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Xfce Getting a New Version Soon

Posted by timothy on from the welcome-eye-candy dept.

jones_supa writes It looks like the release of Xfce 4.12 is finally about to materialize. It has been about two and half years since the last stable release. There is now a concerted effort underway to ship a new release of this lightweight GTK+2 desktop environment out around the end of February or early March. "As we have discussed the status and progress of core components with many of you individually, we feel confident that the state of Xfce is good enough to polish some final edges and push more translations until then," wrote Simon Steinbeiß on the xfce4-dev mailing list. The official list of showstopper bugs does not look too bad either. However, looking at the long time between releases certainly makes one think if the project could have use for some extra resources.

7 of 193 comments (clear)

  1. GTK+ 3 is an abomination. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    I'll let some pictures show why GTK+3 is an abomination.

    This is a GTK+ 2 UI: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/df/Gedit2261.png

    This is the GTK+ 3 UI of a later version of the same application: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ef/Gedit_3.11.92.png

    The GTK+ 2 UI is a good one. It follows widely-used conventions, with toolbars containing frequently-used functionality (with relevant icons and descriptive text), and menus containing additional functionality that may not be used as often. This results in an application that's easy to use.

    The GTK+ 3 UI is an awful one. There's no consistency. It's difficult to tell what's a button that results in an immediate action, and that is merely a menu. The icons don't describe the corresponding action. The application is nearly impossible to use.

    Going from GTK+ 2 to GTK+ 3 was a total regression for gedit. Its UI was trashed, rendering it unusable. I sure hope that the Xfce developers don't make the same mistake.

    1. Re:GTK+ 3 is an abomination. by Masked+Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Why? Why in the ever living fuck did they rape their applications this way? You really have to wonder exactly what type of person the Gnome project is trying to attract with "features" like this. With all their focus on "minimizing distrations," it is safe to conclude they seek to increase market share among the retarded.

    2. Re:GTK+ 3 is an abomination. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      Just to reinforce that point, here is a screen-shot of gedit 3.10.4 on my ubuntu 14.10 system.

      http://s1.postimg.org/g7pfxixun/Screenshot_from_2015_02_08_11_09_15.png

  2. Re:I don't think this [release] matters at all... by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I see XFCE every time I boot up my computer. They seem to be the only Linux desktop willing to maintain a working relationship with sanity.

  3. Re:One pixel wide window borders by Lord+Apathy · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Xfce is for people that want a professional looking desktop that doesn't get in the way of getting real work done. A desktop that does it job and doesn't get in the way or consume to many resources that could best be dedicated to real work.

    If you don't like the way XFCE you can change it. My desktop at one point did look like windows 95 then I changed it. Now it looks like a modern version of CDE. The other day I was playing with some settings and icons and I could make XFCE look like a modern mac desktop.

    So yeah, its like anything else. You only get into it what you put out of it.

    --

    Supporting World Peace Through Nuclear Pacification

  4. Re:I don't think this [release] matters at all... by dskoll · · Score: 5, Interesting

    My company has standardized on XFCE. When Debian switched to GNOME 3, my users revolted so I switched them to XFCE.

  5. Re:I don't think this [release] matters at all... by sjames · · Score: 5, Insightful

    XFCE is seeing a resurgence now the gnome screwed the pooch and insists on depending on systemd.