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GNOME 3 Released

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Re: GNOME 3 Released

#71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hazarding a guess here: because some of us might enjoy different colors and fonts?

I used to change themes a lot back in the day ; now I just wish for a usable desktop that doesn't get in my way, and Gnome / KDE are awful from that point of view. That's the reason why I'm developing software on Linux, but dual-boot in a Windows 7 partition for design-related work, as that requires mouse-based interactions, and in Gnome I can't even rely on copy/paste to work properly. Changing themes and fonts is n…

   For me priorities would be having basic
   functionality, like copy/paste, working properly
It really should work. Since ages. Care to elaborate where copy and paste doesn't work in Gnome? Cause that's really a bug.

   or how about a task-switching applet (activated 
   on alt-tab) that can use the mouse to select the 
   window you want;
You can do that with Gnome 3. Press Alt-Tab, hold down Alt and click around to your app. Works like a charm here.

   or desktop notification windows that you can 
   close (those notifications in Ubuntu are really 
   obnoxious)
In Gnome 3 (and also Gnome 2 fwiw) you can close the notifications by clicking on them. But even better, in Gnome 3 you can set yourself as busy (click on your name in the top-right corner and select "Busy") so notifications will stay silent in the hidden notification area and won't disturb you.

Re: GNOME 3 Released

#72
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people do desire the feature to change themes. A big reason to choose open source in the first place is the flexibility in customization that it brings. It's the opposite of the "Apple mindset" that there's one good way and that's the Steve way.

Many people do desire the feature to change themes. Do they? A big reason to choose open source in the first place is the flexibility in customization that it brings. It's the opposite of the "Apple mindset" that there's one good way and that's the Steve way. I think you are mischaracterizing Apple’s mindset. It’s not about finding the one good way, it’s about finding a good way and the assumption that most people ar…

Yes, the Apple mindset assumes that there is a good way and people are not interested in tweaking that. You can agree or disagree with that.

I do agree that a sane set of defaults is good. It should be usable without customization.

But for one, I am interested in tweaking things. From the operating system to how things look. That's why I use open source. Isn't that the original hacker spirit?

Re: GNOME 3 Released

#73

Does anyone have instructions on how to build this beast?

We have a tool called "jhbuild" that keeps track of all the dependencies and stuff. In short, just get jhbuild from git.gnome.org, build it and do a "jhbuild bootstreap && jhbuild build".

More complete instruction can be found in the wiki: https://live.gnome.org/Smoketesting

If you want to just check out gnome-shell without the other Gnome 3 stuff, you can find instructions on http://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell

Re: GNOME 3 Released

#74
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people do desire the feature to change themes. Do they? A big reason to choose open source in the first place is the flexibility in customization that it brings. It's the opposite of the "Apple mindset" that there's one good way and that's the Steve way. I think you are mischaracterizing Apple’s mindset. It’s not about finding the one good way, it’s about finding a good way and the assumption that most people ar…

Yes, the Apple mindset assumes that there is a good way and people are not interested in tweaking that. You can agree or disagree with that. I do agree that a sane set of defaults is good. It should be usable without customization. But for one, I am interested in tweaking things. From the operating system to how things look. That's why I use open source. Isn't that the original hacker spirit?

It is but various Open Source projects do want to cater to many more people than just hackers. There are several open source desktop environments, they don’t all have to have hackers as their target group, have they? Just looking at Gnome’s website I would argue that maybe Gnome just isn’t for you and that there is nothing wrong with that.

Re: GNOME 3 Released

#75
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to change themes a lot back in the day ; now I just wish for a usable desktop that doesn't get in my way, and Gnome / KDE are awful from that point of view. That's the reason why I'm developing software on Linux, but dual-boot in a Windows 7 partition for design-related work, as that requires mouse-based interactions, and in Gnome I can't even rely on copy/paste to work properly. Changing themes and fonts is n…

For me priorities would be having basic functionality, like copy/paste, working properly It really should work. Since ages. Care to elaborate where copy and paste doesn't work in Gnome? Cause that's really a bug. or how about a task-switching applet (activated on alt-tab) that can use the mouse to select the window you want; You can do that with Gnome 3. Press Alt-Tab, hold down Alt and click around to your app. Work…

    It really should work. Since ages. Care 
    to elaborate where copy and paste doesn't 
    work in Gnome?
Copy something in one app, close it, then try pasting in another app -- sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, depending on the app or on its mood, and this behavior has been going on for ages, up until Ubuntu 10.10, which I'm using.

I'm happy to find that Gnome 3 has usability improvements. I'll definitely try it out.

Re: GNOME 3 Released

#77
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the Apple mindset assumes that there is a good way and people are not interested in tweaking that. You can agree or disagree with that. I do agree that a sane set of defaults is good. It should be usable without customization. But for one, I am interested in tweaking things. From the operating system to how things look. That's why I use open source. Isn't that the original hacker spirit?

It is but various Open Source projects do want to cater to many more people than just hackers. There are several open source desktop environments, they don’t all have to have hackers as their target group, have they? Just looking at Gnome’s website I would argue that maybe Gnome just isn’t for you and that there is nothing wrong with that.

You can tell that by just looking at Gnome's website?

I've been using Gnome for >10 years now. I've never had any big complaints about it (well except for gedit not having a "replace in selection" feature, but there's a plugin for that). Gnome has excellent customization and theming facilities through GTK themes.

I also think the Gnome defaults are pretty good. I've also used KDE and like it but tend to choose Gnome as I'm used to it.

Apple, however, I wouldn't buy because it locks me in too much for my taste. I don't like cages, even cosy golden ones :)

Re: GNOME 3 Released

#78
post #27

Gnome really needs help with their typography (and design in general). Gradients, docks and shiny icons do not make a well designed product. It's clear to see it suffers from the curse of open source software – design by committee, and the featuritis that results from that. There's often "flashy" chrome in OSS, but no solid interactions behind to back it up. It's equally important what you choose to leave out from yo…

Believe me - in the open source world Gnome is the one that leans towards minimalism.

I've found Sawfish+twm to be a sufficient window manager for my purposes.

Re: GNOME 3 Released

#80

Love it! Can't wait to use it. I wonder what the impact is going to be now that Ubuntu is doing it's own UI thing. That's the vast majority of Linux users; so who becomes the premiere Gnome 3 distribution? I was hoping to get a System76 as my next desktop but now I'm not sure; depends if Gnome3 is included in Ubuntu's repos going forward.

Gnome Slackbuild 3.0 has been available for slack 64 for a while, and the stable release hit the mirrors recently. See http://gnomeslackbuild.org/
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