Fedora Proposal To Use Cinnamon Desktop By Default

[Akka]

Again, nobody here cares what desktop anyone uses. This discussion is about the default desktop only serving a minority of users and removing functionality that everyone else uses.



It doesn't offend me at all, it's just that if his desktop is default then Cinnamon, XFCE, or Mate can't be. He is just part of a minority who's needs are met by the current default desktop.
:

Cinnamon has insignificant use outside of Mint, Mate is dead code, and XFCE is probably smaller than Gnome on Fedora and is still gtk2. Gnome 3 is the obvious choice. It's a living project and the project both Unity, Elementary OS, Consort, Cinnamon (and partly XFCE) parasite on, so it must have merits.... The only other desktop project with decently independent development is KDE and I get the impression Gnome is more popular than Kde on Fedora (and KDE has excellent packeting, and work perfect and is what I use by the way..)

[thalaric]

Again, that is not what this sounds like here, and you certainly do not have enough of a handle of the wider picture to definitively say that it only serves a minority of users. This whole thread seems more like a witchhunt against GNOME users perpetrated by people who have gotten themselves so personally wound up in this battle that they have lost all sense of how to distance themselves from it in order to still think objectively. Please study your own motivations and assumptions here. You may be surprised with what you find out about yourself (as a general rule we should all be doing this all the time anyway, but we always do seem to need the reminder).

Right, so what you're saying is that as a Fedora user who uses Cinnamon, I shouldn't comment in a forum topic called "Fedora Proposal To Use Cinnamon Desktop By Default". Further, I should ignore the polling that has already shown gnome shell to be a minority install (even on Fedora) and instead throw my hands up and exclaim "no information has come to light!" Maybe you should do some more research: http://blogs.gnome.org/otte/2012/07/...nto-the-abyss/

Says who exactly? Just because you dislike it does not suddenly make it unusable or even the wrong choice for the default. There has certainly not been enough evidence posted here to say that it does not work for most people, or at the very least that it does not work best for the operating system as a whole. But in the end it is not mine or your call to make - it is up to the Project Board to make these decisions, and I am sure they do make them very carefully. Besides, it is not as if Fedora puts that much emphasis on defaults, and it is very open about pointing out the existence of spins. So I fail to understand the need for all of this egotistical flaming.

I'm sure the fact that Gnome has been forked no less than three times is indicative of a healthy project and increasing mind share. The only "egos" that are involved are those of people who are so completely invested in a project that has so completely failed half of it's users, that they are requesting it be removed as default in favor of *anything else*. For those invested users I'm sure that is a blow to their ego, which is where all that anger is coming from.

They implemented a feature as was prescribed by their design specification, it proved unpopular, and they eventually reverted it. How does this not equate to listening to their users? Of course any new change to the design needs to be justified, and many times politics and yes egos will get involved as this is still a human endeavour, but the simple fact is they did in the end accept the feedback and acted on it. Why is it so hard for you to acknowledge that? Same thing with the classic mode, which has no place in the grand scheme of Shell but is being worked on purely for the needs of a specific subset of users. As I said, this is still a human project, and the least you people can do is actually give credit where credit is due and try to be constructive whenever possible, instead of the arrogant posturing shown here.

I see it as a symptom of an unhealthy process, but I suppose someone could consider removing a feature under protest, only to then add it back a year later, as a success story.

[Hamish Wilson]

Right, so what you're saying is that as a Fedora user who uses Cinnamon, I shouldn't comment in a forum topic called "Fedora Proposal To Use Cinnamon Desktop By Default". Further, I should ignore the polling that has already shown gnome shell to be a minority install (even on Fedora) and instead throw my hands up and exclaim "no information has come to light!"

As a Fedora user who uses Xfce I assure you I never said that you can not post in a forum thread, and find it rather offensive that you allege that I did. This does little to change my opinion of the motivations of a lot of the people posting here, and I still stand by what I said. Moving on to your other points, those polls are not indicative of much, have already had several of the conjectures made based on them debunked in this very thread, and are a poor way of gauging both interest in a project and it's suitability as the default desktop.

Further, Gnome 3 is still the most popular choice on the FedoraForum poll (you claim it isn't), which is also a place frequented by enthusiasts who are likely to stray from the defaults anyway, especially on a distro like Fedora that encourages you to do so. The fact that it does in fact do this makes much of this discussion seem rather unimportant to me as one can hardly say that Fedora is terribly biased one way or another on this point

Maybe you should do some more research: http://blogs.gnome.org/otte/2012/07/...nto-the-abyss/

I'm sure the fact that Gnome has been forked no less than three times is indicative of a healthy project and increasing mind share. The only "egos" that are involved are those of people who are so completely invested in a project that has so completely failed half of it's users, that they are requesting it be removed as default in favor of *anything else*. For those invested users I'm sure that is a blow to their ego, which is where all that anger is coming from.

That blog post seems to contain a lot of hyperbole, and the listing of those developers leaving their work to pursue other things is completely beside the point and irrelevant, much like the conjecture being thrown about with regards to Alan Cox leaving Intel. Still, not all of the arguments are baseless, but if it is not enough to sway the Fedora Project Board then it will not change anything, especially as there are also many other listed reasons to leave Gnome 3 as default, which in of itself does not mean much anyway, despite of the fact you happen not to like it.

As to your little rant there, I have already basically already given my thoughts on that point of view already. I would just like for everyone here to step back and realize how unreasonable they are being. If you want to think it is all these nasty GNOME developers then fine, but I am seeing a lot of ego and hubris on both sides here.

I see it as a symptom of an unhealthy process, but I suppose someone could consider removing a feature under protest, only to then add it back a year later, as a success story.

Frame it how you like, it still demonstrates that they listened to their users. You can not escape that fact.

[kigurai]

Hamish, thank you for bringing some actual grown up debating to this "discussion".
I think you summarized my views quite nicely, in a way that was much better than I did myself.

[headuparses]

Another lovely day in gnome dream land, lalalala.

[thalaric]

Hamish Wilson, in order to save time and avoid an endless back and forth about irrelevant topics, I am not going to directly refute every one of your statements. I just want to clarify a couple things.

The first is, what is it exactly you believe my motivations are? I've made it pretty clear that the reason I'm posting here is because I do not care for Gnome Shell and would like Cinnamon (or a similar DE) to be the default. I happen to believe that Gnome Shell does not provide the features that most people need in a default desktop. If that is a problem for you, then I suggest you review your own motivations and assumptions.

On the topic of Fedora, I probably didn't make myself very clear. My point was that Gnome Shell does not have majority adoption, being at less than 40%. Together Cinnamon, MATE and XFCE make up a slightly smaller but equally relevant share. This is the highest adoption for Gnome Shell, with the other distributions showing much worse numbers. That matters when compared to historical levels of Gnome adoption. It is obvious that the polls have limited use, they can only predict the popularity of each desktop environment, or lack thereof, among people who actually took the poll. That does not make them completely useless for gauging reception.

That said, feel free to reject all of the provided data and observations that have been shared in this forum without providing any of your own.

[kigurai]

they can only predict the popularity of each desktop environment, or lack thereof, among people who actually took the poll. That does not make them completely useless for gauging reception.

I'm glad you at least recognize what I said earlier.
Unfortunately "Not completely useless" and "useful" are not the same thing
But if we want to throw meaningless numbers around, you can take the Phoronix poll. I find that poll completely useless, just as the other polls, but I guess you would categorize it differently, so let's look at the data: http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag...2012_res&num=1

"Which of the following most resemble your dekstop?"
GNOME2+GNOME3: 993 (60%)
Unity: 198
KDE: 201
Other: 260

"What is the latest version of GNOME you are using?"
3.x: 2986 (68%)
2.x: 436
Not using it: 947

What conclusions can we draw from this?
Well, none, because the poll, like most random Internet polls is badly done.
But if we, just for the sake of argument, pretend that the numbers are actually an approximation of reality...
These numbers are at least to me not something that screams "GNOME is dying!". Actually quite the opposite. GNOME seems to be doing pretty good.
Also note that this is a poll hosted by Phoronix (not made by), and pretty much made to show how bad GNOME3 is doing. So I think we can quite safely assume that any bias would be *against* GNOME with regards to the demographics.

[thalaric]

But if we want to throw meaningless numbers around, you can take the Phoronix poll. I find that poll completely useless, just as the other polls, but I guess you would categorize it differently, so let's look at the data

Some are better than others, and anything lacking the words "Gnome Shell" is less useful. However we can take some things away from this poll just like the others. What I can't figure out is why you added Gnome2 and Gnome3 together.

The real numbers are (adjusting for win and mac):

Gnome3 666/1655 [40.24%]
Gnome Not Gnome3 528/1655 [31.90%]

It's almost looks like Fedora logged into phoronix.

[kigurai]

Some are better than others, and anything lacking the words "Gnome Shell" is less useful. However we can take some things away from this poll just like the others. What I can't figure out is why you added Gnome2 and Gnome3 together.

The real numbers are (adjusting for win and mac):

Gnome3 666/1655 [40.24%]
Gnome Not Gnome3 528/1655 [31.90%]

It's almost looks like Fedora logged into phoronix.

So 40% instead of 60% then. I can give you that. I'd still say a 40% market share considering the number of alternative DE's is quite impressive.
Hypothetically of course, since the poll is useless.

[log0]

Relax Gnome Shell users and fans. The shitstorm is almost over. Mate, Cinnamon and Consort will fill the Gnome 2 sucessor role nicely. In a year nobody will give a damn about what functionality has been removed from the Shell...

I am somewhat surprised about the poweroff change and the classic mode talk to be honest. But please don't see this as critique, just stating my personal opinion. Stay true to your vision Shell guys. You have got a brand to create!

Former Gnome 2, now Xfce user.