Kasbar was... amazing. I'm guessing the window preview part is back (and the first time I ever saw that was Kasbar on KDE but KDE 4 had to throw the baby out with the bath water). But I also miss being able to change window behavior / decoration with a right click on the task. Want to full screen an application? Right click on the task in taskbar and make it full screen. Right click again (because you could throw your mouse in the corner and get it kasbar back on top) and turn it off. Right click and that window is always on top. Right click and pin it across desktops. Right click and remove window decorations. Fucking powerful, fucking easy, fucking intuitive.
As a teacher with a 1 year old trying to fix up a foreclosure, my desire to have to resurrect something that worked just fine four years ago is... well screw it, I'll just use Windows 7 which sucks but less painful than using KDE 4.
I might, but it honestly isn't easy. I think of it like a restaurant. Your favorite restaurant changes owners. They then change from serving the food you like to trying to provide a "dining experience." You still go a handful of times but you get food poisoning twice and bad service a third time. You stop going, complain about losing your favorite place and start eating at the food truck that just isn't the same but at least you don't get sick. Now the owner doesn't "owe" you anything but you still get the feeling of regret and resentment every time you drive past.
The other issue is that Kasbar was by far my favorite piece of KDE 3 and it isn't back in KDE 4. I kind of wonder, what's the point without that?
I think we used it for a while. I tried at least KDE 4.0, 4.1, 4.2 and 4.3. When Sergio insisted to SVN that KDE 4.1 was better than 3.X it was the beginning of the end for me. It might be better now, it might be worse. I do know that it was far worse for me for years after KDE 4 came out and at some point you stop looking. And none of that changes that I miss KDE 3 and thought it was a wonderful desktop.
But you don't get credit for Mate and Unity and Cinnamon. All of them (well Unity is its own weird story) were created out of dislike of the GNOME experience. So now we have more fragmentation then before. GNOME has less influence then before. But GNOME developers and designers seem to think that they should get the same pull as before even though they have shed a great percentage of their users. You keep getting forked, it is silly to call that a good thing. It is also getting silly to point out that not everyone was happy with the transition to GNOME 2.0. That version was not forked. The press was not nearly as bad. And most telling, 3 years later peoples reactions to it was not still negative. Gnome 3: still most users, former users, and potential users are still complaining. Rather than claiming that there are a silent majority of happy users, you might want to take that as a _hint_.
PS: Sorry I keep coming at you. I'm starting to feel a bit like an ass. You do a great job engaging. To me you are the GNOME person that seems to at least is trying to listen to people who aren't happy with GNOME. The people who are representing GNOME on lwn.net could very much use lessons from you on engagement.
That's simple, there won't be _any_ extensions blessed by GNOME devs. (and yes I write that knowing that GNOME devs have written some of the extensions, doesn't mean it isn't true).
I'll give you credit for at least trying. I'm not persuaded by any stretch of the imagination. I think a couple of dozen well chosen checkboxes would be welcome. Data from the extensions website could be used to inform choices of what options to add, along with some common sense, and god forbid, usability testing. Extensions just have too many problems as I've enumerated elsewhere.
So now I have 8000 extensions I have to read and try?None of the 8000 extensions are organized. None of the extensions are tested or vetted and god knows how they interact with each other. I would happily take a checkbox that does 95% of the right thing with alt-tab than mess with extensions even if one of them works perfectly for me. You talk about clutter with preferences; what about the clutter that is the extension website.
Extensions have a great number of problems, the updating issue is only one of them. And I still haven't had anyone explain how extensions for preferences is in any way preferable to a damn checkbox. Honestly I don't think KDE has too many options, it has too few. But then again I stopped using it after 3.5 so I guess I don't know how it looked after 4.3 or 4.4. I certainly will not argue that KDE 4 is also a UI disaster. More generally, option clutter can be managed and with advanced tabs, hid. I also don't think everything needs to be an option, but there are a couple of dozen common sense options that would barely increase the clutter and made the thing more usable and more palatable.
Similar to you, the alt-tab default is certainly a poor choice for me. Moreover, I am not going to install a random beta extension to "fix" it. By the time I would have enough extensions installed to make the desktop fit me, I am bound to have interaction issues, slow downs, etc. And hunting through a flat website to play wack-a-mole to find all the extensions would waste more than enough time, thanks.
So why not make it a checkbox? This is something that screams give users an easy option and choice. One that is supported and tested. Many users like the gnome/mac style, many users like the windows/cde/etc. style and it is really hard to adjust to the other style.
There seems to be the point of view that having good defaults means you can't have options. These are not mutually exclusive ideas. I might like the default font, but changing the font size is not some crazy esoteric need. By all means give me a desktop that needs no tweaking, but give me the option of changing some settings if I want. And extensions don't count, especially not for preferences and settings. Like don't suspend on lid close, font size, alt-tab behavior, panel placement, and panels, etc.
Having tried KDE 4.1, 4.2, etc. that was not the problem, at least for me. Panels losing options, Kasbar disappeared and I never did figure out what the "semantic desktop" was. But hey, plasmoids everywhere and configuration was no longer easy. I'm still looking for the spiritual successor to KDE 3.5.
Kasbar went away. Panel options like user hiding went away. KDE made design choices that negatively impacted my use (and now lack of use) with KDE. Wasn't that it was buggy, it became something that I didn't want, full stop.
"Intractable" is a word. Two or three successful forks (depending on how you count Unity) and the main employer of most GNOME developers ships their pay OS with classic mode enabled over shell. GNOME limits options (settings kill kittens) to make life easier. Except we have gone from two dominant desktops w/ Gnome 2 and KDE 3, to one dominant desktop with the move to KDE 4,to no dominant desktop with GNOME 3. Now to use Linux I have to consider: Unity, Cinnamon, MATE, XFCE, LXDE and E. Two more if you are new to Linux and haven't experienced GNOME and KDE. How many GNOME devs have linked to the tired saw about how "Linux isn't about choice." Apparently it is all about choice now, starting with your DE.
It is all academic at this point. GNOME could make a 180 reversal but I don't see users coming back. I haven't tried KDE since 4.4 or so; at some point you just permanently lose most of your former users. You could make life easier for your users who do muddle though with extension by adding a couple of dozen options, and it isn't hard to see what those options would be. But even if I could convince you, Day, McCann, Bassi, etc. would never go for it.
It really is an epic fail. GNOME is suppose to be for inexperienced users but ZDNET today suggests migrating from XP to Cinnamon. http://www.zdnet.com/why-linux... At one point I helped an uncle install KDE 3 on his computer. Now no one in the family runs Linux. Linux wasn't even a fleeting thought a couple of years ago when my grandmothers computer died. Windows 8 was out and we paid extra to put her on Windows 7. Maybe MATE or XFCE could fill the gap, but GNOME would be out of the question for her. I doubt she is alone, is your family running GNOME?
I guess I just don't get the mentality. I loved KDE 3 because it was easy to customize and had great choices. Kasbar was the killer app (especially combined with configuring panel behavior). I could control the behavior of windows with a quick right click on the appropriate task. I dislike KDE because of the lack of choice. I can't easily remove what I don't want, I don't have the options I do want. When GNOME devs hold up KDE as too customizable I am staggered because in the ways I care about, it isn't customizable enough.
I've been thinking more about this and have to say, one of your weaker arguments. Your argument seems to be that extensions suck, but might suck less in the future. It sounds like you agree that extensions are inferior to checkboxes for the user when handling preferences but that the trade off for developer ease is worth it. The issue being code complexity and testing. But you then write about how short the extensions are and that they are code reviewed. So there is a trivial amount of complexity, honestly most of the code is already there it is just difficult to set the preference. And your users want the testing. Extensions suck because they aren't tested, they interfere with each other, they break; but then you say we should try them if we don't like stock.
So as I'm still having my coffee this is less lucid then I would like; but which is it? Is this a tiny bit of code that Gnome developers just can't bother adding or is it truly complex, in which case we can expect extensions to be a mess and make the entire system a tottering mess?
Please tell me that your last line about users abandoning Gnome if you add preferences was a joke or a throw away line. Specious argument, and while easy to deflate I'd rather not take the time. If you have your "perfect defaults" no one would even have to see that you had preferences anyway. And actually maybe not specious, I don't think it is even remotely plausible, everyone has been screaming for preferences.
But yes, the attack vector is the least of my worries. You write: "Putting in prefs and checkboxes also increases code complexity." True, having the extension increases the code complexity by at least the same amount. But no testing, no planning, no updates, no review. Just an unorganized mess of hundreds upon hundreds of extensions that conflict.
Gnome has the reputation, and for very good reason, of not acknowledging when users need a choice of behavior. Look at your own plus.google post about the negative feedback on Nautilus. Users want those options, you and I both know it. The response: 1) We don't acknowledge that people don't like the changes. 2) People who don't like the change are elitist. 3) Yes, it is worse but it works better for touch.
Think about leaving the laptop on when the lid closes. No one has argued that that should be the default. Many gave reasons why it should be a preference. Users were not given an option but you can easily read the snarky comments from developers: "you can run this line of code and keep both halves if your system breaks" on blog posts. And self congratulation for doing the tough work while users fume or leave. Same story with power off as the only option under the name. I read that bug report with my mouth hanging open. I honestly claim that 50% of users would want the other option and Gnome developers would not give their users the check box. Moreover, there is a good chance most would come across as arrogant asses while discussing it. You and Emily do a fantastic job, but I read what others write and I don't want to even give Gnome a fair shot; not that it much matters.
Kasbar back? I'm mad at KDE because it LACKS the features I found useful back in KDE 3. I don't mind if people also fault it for Anakondi and Nepomuk. Semantic desktop crap.
Also forgot the "wack-a-mole" effect. 46 pages of extensions, many that do the same thing. Have fun finding and picking the right extension. Again, clearly inferior to system settings and checkboxes.
Slashdot Mirror
Kasbar was... amazing. I'm guessing the window preview part is back (and the first time I ever saw that was Kasbar on KDE but KDE 4 had to throw the baby out with the bath water). But I also miss being able to change window behavior / decoration with a right click on the task. Want to full screen an application? Right click on the task in taskbar and make it full screen. Right click again (because you could throw your mouse in the corner and get it kasbar back on top) and turn it off. Right click and that window is always on top. Right click and pin it across desktops. Right click and remove window decorations. Fucking powerful, fucking easy, fucking intuitive.
As a teacher with a 1 year old trying to fix up a foreclosure, my desire to have to resurrect something that worked just fine four years ago is... well screw it, I'll just use Windows 7 which sucks but less painful than using KDE 4.
Also: fuck beta. Soylnet News is shaping up ok.
I might, but it honestly isn't easy. I think of it like a restaurant. Your favorite restaurant changes owners. They then change from serving the food you like to trying to provide a "dining experience." You still go a handful of times but you get food poisoning twice and bad service a third time. You stop going, complain about losing your favorite place and start eating at the food truck that just isn't the same but at least you don't get sick. Now the owner doesn't "owe" you anything but you still get the feeling of regret and resentment every time you drive past.
The other issue is that Kasbar was by far my favorite piece of KDE 3 and it isn't back in KDE 4. I kind of wonder, what's the point without that?
But will I ever get Kasbar back?
I think we used it for a while. I tried at least KDE 4.0, 4.1, 4.2 and 4.3. When Sergio insisted to SVN that KDE 4.1 was better than 3.X it was the beginning of the end for me. It might be better now, it might be worse. I do know that it was far worse for me for years after KDE 4 came out and at some point you stop looking. And none of that changes that I miss KDE 3 and thought it was a wonderful desktop.
I don't want GNOME apps or KDE apps or Mate apps, I just want some nice apps that work well on Linux.
But you don't get credit for Mate and Unity and Cinnamon. All of them (well Unity is its own weird story) were created out of dislike of the GNOME experience. So now we have more fragmentation then before. GNOME has less influence then before. But GNOME developers and designers seem to think that they should get the same pull as before even though they have shed a great percentage of their users. You keep getting forked, it is silly to call that a good thing. It is also getting silly to point out that not everyone was happy with the transition to GNOME 2.0. That version was not forked. The press was not nearly as bad. And most telling, 3 years later peoples reactions to it was not still negative. Gnome 3: still most users, former users, and potential users are still complaining. Rather than claiming that there are a silent majority of happy users, you might want to take that as a _hint_.
PS: Sorry I keep coming at you. I'm starting to feel a bit like an ass. You do a great job engaging. To me you are the GNOME person that seems to at least is trying to listen to people who aren't happy with GNOME. The people who are representing GNOME on lwn.net could very much use lessons from you on engagement.
That's simple, there won't be _any_ extensions blessed by GNOME devs. (and yes I write that knowing that GNOME devs have written some of the extensions, doesn't mean it isn't true).
I'll give you credit for at least trying. I'm not persuaded by any stretch of the imagination. I think a couple of dozen well chosen checkboxes would be welcome. Data from the extensions website could be used to inform choices of what options to add, along with some common sense, and god forbid, usability testing. Extensions just have too many problems as I've enumerated elsewhere.
So now I have 8000 extensions I have to read and try?None of the 8000 extensions are organized. None of the extensions are tested or vetted and god knows how they interact with each other. I would happily take a checkbox that does 95% of the right thing with alt-tab than mess with extensions even if one of them works perfectly for me. You talk about clutter with preferences; what about the clutter that is the extension website.
Extensions have a great number of problems, the updating issue is only one of them. And I still haven't had anyone explain how extensions for preferences is in any way preferable to a damn checkbox. Honestly I don't think KDE has too many options, it has too few. But then again I stopped using it after 3.5 so I guess I don't know how it looked after 4.3 or 4.4. I certainly will not argue that KDE 4 is also a UI disaster. More generally, option clutter can be managed and with advanced tabs, hid. I also don't think everything needs to be an option, but there are a couple of dozen common sense options that would barely increase the clutter and made the thing more usable and more palatable.
Similar to you, the alt-tab default is certainly a poor choice for me. Moreover, I am not going to install a random beta extension to "fix" it. By the time I would have enough extensions installed to make the desktop fit me, I am bound to have interaction issues, slow downs, etc. And hunting through a flat website to play wack-a-mole to find all the extensions would waste more than enough time, thanks.
So why not make it a checkbox? This is something that screams give users an easy option and choice. One that is supported and tested. Many users like the gnome/mac style, many users like the windows/cde/etc. style and it is really hard to adjust to the other style.
It only takes a minute to leave. I think you have too much confidence that they'll come back. Maybe some will, I didn't, I doubt I will.
There seems to be the point of view that having good defaults means you can't have options. These are not mutually exclusive ideas. I might like the default font, but changing the font size is not some crazy esoteric need. By all means give me a desktop that needs no tweaking, but give me the option of changing some settings if I want. And extensions don't count, especially not for preferences and settings. Like don't suspend on lid close, font size, alt-tab behavior, panel placement, and panels, etc.
Having tried KDE 4.1, 4.2, etc. that was not the problem, at least for me. Panels losing options, Kasbar disappeared and I never did figure out what the "semantic desktop" was. But hey, plasmoids everywhere and configuration was no longer easy. I'm still looking for the spiritual successor to KDE 3.5.
Kasbar went away. Panel options like user hiding went away. KDE made design choices that negatively impacted my use (and now lack of use) with KDE. Wasn't that it was buggy, it became something that I didn't want, full stop.
True. But I had more faith in falling sales fixing the interface than I ever do of GNOME fixing its interface; or KDE bringing Kasbar back.
"Intractable" is a word. Two or three successful forks (depending on how you count Unity) and the main employer of most GNOME developers ships their pay OS with classic mode enabled over shell. GNOME limits options (settings kill kittens) to make life easier. Except we have gone from two dominant desktops w/ Gnome 2 and KDE 3, to one dominant desktop with the move to KDE 4 ,to no dominant desktop with GNOME 3. Now to use Linux I have to consider: Unity, Cinnamon, MATE, XFCE, LXDE and E. Two more if you are new to Linux and haven't experienced GNOME and KDE. How many GNOME devs have linked to the tired saw about how "Linux isn't about choice." Apparently it is all about choice now, starting with your DE.
It is all academic at this point. GNOME could make a 180 reversal but I don't see users coming back. I haven't tried KDE since 4.4 or so; at some point you just permanently lose most of your former users. You could make life easier for your users who do muddle though with extension by adding a couple of dozen options, and it isn't hard to see what those options would be. But even if I could convince you, Day, McCann, Bassi, etc. would never go for it.
It really is an epic fail. GNOME is suppose to be for inexperienced users but ZDNET today suggests migrating from XP to Cinnamon. http://www.zdnet.com/why-linux... At one point I helped an uncle install KDE 3 on his computer. Now no one in the family runs Linux. Linux wasn't even a fleeting thought a couple of years ago when my grandmothers computer died. Windows 8 was out and we paid extra to put her on Windows 7. Maybe MATE or XFCE could fill the gap, but GNOME would be out of the question for her. I doubt she is alone, is your family running GNOME?
I guess I just don't get the mentality. I loved KDE 3 because it was easy to customize and had great choices. Kasbar was the killer app (especially combined with configuring panel behavior). I could control the behavior of windows with a quick right click on the appropriate task. I dislike KDE because of the lack of choice. I can't easily remove what I don't want, I don't have the options I do want. When GNOME devs hold up KDE as too customizable I am staggered because in the ways I care about, it isn't customizable enough.
I've been thinking more about this and have to say, one of your weaker arguments. Your argument seems to be that extensions suck, but might suck less in the future. It sounds like you agree that extensions are inferior to checkboxes for the user when handling preferences but that the trade off for developer ease is worth it. The issue being code complexity and testing. But you then write about how short the extensions are and that they are code reviewed. So there is a trivial amount of complexity, honestly most of the code is already there it is just difficult to set the preference. And your users want the testing. Extensions suck because they aren't tested, they interfere with each other, they break; but then you say we should try them if we don't like stock.
So as I'm still having my coffee this is less lucid then I would like; but which is it? Is this a tiny bit of code that Gnome developers just can't bother adding or is it truly complex, in which case we can expect extensions to be a mess and make the entire system a tottering mess?
Please tell me that your last line about users abandoning Gnome if you add preferences was a joke or a throw away line. Specious argument, and while easy to deflate I'd rather not take the time. If you have your "perfect defaults" no one would even have to see that you had preferences anyway. And actually maybe not specious, I don't think it is even remotely plausible, everyone has been screaming for preferences.
http://www.ioccc.org/
But yes, the attack vector is the least of my worries. You write: "Putting in prefs and checkboxes also increases code complexity." True, having the extension increases the code complexity by at least the same amount. But no testing, no planning, no updates, no review. Just an unorganized mess of hundreds upon hundreds of extensions that conflict.
Gnome has the reputation, and for very good reason, of not acknowledging when users need a choice of behavior. Look at your own plus.google post about the negative feedback on Nautilus. Users want those options, you and I both know it. The response: 1) We don't acknowledge that people don't like the changes. 2) People who don't like the change are elitist. 3) Yes, it is worse but it works better for touch.
Think about leaving the laptop on when the lid closes. No one has argued that that should be the default. Many gave reasons why it should be a preference. Users were not given an option but you can easily read the snarky comments from developers: "you can run this line of code and keep both halves if your system breaks" on blog posts. And self congratulation for doing the tough work while users fume or leave. Same story with power off as the only option under the name. I read that bug report with my mouth hanging open. I honestly claim that 50% of users would want the other option and Gnome developers would not give their users the check box. Moreover, there is a good chance most would come across as arrogant asses while discussing it. You and Emily do a fantastic job, but I read what others write and I don't want to even give Gnome a fair shot; not that it much matters.
Kasbar back? I'm mad at KDE because it LACKS the features I found useful back in KDE 3. I don't mind if people also fault it for Anakondi and Nepomuk. Semantic desktop crap.
Also forgot the "wack-a-mole" effect. 46 pages of extensions, many that do the same thing. Have fun finding and picking the right extension. Again, clearly inferior to system settings and checkboxes.
But mostly because just about every extension is really something that should be a preference and is every way inferior to a checkbox.
Amen, wish I had mod points.
And stopped serving alcohol and limited the jukebox yo Justin Bieber.
Hey Ebassi! Now we have the GNOME folks on.
Animal House, rent it.