Guest post by “The following are major features for Fedora 16: enhanced cloud support including Aeolus Conductor, Condor Cloud, HekaFS, OpenStack and pacemaker-cloud; KDE Plasma workspaces 4.7; GNOME 3.2; a number of core system improvements including GRUB 2 and the removal of HAL; an updated libvirtd, trusted boot, guest inspection, virtual lock manager and a pvops based kernel for Xen all improve virtualization support.”
[This is about Fedora 16 Default Desktop Edition]
GNOME Shell was really well marketed. Yes. Why do I keep trying it? It must be psychological or a desperation to solve the desktop dilemma in my soul. I tried GNOME Shell so many times, and unfortunately, things remain the same. All in the same place. Horrible fonts, some crashes, and a navigation / interaction system I can’t understand. Not that I can’t understand. I can. What I can’t understand is why everything is so out of place and silly.
It’s like someone who tried to reinvent the wheel and said – ok, now cars will sport a new design, using octagonal wheels, to prevent more accidents, since people can’t be trusted to drive a vehicle good enough. That is the exact metaphor of GNOME Shell for me.
Ok, I opened my music player. Now an email client. Now a terminal; now the file manager. Then I go for Empathy, and Firefox. Ok, things got a little too cluttered. So I drag some of them towards the right-side panel workspaces, to alleviate the issue. While I am one application, I have to constantly go to “Activities” to “monitor” what is going on in the background. My eyes can’t see much out of a workspace panel… there’s not much to see, apart from the fact that I have to select *THAT* workspace and completely let go loose of what I was doing. Was I in Firefox? What was I doing? That is where the Linus’ quoted “mess” comes in.
And the process keeps going and going. Ok, I have counted now that I went to Activities for at least 100 times in 40 minutes. That is where the Linus’ quoted “crazy” comes in. I feel it.
Suddenly, my brain gets an apnea. Like sleeping apnea. You stop for a moment, and there’s distraction. (In apnea, you get a halt in your breathing system, and your brain wakes you up, not letting you sleep). I browse workspaces all over again to see what I am doing. Ok, I was trying to browse for a file. But Firefox is at another workspace, which means that I have to go back to Activities and move workspaces again just to get to it. That is where the Linus’ quoted “head up the arse” comes in.
Now I see a established distro making a decision to use this desktop as default. A distro that is preferred by Linus Torvalds himself. And no one to question. Every Fedora user seems to be happy, accepting this. Number 3 at Distrowatch.com, things are calm, quiet. Good enough. Millions using it. That is where the Linus’ quote “unholy” comes in. Unholy because despite these facts, everybody is happy with it, accepting as it was the Holy Grail in modern desktop design.
Wait, I was told by a GNOME propaganda video that GNOME 3 was made to minimize distraction. Well, I am dsitracted… What now? I am fully distracted because I have to just drop things and go to Activities to take care of other things. Who is the responsible for this entire sh1te? I would at least have fired this group of people.
I tried. And I can’t use it. Brain apnea. Mess. For people who fire up 3 applications and like to see 3D effects, it might be cool. It may even compete with Google Chrome OS. But… let’s be serious. Not a GNOME 2 replacement at all.
Unholy Mess – oh he knows what he says. Precisely.
Unfortunately, Fedora 14 was my last Fedora. GNOME 3 will eventually hit Red Hat stock product. And this will be another story.
All I wanted is that was a huge call out for MATE (GNOME 2 fork). A huge call out from developers everywhere to make this brand into the mainstream and keep us Linux users with sane choices. MATE started with one guy. There may be more now. Lift up the flag. Spread the word. MATE can be even bigger than GNOME. There’s still no website. No foundation. We need it. We need the support of all developers. To port MATE to GTK 3, to port new themes, to re-structure the system back end and get rid of silly dependencies. It can be done. Really.
This was the last time I used GNOME Shell. Today.
And to my surprise, a live Fedora session may/will crash if you start installing stuff. From USB stick or Live CD in RAM. Curiously I havent’t experienced this with Ubuntu Live CDs… ever, even after installing tons of apps in a single session.
Fedora, blows everything again. It’s a shame.
Edited 2011-11-09 01:28 UTC
Fedora is more than GNOME shell, if you don’t like it use the KDE spin or the XFCE spin, don’t confuse the DE with the distro.
Did you read the very first line between brackets?
Besides, I do not enjoy KDE spins, neither XFCE spins.
Weird, I was told that the KDE spin of Fedora had the best KDE experience.
Your first line is completely undone by your last line:
So, really, you’re slamming Fedora because you don’t like Gnome 3.
I suppose “yum install @kde-desktop” was too tough?
Bonus hint: “yum install system-switch-displaymanager”
Slam the DE or slam the distro… if the distro gives you a choice, you can’t slam the distro because you don’t like the DE.
I get the impression that he has issues with both gnome shell and fedora itself, based on pointing out deficiencies in both. why is he only allowed to call out one or the other in any given thread?
Bollocks.
First of all, the GNOME Shell is now the default DE for Fedora. The default live CD points to a GNOME Shell Live CD. The DVD, as in default installation, installs GNOME Shell as main DE. I am not given a choice, unless I want it to be customized my way. Ok, any monkey can install KDE/XFCE using the DVD install.
Alright, but I’ve seen the spins and they are… just… horrible. XFCE a sort of Windows 95… and KDE a sort of customized Kubuntu. Even Kubuntu looks better in its defaults. This is not to mention how messy the DE’s icons get if you install 3 DE’s. Wait, I see in gnome-shell now 3 icons for terminal… Which is the gnome native one? Oh, do I need to remove gnome terminal then?
I could make a huge list of Fedora shortcomings:
– Hundreds of untranslated software descriptions in Anaconda…
– Live CD crashes and GNOME Shell crashes off the Live CD…
– Ugly fonts…
and the list goes on…
The official fedora IRC channel is ruled by four or five moody ops who set quiet on anyone who starts to “disrupt the channel flow” by making suggestions. The only ones in the past that used to be nice were jeremy and mharris and they were actually redhat workers. We didn’t have Fedora at that time. Now we have this bunch of god-wanna-be dcr226, DiscordianUK…etc.
So no, I think this is enough…Fedora just blows everything again and again…
Edited 2011-11-09 14:12 UTC
That’s why Ubuntu become more and more popular. Unfortunately Ubuntu’s turn is also over now. It’s mint’s turn now
1 for mess and crazy and “head up the arse”
use Alt+tab and ctrl+alt+up/down arrow keys; well only alt+tab will be easier for you. or right-click on the ‘dash’ icons
2 unholy
make it holier by customizing with shortcuts, extensions; just because you dislike some parts of it and don’t know how to work with it and feel lazy to learn, that does not make it unholy
3 Wait, I was told by a GNOME propaganda video that GNOME 3 was made to minimize distraction. Well, I am dsitracted… What now?
use alt+tab and dash icons (all the activities related distractions will be gone for you);
Ridiculous. I prefer to go to the gym, instead of this.
>Ridiculous
You’re just being stubborn like a child.
If you are a keyboard guy, use alt+tab and/or alt+`
If you are a Mouse guy, use ‘activities’ dash icons (ignore the windo overview)
If you are keyboard+mouse guy (like most gamers); press alt+tab (leave tab key keep holding alt key) use the mouse to select the task you want to switch to.
It’s pretty easier with all of the three.
And you are doing all kind of mental gymnastics to make gnome shell look bad.
Tell you what, gnome-shell is really easier than other desktops, if you want to.
The point is he didn’t go through these hoops in 2 and he shouldn’t have to do it in GNOME Shell which is called an improvement. Deal with it is never a good way of thinking.
No, the point is, he’s trolling and somehow got loads of + points from people who have no idea what he’s talking about.
So everyone on the internet is trolling?
You’re so wrong.
Most people know what I am talking about.
You’re just a particular passionate Fedora user.
http://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/gnome-3.html
http://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/fedora-15.html
And eagerly waiting this link to be live:
http://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/fedora-16.html
Edited 2011-11-10 12:19 UTC
Hardly. I’ve been using Debian Sid as my main OS for 10 years, and haven’t tested a single version of Fedora until the latest, which I’ve just installed and played a bit with on a spare partition, previously used for Ubuntu 11.10 (which I still dislike intensely) and FreeBSD 9.0 (which doesn’t work with my hardware). For casual use, it seems to do okay. Gnome 3 is mostly good, with some minor bugs and some poor implementations of design decisions which should work just fine with a few tweaks.
Just try using it the way it’s obviously supposed to be used instead of acting like a giant cry-baby. Being deliberately obtuse doesn’t make you a great critic.
I will explain: It is okay for us to do this: NOT FOR END USERS!
The complaints are for end users, at least for me.
So, while GNOME Shell can be customized, the default is very annoying, additional overhead of hardwork. Telling users, press alt, press alt, or log out first, or just smash your laptop so that it will power down.
If the END USERS are so dumb, who is going to install ‘fedora’ with ‘multimedia’ (gstreamer bad plugins, vlc, mplayer, ffmpeg, libreoffice…. flashplugin, java)?
Let’s compare the issues a dumb end-user faces with Windows and say fedora:
1. Installation (partitioning is still not for YOUR end user)
2. Drivers (can the end-user install drivers – what drivers?)
3. multimedia codecs (windows and fedora, can he/she play MKV, MP4, Flv, OGG, files?)
can your dumb end user do the above?
Just the part that end-users are brain-dead, is where you are wrong that users can’t use alt+tab or can’t press alt key; but wait, in gnome-shell superkey helps the dumb end-user, just press super key and click on the task.
To one such computer illiterate user, I showed him “to shutdown you need to press alt then suspend changes to poweroff…”; he said ok. Then I thought He might find it difficult, so I told him, I’ll install an extension which will save you the extra key press; what he said.. “It’s fine.. press alt is no big deal”
If the user is so dumb (can’t learn and remember or write it down for reference) then he/she don’t deserve to use anything.
So, how many of your dumb end-users installed any os and use it happily? Please enlighten me.
It is obvious, the tech-savvy user installs the OS and shows how to use it. that’s all.
OK I also agree that few things gnome-shell defaults need to be changed:
1. maximize-minimize-close (all three must be there): at least show maximize-minimize buttons on hover on titlebar. Without minimize, the many windows present there make the desktop look cluttered.
2. Replace suspend with poweroff… (that would be easy)
3. And bigger text with application icon in overview; looking at the zoomed out windows do not reveal much.
1. and 2. we can do with gnome-tweak-tool and alternate-status menu extension; 3. needs more love.
And what does your dumb end-user say about windows, KDE, what about mobile-broadband, kick-off menu – how does he wades through all the k-names. what about ‘grouped taskbar buttons’; does he feel comfortable with that?
gnome-shell is definitely easier than other desktops for the end-user, and the learning curve is very short; say a few minutes to 1-2 hours.
When I showed KDE 4.7, my friends said, it’s nice but it is hard. Nobody cared to have kde+linux installed on their system.
When I showed gnome-shell, my friends say, it’s easy, why did you not tell us about it already. I said it just got release a few months back. And 3 of my friends got gnome-shell+linux (fedora 15, archlinux) installed.
end-users are not dumb, they just need to know how to get things done the way they are made; show them, make it easier for them. that’s all.
“For people who fire up 3 applications and like to see 3D effects, it might be cool. It may even compete with Google Chrome OS. But… let’s be serious.”
I’m uncomfortable when people make that kind of assumption. It’s a little insulting for the people who are able to use (and even like) Gnome-Shell for real, complex, work. I’m currently doing my thesis (doctoral degree) under Fedora 16, and I have no problem dealing with lots of windows, on multiple workspaces.
I can understand why some people (or even most people) doesn’t like Gnome-Shell, and your comment was truly interesting to read, but it’s perfectly possible for someone else do adapt to Gnome-Shell, and be very productive with it.
Likewise. I get that some people don’t like it – but some of those people seem to feel that if it doesn’t work for them, it must be utterly broken and that anyone using it must not be a serious user. Yeah, thanks, guys…
You’re not a serious user,If you were you wouldn’t be be screwing around with crap like Gnome 3 which was clearly intended for the Teletubbie set.
Your thesis is complex, but editing it with latex or any other software is not complex. The real complex tasks are entertainment tasks. For serious tasks, the stupidity and inefficiency of Gnome shell can be ignored since people will concentrate more on tasks. In your case, I would assume your concentration would be on the contents of your thesis. For entertainment, that is a different story.
So what you are basically saying is that you prefer to walk on foot, than to drive a car. You will get to the same destination, but slower. Yes, the brain can adapt you. Shortcuts are like “buses”, they take you there too, but you need to pay the ticket, find a seat, pay attention to each stop… We see human beings without cars that are completely adapted without a car, or using the bus. Hell, there are people, who, after 20 years in jail, they just rather be there for good, instead of being released! Perhaps it’s the same thought that disturbs you.
Edited 2011-11-09 14:23 UTC
I never said any of that. You are making the strange assumption that any change or adaptation is the result of a forced, undesirable constraint.
Gnome-Shell works for me. I would not be using it if it was slowing me down. It fits my workflow. If it was slow and unproductive, I would be using OS X, Windows 7, KDE, XFCE…
If I take your car analogy: I live in a very dense, walkable city. Taking my car to go downtown would take me around 40 minutes at rush our, and I still have to pay 25 dollars to park for the day. But if I walk to the subway station and take the train, it takes me 20 minutes, and cost me around 2.50 dollars for the day. So, in my situation, walking and taking public transit is the fastest, cheapest and arguably the best way to move around the city.
It’s the same thing with Gnome-Shell. It fits my workflow, the work I’m doing, and the way I think. If walking and using public transit where not the best way to move around for me, I would take my car more often.
So you are the one person who is the target of gnome-shell. They’re glad you like it. If it fits your work flow, why care? Those who are happy with the Shell, ok. But it’s good that at least you can understand why the majority is not happy with it.
I was simply in disagreement with your assumption that Gnome-Shell was usable only by people doing very light work with their computer. I don’t see anything peculiar about sharing my point of view.
As for the popularity of Gnome-Shell, the truth is that we have no idea how much people really like or dislike it. The only thing we know for certain is that the people who don’t like it are a lot more vocal about it. Has you said, people who like it should not really care anyway.
Frankly, I think it’s impossible for Gnome-Shell to appeal to everyone without destroying the very core concept behind it (or offering an insane amount of customization, which will not happen anytime soon). The best thing would be to have a very well maintained, more “classic” shell as an alternative. If it’s good, I’m certain some distro will use it as default. Gnome-Shell, has flawed as it may be for a lot of people, is one more choice for desktop Linux users, and choice is good, I think.
Actually, choice is bad for Linux. We have an absurd range of choices which mine the desktop. Toolkits, UI behaviors, inconsistency. Sure Linux is fun, and choice needs to be limited for sanity. We never had a time like now – it’s like the GNOME team kicked out a whole entire sandcastle, and Ubuntu going nuts with its Mac OSX brother Unity.
Choice is not inherently bad by default. When choice becomes bad is when you fragment everything to hell. For example, having a dozen different themes to choose from is probably not going to cause any massive incompatibilities. However, having a dozen different desktop environments and/or toolkits is a different story …
Isn’t what you said, exactly what I said?
So you never used workspaces before? What you rant about have NOTHING to do with Gnome3. That could happen on any desktop. IF you have 10 windows overlapping each other, how can you ever see whats happening in the bottom? Answer: you can’t very easily! There are shortcuts for moving things to other workspaces. There are shortcuts for moving to other workspaces. While I don’t like the fact that they don’t seem to want to listen to users, I am happy that its all javascript for the most part. Extensions will make up for what they take out.
Edited 2011-11-09 02:58 UTC
No, I never had to use more than one workspace. Actually, I never will use – to me is a “non-feature”. If you like it, praise the Lord. But most don’t use it. On the contrary of what you’re saying, GNOME 2 has a feature in the task-list which colours the window that needs your attention. I have been living with that perfectly fine. XP had that, W7 has this.
I don’t have that in gnome-shell, although it has a notification system that says “Nautilus is now ready”. But I don’t even have a tasklist and I have to move to the crazy Activities a zillion times. Then I have to hunt for 2 seconds what I am looking for, which window I need to monitor what’s happening. Should I have a tasklist, I would just have clicked on the minimized window? This is proof of how the Shell is silly. The direction is to make even this faster, and not slower, like the Shell does.
I think gnome-shell has this appeal because of its effects, and it’s faster than KDE by a thousand miles. Ok, I give you this credit. But it’s a toy DE. For the faint of heart. For daily computer use, it’s a no-go. And it’s just not me saying. Many dinosaurs of OSS are speaking against it.
I am sick and tired of this talk about shortcuts. CTRL+C, CTRL+V, CTRL-Z and ESC are enough to me. If I wanted to use the keyboard other than typing I would be using ratpoison or plain terminal. But apparently gnome-shell wants to take you to the “next level” of knowing shortcuts. Bad news is that I don’t need to use any other stupid combination of shortcuts in most DE’s.
Edited 2011-11-09 13:55 UTC
I see. You do raise some good points about things that are missing. I miss most of those features myself. Personally I hate the top bars in Gnome3. With widescreen lcds why would I want to give up ANY vertical real estate. That top bar would be just fine if I could hide it. But criticizing the DE because you don’t want to use the keyboard shortcuts is like me complaining that I have to use a mouse in KDE.
I wanted to use this. (Like Thom said in his latest KDE article).
But I can’t.
In fact I was one of the most excited when GNOME 3 was going to be released.
And shortcuts, my friend, are nonsense.
Shortcuts are to help in certain situations, but not to be a constant resource. Don’t you agree? If they become a constant resource, then the graphical experience is rendered to nothing.
That is why graphical interfaces were designed. To minimize the use of the keyboard, among other many things.
Actually I went to the gnome IRC channels to request a feature:
– Start “Activities” by right-click button, anywhere on the screen, being that, the first right-click belongs to the application; the second right-click belongs to the Shell, activating “Activities”. Like when you open a folder with 1 or 2 clicks (with the left mouse button). This would save my fist from hurting so much, and save my left hand from doing any work; and save my left hand to do just regular typing, instead of looking 4 seconds for shortcuts combinations. One could get used. But then, I could be a ratpoison user then, and never care about GNOME or KDE…
GNOME guys have said that this is impossible using Xorg, because of the way Xorg works. It can’t interpret the first and second mouse clicking. Since I don’t know how X works, as in structure, I just shut up.
I also suggested that this right-click activation of “Activities” could be started from right-clicking the voids in the top panel. But at this point… you need to spend 12 hours on the channel to get an answer. But they’re nice people, anyway.
Edited 2011-11-09 18:55 UTC
They should look at Wayland.
Edited 2011-11-09 21:09 UTC
Does anybody who actually interacts with the *REAL* world belive this garbage?
I’d suggest you wait for the Linux Mint GNOME Shell Extensions which will have a familiar GNOME-2 like look and probably better and will run on top of GNOME 3. I look forward to the new Linux Mint. http://www.osnews.com/story/25298/Linux_Mint_12_Builds_Custom_Deskt… and http://www.linuxmint.com/tmp/blog/1851/linuxmint12-preview.png
Also here is something else you might find fun to read
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/perlow/why-ubuntu-1110-fills-me-with-rage…
Edited 2011-11-09 10:20 UTC
Thanks for that link. Well I already tried gnome-shell with MGSE. The menu is quite OK, but the task list is something even worse than XFCE, so very unpolished. The experience is confusing. It’s a hack. And as far as I am concern, I get crashes very often when I enable extensions in G3.
Nice acting. Here is a cookie.
No, thanks. I’m on a diet.
Go cry somewhere else. Gnome 3 is fine, if you don’t like it don’t use it and quit your bitching.
Your comment is nowhere near constructive. I want to see if you can argue more objectively, raise some contradiction, some more base. OSNews is free to receive any comment, if it bothers you, just go away.
Same feeling here.
I am an early adapter of GNOME Shell and I like it, but things go wrong:
No Power Off button and was told to:
———> Press Alt
———> Log out so that you can then shutdown!@#!@#$!@#??? Really?!!? Is that a user interface improvement?
———> Use tweak extension
———> Type this command as root: “shutdown -h now”
What about end users? System admin will complain for their end users, not for them. We are okay to just pull the battery out from the laptop just to shutdown the computer, or a better way to smash the laptop against a rock to power it down, but this is a BIG NO to end users.
So GNOME Shell is a niche desktop shell only designed for GNOME Developers and their impressive Design team(I am looking at you ugly icons, ugly icons and ugly fonts, large close buttons and ugly shades of gray, i.e., boring colors) in my opinion. Yes we can use extension as hacks to work-around this mess.
Plus constant hovering over activities complaint and was told to:
———> Use alt shortcut combinations! Note to developers: I am not used to keyboard shortcuts, I am a mouse-only user when it comes to apps switching.
Unity is much better in my use case.
Facts about Fedora:
1. Most GNOME Developers are under the payroll of Red Hat
2. Red Hat is the primary sponsor of Fedora
3. Therefore, GNOME Shell is Fedora 16’s default desktop shell
So DO NOT complain if the GNOME Shell is the default desktop shell regardless of its miserable situation.
GNOME Shell is a failure for me at this moment. (Note, I am not saying that GNOME Shell is failure in general, at least, *it is* for me.)
Can’t stop comparing it to Unity.
Unity, though not perfect, is much better because:
1. Dash bar is consistent
2. Min/Max/Close are still the same
3. Unity is configurable by design, but the Unity team opted to make a stable version first, configuration comes later
4. You don’t have the pain to constantly hover over the top panel just to switch between apps
5. You can access the dash bar with one direction, in GNOME Shell, it is two-way.
6. Scope and lenses
Hmm. I’m still on 13th or so
you might want to upgrade. F13 hasn’t been getting updates in quite a while.
I gave it a try and they have done wonders with the boot time and with the nouveau drivers, the animations in GNOME-Shell are even smoother than my Ubuntu installation with the propietary NVidia drivers, but I still have the problem that it doesn’t detects my Broadcom wireless card, this is something Ubuntu, Mynth, OpenSuse and others do, just not Fedora, but I’ll definitive google for a way to install it.
Nice.
Nouveau never ceases to amaze me too. I’m very impressed with it.
I find it impressive how I can run Nexuiz with nouveau and play it at full speed with native/high resolution on a 23″ LED, or when I boot Linux and I get a full composited desktop without installing the blob.
Nouveau already supports Wayland and KMS as well, which I find it very nice, I can’t wait for the day I can use Nouveau/Wayland/KDE/GS.
I’ve noticed recently in #nouveau the developers already talk about adding video decoding (VDPAU) support. Which is the only thing I miss.
I think it’s impressive what they have achieved in such a short time, considering that Nouveau is all reverse engineered work.
My hats off to the Nouveau developers.
Edited 2011-11-09 06:52 UTC
Last Nvidia chip I used was nForce 430 which was GeForce 6100. Previous to this I used Chrome Graphics. Then I moved to ATI HD 3200. I even used a high-end off-board card from the HD 4xxx series. Unfortunately I had to sell it. I gave ATI the preference because of the radeon open source driver, but then nouveau appeared.
The way you’re saying, would you advise to drop ATI in favour of a new low-end/mid-end Nvidia chip?
I wish the GNU project took the time to design GRUB 2 properly instead of just declaring that the original GRUB is legacy and hacking something flashy right away without much design thoughts.
Like, you know, by actually getting this multiboot 2 specification out of the door. Loading modules at fairly predictable memory locations. Not overwriting user configuration files during updates. Dropping all the hackish Linux-specific stuff or standardizing it.
Oh, well…
Neolander,
“I wish the GNU project took the time to design GRUB 2 properly instead of just declaring that the original GRUB is legacy and hacking something flashy right away without much design thoughts.”
I actually use syslinux to work around quirks with GRUB/GRUB2 and disk mapping (/boot/grub/device.map) which needs to be kept in sync between linux and the bios. Most bootloaders can just use DL and run whether the image is on a CD/thumb drive/hard disk/etc, but no, not grub. Grub infuriatingly tries to predict the linux drive mapping at time of boot and tries to boot off the wrong drive if that ever changes.
(did you get my email?)
Yep, I just am not done writing the reply yet. For my defense, rock n roll gods gave me a burst of inspiration concerning the design of an OS component, and that stuff had to be written down quickly before the inspiration burst ends.
That’s all I had to say.
It sure does.
Right now i’m running OSX, since the major DE’s (and the change to a new, unfinished one for the distro people love to hate) made desktop linux unbearable for a while there. Until now, i didn’t see any light on the horizon (well, perhaps unity in ubuntu 12.04 will get it “right” for once), but with fedora 16, i might actually go for a linux desktop again.
I’m actually running the gnome-shell fallback mode, and it’s quite nice, aside from a few cosmetic glitches. Well, that and the fedora theme defaults blows. But i guess i’m shallow, coming from a mostly pixel perfect OSX desktop. Fixed that with some gnome-look.org love.
The one thing i miss the most though, is the “smart” window positioning mode from compiz, where windows will be placed in the most unused areas of the desktop, even if they overlap other window somewhat. Mutter/Metacity does this thing where is places window beside each other if there’s room, but if there isn’t (because window would overlap slightly), it cascades window right over each other. So, i wish mutter was more configurable, but that goes for the whole desktop in general i suppose.
I must admit, Gnome-Shell is really on the right path and I knew Fedora will bring it to a very stable Desktop by default.
Whatever Linux is today in Limbo when it comes do the Desktop, I’m having a lot of fun trying all of them and learning from it’s ups and downs.
Gnome-Shell is really on the right path
Would you do me a favor? Could you satisfy my curiosity?
Can you answer this question?
Gnome-Shell is on the right path towards what?
I’d like to know.
Yes, interesting question. I’d also like to know where it is going towards to.
Edited 2011-11-09 17:33 UTC
I have installed so many times between alpha, beta, and now final. Can never get nvidia to work. It boots and I see the nvidia logo, and gnome shell loads, but it is PAINFULLY slow. Someone else on IRC was having the same problem… no solution. I filed a bug with Red Hat and they said they don’t package the driver so they don’t support it. Whatever… thats garbage. I can’t believe it shipped in the state it is in.
I really wanted to like Fedora but with no nvidia drivers its not worth my time. I guess I’ll try Linux Mint now, I know my drivers work fine there.
Try nouveau, it should work better than the nvidia blob.
Happy Ubuntu 10.10 user here. No Gnome 3, no Unity. Just plain Gnome 2.32
What did you do? Did you install the server version with X libs and compiled GNOME 2 source? I’d like to know what you did…
he’s referring to the version from last year that we’re still using because nothing has improved since then
🙂 and Firefox 8 is running fine …
Life is good.
Oh yes, that would be Maverick. I can’t cope with these version numbers.
Edited 2011-11-10 12:13 UTC
I decided to lay down my prejudices against Ubuntu and tried the LiveCD session of Unity.
I will admit now, it’s not *THAT* bad. It’s pretty usable. Not very much configurable. Canonical really polished things around. I wished I could move the side panel or resize it to make it smaller – right now I can’t. There’s a hack to put it on bottom, I will test it. But comparing to GNOME Shell, it is more usable.
Now, the interesting thing of all is… I also installed GNOME Shell inside a LiveCD session, and to my surprise, it feels and runs much faster than Fedora’s. Ubuntu is booting faster, taking it to lightDM and it takes half a second for GNOME Shell to load. I counted at least 9 seconds for GNOME Shell to load in Fedora after GDM login.
Although I don’t agree much with Unity, I may change my mind. But am amazed on how faster GNOME Shell is on a Live CD. Another thing is… I keep installing stuff on the LiveCD session of Ubuntu, and it doesn’t crash. Try that on Fedora!!!!
I just got the F16 DVD ISO and used unetbootin to put it on a bootable USB stick. I then booted from the stick when plugged into a Dell Mini 9 which has Broadcom wi-fi onboard (and isn’t plugged in via ethernet).
Whilst Anaconda detected the Broadcom wi-fi, it (still) has no driver for it, so it just hung around not doing a lot on about the 5th install screen (just after the partitioning and boot screens). When I clicked on Cancel, the installer refused to go on further! So does this mean Anaconda now *insists* on a network connection even before it asks if I want to get updates or use a third-party repo? Not good – no previous Fedora has ever insisted on this, so I’m not happy at all…
In case you’re wondering, I use the wl driver goodies from rpmfusion post-installation (yes, by downloading them on a USB stick on another machine first) – this is how I got wireless working on the Mini 9 in F14 for example.
Edited 2011-11-13 20:14 UTC