topbanner_forum
  *

avatar image

Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.
Did you miss your activation email?

Login with username, password and session length
  • Tuesday March 19, 2024, 12:07 am
  • Proudly celebrating 15+ years online.
  • Donate now to become a lifetime supporting member of the site and get a non-expiring license key for all of our programs.
  • donate

Author Topic: ARS reviews Linux Gnome 3.0  (Read 5924 times)

zridling

  • Friend of the Site
  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2005
  • ***
  • Posts: 3,299
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
ARS reviews Linux Gnome 3.0
« on: April 12, 2011, 06:58 PM »
ARS reviews the new Gnome 3.0:

gnome-stolen-by-aliens.jpg
http://arstechnica.c...-your-linux-lawn.ars

The new version also represents a major architectural overhaul, with many important enhancements to the GNOME platform's technical underpinnings. But it's not all good news: The new GNOME Shell is built largely with the Clutter drawing toolkit and depends on composited rendering to function properly. If you don't have compatible graphics hardware or drivers, you won't get to run the new shell. It will instead punt you back to a more conventional 2.x-style desktop with regular GNOME panels.

Love the app launcher, though!

zridling

  • Friend of the Site
  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2005
  • ***
  • Posts: 3,299
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: ARS reviews Linux Gnome 3.0
« Reply #1 on: April 12, 2011, 06:59 PM »
PS: That gnome being stolen by aliens can be found here:
http://www.whatonear...5_VG8392_ps_srm.html

Lashiec

  • Member
  • Joined in 2006
  • **
  • Posts: 2,374
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: ARS reviews Linux Gnome 3.0
« Reply #2 on: April 12, 2011, 07:18 PM »
GNOME 3, codename "Pointless waste of space". What's up with the humongous widgets and the insane amount of wasted space in the different windows? Is everyone in the GNOME team using 30" monitors or what? I hope the different Linux distros will come up with sane themes, because I should not be using XFCE just to avoid this horror.

I wonder if the new app launcher will be competing with GNOME Do in terms of features and extensibility?

zridling

  • Friend of the Site
  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2005
  • ***
  • Posts: 3,299
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: ARS reviews Linux Gnome 3.0
« Reply #3 on: April 12, 2011, 10:55 PM »
I wonder if the new app launcher will be competing with GNOME Do in terms of features and extensibility?

Not sure, but that person definitely has the icon text way too small. (I'm a KDE guy since 4.0.) Hoping Tuxman or 40hz has some play time with one of their distros this month to try it out.

Deozaan

  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2006
  • ***
  • Points: 1
  • Posts: 9,746
    • View Profile
    • Read more about this member.
    • Donate to Member
Re: ARS reviews Linux Gnome 3.0
« Reply #4 on: April 13, 2011, 12:12 AM »
Not sure, but that person definitely has the icon text way too small.

This could be why (emphasis added):

As I have previously stated, the general configurability of the desktop has been broadly crippled. You can't change your widget or window manager theme, set a screensaver, or adjust any of the interface colors. Shockingly, even font configuration appears to have been removed. I couldn't find a way to change the default interface font sizes in GNOME 3.0.

Though if you look at the screenshots at full resolution, the font size seems big enough to me.

The article makes it sound as though GNOME 3.0 is super stable and ready to go, so it makes me wonder if Ubuntu will be using it in their eminent Ubuntu 11.4 release...

40hz

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2007
  • **
  • Posts: 11,857
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: ARS reviews Linux Gnome 3.0
« Reply #5 on: April 13, 2011, 08:12 AM »
Hoping Tuxman or 40hz has some play time with one of their distros this month to try it out.

Got it on the schedule. Although at the rate I'm going it will probably be around mid-May before I can really sit down and give it some serious attention. In the meantime, I'm hoping some of the limitations the ArsTechnica article mentioned are only temporary issues that will get resolved by the time I load it up. Gnome lets you do little enough to customize it already.

GNOME 3, codename "Pointless waste of space". What's up with the humongous widgets and the insane amount of wasted space in the different windows?

Couldn't agree more. That excess padding has got to get fixed.

The article makes it sound as though GNOME 3.0 is super stable and ready to go, so it makes me wonder if Ubuntu will be using it in their eminent Ubuntu 11.4 release..

It will likely be in their repositories. But last I heard, Shuttleworth & Co, are totally committed to using Unity as the default desktop starting with release 11.4, aka Natty Numnutz Narwhal.

Most people outside Canonical seem to think this is a 'very bad' idea.

(Note: IMO they also need to lose those release names. Totally bogus. It stopped being clever 11 names back with Dapper Drake.)

 8)
« Last Edit: April 13, 2011, 08:13 AM by 40hz »

Edvard

  • Coding Snacks Author
  • Charter Honorary Member
  • Joined in 2005
  • ***
  • Posts: 3,017
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: ARS reviews Linux Gnome 3.0
« Reply #6 on: April 14, 2011, 12:12 AM »
Been using Xfce since 3.something.
Never looked back, and I keep finding good reasons why...

Deozaan

  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2006
  • ***
  • Points: 1
  • Posts: 9,746
    • View Profile
    • Read more about this member.
    • Donate to Member
Re: ARS reviews Linux Gnome 3.0
« Reply #7 on: April 14, 2011, 04:04 AM »
The article makes it sound as though GNOME 3.0 is super stable and ready to go, so it makes me wonder if Ubuntu will be using it in their eminent Ubuntu 11.4 release..

It will likely be in their repositories. But last I heard, Shuttleworth & Co, are totally committed to using Unity as the default desktop starting with release 11.4, aka Natty Numnutz Narwhal.

Most people outside Canonical seem to think this is a 'very bad' idea.

Unity looks very much like GNOME 3.0 to me. At least from screenshots and videos alone, they seem very similar to me.

40hz

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2007
  • **
  • Posts: 11,857
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: ARS reviews Linux Gnome 3.0
« Reply #8 on: April 14, 2011, 07:25 AM »
Been using Xfce since 3.something.
Never looked back, and I keep finding good reasons why...

+1! I prefer a lighter desktop myself. But that was thanks to #! (CrunchBang :-*) and their choice of Openbox for their default desktop. The fact that much of my personal tech is also showing signs of age could also have a lot to do with it. ;D

#! has an XFCE version as well. But after using both for a while, I find myself with a 'slight but definite' preference for Openbox. Which seems to suggest it's not so much which desktop manager gets used as it does how well it's been implemented and tweaked for a specific distro.

Not to say you couldn't do all of that yourself from scratch. (This is Linux after all!) But that's a huge amount of work, so it's a much better strategy to find something that meets your needs 90% of the way and customize from there.

-----------------
The article makes it sound as though GNOME 3.0 is super stable and ready to go, so it makes me wonder if Ubuntu will be using it in their eminent Ubuntu 11.4 release..

It will likely be in their repositories. But last I heard, Shuttleworth & Co, are totally committed to using Unity as the default desktop starting with release 11.4, aka Natty Numnutz Narwhal.

Most people outside Canonical seem to think this is a 'very bad' idea.

Unity looks very much like GNOME 3.0 to me. At least from screenshots and videos alone, they seem very similar to me.

Hope not! I tried Unity and didn't like it at all. I really thought they crossed the line between "simplified" and "dumbed-down" in its current version.

If I want to ride a training-wheel equipped bicycle while handcuffed and wearing a straitjacket I can always buy something from Apple. At least that way I'll get bragging rights with the Cappuccino Computing Cabal that hogs the tables over at my local Barnes & Noble.


« Last Edit: April 14, 2011, 07:30 AM by 40hz »