Life is too short to depend on unstable software • Hacker News Board

Re: Life is too short to depend on unstable software

#171

Post by doubleunplussed » Sun, Nov 14, 2021, 11:10 PM UTC

Mikeb85 wrote: post #166

doubleunplussed wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still see GNOME as the most practical DE to run - but it's telling that absolutely nobody uses it as shipped: at minimum they install dash to dock or dash to panel, re-enable minimise buttons, and install a system tray extension. The project seems to usually come around in the end, and it reminds me of some quote critical of the US's foreign policy I think, that "You can always count on the Americans to do the righ…

> I still see GNOME as the most practical DE to run - but it's telling that absolutely nobody uses it as shipped: at minimum they install dash to dock or dash to panel, re-enable minimise buttons, and install a system tray extension. And all those things can be done easily, intuitively, through a GUI. Kind of a testament to Gnome if you ask me. I don't mind the default behaviour though. Minimalist and nice.

If you are in the know and are aware that dash to panel, dash to dock, and whichever system tray extension is the one maintained by the Ubuntu developers are the ones you want. Otherwise you get one of the million broken extensions.

And this is after figuring out how to install a browser extension (from the browser extension store) and the "connector" library from your package manager, to be able to install shell extensions from the browser. I wouldn't call it intuitive at all.

And the re-enabling of minimise buttons is in gnome-tweaks, which you have to install separately, and which I'm used to, but is a bit weird to put such crucial functionality in a separate settings app.

Good thing Ubuntu sets these things up by default for their users.

Re: Life is too short to depend on unstable software

#172

Post by md8z » Mon, Nov 15, 2021, 12:41 AM UTC

hsn915 wrote: post #155

md8z wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"over time software should converge on being bug free" Yeah, and the way that's done is by refactoring things, removing buggy/deprecated things, and not adding any more new features/requirements... So, pick your poison, I guess? I'd love to go move on to the next job as much as the next person, but somebody still has to be paid to do those things. I don't see what the significant difference is there with free-with-pa…

All I hear is excuses. I'm not interestd in hearing excuses.

That seems dismissive and I don't know why you would be hearing that. If there is a way to do this that you think would not qualify as an excuse, then you should mention it, otherwise both of us are stuck to what we are limited to by these bodies that require rest and sustenance.

Re: Life is too short to depend on unstable software

#173

Post by hsn915 » Mon, Nov 15, 2021, 1:42 AM UTC

md8z wrote: post #172

hsn915 wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All I hear is excuses. I'm not interestd in hearing excuses.

That seems dismissive and I don't know why you would be hearing that. If there is a way to do this that you think would not qualify as an excuse, then you should mention it, otherwise both of us are stuck to what we are limited to by these bodies that require rest and sustenance.

You're creating a false dichotomy: we can either add new features, or stabilize the current version, but we can't do both!

Yes you can. You can spend some time to stabilize, and then add new features on top, then stabilize again if needed.

Re: Life is too short to depend on unstable software

#174

Post by md8z » Mon, Nov 15, 2021, 4:43 AM UTC

hsn915 wrote: post #173

md8z wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems dismissive and I don't know why you would be hearing that. If there is a way to do this that you think would not qualify as an excuse, then you should mention it, otherwise both of us are stuck to what we are limited to by these bodies that require rest and sustenance.

You're creating a false dichotomy: we can either add new features, or stabilize the current version, but we can't do both! Yes you can. You can spend some time to stabilize, and then add new features on top, then stabilize again if needed.

I am not saying that's a dichotomy, I mean this purely as a function of resources. Sure you can do both but that takes up twice as much time as if you only did one of them. So however much you want to do of either is really up to the project's management goals and what the customer is willing to pay for...

Re: Life is too short to depend on unstable software

#175

Post by intrasight » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 8:28 PM UTC

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #83

intrasight wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still have the Mac. It's now over 35 years old! Remember that the computer only had 128K of memory. There were like three applications. MacWrite, MacPaint, MacDraw. MacDraw was the most crash-prone. What else might you like to know? I'll have to dust off some old neurons.

Is that the infamous Mac model that Steve Jobs intentionally under-specked in order to hit a consumer friendly price point (at the time) and as a consequence was dog-slow and basically unusable for anything serious?

And the rest is history. And the first or second largest market cap company in the world.