mga2b3 and GNOME 3

[tarazed]

Have just started testing the latest Mageia 2 beta on live CD, posting
messages to mageia-discuss. That is not the place to express my
opinion of GNOME 3 = totally horrible. One of the most dreadful
interfaces I have ever encountered and I have been an ardent fan of
GNOME for 15 years. GNOME 2 allowed me to work just as I wished and
basically ignore most of it. All I ever needed was a panel to which I
could attach favourite applications and the many utility programs
which I have developed over 20 years. That and a background which
could be set to any image and virtual workspaces to place half a dozen
terminals and a browser. I presume that my own programs could be
transferred to the favourites bar as icons but that would need a
development environment including ruby, tcl/tk and emacs. At this
stage I am unwilling to install Mageia 2. Unix and Linux have always
been about choice - give the user the tools and let her do with them
what she will. GNOME 3 is obtrusive, claustrophobic and makes the
users feel as if they are no longer in control of the machine, just
like MS Windows in fact, tail wagging the dog.

One can only hope that somebody at Mageia will have the time to update
the GNOME 2 package for Luddites like me, at least until it becomes
unmaintainable. I have neither the time nor the expertise. When the
dark day comes I shall have to freeze Mageia and ignore all later
releases.

Or maybe the good people at GNOME will take notice of all the complaints and
fork in the direction of the old user-friendly interface. What I
suspect is that Mageia will take notice of all the complaints and
simply drop GNOME altogether. What is the point of maintaining an
interface which everybody hates?

None of this is meant to denigrate the GNOME developers, who must have
worked extremely hard to produce the latest offering, having taken a
populist decision based on the way the world seems to be going. Kudos
to them.

[doktor5000]

Hate is such a strong word. An you can be sure that certainly not everybody hates GNOME3, we even have some GNOME developers aboard. Also many users like it. IMHO this will be the same as with the transition to KDE4. First everybody, even long term KDE users disliked that move, but it always got better.

[tarazed]

Yes, I know. Shouldn't use such emotive language or assume everybody feels the same. Nonetheless I cannot see how it can ever progress in a direction which would suit me. I feel totally comfortable with the current GNOME 2. As far as I am concerned the actual interface needs no more development. It is perfect as it is. I love it (emotive language again). KDE does not suit me either but I imagine it would be better than GNOME 3. One way GNOME could be improved is to offer a choice of a legacy interface for anachronisms like me.

Anyway, thanks for your reply and apologies to anybody who might be offended by my tirade.

[martinw]

The new GNOME 3 shell is not to my liking either. However, I'm using GNOME 3 in fallback mode, and my desktop looks and works just like GNOME 2. Maybe there are some features missing, but I think most things on your wish list are there. Three things to get you started:

• Selecting a "GNOME Classic" session when you log in will start GNOME in fallback mode
• Installing the gnome-tweak-tool package will give you a "Advanced Settings" menu option
• To modify the panels, hold down the Alt key when using the centre or right mouse buttons

[ferri]

For exactness:
GNOME 3 is background which provides its tools to Gnome Shell. Therefore, we are talking about controversial Gnome Shell.

Cinnamon (developing by Linux Mint) has as background GNOME 3 too and seems to be more usable. Some other distributions already adopted it. But it is still under strong development.

[tarazed]

Thanks martinw for that information. I guess I should do an install on the test machine and try it out properly. And read up on Cinnamon.

[winstonteacox]

The Gnome-Classic Mode is not that bad, but
- as I understand it will not be developed any further, and ...
- you can get nearly the same with LXDE, but much faster. Have a look:

Bildschirmfoto.jpg (79.44 KiB) Viewed 6033 times

cheers,
Bernd

[martinw]

I gave LXDE a try, but there were a number of small things and one big thing that made me stick with GNOME Classic mode. The big thing is that LXDE doesn't handle spreading the desktop over multiple displays very well. It extends the panel across the full width of the combined display. If you use a bottom panel, and your displays have a different vertical size (in pixels), you can't see or use the part of the panel on the shorter display. If you are using this on a notebook plugged into a projector, you don't want the panel to appear on the projected display at all.

GNOME Classic mode will be available for the lifetime of Mageia 2. If it's no longer supported when Mageia 3 comes out, I'll have to look at the alternatives again.

[ferri]

I give attention to MATE for Gnome 2 fans.
MATE is a fork of Gnome 2.
http://mate-desktop.org/about/

[mriccardo]

Mageia+Gnome3=Love
Testing and approved , very good work

Gnome LiveCD x86_64
Language: Brazilian Portuguese
PC - Intel 945G - HD 160 Sata - mem. 2GB - Networking: Atheros and Realtek RTL-8139

Livecd and hd installation without problems, after installing two occurrences: 1 - plymouth did not work on boot, 2 - media repositories did not work (contained in the livecd), removed all the repositories and added new set media repositories and all ok.

[tarazed]

GNOME Classic fits the bill. Need to figure out how to make sessions persistent across boots.

[dave]

Mate and cinnamon are the solutions.

[martinw]

Mate and cinnamon are the solutions.

Not until a volunteer steps forward to package and maintain them for Mageia.

[martinw]

GNOME Classic fits the bill. Need to figure out how to make sessions persistent across boots.

Report back here if you do find out - I'd like to know too.

Be warned that there is still support for configuring GTK2 based applications lying around (e.g. Tools->Configuration Editor). Using such tools has no effect on GTK3 based applications. For GTK3 configuration, there is a command line tool called 'gsettings'.

[mriccardo]

almost everything that is new, dislike or suffer some kind of resistance occurred with kde and gnome now, I particularly like the gnome3, you can easily add extensions that can help you improve productivity, visit https://extensions.gnome.org, live in the past is museum with all due respect, we must always adapt/suit the new interfaces and technologies.

[tarazed]

Touché. We do have to accept that "there is a tide in the affairs of
men and technologists" which means the disappearance of old values and
technologies at some point. The crucial issue is the amount of
community effort available in Linux to maintain the frameworks which
diehards like me prefer. Right now GNOME 3 is a good choice because
it still has GNOME Classic. After using it for a couple of days I am
beginning to feel at home again, but how long can the idyll last?

This is getting into Wizard's Lair territory you think?

[MrBeauregard]

almost everything that is new, dislike or suffer some kind of resistance occurred with kde and gnome now, I particularly like the gnome3, you can easily add extensions that can help you improve productivity, visit https://extensions.gnome.org, live in the past is museum with all due respect, we must always adapt/suit the new interfaces and technologies.

funny, I've always believed that the world is what we make of it.

I totally agree with tarazed, I mean....how can there still be users saying it's possible to work effectively with these kinda ***-DE like gnomes-hell.

I'm currently using Xfce with albatross theme and you know what, it looks like gnome 2 wihout any ristrictions (gnome3)

[wobo]

funny, I've always believed that the world is what we make of it.
.....
I'm currently using Xfce with albatross theme and you know what, it looks like gnome 2 wihout any ristrictions (gnome3)

There, you say it yourself. There's always the main stream of innovations and evolution. If you don't want to follow this there is mostly a way to stick to something you don't want to change.
Nobody is forced to have an automobile and use it. There's always the option to go on with horse&carriage.
If you don't want to use Gnome3 and the gnome-shell, you are not forced to use it. But you have to accept reality (like "we do not have manpower enough to keep 2 versions alive").

[MrBeauregard]

funny, I've always believed that the world is what we make of it.
.....
I'm currently using Xfce with albatross theme and you know what, it looks like gnome 2 wihout any ristrictions (gnome3)

There, you say it yourself. There's always the main stream of innovations and evolution. If you don't want to follow this there is mostly a way to stick to something you don't want to change.
Nobody is forced to have an automobile and use it. There's always the option to go on with horse&carriage.
If you don't want to use Gnome3 and the gnome-shell, you are not forced to use it. But you have to accept reality (like "we do not have manpower enough to keep 2 versions alive").

I'm sorry but you don't get it, I was just replying to his line: "we must always adapt/suit the new interfaces and technologies."

this "argument" is pretty laggy, there's no need of some unconditional will to progress, just because something can be done, doesn’t mean it should be done. I respect the choice of gnomes-hell, I was just telling him his own constraints regarding to his "we must" and "live in the past is museum" "aguements". So, if you want the freedom to say "gnome 3 is cool, accept reality", give me the freedom to say either "no, I don't think so" or "sry, I don't like gnome 3 for some different reasons".

regarding to your "automobile-example": I think you shouldn't bollix sth. here, I'm not criticizing gnome because I think I'm forced to use it, like you said...I'm free to choose but that has nothing to do with my criticism on gnome. according to your logic I should keep my mouth shut concerning everything that doesnt affect me, and that's the biggest bs I've ever read, sry.

[wobo]

Thx for your insightful comment in a matching wording, especially in the last line.
You don't really expect that I comment that?

[MrBeauregard]

I'm sorry, but that's your opinion?

You really think you're right about that, I mean a guy with over 1200 posts...interesting insight of participation in a forum!

[tarazed]

martinw, re persistence.

Try this:

Run gnome-session-properties from the command line, which gives you Startup Applications Preferences.
Select options tab
Check the only option: Automatically remember running applications when logging out

One trial;
workspace 1 :: 2 gnome-terminals + gkrellm
workspace 2 :: 1 gnome-terminal (su to root)
workspace 5 :: firefox resized

After login
workspace 1 :: 2 gnome-terminals + gkrellm - positions altered
workspace 2 :: empty
workspace 5 :: firefox back to default size and position

Looks like it works more or less. The terminals keep their current working directories, sometimes.
Another trial lost one of the terminals and again, any text vanished. I assume that gnome-terminal is now GTK3 based which might explain the insufficiencies. The file command says that gnome-session-properties was compiled against kernel 2.6.33.

[wobo]

I'm sorry, but that's your opinion?
You really think you're right about that, I mean a guy with over 1200 posts...interesting insight of participation in a forum!

Ok, maybe you misunderstood, so I will make it clearer. I already gave my opinion about the issue in the post before.
My last post was the follow-up to your last sentence only: "according to your logic I should keep my mouth shut concerning everything that doesnt affect me, and that's the biggest bs I've ever read, sry." 1. I never wrote that nor something similar. 2. I'm not used to have my writing called this way. I'm not offended nor angry, I only take the freedom to decide which conversation I continue and which I don't. That's one of the experiences with forum discussions.

[MrBeauregard]

of course you never wrote that, but you said I'm "not allowed" to criticize gnome 3 because I don't have to use it.

just to make it very clear, I'm free to criticize whatever I want, and you're free to tell me your point of view ("gnome isn't that bad, because..."), instead of telling me I should just shut up/stop criticizing because I don't have to use it.

if topics getting discussed that way this forum would be useless...

[wobo]

of course you never wrote that, but you said I'm "not allowed" to criticize gnome 3 because I don't have to use it.

Where did I say that? Pls stick to the things which were written and do less interpretation.

I am always free to comment on things whether I use them or not. If this is not allowed somewhere I would not go there. Of course, comments about things I know and understand will always have more weight than comments about things I know nothing about.