Ten Suggestions For The GNOME Camp

[TobiSGD]

I'm a software developer, and it's easily the most productive environment I've ever used.

Just out of curiosity, which other options besides Gnome 3 and KDE 4 have you tried and how do you measure your productivity?

[cbamber85]

How you measure productivity? And honestly don't you find counterproductive the fact that the same action requires more "moves" to complete.

Primarily I find it faster to launch programs when using the keyboard or mouse. How do you mean more "moves"? To launch a program just hit the Windows key and begin typing the name of it, hit enter when it appears - faster than navigating a Start menu (or KDE's clone). And by mouse, I just throw the corner into the top-left corner, start typing it's name with my left hand and click on it when it appears. And I put my most used programs in the quick access bar on the left in 'Activities' mode.

Switching programs is alt-tab like every OS, certainly doesn't take more 'moves'.

In reality this is all personal opinion and everyone likes different things, but the level of vitriol against Gnome3 is utterly bizarre. I use Gnome 2 and Windows 7 at work, I used to use KDE and currently use Gnome 3 at home - none of them spoil my life to the point where I feel the need to spread hate about it across the web. People have too much time on their hands...

[daniels]

Just out of curiosity, which other options besides Gnome 3 and KDE 4 have you tried and how do you measure your productivity?

How do you measure yours?

I've used GNOME 1.x → 3.x, KDE 1.x → 3.x, Enlightenment 13 → 16, Blackbox/Openbox/Fluxbox, awesome, WindowMaker, fvwm2/fvwm95, XFCE, LXDE, OS X 10.3 → 10.7, Windows 3.11 → XP, and certainly some others which I'm missing out here.

And, contrary to the claims that 'only idiots like it', 'it's not designed for real work', and 'all power users obviously hate it', I love it and think it's the most productive and pleasant environment for software development I've yet used. It's got its flaws, but go back from GNOME 2.30 to 2.0 and see how much you like that (or just search for exactly the same arguments being trotted out during the transition from 1.4 to 2.0). 3.0 → 3.2 → 3.4 has brought massive incremental improvements on the radical design change, and I'm expecting more of the same from 3.6.

[89c51]

Primarily I find it faster to launch programs when using the keyboard or mouse. How do you mean more "moves"? To launch a program just hit the Windows key and begin typing the name of it, hit enter when it appears - faster than navigating a Start menu (or KDE's clone). And by mouse, I just throw the corner into the top-left corner, start typing it's name with my left hand and click on it when it appears. And I put my most used programs in the quick access bar on the left in 'Activities' mode.

Switching programs is alt-tab like every OS, certainly doesn't take more 'moves'.

In reality this is all personal opinion and everyone likes different things, but the level of vitriol against Gnome3 is utterly bizarre. I use Gnome 2 and Windows 7 at work, I used to use KDE and currently use Gnome 3 at home - none of them spoil my life to the point where I feel the need to spread hate about it across the web. People have too much time on their hands...

First of most people just use the mouse to do things like launch apps and in general do things that don't require typing. They are spoiled by windows or whatever and habits are difficult to quit but thats what they fuckin do. And you cannot overlook that.

On gnome 2 you could have your most used apps on the panel on the screen. (we are talking for environments out of the box not using extensions etc). The move pointer>click is faster than click (or throw the cursor) activities>wait for the animation> click app.

Also another case. Try rearanging windows on the workspaces and tell me if its more efficient than Gnome 2.

[HokTar]

First of most people just use the mouse to do things like launch apps and in general do things that don't require typing. They are spoiled by windows or whatever and habits are difficult to quit but thats what they fuckin do. And you cannot overlook that.

On gnome 2 you could have your most used apps on the panel on the screen. (we are talking for environments out of the box not using extensions etc). The move pointer>click is faster than click (or throw the cursor) activities>wait for the animation> click app.

Also another case. Try rearanging windows on the workspaces and tell me if its more efficient than Gnome 2.

You are both right, actually.

The problem is that both Unity and Gnome3 are nice if you are willing to use the keyboard. But just compare the time to move from the 1st workspace to the last on the mentioned two and Gnome2 - using only the mouse.
Gnome 2: position + click
Gnome 3: position (corner) + position (above workspace) + double click
Unity: position (side) + position + click + position + double click

So you and up with more steps (5(!) on Unity) that also involves massive mouse movements. Basically the idea of workspaces is killed with the inefficiency, unless you use the keyboard, that is.
I am still astonished that nobody ever realised what an immense regression this is...

[devius]

Unity: position (side) + position + click + position + double click

Actually: click on launcher icon + right click on desired workspace

Or

Ctrl+Alt+Down, Right

But like cbamber85 says I really don't see the point of these discussions. I have also used a lot of DEs over the years and for the most part all are more or less equally usable. In some you do more mouse clicks, on others you use the keyboard more, and on others you move your mouse around more.

[Adrinnho]

You are both right, actually.

The problem is that both Unity and Gnome3 are nice if you are willing to use the keyboard...

Wait, what?
And why in the name of God wouldn't you want to use the keyboard? Is it that awkward, uncommon, hard, strange to use a keyboard these days???

Yeh, now we know who's trolling LKML these days...Gnome 2 mouse lovers

[TobiSGD]

How do you measure yours?

Since I earn my money on the hardware side my productivity can't be measured with regards to different DEs/WMs. Since you claim that Gnome 3 (I would rather think that you mean Gnome Shell) is the most productive environment you have ever used I thought that as a software developer you have ways to measure that. Seems to me that this is only subjective thing, not something that can be measured.

But anyways, I find the whole discussion about how many clicks or moves you need with the mouse flawed anyways, since you need much more time to move your hand to the mouse and back to the keyboard than for moving/clicking the mouse cursor. I try to set up my systems in a way that a mouse is mostly not necessary (except for things like using GIMP, of course), but this also is a personal thing.

And that is the whole point, I would think: It comes down to personal preference. That is what the real problem with Gnome Shell is. People expected it to be Gnome, since that is what they preferred and that is what it is named. But it isn't Gnome, it is a totally new DE that shares nothing with its predecessor than the name. A simple name change could have prevented this whole uproar and "dissatisfied users" thing.

[Adrinnho]

So you and up with more steps (5(!) on Unity) that also involves massive mouse movements.

Oh, yeh, those MASSIVE mouse movements can be tough to execute...it can give you MASSIVE wrist pains

Sorry, me just having fun

[89c51]

Wait, what?
And why in the name of God wouldn't you want to use the keyboard? Is it that awkward, uncommon, hard, strange to use a keyboard these days???

Yeh, now we know who's trolling LKML these days...Gnome 2 mouse lovers

When you decide on the usability of something you don't concentrate on what you would like people to do or what you think they do. You concentrate on what they actually do. Its really nice to have all the keyboard functionality but the majority of people work differently.