Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Pop_OS 24.04 LTS with COSMIC desktop environment

blog.system76.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 98 posts

Re: Pop_OS 24.04 LTS with COSMIC desktop environment

#31

Post by jorvi »

tmtvl wrote: post #23
foxheadman wrote: post #2

I used to hear about COSMIC and think "Glad to see more choice, but I doubt this will go anywhere". I wanted a Sway-like experience but with a desktop experience, and so tried it. It's surprisingly good: a DE with powerful enough window tiling. It's now my daily driver. Since they're backed by a sole company, I'm still not convinced on their longevity, but remain hopeful! I'm not familiar with Pop OS, which I now rea…

I hard bounced off COSMIC with the complete lack of theming. I can't even set my clock to a reasonable format in it. The only thing it has going for it is sane multi-monitor support, which neither KDE nor GNOME have gotten right so far (though at KDE there is some activity around it, dunno 'bout GNOME).

I really hate that at some point in the past, KDE developers decided that they hated how deeply intuitive virtual desktops are and deprecated them in favor of something deeply unintuitive (Activities). Any issue or complaint mentioning it is shot down with "you're holding it wrong."

Please just give virtual desktops first class support and lets forget about the Activities experiment. Most users hate it.

The attitude regarding it is about as bad as Gnome forcing Overview on everyone, refusing to provide a first party dock or lightweight launcher. Despite almost every distro and 95% of Gnome users immediately installing Dash to Dock.

Re: Pop_OS 24.04 LTS with COSMIC desktop environment

#32

Post by mghackerlady »

criddell wrote: post #15
foxheadman wrote: post #2

I used to hear about COSMIC and think "Glad to see more choice, but I doubt this will go anywhere". I wanted a Sway-like experience but with a desktop experience, and so tried it. It's surprisingly good: a DE with powerful enough window tiling. It's now my daily driver. Since they're backed by a sole company, I'm still not convinced on their longevity, but remain hopeful! I'm not familiar with Pop OS, which I now rea…

I skimmed the linked story and I still don’t really know what POP!_OS is. They are using the Linux kernel and wrote their own desktop environment, but what’s in between that? Does it include all the GNU system tools? Is there a lot of software that takes advantage of the COSMIC desktop environment? Do they have an App Store? Is it closer to something like Ubuntu or is it more like Android?

It's ubuntu with their own desktop and app store (kinda like mint) its also known for being the best linux experience for nvidia users. It's designed for power users and gamers

Re: Pop_OS 24.04 LTS with COSMIC desktop environment

#33

Post by akdor1154 »

dsego wrote: post #18
jsk2600 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's based on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, with their own DE

Does it use snap packages?

They attempt to avoid them, though snaps are still available if you wish.

Flatpak is installed by default and used by their app store, and Firefox is packaged as a deb so you can avoid the snap.

I consider it a deshittified Ubuntu.

Re: Pop_OS 24.04 LTS with COSMIC desktop environment

#34

Post by bsimpson »

tmtvl wrote: post #23
foxheadman wrote: post #2

I used to hear about COSMIC and think "Glad to see more choice, but I doubt this will go anywhere". I wanted a Sway-like experience but with a desktop experience, and so tried it. It's surprisingly good: a DE with powerful enough window tiling. It's now my daily driver. Since they're backed by a sole company, I'm still not convinced on their longevity, but remain hopeful! I'm not familiar with Pop OS, which I now rea…

I hard bounced off COSMIC with the complete lack of theming. I can't even set my clock to a reasonable format in it. The only thing it has going for it is sane multi-monitor support, which neither KDE nor GNOME have gotten right so far (though at KDE there is some activity around it, dunno 'bout GNOME).

I tried a bunch of shells when I got my Legion Go, including COSMIC. It had the worst touchscreen support of any of them.

Now that SteamOS is officially released, I just use KDE. Maybe COSMIC will be better at touch eventually, but since it's a traditional laptop company, I'm not sure.

Re: Pop_OS 24.04 LTS with COSMIC desktop environment

#35

Post by mghackerlady »

criddell wrote: post #22
jsk2600 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's based on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, with their own DE

Based on Ubuntu? So is it basically Ubuntu with Gnome removed and COSMIC added? How compatible are the two OS's? They show icons for Steam, Chrome, Firefox, Zoom, etc... Does that mean they are maintaining their own fork of those applications built for COSMIC?

No? They can run on cosmic, just like they can run on any other desktop. It's a linux distro, it does linux distro things and happens to be built on ubuntu. What part of this are you not getting? Remember when Ubuntu made Unity because they were pissed at the GNOME people? That's what System76 did, they got mad at GNOME because GNOME didn't like how much they were messing with GNOME

Re: Pop_OS 24.04 LTS with COSMIC desktop environment

#36

Post by bsimpson »

kwanbix wrote: post #30

I tried it because another_linux_distro! Sadly, I found the COSMIC dock looks "dead" since they can not implement the genie effect as it is patented by Apple ://///////// EDIT: I refer to this effect: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/eOrvbaKz5H4 It is called magnification effect.

The genie effect was from the original X release in like 99. If there's a patent, it should be expired.

But that's a weird line to draw for which shells you find unacceptable.

Re: Pop_OS 24.04 LTS with COSMIC desktop environment

#37

Post by mghackerlady »

criddell wrote: post #28
pjmlp wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was introduced to UNIX in 1993, Linux in 1995's Summmer, and have lost count how many X Windows desktops or windows managers have come and gone in 32 years.

What's been your favorite? I wasted too much time tweaking Enlightenment. I remember that was fun but I don't really remember much about actually using it. OS/2's Workplace Shell feels like the biggest lost opportunity (and has nothing to do with UNIXy stuff). I really liked Rexx and the SOM stuff felt cleaner than what became COM in Windows.

Enlightenment still exists and works well, I just wish more apps were written around EFL so themes were easier

Re: Pop_OS 24.04 LTS with COSMIC desktop environment

#39

Post by phkahler »

I've often said OSes and DEs have stagnated, so web browsers started innovating in areas they shouldn't have needed to. Tabs is one such area. And now with Cosmic:

Stacks, snapping, and sticky windows

◦ Stack windows to combine them into tab groups like a browser

••• Right click on the header and choose Create Window Stack. Then drag another window to the stack.

••• When tiling windows, simply drag the window on top of another to create a stack.

Tabs are an interesting way to handle multiple instances of the same app (though this sounds like cosmic might mix them too). But in Windows for example, each app would have to do it's own implementation of muli-document handling. Browsers just brought us the tabs metaphor to manage them. I always thought that should be done at a higher level than the apps, and now it's here! I was thinking toolkit level, but go a level up to the DE and mix apps.

Re: Pop_OS 24.04 LTS with COSMIC desktop environment

#40

Post by mghackerlady »

ender341341 wrote: post #20
panick21_ wrote: post #12

I have been using is since early Alpha and overall its pretty good. Certainty bug early on but now that I'm thinking on it I don't remember hitting any real issues in a few months now. I still think the name Pop!_OS is dumb, they should just call it CosmicOS, as this new desktop is their defining feature and its a great name. What is really amazing is that thanks to Cosmic now becoming an important part of Wayland, a…

> the community in total can finally move protocol forward that were blocked by really dumb ideological conflicts that are holding back Wayland. If Cosmic can take Gnome market share, people will be more willing to move on protocols without Gnome and hopefully eventually Gnome will realize that they have to implement this stuff, or at least large users of Gnome will realize it. Can you expand on what you mean here? I…

GNOME is wayland only but either refuses to implement certain things or uses their position to prevent discussions from going anywhere
Post reply on HN