The GNOME 3.0 Shell Is Advancing Too

[phoronix]

Phoronix: The GNOME 3.0 Shell Is Advancing Too

Last night an update was published as to the state of Unity in Ubuntu 11.04 Alpha 1, which is the Unity desktop interface that Canonical will be using in their next Ubuntu release rather than the GNOME Shell. Most all other GNOME distributions, however, will be using the GNOME Shell with GNOME 3.0 when released in March. As it so happens, another development snapshot of the GNOME Shell arrived last night too...

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=ODg0MQ

[ryanpg]

The worst thing I've encountered in gnome-shell is the horrible "flat application menu." The lack of categorical organization, and the severely truncated application names, means you're literally left to guess if you've got two or more applications whose name begins with the same letters.

I.e. Armagetron and Armagetron-Server, or if you've got Picasa for linux installed along side Picasa under Wine.

I've actually spent minutes hunting for the application I need, only to become frustrated enough with gnome-shell to give up, and restart err... "gnome-classic."

[89c51]

what i feel they are trying to do with shell is take the current desktop experience and put it under a layer

this adds clicks, scroll/navigate time etc and it is plainly wrong and stupid

[ryanpg]

what i feel they are trying to do with shell is take the current desktop experience and put it under a layer

this adds clicks, scroll/navigate time etc and it is plainly wrong and stupid

Agreed. Here's an experiment to try, that will illustrate your point.

Take a screenshot of the shell Application Menu overlay. That's it. Just open the Application menu, and press PrtSc (or whatever) key. The resulting screenshot dialog window won't appear on top of the menu. You have to click out of the overlay to get to the screenshot dialog.

In fact, how dialogs (and apps launched from the notification area of the top panel) are handled is very inconsistent. But then, I have no idea how dialogs should be handled when you're in the overlay, because as you suggest, the desktop is buried under it.

Ugh.

[KAMiKAZOW]

it is plainly wrong and stupid

Then don't use it.

[ryanpg]

Then don't use it.

I agree. Don't use it. FOSS is all about options. And also, keep pointing out the faults and shortcomings. And, feel free to vent your frustrations about obvious or non-obvious problems with gnome-shell or whatever other software.

And remember above all, you were invited to this forum to discuss the subject of the article. Discussion, including criticism, is good. Cheers!

[madjr]

just like kde4.0 it will probably be missing tons of usability options on first release.

I would not really use it on a daily basis, till after 2 extra major releases.

meanwhile it will still be "stable" and some may be able to use it on a daily if they dont mind the limitations unlike kde4.0 which was not even stable enough at the time.

Anyway, what i like is the good competition between this and unity. The standards are getting higher and higher

[89c51]

Then don't use it.

of course i wont

its just sad to try to "innovate" for the sake of new and different

[Delgarde]

of course i wont

its just sad to try to "innovate" for the sake of new and different

What a strange thing to say. People trying to be new and different is how progress is made - they don't always succeed, but you'll never get anywhere if they didn't try.

[89c51]

What a strange thing to say. People trying to be new and different is how progress is made - they don't always succeed, but you'll never get anywhere if they didn't try.

lets make a new and different wheel. we'll make it hexagonal.

joking apart the shell and what they are trying to do (design wise) has OBVIOUS faults and makes things more difficult

the purpose of a desktop is to let you finish the task you want in the quickest/easier way and only this.