether the mouse pointer is over it or not. This saves many many mouse clicks and makes work smoother. Though I have to admit that Windows and Mac users get quickly infuriated when working on my desktop. Which doesn't bother me too much, because I configured it to my tastes.
I've never understood the Gnome hype to begin with.
I did like the fact that FOSS has two large desktop kits competing each other - that is a neat luxury - but the hype about Gnome I couldn't understand. The only thing Gnome really had going for it, compared to KDE or generic custom WM setups like a WindowMaker environment, in my opinion, was that you could, back then in 2001, with a litte work, get your desktop look totally different and awesome compared to anything else on the planet. But that was a large part to the relatively hassle-free GTK theming, and not on behalf of Gnome. And the people who did that usually did it using Enlightenment as their main environment as the way better choice anyway. And even without E, in my opinion WM or some default Fluxbox setup allways looks better than a bland and somewhat half-assed Gnome UI.
For the better part of the last decade Nautilus was flaky software in beta stage compared to KDEs Konqueror. Konqueror would kick Nautiluses ass up and down the street in terms of features and usability. It was the best FM on the entire plantet, and probably still is ... although I haven't been keeping up with all the details, changes and redos in the FOSS Desktop world since about 2006 so I couldn't really say. FOSS developers have a tendency to break things just to redo entire core-pieces of code or come up with new projects. ... What was that FM thing for KDE a few years back? Dolphin or something? ... Dunno, didn't care. I just remember thinking: "Oh, great, some guy fucking up Konqueror and thinking he can do better than about a decade of FM projekt work. Great." ...
Anyway, I am now using Gnome (2.something) on debian stable because it is the default and it's still way better than windows, but it does bug me with shit I'd expect not to have to put up with in 2012. The Filemanager (still nautilus? couldn't tell) wets its pants when accessing a dir across samba with the svn extension blocking the FM for minutes. Firefox has rendering errors in the tabs, and while the desktop pager works as expected, as far as I can tell it looks very much the same as it did eleven years ago in 2001. And even then E and WM had pagers at least as good, and you could run and customize them with a few lines of easy configging.
With KDE its a simular thing, althoug I'd say they did (and do) way better with the integrated desktop thing. KDE allways had Windows-style performance hog qualities, but they *did* offer the full Desktop experience. I'd bet that to this very day a well configured KDE is the best GUI on the planet, on a machine that can handle the workload. And yes, I know the Mac, I'm typing this on an MB Air with Snow Leopard. However, it wasn't that the KDE team hadn't also been smoking their share of crack while coding. Some dimwhit back in the 90ies had the brilliant Idea to copy the entire Windows KB shortcuts and make them KDE default, thus fucking with the entire userbase of opinion leaders that actually cared about them: The core FOSS unix crowd. As far as I know it has been that way since then. Granted, rare things are as easy to config as KB shortcuts in KDE, but come on! That's, in my book, at least as bad a markting move as Gnome is doing now with v3. Allthough I have to say that ever since Gnome v3 came about posts about gnome on slashdot have at least trippled. ... Maybe not so bad marketing after all. Gnome is refreshing its mindshare with its moves, that's for sure.
Whatever way you put it, the real anoyances with Linux on the desktop are still the same they were 15 years ago when I started using it, and they have nothing to do with wether the Gnome (or any other desktop or WM) crew has decided to make a paradigm shift or not.
I've seen the screens of Gnome 3, I've installed the newest Ubuntu with Unity on a netbook for my daughter (yes, yes, odd and dumbed down, but it's not the end of the world there are some neat ideas in Unity and the Terminal works as exp
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
scraps its last users.
Some users (especially shortcut-heavy users) just want to get the cursor out of the way and focus follows mouse effectively wrecks that.
You know, KDE allows you to turn it back off, too.
Why?
What is this? 2001?
Maybe it "just works" for you, but every time I've tried to use MacOS X, I had to give up in a short time and go back to KDE. This thing is just too infuriatingly dumbed down.
So much so that Mac users don't even get a proper delete key that goes forwards or a right click on the trackpad (without holding down function). The idea that this is a professional OS is laughable (doesn't even have highlight, middle-click copy).
The purist's desktop always "just works" in Linux. Instead of drowning in all the clutter, you could just switch to evilwm or something similar. Typing commands instead of selecting them from a menu is faster anyway (and you can install a pop-up menu for that if you're into that sort of thing). I've been using XMonad for years now and I'm happier and more productive than before. What is it with people's work that requires a "desktop" or "windows that are smaller than the screen that block the others so that you can't exactly see them" or "menu bars"? I don't seem to get what all the fuss is about, even though I've used those sort of systems for years. I have my status bar though, and a little command prompt with nifty completion that I use to run programs. I will be using the same system 5 years later too and it will not introduce any disadvantages.
... you won't miss anything about GNOME 2 ...
What I miss from Gnome 2 is its ability to run smoothly on my chosen hardware. Seriously, I do not want to have to buy a faster machine just to draw some fucking window borders.
define polish, smoothness and 'complete lack of fuss.' every single desktop I've used I've had to customize, including osx. they're all annoying.
1. it's ok to have an opinion
2. it's ok to express that opinion regardless how it impacts others' feelings.
3. free doesn't exempt something from critique
I have to laugh out load when I see so many people bitching about getting something for free, and expecting it no matter what, then complaining endlessly when it's taken away from them... I have to wonder how many people on here contributed anything to Gnome over the years or even ANY free software for that matter.
History: GNOME 2 was usable (like KDE 3.5). In the past GNOME developers said that they were going to continue on to version 2.32 and then that would become GNOME 3. Then KDE 4 came out, after Windows 7, which was a response to Macintosh getting higher profits and being seen as popular.
Problem is that they are all copying Macintosh because it is highly profitable at the moment, discounting that relatively few people actually use it to get stuff done (due to high profit margins and cool factor for showing off instead of use). If you like it fine, but to most people a usable desktop environment should not have been abandoned (at the whim of developers who do not listen to their users) just because it was "popular" to become more like Macintosh.
FTFA: "too much of a burden"
Because adding completely new features and redesigning the entire system is so much easier not to mention alienating what little user base you have left. Not to mention this is the exact same reason that drives people to hate proprietary software.
Seriously; thanks go out to all the Gnome developers for their efforts over the years but you guys have really been making some boneheaded decisions.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
"Star Wars is adolescent nonsense; Close Encounters is obscurantist drivel; Star Trek can turn your brains to puree of bat guano; and the greatest science fiction series of all time is Doctor Who! And I'll take you all on, one-by-one or all in a bunch to back it up!"
As Birdy said:
"It means context sensitive. It's sensitive to context. Try it over there."
>> Some people are just afraid of change.
And some people assume that change always represent progress, and accuse the people who aren't fooled by the hype of being "afraid of change".
Also, to your point about Unity being a perfect unification of the mouse+keyboard UI and the touch interface, I think the "one size fits all" religion in the Windows 8/Unity design subculture is a tremendous waste of billions of user-hours that will end with the realization that it is better for a UI to adapt (to some extent) to the context in which it will be used! Wow, what an advanced concept!
Really, the drive to "unify" desktop and tablet is entirely ECONOMIC, not ergometric! Microsoft (with Windows 8) and Canonical (with Unity) want to cash in on the walled-garden model that proved to be such a huge success for Apple's iPhone/iPad. The end. Getting the public to think of the PC/laptop as a "tablet" -- where the tablet (like game consoles of yesteryear) has an established and familiar closed market model, with limited side-loading ability -- is just a marketing strategy to herd people in one of the few huge app-store corrals.
You might think the inability to move the "task bar" from the left edge of the screen in Unity to some other location on the desktop represents some sort of "progress", or that the ridiculous way Unity cycles through open windows on the desktop represents an "improvement" in efficiency, etc. The devs have "tablet fever" because of the CEO writing the Canonical/Microsoft paychecks, and are willfully ignoring the utterly stupid usability blunders made by UI designers pursuing their stupid aesthetic ideas (that "make sense" at a *superficial*/theoretical level, but prove to be horrible in practice).
But, good for you: Unity allegedly increased your productivity somehow. What you install on your computer is your choice.
...has already stopped using GNOME.
While I respect your decision I can't help noticing that you must have done something wrong.
I switched from the Mac to Ubuntu 5 years ago and I'm definitely not going to switch back. The only problems that I have ever encountered were solely caused by my own tinkering. If you don't start hacking it, Ubuntu works perfectly fine out of the box. (And by 'hacking' I don't mean changing the window manager; I'm using Xubuntu anyway.) Are you sure you haven't just played around with your distro too much? Like when people start to learn LaTeX and write papers with too many symbols in them because they can? You can just as easily run into problems with OS X when you start messing around with the underlying Unix, you know.
This thing is just too infuriatingly dumbed down
That's so cliché that I really wonder if you really got your hands on a Mac aside from a shop demo. Also, I am trying to imagine what kind of "power user" are you, 'cause usually power users are command line freaks. While programmers that I know usually use vim or some kind of IDE like Eclipse/Netbeans.
... and that was the last draw. It was the last nail in the coffin.
FYI, I moved to Mac a month ago and I'm very happy. Laptop was from the company so I switched first thing on monday, being back on track after a couple of days.
I use the Mac both home and at work place and IT FUCKING WORKS. I was sick of my Dell that I have to carefully shutdown because it NEVER WAKES FROM HIBERNATION. Did I mention that ATI drivers overheat and wireless are major PITA to set-up and works only g? Then came the freaking Gnome
On desktop Linux and Gnome 2 was a VERY DECENT workstation. Used it for several years. On laptop SUCKS BIG TIME. Anyway, it's free and I am still using CentOS on our servers, cannot complain in that department.
I won't have to hunt down special repositories to get essential things installed any more, and I won't have to read lengthy HOWTOs to get some basic things working.
... because it's *just not possible* on the Mac. Well, either it's not possible or you have to go and buy iGizmo X, which probably takes longer time than reading the HOWTO anyway. I have 0 experience with Mac (downloading a VM image to play with), but I know what it's like on Windows, and it's probably the same.
For some people it's better to have something be impossible than to require hours of hacking, because they can't help themselves. I'm probably one of those, but I still prefer Linux.
I was under the impression that focus follows mouse works fine in OS X out of the box.
Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
Some users (especially shortcut-heavy users) just want to get the cursor out of the way and focus follows mouse effectively wrecks that.
No, no it doesn't. You can install unclutter, and your mouse pointer will hide when idle, or on keystroke (except in firefox, known bug.)
There's always someone come along to defend the amazing power of the Mac's interface, but that is a fool's game, because various Linux window managers provably have dramatically more functionality to say nothing of configurability, which the Apple lacks almost entirely. OSX does what most users want, but making it do anything else is a nightmare, because those parts of the OS aren't open. By contrast, any asshole with the skills can write a compiz plugin.
It is a fact that the OSX interface is less capable and less configurable than the typical competition on Linux. You cannot argue this point without being wrong. Stop it.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Whatever! But I much prefer GNOME 3 to any other interface, even GNOME 2 with Compiz. If the developers are reading this, they can certainly view my comment as praise, because it's really the best thing going right now.
I know. I get the feeling there are a lot of old fogeys that frequent this site who have somehow become very closed-minded and picky over the years - you know the type, the ones that say "I only use vim" and that sort of thing. And then there are the loudmouth hateful youngsters. So I dunno.
Because my comment has a zero rating and I personally have no mod points? Sounds legit.
It is a fact that the OSX interface is less capable and less configurable than the typical competition on Linux. You cannot argue this point without being wrong. Stop it.
Depends on needs. I personally have a very customized UI through the use of AppleScript (via folder actions, regular scripts and services. The existence of a (mostly) standard way to script all GUI applications is a killer feature I've not found in Windows or Linux.
-- Using the preview button since 2005
Sounds like your problem isn't GNOME, it's that your hardware is obsolete. Go on using that old junk, though - "it still works," right?
See my new comment about how "Slashdot's Comment Moderation System Sucks".
When G3 was launched, at first I didn't like it, I liked G2 + Compiz much more. (I'm a huge Compiz fan). So, until now I used G3 fallback mode + Compiz. Now, as it seems both G3 fallback mode and Compiz are under-maintained, I decided to try Ubuntu QQ with gnome-shell 3.6 for some time, and was amazed by the usability of G 3.6 plus some extensions (besides being beautiful, of course). I believe G3 + gnome-shell extensions is the way to go.
If you dislike it so much, why don't you install "Dash And Overview Click Fix" instead of just complaining about it?
https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/67/dash-click-fix/
For me the deal breaker is that OSX doesn't support real desktops/workspaces (or whatever you are calling them). I use workspaces to set up roles or projects. Unfortunately, that doesn't work very well because running multiple versions of a program on separate data in separate workspaces is only an illusion. It is still a single program and often insists that I need to go back to the workspace the program originally started from in order to do something. And I hate it that it is so mouse oriented.
(Before all you fan boys get on my case, I know that it is possible to configure OSX to do those things. I have seen an extremely tweaked out OSX that does amazing things. Except that he had to tweak things. So much for "it just works." Might as well stay with Unix which doesn't attempt to do things for me, fail miserably, and cause far more trouble in the long run.)
How about we just agree to disagree. You keep liking OSX and I will continue liking Unix.
A couple of things power users enjoy in OSX:
- Services
- The automator
- AppleScript
- Using these to design workflows involving different applications
If you are creative and willing to learn a bit, you are getting pretty damn enabled in OSX by these extremely well thought through tool sets.
And I actually even like the Finder. Miller Columns mode together with a persistent info window, and of course activated services linked to my custimized scripts, is working fantastic.
I'd agree with you. And while this is a Gnome thread particularly if you start comparing desktops other than Gnome.
That being said you really should be saying "Aqua" here not "OSX". OSX can run a LInux window manager.
OSX runs on top of a BSD called Darwin. Linux I think is a better Unix than Darwin but Darwin is a pretty good Unix. Getting Unix stuff up on OSX is is nothing like trying to get stuff to work on Windows. The vast majority of software is installed out of the box with "port install xyz"
You are forgetting that Linux has always ridden on the back of x86 hardware. The Windows 8 hardware has input interfaces that are a tablet / traditional mix.
When reading the posts so far, it looks like that some want their old interface back, which Gnome always had (which is not totally true, the old is also quite new). The main problem is, people have to relearn (a bit) how to use their machine. Some processes they used are no longer possible or useful. This is actually the same thing why other people do not want to go away from Windows on the desktop of their PCs and laptops.
Honestly, some her claim it was a bad move and no one wants the new bad and un-usable interface, while others call the previous group idiots and only a minor group with not much relevance. I am absolutely sure that both side talk bullshit (as in Harry Frankfurts, "On Bullshit"). Both sides cannot backup their claims toward the user basis and the user experience. I wonder why nobody is discussing the technology of the new and old Gnome stuff. Or the development and documentation process, which sucks (like in most OSS projects and even more in close source projects, design and documentation is mostly done after implementation and decisions are not documented. It is most important for other people to understand code to know why it is the way it is. The API is not enough. But, yes that is a general problem), or the choice of development language for gnome-shell etc.
To do a real critique on the UI experience, everyone should ask himself who are the audience of the UI? Which uses cases are incorporated? Which case cases are missing? If only application have to be launched and desktops have to be switched, then there is not much difference between Gnome 2 or Gnome 3, beside some eye candy. Honestly, they failed to make it more task centric which was one idea at the beginning. But the infrastructure for a move in that direction has to be build first. So I am not blaming anyone here.
So as a start: What do you want to do with your desktop shell? What do you want to do with your data navigation tool (aka file manager)?
Well that's the way how this system works. When people are too impassioned. Its the same feeling when a kid comes by and builds a nicer sandcastle or criticizes yours. Or even takes over your castle, because you had to leave and modifies it. The horror! If you want a more objective answer, you need a different discussion form. On /. people state their opinions. They take them as truth. And if you criticize their position, they start calling names or the start debating. Instead of a real discussion (something we should have learned in school and university) we have a debate on our hand. And the goal is to win, rather than to find a solution or an answer. And the moderation system is the same way. Minorities get suppressed. The only way out of this would be professional moderation, but that is definitely too expensive for /. and all the juvenile commentary going on here. Therefore you have to filter yourself. Maybe the system should automatically put move posts up, which are controversy.
Find me a 2 dimentional pager with a fixed number of desktops (like 3x9), and I might use gnome3, until then, I'll go elsewhere...
Having used Windows at work and KDE at home for the better part of 15 years, I was forced to use Mac OS X at a new job. It reminded me of Amiga workbench. In other words: about 25 years out of date. It was about a month before I could have a decent workflow, and even now multitasking is a frustrating experience. It absolutely sucks that I can't have any other interface.
It is a fact that the OSX interface is less capable and less configurable than the typical competition on Linux. You cannot argue this point without being wrong. Stop it.
Depends on needs.
See, this is why people assumed people like you couldn't use a mouse with more than one button. Whether you want it to be more configurable has no bearing whatsoever on whether it is more configurable. If you can show where in my comment I said that OSX's relative lack of configurability results in it not suiting your particular needs, I'll give you a dollar.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Maybe it's because, you know, ass kissers, brown-noses and sock puppets generally aren't very popular.
Also, a heap of "I love Gnome 3, fantastic work great gods of Gnome, thankyouthankyouthankyou, may I kiss your asses some more?" will never be as informative as a good rant with reasonably succinctly identified weaknesses and brain dead decisions which most, if not all users can identify themselves with.
Last Feb, I tried a Mac Mini running a Core i5. For the first few days, I was willing to learn, but found all the "different just to be different" keyboard accel choices to suck. The lack of x-mouse and the way that certain services were not called what they were really know as started driving me nuts. Eventually, I needed to connect the machine to my other machines with NFS or Samba. Samba wouldn't connect. Searching the mac forums found a known bug that didn't have a fix.
I wanted a desktop that just worked. It didn't.
There were a few good outcomes too. Migrating my Thunderbird and Firefox profiles over "just worked" - well, mostly, except the gpg integration for enigmail didn't work.
The keybaord issues continued and never were solved. Perhaps if I had a Mac keyboard, it wouldn't have sucked so much. My IBM 101M has been a friend for over 20 yrs - should I have to change?
I've owed a few Dell laptops over the yrs. Some were ok, others sucked and my current Dell completely rocks. I made a huge list of what mattered to me and waited for a dell model that had those capabilities to be 40% off - about 6 months. That was over 2 yrs ago - this core i5 laptop still completely rocks.
For me, OSX felt like "linux-lite."
Some users like it, some don't, that's why people invented options, so you can satisfy everybody.
That being said you really should be saying "Aqua" here not "OSX". OSX can run a LInux window manager.
Can the Linux window manager manage the OSX applications, or just the X11 applications? Genuine question, I have no idea. My last OSX box was a G3 with the Rev.1 CMD IDE data corruption flaw running 10.2.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Not really. But you can scroll a background window w/o making it active by mousing over it and doing teh scroll gesture. You can't type into that window by default.
My perception of Mac OS X in short: UNIX/Linux with a straight jacket.
It always amazes me how "power users" can actually stand the MacOS X desktop, but I guess everybody is different.
Because not all of us are configuration ricers?
You're twelve, aren't you?
No, but apparently you must be.
[...] Yes, it is a bold departure, but I find it makes me more productive all in all.[...] The quick gesture of ramming my mouse into the corner to arrange work-spaces works great.
Until someone decides that particular gesture opens your email in the newest, bold departure from convention.
The problem many people have with Gnome 3, KDE 4, Unity, Wayland, Windows Vista, Windows 8 etc. is that people keep changing stuff dramatically. Nobody complains about a new color scheme, we complain in great numbers about removing helpful features we like to use and replacing those with dumbed down stuff (let's call it Toddlerization of the UI) that emulates the latest cool overpriced toy.
I use computers for other stuff than hitting the screen roughly in some spot in a 4x6 coordinate system to start an "app" that is in 97.23% of the cases just another un(sup)portable spyware "website".
Those people taking these decisions are often more concerned about what they'd like to do or what they find Kooool. Rather than considering what is easy and agreeable to use for the actual user. It's their prerogative to do so, but don't complain when users start complaining and then start leaving in droves...
I'm aware that in FOSS you can always express your discontent with a fork (instead of a knive). I'll probably turn away from Ubuntu
For example I need focus follows mouse and absolutely detest the "active window is top window" mode.
Interestingly enough, back in the '90s when I started using Linux this used to come enabled by default. It was one of the things that I used to find extremely irritating with the system, what with me typing something without looking at the screen to only discover after a minute or two it was all going into the wrong window. I tried very hard to get used to it, even by taking extra pains to be absolutely sure the mouse pointer never ever went even near the borders of the active screen, up to and including trying something (I don't remember what, I guess some feature of some window manager) that slowed down and made it more difficult for the pointer to cross window borders, that one feeling even more aggravating whenever I was actually trying to move the cursor fast from one point of the desktop to the other. Alas, in the end I gave up and just disabled it, becoming quite happy when I noticed it starting to come disabled by default.
I guess X-Mouse is one of those features with no middle ground: people either love or despise it. Indifference isn't an option.
Conservatism: (n.) love of the existing evils. Liberalism: (n.) desire to substitute new evils for the existing ones.
Tapping track-pad with two fingers is right click
Gnome 3.8 won't run on my elderly computer and onboard graphics. In any case, it has become a bloated monstrosity.
Fluxbox forever!
I scrapped gnome for xfce when gnome 3 screwed everything up. They can turn it into garden-gnome for all I care.
Xubuntu, my friend.
I actually like Gnome (maybe not every aspect of it, though) and use it daily in my profession (long time programmer). I think that quite a lot of the design choices are sound, and I don't have a lot of complaints. It's efficient and I get the work done. Considering the many different (XP, W7, Mac, Android, different unices) environments I work with, I still consider Gnome the most preferred.
I'm a bit surprised (well, not really, but sort of) about the amount of complaints seen on /. - but then again, it's always been like that. KDE is fine, but I prefer Gnome. It's as simple as that. I really hope that the Gnome Foundation keeps on going on.
It's not a case of wanting it to be more configurable. It is configurable to my needs, and I'm a 20 odd years veteren of Macs and various Unix-likes and flavours of Unix. Is KDE more configurable than the Finder? Generally yes. Could I script applications on KDE the way I do on Macs? Definitely not. They simply don't have the same standardized hooks to facilitate the workflows that the Apple Events model provides. Do most Mac users do this? No, because it comes down to personal needs and workflows. One man's configurability is another Man's trivia, or unnecessary complication. I'll just have to get by sans one dollar.
-- Using the preview button since 2005
It is configurable to my needs, and I'm a 20 odd years veteren of Macs and various Unix-likes and flavours of Unix
So because it's good enough for you, it should be good enough for everyone?
it comes down to personal needs and workflows
No, it comes down to Apple's needs and workflow. And god help you if you want to do anything any way other than theirs.
I won't argue there aren't benefits to homogeneity. It's too bad you can't accept that for many, OSX is inadequately configurable, and the fact that it meets your needs does not mitigate that fact at all. It only means that your needs are lesser than those of others. You should be thankful for that fact, not proud of it.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
There are good reasons for much of the whining. Read this article for more information: GNOME (et al): Rotting In Threes
Just browse at -1. They're only being filtered because you left the filter enabled.
Unity is not Gnome 3. I currently use Fedora 17 (Gnome 3) which is a world of difference.
However, the thing that makes Gnome 3 worthwhile is extensions. Did you try http://extensions.gnome.org? You find the extension you like and click the ON button. No authentication or package downloads. I think this is where the power of Gnome3 comes to show = e.g. you can disable all the fancy fluff with simple CSS.
You could say that Gnome 3 should have sane defaults instead of relying on users installing 5 extensions at the end of installing the OS. And I totally agree.
Defining Statistics and Social Research
I understand that there are a lot of people who don't like Gnome's recent design decisions. Neither do I.
But there's a bigger problem here. By removing Classic, they are eliminating the ability to run at on a platform without a modern GPU.
And this doesn't mean just that they won't run on old hardware, it means that they won't run in most virtual environments, and they won't run on most remoting platforms.
And given the growing prevalance of virtualization and remoting, that's an astoundingly stupid move.
There is the possibility, if I spent the time to get used to it, grow to like the new UI choices. But I simply can't - not won't, or wouldn't like, but absolutely can't, run a desktop that I can't run in a VM and then access remotely.
I have done the desktop tour and have settled with KDE4. Goodbye Gnome, goodbye Canonical advertising. Hello Blue Systems and Kubuntu. Please treat us well.
Does anybody still use the old 95/xp/7/kde/xfce/lxde type menu systems to access your programs? For windows 7 I used rocketdock on main monitor(dual monitor) at the top hidden with all the applications I needed and i did same thing on kubuntu but used a regular kde taskbar instead of cairo dock. Windows 8, i just pinned some applications on taskbar and the rest rearranged as tiles in groups in metroUI. Unity, have all apps that I need on the unity dock. I just don't see the start menu or start button relevant anymore, why spend time on navigating through menu system(kde nightmare) when it's easier by using docks or metro.
Gnome is missing the minimize button on the right corner which is a pain but that's it. Kde, I hate it when I drag a file, folder, icon to the second monitor it asks me if I want to move it here or copy it here, ridiculous. For linux i will be sticking with ubuntu unity and for other distros gnome.
Soon, I am tired of hearing about it on Slashdot, go somewhere where someone cares.
Christ, I don't know why I bothered explaining this to someone clearly with an axe to grind and an Masters in disenguous point making. Yeah, it's all about saying my needs are the norm, despite my acknowledging that needs vary and that personal needs would be the basis of my whole fucking point. And yes, it's entirely about what Apple wants. Did you also notice that I think Asians shouldn't be alowed to use GIMP? I didn't, but I'm sure you can somehow find that in my posts.
-- Using the preview button since 2005
Christ, I don't know why I bothered explaining this to someone clearly with an axe to grind and an Masters in disenguous point making. Yeah, it's all about saying my needs are the norm, despite my acknowledging that needs vary and that personal needs would be the basis of my whole fucking point
I said "It is a fact that the OSX interface is less capable and less configurable than the typical competition on Linux" and you said "depends on needs" which is completely disingenuous bullshit. Now, unless you can unfuck yourself, this conversation is over.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I guess I am the only one, but I like Gnome 3. I prefer it over Gnome Classic and Unity. It's not slow, it looks good, I got all the features I want.
Gnome 3 has become better for every release, and I like it! And every Ubuntu-install I do to friends and family, ie no-tech people, have no problems with it. I just have to learn the to use the Windows-button on the keyboard.
It's too bad you can't accept that for many, OSX is inadequately configurable, and the fact that it meets your needs does not mitigate that fact at all. It only means that your needs are lesser than those of others. You should be thankful for that fact, not proud of it.
Since when are you qualified to speak for the majority? 98% of people I've run into don't require anything more elaborate than point and click. Many even still have stock OEM/Windows/OSX backgrounds. Configurability means nothing to the average user who does little more than Facebook, email, and word processing. Actual "power users" who like/need to set things up their own way are a rare breed these days. Unless by "for the many" you meant the specific sub 10% of PC users that are into detailing the hell out of their desktop experience to maximize productivity, your argument is baseless.
I work with Windows 7, OSX, and Ubuntu (and Kubuntu) regularly. The desktop experience is generally boils down to ease of use, configurability, and time/effort to set up and maintain- pick two.
I used to run Kubuntu as my primary OS at home. After a fresh install I'd spend a week or two setting everything up and tweaking it to run the way I like it. Every so often updates for some library or core program would be installed, and little things would break. I'd spend another week searching for a workaround to get all of the little annoyances under control. A few weeks later another update would come around, rinse and repeat. A number of years ago I'd think it was neat to be able to problem solve and figure out what broke and why. Now I'm older and wiser, and just want the damn thing to work. My time is too valuable now to play whack-a-mole with my OS.
At this point, the trade-off of configurability vs. simplicity leans towards simplicity. OSX works for me, and it works for many others who would rather get things done than spend a week configuring their systems, only to have them break the week after.
I switched from a Linux desktop to a Mac a couple of years ago and had an initially painful learning period for a few weeks. I'd keep trying to do something the Linux way, give up in frustration and Google it, and find that I was making it way harder than it needed to be. For example, I remember spending a long time in the man pages trying to figure out how to move a stuck print job off a dead printer and onto a working one. I was ready to set fire to the laptop or kick it down a flight of stairs or throw it out the window. Then I discovered that the correct method is to open both printers' job lists and drag the stuck job from one to the other.
OS X is despicably horrible at doing things the Linux way. Seriously rubbish. When I stopped fighting it and started trying to do things the Mac way, it became infinitely easier than I knew a desktop could be.
I still use a Linux desktop every day at work. Thanks, Mint Cinnamon for giving me an easy escape from the hellish tarpit that is Ubuntu Unity! It's tolerable and I don't mind it too much. But after becoming used to OS X, it's nice to come home to my Mac that I actually enjoy using.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Maybe it "just works" for you, but every time I've tried to use MacOS X, I had to give up in a short time and go back to KDE. This thing is just too infuriatingly dumbed down.
So much so that Mac users don't even get a proper delete key that goes forwards or a right click on the trackpad (without holding down function). The idea that this is a professional OS is laughable (doesn't even have highlight, middle-click copy).
Seriously, that's the best you got? You can right click on the trackpad by two finger tapping or clicking in the - wait for it - lower right corner. Or holding down control, not function. Forward delete on my Macbook is Fn-Delete. My full size aluminum keyboard has a dedicated forward delete key. iTerm, which I use instead of Terminal, has auto-copy on highlight. You could certainly assign middle click to that if you wanted. I prefer auto-copy. I spend 70% of my work day in iTerm ssh'd in to remote CentOS VMs so I'm picky about my terminal functionality and I've never found the Mac wanting.
no longer working for cnet
I've never used it (don't like focus-follows-mouse), but there's VirtualDesktop Pro, which apparently does focus follow mouse, and the feature list claims it can do so without automatically raising the window. It isn't free, but apparently there are options.
I'm using bash 4.2 right now and after years of expanding
$W/xx to /path/xx
Now I get this stupid thing:
\$W/xx
Maybe a Gnome developer is helping the bash team...
1) Why should I have to download plugins just to get something working as well as it was before they "upgraded" it? And how exactly is a person on day one of the new interface supposed to know that?
2) And yes, apparently there are ways to get the new interface working. Plugins, middle clicks, Ctrl T. You know what? I didn't spend enough time using it to find out. I just clicked the icon and it didn't give me a second terminal (like it should) and said "you know what, this sucks". Who wants to waste time learning some dippy new interface? Especially when you've got work to do and really, that's all you want to do - get your work done.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Yes. OSX applications and documents are openable from the command line which creates an interface for X11: https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/Darwin/Reference/ManPages/man1/open.1.html
Though I'd recommend if you intend to intermix X11 and Aqua applications you let Aqua via. quartz-x11 manage X11 applications rather than have the X11 window manager try and provide services to Aqua applications. If you use an X11 window manager the Aqua application will be oblivious to the desktop and you can end up with parts of the visual screen not corresponding to the functional screen.
If KDE feels like too much, but you happen to like Qt based applications, a good alternative might be Razor-qt, which like KDE, is also Qt based but not nearly as feature rich. That would be a good Qt based equivalent to LXDE or XFCE.
AKA The last nail in the coffin of Gnome
No, farmville loving housewives and construction workers need to use your desktop, too. You have to give up on "advanced options" and "terminals", we don't want those people to learn something...
IIRC, active window is top window was even in classic Mac system os.
- I like this orange juice.
* Orange juice is boring. From now on, orange juice will taste like grapefruit juice!
- What? No, it was great before, stop that!
* Our research shows that people will be happier with grapefruit juice. If you don't like it, go drink apple juice. Or soda, or milk.
- WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?
- U mad bro?
Let's face it. GNOME is just a synonym for troll.
that's what you get for using apple products.
i like it too, overall. i miss some configurability and network manager is evidently going to annoy me forever but i haven't been bothered enough to install gnome extensions so it must not be that bad. until gnome shell i rarely used virtaul desktops because i didn't like the implementation. with gnome shell i have all manner of window open when working. seriously, 4+ leafpad windows, geany with multiple tabs, 3 browsers, file browser, t-bird, terminal, gimp. it's pretty much minority report. although i didn't really understand/like it for a few days/week at first until i got used to it. now when i use other desktops i find myself frustrated with the effort required to manage all those tabs.
Why a desktop needs 3d acceleration is beyond me. All research into computer interface design indicate that the concept "black cockpit" is the best When a game or a film making application drives hardware levels I can understand it but not when a workbench or a desktop does it.
I've tested Gnome 3 on kvm virtual machine. I used Fedora 18, and it did seem to work rather well. Also, I have Ubuntu 12.10 installation with vino enabled, and I connect to it using remmina - and it too works pretty well, even when I connected over DSL line.
Llvmpipe option should just automatically reduce all animation effects to minimum levels and it is all fine even on little bit older hardware too.
Ever since the dawn of time, every time there's an article on GNOME here, it's nothing but immature remarks about how absolutely terrible it is left and right. It should be pretty dang obvious by now that some people don't like GNOME. So just live with it! You don't have to spread doom and gloom wherever you do! If you don't like something, just don't use it and leave the comments section for actual constructive discussion! I've seen a few good comments here and there about the actual details of things, legitimate concerns, and rather respectable opinions on either side, but if all you're saying is "I'm leaving GNOME" or "I hate GNOME, XFCE/KDE/some old archaic window manager that nobody ever uses anymore/etc. is so much better", then please, for the love of all that is good, don't even bother saying it. Please try to say something more than an annoying rant. I know that slashdot is infamous for its annoying commenters and hateful mentality towards pretty much everything, but you don't have to uphold that!
"Our country is not nearly so overrun with the bigoted as it is overrun with the broadminded." -Archbishop Fulton Sheen
Hi everybody, I am using the elementary beta right now and it's what I think the best environment on Linux as of now. What do you think of it? Wondered why nobody brought it up? http://elementaryos.org/
For what it's worth, I agree with what you said. I won't feed the trolls, though! If only some people can configure the thing, does it really matter whether it is more configurable? I think that's where he's wrong and you are right. If you have easier ways to configure your system the way you need, you are just set. And so would be many others with similar needs.
I really, reaaaally liked Gnome 3.x unlike a lot of people apparently. Also a fan of Gnome 2.x. I've only been using Linux since 2008, but since then all that I've seen are improvements in the two major desktop GUI's apart from a couple nitpicky issues. Gnome, as I've understood it, has traditionally been about a super-customizable interface and lower hardware requirements than KDE. KDE, on the other hand, has always been about a more traditional desktop with eyecandy and usability upgrades over Windows. I recently reinstalled XP onto my "aging" hardware because I wanted to use some of the applications that I was trained with (Photoshop over GIMP, some audio stuff) and made room for a Linux partition because that's the OS that I love, and I've got to say that I have nothing to be mad about Linux wise. XP does what I need for the proprietary stuff, and Linux is still Linux. Just because a project decides to start phasing out old hardware doesn't mean that the project should be blamed for anything. I can still (barely) use Gnome 3.x 3D, and when the time comes when this old bird won't sing I'll switch to a different GUI. That's the power of choice.
It all boils down to this fact: not everyone has time (or need) to write their own compiz plugins. Saying something is eminently more configurable than anything else is a fool's errand. So what if it is? Does its extra configurability result in a unified whole? Probably not.
My time is too valuable now to play whack-a-mole with my OS.
You've hit the nail on the head right there.
I realise you're just being informative to those that might find such a thing interesting, so I won't bite your head off, but I have no idea why anyone would want to further complicate matters by running a Linux window manager on a Mac. That just defeats the whole purpose, IMHO. At the age of 38 I now want simplicity and a hassle-free computer. The last thing I should be doing is bringing all my control-freakery from Linux to my new computer :-)
That's an interesting way of summarising the situation. GNOME have effectively ruined what most of us knew well and were more than happy with, and foisted some half-baked straight jacket worse than the alleged strait jacket that is OSX (claimed by a commenter above). GNOME 3 is a serious regression from its predecessor. No wonder people a looking at the greener grass elsewhere and giving up on desktop Linux.
Thank you. So I did a quick test : :( :( (and the default format is rather strange)
- After looking everywhere for options (and feeling very helpless without even an option dialog or right-click menu), it turns out you can configure the number of rows/columns in the js file, how modern
- Someone really have to explain to me why I must go all the way to the left to make the workspaces appear all the way to the right, I would guess there is an extension for that, but come on...
- I like to keep my 3x9 pager in big (256 pixels width) in the bottom right of my screen (I've got a wide screen), doesn't seem possible currently
- no options that I can see to configure the date format on top of the screen
- no error displayed when somehow (=most of the time) one extension doesn't install/work, and it takes a while to realize the place to look what extensions are installed are on a remote website, that is insane and so not intuitive, so does that mean you can't check/remove extension without internet ? (without fiddling around, it is supposed to be a user-friendly desktop). Ok, the system monitor did display an error, but it is the only one of the 3 cpu extensions I tried that did show up in the installed extensions list !
So in conclusion, it really feels like I'm fighting the system rather than using it. I'm 100% happy with what I had before (since fvwm2), don't see the use for any of the new stuff. And the configuring of gnome3 seems to me less user-friendly than the fvwm2 I used to use way back then (that required editing files), come on, it's 2012.
Thanks but no, thanks.
True, most desktops require some fiddling, and I'm sure I'll customise OSX in some way. An example of the "polish, smoothness and complete lack of fuss" would be the Magic Mouse and web browsing. Swipe left or right and it's the back/forward buttons, but not only that but as you swipe your finger, the current tab/page slides in sync with the motion and eventually disappears left/right off the window as appropriate.
Another example would be downloading files: the Finder window's Size column for downloads becomes a tiny progress bar in the adjacent cell for that file. Very nice indeed.
The menu bar at the top I'm beginning to appreciate, too. So many programs on Linux/Windows have weird and wonderful variations on the menu bar theme (especially considering the different libraries used to create each one), and some (especially on Windows) require considerable research to figure out how to use (I'm looking at you, WLM/Office Communicator!). On the Mac, the menu bar is at the top of the screen, and after all these years I think I finally appreciate the simplicity and uniformity of this approach. Sometimes, the "there's more than one way to do it" approach is just stupid and simply creates confusion.
Ok, I found the option dialogs for the extensions : in the remote gnome.org web page !! Really ? That's not even the last place I would look, I would never look there, I stumbled on it. I really can't express how wrong and un-intuitive this whole "installed extensions" page is, and why the hell there is not an equivalent accessible from a menu somwhere (if there is one is well hidden) inside the actual desktop.
Addendum to my list :
- I want to see my apps in pager not with a miniature of the window, but with a box containing an icon, like gnome2 did. And I don't need to see 27 mini desktop backgrounds, yes I know, it's up to the extension dev, but for me the pager is by far the most important thing in a desktop. I feel like wanting to add wheels to a submarine because I need a car.
I haven't tinkered much at all. In fact, among Linux users, I'm probably among the more lazy because I prefer things to "just work" here, too. My latest problem was having to switch from Debian Squeeze to another distro because I upgraded my mobo and didn't want to use Sid to get my ethernet working. I found that openSUSE's KDE Live CD seemed quite smooth but it's not particularly stable. Now this could be the mobo's fault and/or the ATI 4670HD using the FGLRX-LEGACY driver from geeko.ioda.net (you talk to some Linux users and they shit all over ATI: "ATIs are shit, get a NVidia", yet others are quite the opposite). I have a Dell U2711 LCD screen, and thought perhaps it's too big, so I changed a couple of settings in Catalyst (enabled Tear Free and reduced DVI frequency) and it seems a little more stable, with less complete X lockups, but they still occur several times a week.
But I'm just sick of the problems and the tinkering required to get it stable. KDE sometimes takes 2 minutes to let me start an application after login, too. That's another thing I don't care to get to the bottom of, and Nepomuk is just irritating shite. Playing a video sometimes results in complete video corruption such that I have to log off and on again. And Dolphin hangs if I forget to unmount a samba share before switching off the computer on which it resides.
My brother/mother recently got onto Skype to do video calls with my nephew and so I found a HOWTO and installed it. Seemed to go well, except it won't listen to my microphone or pick up my webcam. I've never seen a distro yet that wouldn't detect a webcam, so this is a first. Yet another issue that could take hours of fiddling. Linux's many sound systems are a joke. More Balkanisation to keep the control freaks happy (see: http://xkcd.com/927/). Skanlite is complete crap, too. I eventually installed Simple Scan (remembering it as a nice, no fuss, scanning program from my good old Ubuntu 10.04 days). Why have a scanning program on offer if it's complete garbage? It doesn't make sense.
Many of my MP3s show up as being 27:03:11 in length in Audacious. That's quite bizarre, since I ripped them from my very own CDs in Linux.
I hope this conveys some of the reasons why I'm done with Linux. I know I'm done enumerating my problems with it.
My problems with Linux are not entirely the fault of the GNOME developers' downward spiral into insanity. See my earlier comment: http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3243483&cid=41946241 (just posted). I agree with your last sentence about not having to use extensions to make it usable.
I've been using Linux distributions since 95 and for the last 10 years I've been using the default desktop that the distributions was shipped with. As long as I can find my way to the terminal app, it's all what I need to get things done. The thing is that they are all good enough.
I tend to run computers until they break down. The only cpu intensive apps I do on my home machines is run rawtherapee in batch mode when I dump a ton of pictures on the computer, and there I just let it run until it processes everything. The laptop I'm posting from (Dell D620) does not have a GPU. I bought it used 3 years ago. Right now, it is locked at Fedora 14, since that is the last revision with Gnome2. My work computer uses RHEL 6.2 (soon RHEL 6.3) and I want to have exactly the same interface, keystrokes, etc. on each system I run on. I have tried the Gnome3 fallback mode, Mate, and probably one or two other options, and none of them give me the things I had in Gnome2, such as the ability to switch to alternative screens with a keystroke sequence and not moving the mouse.
In some things, I agree things can be much better (and I'm interested in why you find the date format odd). In others, you're just unused to the way things work with extensions.
1) If you go to "Installed extensions" on the website, you'll see an icon besides the toggles for enabling/disabling the extensions. If you press it, it will launch an application that exposes the settings for it. I tried to set the grid you suggested (3x9) with it, and it worked. This application can be launched from the desktop too, it's called `gnome-shell-extension-prefs`.
2) Extensions installed from the website are always installed in ~/.local/share/gnome-shell/extensions/ and removing them locally is as simple as deleting the folder and reloading the shell (I know this is not ideal, and it's not mentioned in the website).
3) Errors can be inspected from the "Looking Glass", which you can launch pressing F2 and entering "lg" in the run dialog that appears. You then go to "Extensions". Under every extension listed there is a link that says "Errors", that should show you give you some feedback. To close the Looking Glass you just press Escape. From the looking glass you can inspect the shell innards through a javascript REPL (there's a tool in the left hand you can use to select a piece of the shell and inject it into it---i'm not sure this description is very clear, but you should try it.). Most errors I've had installing extensions have been caused by version incompatibilities; if the website didn't get what version you were using it will show you incompatible extensions, and even if it does, it will let you try to install incompatible versions and not display any errors (I guess because the communication between the browser and the shell is not bidirectional).
I think the whole enabling/disabling extensions mechanism should be integrated on the shell somehow, instead of delegating that work to the website, that isn't too intuitive/doesn't explain things too wee (neat as it is, when things do work).
Anyway, it's too bad it didn't work for you, I hope if you give it a chance again in the future (you might not) these things are ironed out.
Seriously, that's the best you got? You can right click on the trackpad by two finger tapping or clicking in the - wait for it - lower right corner. Or holding down control, not function.
I used and supported Macintosh laptops for over a year and maybe things have changed very recently but god was that awful. You had to hold two finger on the non-click touchpad and mangle your fingers to right click or use 2 hands! It drove everyone bananas to use these things (in a large school with over 100 staff and 1650 students using this thing). In the rooms we'd have students break the apple mouses because they only had one click that worked (by default the setting was for one click and the guy who did the image was in a company affiliated with Apple for legal reasons or some BS). Had to stick in Microsoft keyboards and mouses to make them at least sometwhat usable.
scroll to top of page, see that little slider, max it out on both sides and quit being retarded
sorry, no ... I dont owe them anything, and they dont owe me anything. They had a good product that I used frequently and now (IMO) they dont so I dont use it. I tried expressing my opinion and they felt that not only mine, but the majority of peoples opinion was worthless, and they keep steam-rolling down this path on something that pretty much everyone but you seem to dislike.
aptly represents the aftermath of shooting one's self in the foot.
It all boils down to this fact: not everyone has time (or need) to write their own compiz plugins.
No, it actually does not, and that is either a disingenuous or incredibly idiotic thing to say. The only thing that needs to be true for my statement to be true is that there have to be more configuration options, which is patently, obviously true. The only thing that needs to be true for my statement to be relevant is if the additional configurability already available is both relevant and useful to users, which is provably the case — I can use myself as an example, and I'm a user. And you are the only one who brought up "a unified whole", which is a subjective description anyway. Every single package in Ubuntu is "unified" as being part of Ubuntu. And the packages in the PPAs have been unified by packaging and uploading.
Finally, saying something is a fool's errand doesn't make it a fool's errand. You are committing the same stupid error as the other person I'm having to deal with not understanding English or logic in this thread. You're asserting that because you don't think it's valuable that it's not valuable. But nobody died and left you in charge, which is a good thing, because we'd all have to use lickable interfaces designed for one button.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
About the odd date format, maybe odd is a bit strong, mostly I find it odd to have the weekday without the day of the month. I kind of expect the default date format to have the day of the month and the month. Even without giving the user a text entry to enter a custom date format, there should at least be a choice between a few standard ones, and some people like to see seconds (I don't)..
I replied to myself earlier to mention I found the extensions options button. But really, there should be an easy way (and discoverable) to launch gnome-shell-extension-prefs and maybe also lg. I spent a few minutes trying to look everywhere for a right-click menu, or anything that would present me some options, and I found nothing, it's very frustrating.
The whole "installed extensions" page is neat in a way, but very confusing, other than not being a place I would ever look, it makes it look like it is some kind of cloud thing, and even makes you wonder if gnome.org does know about your installed extensions, I guess not, but only because I trust you enough not to do such a thing.
And again I want to insist on how annoying is it to switch workspace with the mouse, go to top left corner, then go to the pager all the way to the right. My immediate idea would be a hot spot in the lower or top right corner to make the pager appear. I personally like to see it permanently but it does take up some space, a hot spot would make it almost as good. I honestly think that a 2-dimentional pager with fixed workspaces is the best way to handle a desktop and that eventually people are bound to realize that and to re-invent it. It's the best way to make use of our spacial memory, I have multiple browser windows and terminals opened, but I know which one are which, even though they only show an icon, because I remember where I put them, I can group things spatially like I would with real papers on a real desktop.
At the moment I have over 30 windows opened (only 5 of them are unique apps, the rest are terminals, browsers, editors), and I can go to any of given window in about 1 second, I can't imagine handling them any other way.
You shouldn't need shitloads of horsepower to run a modern GUI - see E17 or even E16 from 1997 (even that is more advanced than gnome 3 in many ways) for example. In E17 it uses a GPU if you have one but degrades gracefully if you don't, so it will still provide a decent GUI on a raspberry pi. I'm not sure what KDE does but I would not be surprised if it's something similar.
Anyway, netbooks and tablets (which have a GPU but linux can't use it for acceleration yet on most) are a growing group so I think it's not in the interest of the gnome people to ignore them. They've always had problems with remote windows so don't quite seem to get the idea of X, so they're sure to ignore any rants here just like they've ignored nearly everything outside their own little group all along. I accept that your suggestion makes sense to just accept that it is not designed to be used on netbooks but I remain disappointed in that design choice.
Gnome2 was very popular so it's a pity that Gnome3 is very different and due to some IMHO incredibly fucking braindead choices you can't run recent GTK software and Gnome2 on the same system (yes I even tried a chroot with the new GTK but couldn't get that going). All I've been able to do for users that hate gnome3 but want the new gimp is to get them to run it remotely, but then the poor handling of remote windows in gnome3 kicks in and a busy remote system (eg. opening up a huge image) locks up the entire local desktop for as long as the other system is busy, maybe even minutes. It's like 1992 all over again and should never happen today.
My point to gp was his complaints were about Aqua not about OSX. That being said I think running quartz-wm on top of Aqua to get X11 functionality is fine for desktop and give up on the advantages of Linux GUIs since there are more Aqua advantages.
You've got to be kidding about the extensions. Half of them don't even work and are buggy as hell. Every new gnome version that comes out usually breaks something with a past version and requires the extension developers to constantly update and maintain multiple versions so that their extension will work with the number of older gnome versions running on different distro. You've only 3 developers that are actually reviewing the submissions and some extension devs haven't heard anything about their updates for weeks. Extensions are a joke.
Running gnome 3.2.1 I love it. I think I am the only user who does.
I see now what you meant with odd about the clock (I think GNOME's reasoning is that you can get the month and date information from the calendar). gnome-tweak-tool has switches for adding the month and day, and also displaying the seconds in the clock; you might want to check that. You can disable dynamic workspaces and change the number of them with it too.
I completely agree things should be a lot more clear about the extensions operation and the website too.
The workspaces behavior is fine for me because i never have that many windows open, but I completely understand it doesn't scale well for your usage. Actually, I use https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/503/always-zoom-workspaces/ to have the workspaces always visible instead of having to move the mouse all the way to the right (To switch windows I liked using https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/317/window-display/ so I could search for window titles, but it hasn't been updated to 3.6). A pager like what you proposed would be a nice extension for gnome-shell, and I think it would be entirely doable.
Btw, have you tried bbpager?
Whenever I forget to wipe gnome3 from a fresh install and replace it with something that is actually useable in the office: "Where is all my stuff gone?!". I've been installing -thousands- of pc and laptop with debian, mostly in work environments. E.g. not being able to paste to desktop in xfce makes it an instant fail, no matter how entrenched the devs maybe. But not having any desktop to begin with definitely requires the removal of gnome3 or my removal from my job. I'm yet to see any office that uses such things as a touchscreen, gnome3 or unity for work. Many unpaid nightshifts ahead ...
Good luck with the Apple thing. I tried it, got burned numerous times, found out it was a certified Unix but did things "differently" just to be different, and then came the WiFi problems.
Oh. My. God. Seriously, there are threads thousands of posts long spanning numerous (5+?) years concerning issues with WiFi. In my experience, maybe 15% of all Apple users ever see this problem, but once an Apple computer has it, it -never- goes away. Even worse, it is intermittent. You might stay connected for a few weeks but then, when it hits again, every 3 to 5 minutes, you are getting disconnected.
The way to solve it when running Linux on the same hardware is to disable the power saving features entirely on the Broadcom chipsets. There is no way to do that on Apple products. I strongly suspect they "activate" this problem if they feel you have not spent enough money on Apple products recently.
"Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
See your points. In addition, regular users buy gadgets abroad, take 'em home, and they REQUIRE MS Windooze (not Linux, and not Mac).
This is a problem that is pervasive, and its name is "Microsoft Power". Why can't the Brother network printer/scanner just work? Because it was developed _for_ MS. Brother was nice enough to release their own Linux drivers, but these are not compatible with CUPS. So I find the printer in CUPS, and though it _spools_ print jobs it never gets around to actually printing them...
I think Linux is great, and if OEM and hardware manufacturers could see this they could potentially use Linux-support as a PR measure. I think Valve's Linux endorsement is interesting, that will lead to some benefit for gamers, and _hopefully_ raise an interest in hardware manufacturers to support us.
(Btw, I sit in 2nd line tech support and more and more people from all walks of life say that know or use Linux on one of their computers. Usually, it's their Windows or OSX machine that needs support:)
Defining Statistics and Social Research
Cheers. Yeah, my troll/curmudgeon radar was on the fritz.
I wish there was something equivalent to AppleScript on the OSS desktops. It's pretty much the deal breaker for me, since bring able to script as I do saves me upwards of one week of work every 2 months. That's a combination of little helpers written for small tasks that add up, and reporting scripts that do in 20 minutes what would manually take a day. That's my configurability, and I'd be very happy to see the same become possible in other systems/desktops.
-- Using the preview button since 2005
I must have tried it once years ago when something was bugging me. Anyway there is no shortage of pagers, it is pretty much standard in most desktops/wm, at least it used to be, I haven't looked much lately. In the worst case I can write my own pager in perl-gtk.
Screenshot of my current gnome3-fallback pager : http://i.imgur.com/HTUdW.png
Another thought to explain the problem with gnome shell : it seems they removed all the options and replaced them with extensions. Extensions are nice and all, but for basic things it's just stupid and frustrating, and the opposite of user-friendly, an example is the date format, it should be a simple combobox, instead you must search "date" in the extension list, find an extension that simply replace one format by one other, which doesn't even install ... But even if it worked, it replaces a simple thing like a combobox or a checkbox by a complex, long and annoying procedure... Gnome 2 already removed or hid options, some that I liked, but this has reached a ridiculous point.
And I tried a few extensions, why do they use this strange submenus that insert the items into the menu rather than opening on the side, and as a bonus require a click.
I wish for the same thing. Just being able to script GUIs in a simpler way would be fantastic. Writing scripts for xdotool simply doesn't cut it. But intercomunication between apps still has a long way to go in the linux desktop. I wish DBus was (ab)used more and every app provided a nice interface through it...
Oh, those "menus". I think they were just simpler to make (although you can rationalize them saying that they are "linear" (your eyes don't have to move sideways to check the subitems) and clicking on them expresses "intent" (avoiding opening the submenus just by hovering on them)). Now, why did extension developers not create their own widgets (they could)? Probably because it would be harder, though, or they didn't see the need.
Clicking may show intent, but it's slower and annoying, especially when browsing to see what the submenus contain. And these are not the standard gtk menus, doesn't gnome shell use gtk ? Also, it makes long submenus longer, and I don't even want to think about a sub-submenu.
Frankly, why ? I never heard any complaints about the normal submenus, I've already seen a complaint about these new submenus in one of the extension's comment. Is this for touchscreens or just for fun ? The only problem they solve is maybe the submenu appearing on the left rather than the right when there is no room to the right, but that is a very minor issue.
I agree. Also, you're right, gnome-shell doesn't use Gtk, but a custom UI thingie (based on Clutter [the library.. oh, the irony] and Gobject). The default shell has only short menus, so I guess they didn't bother with having a proper model for longer menus. To be fair, most of the things that could be reached from a menu in gnome 2 should be or are Overview search providers on gnome-shell (places, for example). GNOME designers took Microsoft's side on the argument about menus that lead to the invention of the Office ribbon...
That does it, I'm switching to Windows 8...
Oh, wait. FUUUUU!!!
As said above, other WMs do not fall over in the same situation, e16, e17, fvwm2, multiple versions of kde and fluxbox work OK but gnome2 locks up until the app that owns the window is killed - and ALL of them are using ssh so don't blame ssh. There was stuff about it on a gnome mailing list way back but due to the gnome attitude to users doing anything off the mainstream it was just written off as something unimportant :( However I don't know if gnome3 does that or not. I've only had one user on gnome3 for about 8 weeks and he seems very happy with it so far.
Also I made a mistake above about the keyboard - VT switching still works and ctrl-alt-backspace still works and gets fed to X, so the user can kill the X session or more usefully switch to a VT, log into the host with the troublesome app and kill it to get the local WM to work again.
Sounds like your problem isn't GNOME, it's that your hardware is obsolete. Go on using that old junk, though - "it still works," right?
Different AC from above, but... yes, my 8yr old dual physical dual cpu machines (plural) do everything I need them to do, just as my 17y/o (vintage 1995) car still gets me from point-A to point-B reliably - when they cease to meet my needs I'll replace them... I do *not* need to "upgrade" to the new Ford iCar-5 just because my old iCar-4 isn't "new" anymore. When the applications I use need more power, maybe I'll think about upgrading... but when people start telling me I need an 8-core cpu just to friggen browse the internet and send emails, there's something wrong - I was doing that many years ago on a single 600mhz cpu, and never needed 3d accelerated graphics for it. (I don't play games anymore really, rarely do I do anything 3d acceleration would help).
I am glad I started using KDE a few months ago.
I did this in 2009, since using Linux from 1995 onwards. I can't say I miss much - on the desktop at least. Servers I'll generally run FreeBSD or Windows as appropriate.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
OS X is not perfect by any stretch. But the annoyances I have with OS X are worth putting up with for me, for good hardware support, and good application support.
To paraphrase here: all desktop UIs are crap. But some have different trade-offs, and the trade-offs with OS X are acceptable for me.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
maybe i'll call it "Troll" :)