What's New In GNOME 3.18

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Posted by timothy on Wednesday September 23, 2015 @03:00AM from the slicker-and-slicker dept.

prisoninmate writes: In this release, GNOME improves the general user experience for users and new developers alike. GNOME 3.18 adds a feature called "Automatic Brightness," which, when enabled, it will make use of your laptop's light sensor to dim or increase the screen's brightness depending on the surrounding lighting. GNOME 3.18 also improves the touch screen experience, especially when selecting and modifying text, implements a new view in the Nautilus (Files) sidebar, which collects all the remote and internal locations in a single place.

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Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by squiggleslash · 2015-09-23 03:02 · Score: 4, Insightful

Screenshot on that page showing a screen you'd only love to use on a tablet.
8.1 was a very nice tablet UI. Unfortunately, Windows, like GNOME, is almost always used on desktops. Controlled by mice and keyboards. Perhaps it's time the GNOME team recognized the need to focus on that again and made the desktop the priority of the project.

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You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
1. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by bondsbw · 2015-09-23 03:06 · Score: 2
  
  Perhaps it's time the GNOME team recognized the need to focus on that again and made the desktop the priority of the project.
  Great point. After all, it is the year of Linux on the... you know.
  
  --
  All my liberal friends think I'm a conservative, all my conservative friends think I'm a liberal.
2. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by mccalli · 2015-09-23 03:07 · Score: 1, Insightful
  
  Disagree - the linked video shows a very desktop-oriented device, not tablet. They do seem to have some UI guidelines around touch which they alude to in the video, but on the whole - it looks like a nice desktop update.
3. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by msobkow · 2015-09-23 03:16 · Score: 1, Insightful
  
  I find Gnome 3 to be very usable on a desktop with no touch devices. I thought the same as you until I actually used Gnome 3 for more than 5 minutes to "test" it.
  It is not a "Windows Clone" UI, but it is quite usable.
  
  --
  I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
4. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 03:22 · Score: 1
  
  It's very good, and I'm an old fart: started on Slackware 1.0 with no GUI.
5. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by flacco · 2015-09-23 03:23 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  > Screenshot on that page showing a screen you'd only love to use on a tablet.
  Is that the extent of your research?
  The video shows a number of useful incremental improvements to GNOME 3, and a few new features that make GNOME more tablet-friendly. I checked out the beta in a VM yesterday, no feeling that tabletization was a threat.
  I do understand you were spring-boarding off the new GNOME release to say something about Windows 8.1, but still...
  
  --
  pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
6. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Lunix+Nutcase · 2015-09-23 03:25 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Screenshot on that page showing a screen you'd only love to use on a tablet.
  Not true. It's actually shitty even on a tablet.
7. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 03:35 · Score: 1
  
  Or Gnome could admit the error of their ways and just copy Cinnamon from here on. The gazelle is chasing the lion now.
8. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by DrXym · 2015-09-23 03:43 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  GNOME works great on a desktop. There are also lots of extensions that add stuff like task bars, app launchers etc.
9. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 04:15 · Score: 1
  
  I did not see that in the video at all. What I see is the same giant icons for tablet desktop with a few new windowing features.
  Looks just like the built-in Launchpad app launcher in Mac OS X to me. And the cretinous masses just love everything about Mac OS X, even though Launchpad is just a big ugly grid of app icons, same as Windows 8.1 and this.
10. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by squiggleslash · 2015-09-23 04:19 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Yeah, that's the point. What you're given by default (and what GNOME's developers seem to focus on) is the touch oriented interface. Getting the desktop means installing extensions.
  Microsoft made the same mistake with Windows 8. You could get to the desktop with the default UI, and you could add extensions to make it more optimal (albeit not from Microsoft, at least GNOME's own developers are doing the equivalent of "giving you a start menu"), but it wasn't what desktop users wanted.
  Windows 10, for all its faults (and it has a million of them) fixed that and focuses on the desktop. It's time GNOME did the same thing.
  
  --
  You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
11. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by squiggleslash · 2015-09-23 04:22 · Score: 2
  
  I'll have to find a PPA (Ubuntu 15.04 Vivid Vervet) and try it again. Last few experiences required rather a lot of customization to get a UI that was remotely oriented towards desktop use, but perhaps it's improved.
  
  --
  You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
12. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 04:28 · Score: 1
  
  I'm happily using Gnome on a desktop, and prefer it.
  Whenever Gnome gets brought up here, it seems there's a flood of responses saying that they switched to X or Y and are happier with it. Which just goes to show that Gnome was never really filling a void. However there *is* a void for an interface that runs decently with a touch screen. So what's the problem?
  Not very relevant, but Gnome actually predates Windows 8.
13. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by jcupitt65 · 2015-09-23 04:36 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  I just don't think that's true, there's nothing touchy about the design of gnome3, it's a desktop UI and always has been. They are only now starting to add touch stuff, and only because most laptops now come with touch screens.
  It does aim to be a very minimalist desktop. You have your application windows and ... that's about it. All the stuff for launching applications, managing workspaces, managing windows and so on is on the overview screen. I think the idea was that the desktop should get out of the way and just present your work without distraction.
  I didn't like it much when it came out, but it's grown on me. I now prefer it to KDE and Unity, the two main rivals. The extension system is especially nice: you just go to the gnome extension site and turn the things you like on and off.
14. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by squiggleslash · 2015-09-23 04:39 · Score: 1
  
  Well, no, my research includes using a heavily customized version at home (heavily in order to get my precious desktop back), which I'm afraid to upgrade (and thus on an LTS version of Ubuntu as a result) for fear my hacks, customizations, et al, will be lost with the next iteration. Alternatives are Unity - which I'm unimpressed with and suffers many of the same mindset flaws - and one of the forks of GNOME 2 which I don't feel are as integrated with modern software.
  As for your last sentence, I was actually talking about GNOME. Windows 8 only came into it to point out that one major software entity realized that tabletization was a bad idea and walked it back.
  I do understand you were spring-boarding off my comment to say something positive about GNOME, but still...
  
  --
  You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
15. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by squiggleslash · 2015-09-23 04:42 · Score: 1
  
  The responses saying they switched to X or Y are usually referring to one of the forks of GNOME 2 that were created as a direct response to GNOME 3's tablet orientation, so I'm not sure how you can say GNOME was "never filling a void". Nor was there a void for an interface that runs decently with a touch screen, Android seems to be doing that very well, and people are actually using Android.
  And yeah, Microsoft made the same mistake as the GNOME team after both GNOME and Ubuntu did, but seem to have learned from the mistake far, far, quicker.
  
  --
  You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
16. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 04:44 · Score: 1, Insightful
  
  Giant icons, hamburger menus, icons that don't give any hint to functionality, calling programs "apps", etc, etc. Yeah, this is definitely tabletizing the user interface.
17. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by kthreadd · 2015-09-23 04:45 · Score: 2
  
  Yeah, that's the point. What you're given by default (and what GNOME's developers seem to focus on) is the touch oriented interface. Getting the desktop means installing extensions.
  It was designed with touch in mind but not as a requirement. It was designed to be used as is on a desktop as well as on a tablet.
  And if you think that a desktop needs a task bar then maybe you should take a look at OS X. They have the Dock which GNOME 3 has a similar implementation of, but what they don't have is a task bar. The task bar is a very Windows-centric design pattern and I don't think that Windows in any way is the definition of what defines a desktop OS.
18. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by mccalli · 2015-09-23 04:49 · Score: 2
  
  1.0? 1.0? Pah - noob. 0.99alpha crew checking in. Bragging rights a go-go...
19. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by kthreadd · 2015-09-23 05:03 · Score: 2
  
  It's a good way to get an overview of the apps you have installed. I seldom use the icons when launching apps though, I just enter the first few characters and press return.
20. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by kthreadd · 2015-09-23 05:07 · Score: 2
  
  The Ubuntu GNOME team is doing as good job as they can but if you just want to try out the new release you may want to give the Fedora 23 beta a spin. Ubuntu is unfortunately often behind with GNOME. They are planning on shipping the old 3.16 release in Ubuntu 15.10 so getting a supported 3.18 release will probably not happen until 16.04.
21. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Hognoxious · 2015-09-23 05:09 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  There's already a way to get an overview of the apps that are installed - a properly structured custom menu.
  
  --
  Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
22. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by kthreadd · 2015-09-23 05:11 · Score: 2
  
  True, the post above yours did say that. I apologize. The point is however still that you don't actually need any extensions at all in order to get a good desktop experience, as long as you're willing to accept something that isn't a Windows clone as a desktop.
23. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 05:12 · Score: 1
  
  Did you try Cinnamon? I find it takes the best of both camps - the "integration" and general modernness of GNOME3 (good multi-monitor setup etc.) with the thoroughly desktop-oriented interface from GNOME2 and its forks (Xfce, LXDE, MATE...).
24. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by kthreadd · 2015-09-23 05:15 · Score: 2
  
  That works too but at least for me it's often slower. Where did they put the Terminal app, was it under Accessories or Utilities? Now I just have to look at T since they are ordered alphabetically. The old menu system from GNOME 2 also suffered that it didn't allow you to search for apps by typing its name.
25. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by theguyfromsaturn · 2015-09-23 05:24 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  I use Gnome on a Desktop exclusively. I haven't tried 3.18, but in general, GNOME 3 made my desktop experience more enjoyable. In particular, dynamic virtual desktop allocation, mouse swipe the the corner to reveal the dash etc, are actually very productivity enhancing for me. I don't know how good the interface would be on a tablet, but to me, it is definitely a superior desktop paradigm for the desktop. Gnome shell applets and various settings can be tweaked to improve on the overall experience (like a mounted volume indicator on the task bar etc.). The only issue I have with Gnome, is that Gnome Tweaks should not be an optional additional application to install, but should be integrated in the default settings of Gnome. Personally, I wouldn't go back to the antiquated hierarchical menu, as my apps are much easier to find now (this I think is definitely more oriented towards the desktop, as typing in search terms in a touch screen sucks).
  
  --
  I like my dinosaurs feathery, and my pterosaurs hairy (or is it pycnofibery?)
26. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by kthreadd · 2015-09-23 06:09 · Score: 2
  
  Apps is just one of the things it can search for. Among other things you can search for contacts, files, notes. Type in a mathematical calculation and it computes it for you, or the name of a city and it tells you the local time there.
27. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by DrXym · 2015-09-23 08:58 · Score: 1
  
  What's there by default isn't touch oriented, it's task oriented and in terms of influence it takes more from OS X and exposé than it does Windows 8 (which didn't even exist when GNOME 3 came out).
28. Re: Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by msobkow · 2015-09-23 09:59 · Score: 2
  
  15.04 is the current official release. 15.10 is still a development release: use at your own risk.
  
  --
  I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
29. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by SCHecklerX · 2015-09-23 10:30 · Score: 1
  
  Cinnamon.
30. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by MrKaos · 2015-09-23 14:51 · Score: 1
  
  Yes - touch screen displays are inevitable and they are just getting ready for that.
  The thing I find though is that when screens are touched they get finger marks on them and that interferes with the display quality making odd fuzzy parts to text and code. For some I think the whole touch screen revolution will live and die on people's attitude towards that.
  
  --
  My ism, it's full of beliefs.
31. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by DrXym · 2015-09-23 20:12 · Score: 1
  
  I agree with this. Touch screen support more or less falls out of the design of GNOME 3 rather than being to the detriment of desktop use. It's meant to be a task oriented design and it just happens that this fits in with the model that most tablet OSes follow.
  That isn't to say I like everything about GNOME 3. I spent WAY too long recently just making a lousy launcher for Minecraft for my kid. Something that would take seconds in Windows but meant I had to figure out how write a .desktop file by hand and where to put it.
32. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Xtifr · 2015-09-23 20:17 · Score: 2
  
  Most of the reviews of Cinnamon I've read point out that it really doesn't do anything that gnome-shell can't easily do since "classic" mode was added (circa v. 3.8). Not that there's anything wrong with using Cinnamon if that's the only possible mode you'll ever want. Me, I've been experimenting with different modes of gnome-shell, and Ilike it. (The ability to experiment.) Haven't yet actually tried Cinnamon.
33. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by thegarbz · 2015-09-23 23:52 · Score: 2
  
  There's already a way to get an overview of the apps that are installed - a properly structured custom menu.
  How 2009.
  Actually there was quite a bit of research into user interaction which showed that users used icons more easily to identify a program, and that by switching to a grid layout the density of information on the screen could be increased relying less on scrolling or small hard to read text.
  You may enjoy digging through a menu but most users avoid it when they can, and to be perfectly honest I'm not even sure how to customise the menu in Windows 10 to give it some "structure".
  You're not alone though. You've been modded up so someone agrees with your view of the menu. I hope you find some program that will allow you to continue to use your systems the way you want. But at the same time I applaud people actually looking into progressing this. Text is getting smaller and my eyes are getting worse.
34. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 04:10 · Score: 2
  
  It also tends to be behind GNOME. It is based on GNOME, but since they've added their own bits, they can't reasonably update all the GNOME libraries as easily since they forked them all. In honesty, they could probably have re-implemented Cinnamon with using all GNOME libraries and saved themselves a lot of maintenance cost. After all, the platform has now already de-coupled the user experience from everything so you could just implement the shell like Elementary has done, and Budgie. Mate could do the same thing. There are some issues of course like gnome-settings-daemon which has some hardcoded stuff. But if you have the resources to support a whole platform focusing on making something like gnome-settings-daemon generic would be a great effort.
35. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 04:21 · Score: 1
  
  I agree about the software launcher stuff.
36. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 04:24 · Score: 1
  
  Windows 8 was a very busy desktop. You go into their overview (vs GNOME) and it's full of distracting thing. GNOME was meant to be distraction free, while Windows 8 went completely the other way. I also had problems going back to the desktop view. Windows 8 was an effort at desktop/tablet convergence, but it didn't succeed and so windows 10 came that modified the UI. GNOME is still a desktop oriented OS. The desktop is still prime. The basic paradigm has not changed.
37. Re: Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Evan+Langlois · 2015-09-24 04:34 · Score: 1
  
  This is about 3.18 and you are just now commenting on 3.0 design features? If you look in the design documentation and actually READ it, there are good reasons for it. I initially disagreed and installed an extension that gives you the old cascading menu. It is there if you want it, and many other Tweaks. However, I can launch apps faster from the overview or search feature. It actually IS more user friendly. Try typing the name of one of your phone's contacts in the search bar (you don't have to click it, just type), or type in some math! Gnome syncs your calendars and contact's for you (if you allow it) and unlike some other desktops, does not feed your searches to Amazon or other third parties. And I HATE Windows 8. While supporting tablets may be a hard focus, Gnome does not do so at the expense of desktops. Windows 8 should take lessons from Gnome. The Gnome team has done an excellent job in UI design. Yes, its different and it takes a minute when you are used to something else, but if we keep using the same UI paradigms over and over then you can't ever innovate.
38. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Hognoxious · 2015-09-24 23:42 · Score: 1
  
  Where did they put the Terminal app, was it under Accessories or Utilities?
  
  That's why I said custom. Put it where you want. It's about the third thing I do on a new system.
  
  --
  Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
39. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by Blaskowicz · 2015-09-30 13:48 · Score: 1
  
  One day we'll finally go back to Windows 3.1. It has both the structure found in menu and grid layout.
  In my experience text is getting bigger, on websites or as an egregious example Firefox's setting page or "tab recovery" page. As I'm not buying new hardware every month like a mobile computer with a 1080p 13" display.
  Hurts my eyes and makes me scroll. I find it easier to read a web 1.0 page such as wikipedia than stuff like medium.com but with even bigger text if that wasn't enough.
40. Re:Ah, no lessons learned from Windows 8 by thegarbz · 2015-10-01 07:33 · Score: 1
  
  In my experience text is getting bigger
  Maybe one day when Window's scaling functions are actually worth a dam you may be right, but what I see now is that I have a laptop with a ludicrous screen resolution and for example a software option in Photoshop to scale it to 200% making the UI take up a stupidly large portion of the screen, or 100% where the text is too small to read. Combine that with applications, even windows installer applications distributed by Microsoft themselves which don't scale well, or legacy programs like the Computer Management Console which only get blurrier when scaled up, and I find it to be a real problem.
  On website it's less of an issue because I can scale the fonts myself, but right now I default to 150% when browsing and that among other things break's Slashdot's shitty UI in various places.
GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 03:08 · Score: 1

GNOME 3 sent me to OSX.
1. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by itamihn · 2015-09-23 03:41 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  GNOME 3.x sent me to KDE, even though I eventually settled in Cinnamon.
2. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 04:10 · Score: 1
  
  Thanks to Gnome3 I moved back to XFCE. This is a good way to prepare for next step, as systemd is enforcing a move back to FreeBSD.
3. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by AntEater · 2015-09-23 04:22 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Thanks to Gnome3 I moved back to XFCE. This is a good way to prepare for next step, as systemd is enforcing a move back to FreeBSD.
  Check out Slackware before you run all the way back to FreeBSD (not that there's anything wrong with FreeBSD). Slack ships with a good XFCE desktop. It's a great Linux distribution without the systemd infection.
  
  --
  Alex, I'll take keybindings not used by Emacs for $400....
4. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 05:21 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  All I want is to use a modern Linux distro without systemd.
  Gentoo is one option for that.
5. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by armanox · 2015-09-23 05:26 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Slackware recieves regular security updates, so claiming it hasn't been updated in that time is false. Version.next has been in Alpha for a little long now - usually Slackware releases once per year.
  
  --
  I'm starting to think GNU is the problem with "GNU/Linux" these days.
6. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by Pseudonymous+Powers · 2015-09-23 05:50 · Score: 1, Funny
  
  GNOME 3 sent me to OSX.
  You say you wanna know what Gnome 3 ever did to me? Gnome 3 sent me to a foreign land to fight a war I didn't start with people who never did me no wrong. It made me do terrible things, things I still can't talk about, not with anyone, not with God, not even with the Devil. It feels like part of me is still over there. It probably always will. That's what Gnome 3 did to me, Sonny Jim.
  Seriously, though, Gnome 3 sucked the last time I looked at it. And by "the last time", I likely mean both the first time and the last time. Trust is a delicate thing. When you sleep with your spouse's best friend or add a "charms bar" to your UI, there's a good chance you won't ever really get back to where you were.
7. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by AntEater · 2015-09-23 06:58 · Score: 1
  
  Even the 2 year old 14.1 release of Slackware isn't as bad as you might think. Official releases aren't nearly as conservative as Debian's. If you want current, then Slackware-current is available and really is quite stable in spite of the fact that it's a development branch.
  
  --
  Alex, I'll take keybindings not used by Emacs for $400....
8. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by Cro+Magnon · 2015-09-23 08:30 · Score: 1
  
  Even the 2 year old 14.1 release of Slackware isn't as bad as you might think. Official releases aren't nearly as conservative as Debian's.
  Of course, that's like saying a turtle can outrun a snail.
  
  --
  Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
9. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by SumDog · 2015-09-23 08:49 · Score: 1
  
  It sent me to i3. Tiling window managers are the way to go.
10. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 04:28 · Score: 1
  
  Yet, here you are on a GNOME 3 thread like a jilted lover who still has feelings, but has to trash the ex.
11. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by Pseudonymous+Powers · 2015-09-24 04:54 · Score: 1
  
  Yet, here you are on a GNOME 3 thread like a jilted lover who still has feelings, but has to trash the ex.
  Well, yeah, pretty much. I had deep feelings for Gnome 2, but then Gnome 3 betrayed my love, so of course I feel jilted.
  Actually, now that I think about it, it's more like that Angelina Jolie movie where her kid got kidnapped, and then the police "found" this other kid and "returned" him to her, only she was like, "but that's not my son", and the police were like, "shut up, you stupid broad, of course it's your kid, stop trying to make us look bad, or we'll have you institutionalized."
  In this analogy, I'm Angelina Jolie, Gnome 2 is my son, and Gnome 3 is some other random kid that, aside from being roughly the same size and color, isn't related to Gnome 2 in any way.
12. Re:GNOME 3.x worsens the general user experience by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-27 10:24 · Score: 1
  
  haha, that's pretty funny. :)
  I'm sorry that you didn't like GNOME 3. But it got changed because it was very limiting. There is so much more to accomplish. It's what happened when GNOME 1 -> GNOME 2 and people didn't like that either. The flames continued up until it got moved to GNOME 3. Check any slashdot thread.
  It'll all get better, hardware continues to change and maybe at some point, you'll come back and try GNOME 3 to check out all the new hardware toys that are coming out. Nothing is forever.
GNOME it's getting really good by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 03:10 · Score: 5, Insightful

Despite all the negative buzz against GNOME 3, latest releases are, in my opinion, very good (and I hated GNOME 3 with a passion when it came up).
Also, they're putting efforts on style consistency and usability which is very welcome.
1. Re:GNOME it's getting really good by kthreadd · 2015-09-23 04:17 · Score: 1, Informative
  
  Despite all the negative buzz against GNOME 3, latest releases are, in my opinion, very good (and I hated GNOME 3 with a passion when it came up).
  Also, they're putting efforts on style consistency and usability which is very welcome.
  Same thing here. GNOME 3.10 finally made me leave fvwm and switch to GNOME full-time. Before that it was still an unfinished experience in many ways.
2. Re:GNOME it's getting really good by kthreadd · 2015-09-23 06:10 · Score: 1
  
  Then the universe is in balance. :-)
3. Re:GNOME it's getting really good by Xtifr · 2015-09-23 10:22 · Score: 1
  
  Indeed, I switched to Xfce when Gnome3 first came out, but between hearing that 3.10 was much improved and the fact that Xfce was struggling with my (admittedly bizarre) sound setup, I gave Gnome another try, and have been quite happy with it for many months now.
4. Re:GNOME it's getting really good by mvdwege · 2015-09-23 18:06 · Score: 1
  
  I went the other way, but purely for reasons of taste: I hate the new window style that replaces the menu with a tiny button and builds it right into the window itself along with the window operation buttons.
  It's a purely aesthetic decision. I realise some people like it, I just prefer my decade-old sawfish setup to do the window management for me, and until about 3.10 or so that worked fine in combination with Gnome. Now it just looks ugly.
  
  --
  "I know I will be modded down for this": where's the option '-1, Asking for it'?
5. Re:GNOME it's getting really good by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 04:32 · Score: 1
  
  Actually, slashdot bashed gnome 2 continuously until gnome 3. :) Then turned around and bashed gnome 3 because it wasn't gnome 2.
The times they are a changin' by juanfgs · 2015-09-23 03:19 · Score: 5, Insightful

I was a former Gnome user and I ditched it, but to be honest, new users seem to like Gnome 3, for the obvious reason that touch interfaces are more familiar to them. They are more used to "slide to unlock" behaviours and such, big icons for rapid identification.
Sometimes it's worthy to make a little of self-criticism and realize that many of us aren't from this era of interfaces. I recognize that I hardly use a computer in the same way the average person uses it, I often rely on the terminal, I tend to remember programs by name rather than icon, and my workflow is probably way different than those born in the "apps" era.
It's Gnome for me? not anymore. Should it be? no, why should I force developers to do things as I like.
Gnome 3 is a good thing to have, because it enables free software to reach people that otherwise wouldn't be interested. Luckily for us, there are a plethora of options if you are fond of the old interface, and they seem to keep getting better and better (MATE, Xfce , KDE).
1. Re:The times they are a changin' by Eunuchswear · 2015-09-23 04:18 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  I often rely on the terminal, I tend to remember programs by name rather than icon, and my workflow is probably way different than those born in the "apps" era.
  That's the normal way of working with Gnome3 -- you launch programs by hitting window key, typing the first few characters of the program name then enter.
  
  --
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2. Re:The times they are a changin' by juanfgs · 2015-09-23 04:21 · Score: 1
  
  I know I have used it, but I had to do some massive tweaking to get it to a working state. Getting rid of desktop switcher and some other annoying bling. i3 does all this for me and is way more lightweight.
3. Re:The times they are a changin' by Eunuchswear · 2015-09-23 05:04 · Score: 1
  
  Ok, I just found it weird that the things you said about your way of working: "often rely on the terminal, I tend to remember programs by name rather than icon" fit rather better with Gnome3 than the slavish Windows95 emulation that was Gnome2.
  
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4. Re:The times they are a changin' by juanfgs · 2015-09-23 06:05 · Score: 1
  
  How is that so? on gnome 2 you had alt+f2 if you weren't using an application launcher (launchy/gnome-do/synapse). You could run without compositing (better performance on some games), you didn't have animations unless you wanted to.
  Also it's not the only reason, some of the things that drove me away was the simplification of the individual apps (specially nautilus), the mania with integrating everything with online accounts, and bugs, many bugs sometimes critical (killing the entire session ).
  Many things that gnome 3 did well (I documented some of them back then on my blog http://juanfgs.eosweb.info/pos...). After all my eventual shift to i3 wouldn't have happened if I didn't went through gnome 3.
  i3 is for me Gnome minus the resource load, load of bugs with my current hardware and many things that I frankly didn't use. As I said I don't bash gnome now that the initial "anger" is gone, but it's just not for me anymore. I run i3 with caja (old nautilus), moc for music, emacs.
5. Re:The times they are a changin' by BlackPignouf · 2015-09-23 06:18 · Score: 1
  
  What? A fair, balanced and open-minded comment about GNOME 3?
  Guys, bring the pitchforks!!!
  Next time he'll tell us that systemd has some interesting features!
6. Re:The times they are a changin' by juanfgs · 2015-09-23 06:30 · Score: 1
  
  I don't hate systemd
  bring it on :)
Haters gonna hate by Dcnjoe60 · 2015-09-23 03:28 · Score: 1

It seems that the only acceptable change to Gnome for slashdotters is going back to the version 2 interface.
1. Re:Haters gonna hate by Dcnjoe60 · 2015-09-23 04:02 · Score: 1
  
  Yeah, god forbid you actually prefer something that isn't the latest and [sometimes] greatest... You'll be labeled a hater if you do.
  Most likely people that did not want to use something that is the latest and the greatest, they would have long ago switched to a different desktop. Things like XFCE or Mate are good alternative. However, the rants about Gnome 3, every time it is mentioned, would indicate that people haven't really moved on (at least emotionally) and have some other agenda fueling their angst.
  It's not the dislike of Gnome 3 that causing one to be a hater, it's the rants about any change to the way things were (not just Gnome 3) that causes people to be a hater.
2. Re:Haters gonna hate by 0123456 · 2015-09-23 04:47 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  It seems that the only acceptable change to Gnome for slashdotters is going back to the version 2 interface.
  I think you'll find that most of us never left. MATE runs fine on my Linux machines.
3. Re:Haters gonna hate by squiggleslash · 2015-09-23 04:59 · Score: 1
  
  It sucks in software when something that worked well is declared obsolete, and is replaced with something fairly suboptimal in an apparent attempt to chase a market for devices that aren't particularly mature or productivity oriented.
  I commend the GNOME 3 developers for at least part acknowledging there's a problem by developing extensions to bring back the desktop, but really, it's not "hating" to acknowledge that it's doing nobody any favors, not GNOME, not end users, not anyone, to rely on that to solve the problem, and treat desktop users as second class citizens even though they make up the majority of users.
  Criticism is a good thing. Would you have us just ignore GNOME and switch to other platforms, refusing to say why?
  
  --
  You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
4. Re:Haters gonna hate by 0123456 · 2015-09-23 05:11 · Score: 1
  
  Gnome now appears to be a haven for SJWs. Disagreeing with anything they say is 'hate', by definition.
5. Re:Haters gonna hate by Xtifr · 2015-09-23 10:26 · Score: 1
  
  The people who want to bitch are usually the first and most frequent to post. That doesn't mean they're representative of the whole population. I'm pretty happy with Gnome 3 now, although I admit I did switch to Xfce for a while when it first came out. Aside from enabling focus-follows-mouse (which is something I have to tweak in every environment), I haven't even mucked about with the defaults very much.
6. Re:Haters gonna hate by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 04:36 · Score: 1
  
  Try looking at some of the slashdot articles on GNOME 2 releases. :-)
7. Re:Haters gonna hate by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 04:43 · Score: 1
  
  Design changes are driven by changes in technology. If you have faster processors, faster memory, and you have new IO devices, then your design has to be updated to able to take advantage of them. If you have a laptop that has touch capability, then economically having a desktop that use it is a waste since that cost is built-in the laptop. Meanwhile the other desktops are quickly ramping up on the new paradigm. If you decide to stay still, you become stagnant.
  GNOME is part of GNU, the goal is to continue to bring Free Software to users. Being stagnant means we can't reach the users anymore. In the end, we'd be stuck with a dwindling set of users who prefer the mainframe era of computing. Those users are what? late mid 40s and up? How long will that base of users last when there is nothing to replace them?
Re:light sensor by itamihn · 2015-09-23 03:42 · Score: 1

You'll have a very bright screen from now on.
SystemD by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 03:47 · Score: 2, Interesting

Does it still require that awful SystemD OS to be installed in order to run?
1. Re:SystemD by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 04:39 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  Eunuchswear or Barsteward or whatever your actual name is (Lennart?), GNOME 3's close ties to systemd are a real concern for many users.
  It's not, as you incorrectly put it, "trolling" when somebody raises this concern.
  Systemd has some fundamental problems with its architecture, such as its use of binary logging and how it has subsumed so much unrelated functionality. It has also caused many problems for many users, including computers that don't boot fully, which is among the worst possible software problems.
  We don't need to rehash all of the problems affecting systemd. You're well aware of them, from all of your past attempts at denying that these very real problems exist.
  Systemd is not a viable option for a great many Linux users, and all users of other UNIX-like systems (such as the BSDs). Many Linux users can't use it because of reliability concerns, and the others can't use it because systemd's portability is zilch.
  So when GNOME 3 depends on systemd, it makes GNOME 3 unusable for a great many people. These aren't just any people, too. They're the most talented, valuable and intelligent users. They're the ones who can contribute the most to GNOME and its community.
  The GNOME project only hurts itself by excluding the best possible users, especially when it does so thanks to unnecessary ties to unnecessary and unwanted software like systemd.
2. Re:SystemD by Eunuchswear · 2015-09-23 18:53 · Score: 1
  
  Weak troll -- gnome doesn't log to syslog, does log to journal.
  
  --
  Watch this Heartland Institute video
3. Re:SystemD by Eunuchswear · 2015-09-23 19:11 · Score: 1
  
  Barstewart is not my sockpuppet. (My actual sockpuppet is taking a rest as slashdot is so close to brain death as to be no fun any more). I'm not Lennart, I'm considerably older than him (and much less German).
  
  Systemd has some fundamental problems with its architecture, such as its use of binary logging
  How is binary logging a "fundamental problem with its architecture"? Any half competent programmer could replace journald with something that logged to a text file in about half a days work.
  
  It has also caused many problems for many users, including computers that don't boot fully, which is among the worst possible software problems.
  Which is something that never happened with sysvinit. (Hint -- I've been using sysvinit since SVR3 in 1989).
  
  So when GNOME 3 depends on systemd, it makes GNOME 3 unusable for a great many people. These aren't just any people, too. They're the most talented, valuable and intelligent users. They're the ones who can contribute the most to GNOME and its community.
  But, somehow, these "most talented, valuable and intelligent users" are unable to contribute the one thing that would make GNOME 3 independant of systemd -- a working replacement for logind.
  
  The GNOME project only hurts itself by excluding the best possible users, especially when it does so thanks to unnecessary ties to unnecessary and unwanted software like systemd.
  If those "ties" were unnecessary they should be easy to undo, right?
  Like I said, the quality of the trolls is dropping rapidly.
  
  --
  Watch this Heartland Institute video
4. Re: SystemD by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 04:51 · Score: 1
  
  Linux never claims POSIX compliance. There is a lot of stuff in the kernel that doesn't necessarily conform to POSIX standard. In fact, if kernel folks disagree with something on the POSIX standard they will modify it. Do you think Linus wouldn't do that? /proc is not a UNIX thing.
Incorporated into systemd yet? by the_humeister · 2015-09-23 04:00 · Score: 1

If not, then I'm not interested.
1. Re:Incorporated into systemd yet? by armanox · 2015-09-23 05:31 · Score: 1
  
  Someone hasn't been paying attention - for quite a while now GNOME has been the frontend to systemd. It was integrated from the start (of systemd).
  
  --
  I'm starting to think GNU is the problem with "GNU/Linux" these days.
What User Experience? Everyone Left. by BrendaEM · 2015-09-23 04:06 · Score: 2

Face it, Gnome was ruined, perhaps even sabotaged. Year after year, they turned their backs on users, removed any power the user might have had all in the name of making it "clean."
Gnome should either stand or die and a lesson: do not design by infatuation.
Everyone left.

--
https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
1. Re:What User Experience? Everyone Left. by BrendaEM · 2015-09-23 04:07 · Score: 1
  
  Oh, by they way, some years ago, I supported Gnome, like gave money to.
  
  --
  https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
2. Re:What User Experience? Everyone Left. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 05:11 · Score: 1
  
  When looking at the big picture, no, you don't exist. The huge majority (we're talking over 90%) of Linux desktop users are now using Unity, KDE, or XFCE, or MATE, or one of the many other window managers that exist. GNOME 3 and Cinnamon users like you are irrelevant, given your small number.
  You guys are like Firefox users. You're loud and obnoxious, but you're also very small in number. Your single-digit share of the market makes you absolutely irrelevant compared to the other players.
  I suppose it isn't surprising that GNOME 3 users and Firefox users are so much alike. Both GNOME 3 and Firefox are formerly-successful software products that had their UIs and usability totally trashed by hipster "designers", and whose developers have shown no interesting in improving the awful conditions they're subjecting their users to. GNOME 3 and Firefox are both very similar types of disasters that attract the same sort of failures as supporters.
3. Re:What User Experience? Everyone Left. by umafuckit · 2015-09-23 11:11 · Score: 1
  
  Face it, Gnome was ruined, perhaps even sabotaged. Year after year, they turned their backs on users, removed any power the user might have had all in the name of making it "clean."
  Gnome should either stand or die and a lesson: do not design by infatuation.
  Everyone left.
  Did they leave? You might be right, but what are the stats on the market shares of these desktop environments? I can't find anything.
  
  --
  soylentnews.org
4. Re:What User Experience? Everyone Left. by Xtifr · 2015-09-23 12:11 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  When looking at the big picture, no, you don't exist. The huge majority (we're talking over 90%) of Linux desktop users are now using Unity, KDE, or XFCE, or MATE, or one of the many other window managers that exist. GNOME 3 and Cinnamon users like you are irrelevant, given your small number.
  And your evidence for this amazing claim is...?
  The Debian popcon results certainly seem to suggest otherwise:
  * gnome-shell: 30% installed, 18% recently used.
  * kde-runtime: 19% installed, 11% recently used.
  * xfce4-panel: 14% installed, 7.6% recently used.
  * lxde-common:5.6% installed, 2.5% recently used.
  * mate-panel: 4.6% installed, 2.3% recently used.
  * cinnamon: 3.5% installed, 1.6% recently used.
  * Unity: not available for Debian.
  (When looking at those numbers, you have to take into account the fact that a lot of Debian systems are servers, and don't have X11 installed at all.)
  Of course Debian isn't representative of the whole world, but it is generally among the most popular systems, and one that has a disproportionate number of experienced users compared to systems like Ubuntu or Mint. Users who like choice. And they seem to be mostly choosing Gnome 3.
  Factoring in Ubuntu and Mint, well, Ubuntu users will heavily use Unity, but there's still a lot using Gnome or KDE or Xfce. Plus, Unity is basically Gnome with a replacement for gnome-shell. And Mint users will most likely be using Cinnamon (which probably makes it a lot more popular than you suggest) or KDE. So those will likely balance out the strong Gnome lead we see on Debian. But as a rough estimate, I think it's safe to say that Gnome 3 is easily in the same ballpark as KDE and Unity. And the Debian results certainly suggest that Gnome 3 is more popular among experienced users than a lot of people like to claim. Which matches what I've been hearing:that many people have been going back to Gnome since 3.8 finally gave us "classic" mode.
  (I tried to go through the Ubuntu popcon results, but they don't seem to be as well organized or easy to search, and I gave up in frustration. Feel free to check the numbers yourself. I think you may be surprised at how high in the rankings gnome-shell is, though. Mint doesn't support popcon at this point in time.)
  I'd try to factor in Fedora, but Ihave no idea how to estimate what's going on in that part of the world. But I'd say your "over 90%" claim is on pretty shaky ground. (To describe it with more politeness than it probably deserves.)
5. Re:What User Experience? Everyone Left. by Eunuchswear · 2015-09-23 19:21 · Score: 1
  
  Not fair bringing facts to a trollfest.
  (And, as it happens I'm one of those popcon reporting Gnome3 on Debian users).
  
  --
  Watch this Heartland Institute video
6. Re:What User Experience? Everyone Left. by Xtifr · 2015-09-23 20:07 · Score: 1
  
  That's why I included the recently used numbers, and not just the install numbers. The recently used numbers are based on atime. If people aren't using those programs, the atime won't get updated, and they won't be marked as recently used.
  There's multiple reasons why a DE or WM might be installed but not recently used. I have three DEs and a handful of separate WMs installed on my system, which I occasionally use for testing and experimentation. But mostly they sit there because I'm not motivated to delete them or use them.
7. Re:What User Experience? Everyone Left. by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 05:02 · Score: 1
  
  A couple of other data points, both SLES/SLED and RHEL all default to GNOME in the enterprise. Secondly, Cinnamon, Mate, and Unity all depend on underlying GNOME libraries. So, there are a lot of projects depending on GNOME developers. It might not be good for users to wish GNOME's demise since that sow chaos in their own desktop of choice.
8. Re:What User Experience? Everyone Left. by Xtifr · 2015-09-24 06:47 · Score: 1
  
  Debian doesn't exactly have a default. If you use netinst, the desktop task offers a selection of subtasks, including Gnome, Xfce, KDE, Cinnamon, Mate, and LXDE. Choosing the one (or ones) you want is the matter of clicking a checkbox—not exactly something that requires a great deal of effort. If you don't use netinst, then you can choose between several different Disc 1s; one each for the different desktops. Although each of those offers the same set of choices, in case you want to install more than one DE.
  In any case, the popcon pages show a graph of historical data which doesn't seem to support your supposition.
What's GNU In GNOME 3.18 by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 04:06 · Score: 1

That's the real question.
I Don't Get Mobile UI Devs by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-23 04:16 · Score: 1

Why are there always separate apps to display a grid of icons and people go around talking as if it's a big deal. It's just like a standard desktop with large shortcuts on it! People complain that standard UIs suck for mobile devices but then spend their time recreating all of it as apps. Why not improve the real desktop with different sets of icons on each virtual desktop instead of trying to recreate the desktop through an app that runs on top of a now near featureless desktop?
You can change the desktop shell in Windows. You can change it in Linux. Why is mobile and mobile inspired UIs adding yet another layer?
Wayland support! by neuro88 · 2015-09-23 07:33 · Score: 1

I've been a KDE user since the 1.1.x days, but even I'm pretty excited about the Gnome 3.18 release. This release is supposed to have very polished Wayland support! If the Wayland support is all it's cracked up to be, Fedora should default to Wayland over X.org with Gnome 3.20. I don't use Fedora either, but if 24 defaults to Wayland, I'll install it to another partition at the very least.
Re:The Obvious Question by Hognoxious · 2015-09-23 07:33 · Score: 1

Nice try, but that's clearly a trick question - there weren't any left.

--
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
"Improved user-experience"? by jopet · 2015-09-23 10:09 · Score: 1

Gnome 3 has made the user-experience a disaster. But even worse, it took away or made it much harder for a user to fix that disaster, even when willing to invest time to fix it. Because, you know, the Gnome3 developers just know so much than all their users what the users want and need.
So they decided that it is really not good for us to have task bar any more, or to have shortcut icons on the desktop or have shortcut icons in the panel, or have the panels organized like we want, because doing it all like they figured out some noobs want to do it is obviously the only road to happiness for us all.
And they were so busy taking away the freedom of their users they could just not be arsed to work on important stuff like e.g. proper support of HiDPI monitors or multitple monitor configurations with big differences in DPI.
The same applies, probably even more, to the Unity team, btw.
1. Re:"Improved user-experience"? by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 05:07 · Score: 1
  
  Gnome 3 has made the user-experience a disaster. But even worse, it took away or made it much harder for a user to fix that disaster, even when willing to invest time to fix it. Because, you know, the Gnome3 developers just know so much than all their users what the users want and need. So they decided that it is really not good for us to have task bar any more, or to have shortcut icons on the desktop or have shortcut icons in the panel, or have the panels organized like we want, because doing it all like they figured out some noobs want to do it is obviously the only road to happiness for us all. And they were so busy taking away the freedom of their users they could just not be arsed to work on important stuff like e.g. proper support of HiDPI monitors or multitple monitor configurations with big differences in DPI.
  The same applies, probably even more, to the Unity team, btw.
  GNOME already has support for HiDPI already part of GTK+. When the switch comes to Wayland, then multiple monitors with different resolutions will also be addressed.
2. Re:"Improved user-experience"? by jopet · 2015-09-24 05:25 · Score: 1
  
  The "support" currently in Gnome3 is ridiculous: you can scale your fonts, but all the window decorations, panel icons etc remain tiny, no matter how you scale that. And you can scale windows by integer numbers which means you end up with window decorations being too tiny or too large because what you really would need is 1.45.
  On top of that, none of this happens automatically, your have to use the gnome-tweak-tool to fiddle with it.
  I do not know if you have actually tried to use Gnome3 on a HiDPI laptop, it simply is a terrible experience. Granted, not all of it is due to Gnome3, since the underlying abstraction model is totally broken and individual apps, including Java apps, are still doing their thing based on physical pixels.
  It is breath-taking that such a basic aspect of interacting with an OS is still broken so badly in the year 2015 (and I hear it is nearly equally broken in Windows).
  Cinnamon does a much better job about handling HiDPI right out of the box at the moment.
  I have to admit I do not know how Wayland is going to address this issue, if it helps to solve the current situation I am all for it.
  But that was not even my major point: what really annoys me about Gnome3 is the way how they without any apparent need took away ways of interaction, ways to configure and personalize, ways of how to get work done efficiently from their users and forced their one golden path to happiness on everyone.
  As if people would be using Linux because they love others to limit their options and make decisions about how to do their work for them!
Re:It looks just like the last release by jopet · 2015-09-23 10:11 · Score: 1

KDE is OK, but unfortunately its HiDPI support sucks as much as, if not more than, Gnome3's.
And with Laptop workstation screens having DPIs in the 200s and much above, we are talking a quite sever amount of suckiness.
I mainly agree ... by jopet · 2015-09-23 10:15 · Score: 1

but the problem is that for some reason the only real effort and money goes into shit projects like Gnome3 or Unity.
Tiny projects like Cinnamon or Mate do a much better job but necessarily have more problems because only a fraction of work goes into them.
For example, Cinnamon is currently the only desktop manager that can really deal with HiDPI on Linux. Everything else is still an abomination.
To be fair ... by jopet · 2015-09-23 10:18 · Score: 1

Unity is an abomination several orders of magnitude worse than Gnome3. On the other hand Cinnamon is the only one among all of them that can handle HiDPI correctly, unfortunately it frequently locks up and has a ton of other problems.
Hipster designers and self-declared usability experts are everywhere and they have ruined many a good project.
Re:light sensor by thecombatwombat · 2015-09-23 13:40 · Score: 1

If the camera is the light sensor on his computer, he'll probably have a very dim screen, not a very bright screen.
Most devices (all I've ever seen) get brightest in bright light, so the screen is still visible, and dimmest in low light, so as to not hurt your eyes.
Re:light sensor by itamihn · 2015-09-23 14:03 · Score: 1

Yeah good point :)
Sent me to MATE by walterbyrd · 2015-09-23 15:02 · Score: 1

Maybe not quite as good as Gnome2, but close.
Gnome3 is an abomination.
Re:Gnome3 is the sucky one right? by walterbyrd · 2015-09-23 15:06 · Score: 1

Why is MATE "BULLSHIT?"
Seems to work fine for me.
MOD PARENT UP! by walterbyrd · 2015-09-23 15:10 · Score: 1

Well said.
meaning of 'release" by 3LP · 2015-09-24 00:42 · Score: 1

The URL shown in the announce video https://download.gnome.org/mis... n'exist pas. Tsk!
1. Re:meaning of 'release" by 3LP · 2015-09-24 05:13 · Score: 1
  
  The file has now appeared but I cannot get it to boot in virtualbox. Tsk tsk!
Re:BINGO!!!! I WIN! by Sri+Ramkrishna · 2015-09-24 04:53 · Score: 1

It means that you've improved the experience (e.g. from feedback) from the last release.
Re:Listen to users by danbuter · 2015-09-24 10:58 · Score: 1

Both. Oh yeah, and KDE.