GNOME and the way forward [LWN.net]

GNOME and the way forward

Posted Aug 18, 2005 10:42 UTC (Thu) by hensema (guest, #980)
Parent article: GNOME and the way forward

The problem with gnome seems to be that is isn't aimed for the experienced user. They seem to be making the desktop suitable for your grandma and forget the experienced (and demanding) user.

Meanwhile gnome isn't used by your grandma. It's used by unix folk. It's used in corporations with trained personnel. Why ignore these groups?

I've always used KDE and always found it to have bad usability. Way, way too many options. However this also means KDE can actually DO what I want. KDE never has annoying focus stealing -- if you configure KDE that way. It also means KDE has lots of focus options. Too many for an inexperienced user.

But I'm experienced. I've got the hardware to compensate for bloat. I can get used to overcrowded toolbars. Why on earth would I want to run gnome?

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GNOME and your grandma

Posted Aug 18, 2005 16:53 UTC (Thu) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link]

Meanwhile gnome isn't used by your grandma

A data point: My parents use Linux (because I refuse to support Windoze, even for family members.) My kids use Gnome, and my parents were horrified by its complexity. My parents are really neophytes when it comes to computers.

So my parents run Debian Sarge, with the XFCE3 desktop (XFCE4, alas, has become too Windoze/Gnomish for their tastes.) It's a nice, clean simple desktop. It does everything they need, which consists of precisely three things: Read and send e-mail (Thunderbird), Surf the web (Firefox) and do word processing (WP 5.1 for DOS in Dosemu.)

Now that's a desktop for Grandma. :-)

GNOME and your grandma

Posted Aug 18, 2005 17:49 UTC (Thu) by rknop (guest, #66) [Link]

My wife has a similar experience.

She needs to surf the internet and read email (both with Mozilla at the moment), and do some writing (with Emacs at the moment). She also listens to some online radio streams (gmplayer).

I set her up with FVWM. Works. She didn't set it up herself-- that would be asking too much. But once I set up the dock buttons and the menu items, she was good to go. And, it works well enough on her 266 MHz PC. (OpenOffice.org is a dog on that, at least starting up, but the window manager is just fine.)

I used to set up new student accounts on my machines at work with KDE, under the theory that it's enough like Windows that they will figure it out more easily. Nowadays-- FVWM. Preconfigured to do most of what they want. It's just so much cleaner and simpler and faster. It gets them going, and they'll need to be doing Unix things from the command line anyway. (You can't run IRAF from a menu-- or if you do, it opens a terminal in which to run it anyway.)

-Rob