GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
The end of the year is approaching, and work is slowing down on a number of fronts. The 2.6.15 kernel is well into the stabilization phase, so there is relatively little work to be done on that front. As a result, it seems that Linus Torvalds had a bit of spare time to engage in a nostalgic flame exercise. In response to a question on printer configuration dialogs, Linus made his desktop preference clear:
This "users are idiots, and are confused by functionality" mentality of Gnome is a disease. If you think your users are idiots, only idiots will use it. I don't use Gnome, because in striving to be simple, it has long since reached the point where it simply doesn't do what I need it to do.
Those who are interested in the discussion that resulted can read the full thread. Some of it contains language which is not necessarily work- or family-safe.
GNOME developers often complain that their approach to user interface design is misunderstood. But the fact is that they have, indeed, left behind a certain subset of their user base which has grown tired of seeing features and options disappear in the name of usability. The low point for the de-featuring of GNOME applications was probably early in the 2.x series, but the fact remains: GNOME does not allow things which certain types of users want to do.
This gap is there explicitly by design; Jeff Waugh put it this way:
Havoc Pennington also compared the implementation of one often-requested feature (the ability to arbitrarily rebind mouse buttons in Metacity) to selling maternity clothes for men. One can only assume he is not implying that people who want to rebind buttons are, in fact, pot-bellied transvestites.
Havoc notes that he has never encountered anybody wanting to rebind mouse buttons who was not a "historical Unix user." Whether that is because these "historical Unix users" are, in addition to possessing questionable taste in clothing, just unusually fussy about mouse buttons, or whether the rest of the user base simply is not used to the idea that this sort of behavior can be changed is not clear. What is clear is that the GNOME project has chosen to target the subset of users who are content to have a number of user interface choices made for them as long as the result "just works."
Flaming the GNOME developers for this decision is a mistake. There is clearly a user base for the GNOME desktop, and who can say that it is wrong for the GNOME developers to create a system which works for those users? Over time, these developers may also figure out how to support both the "just works" crowd and the small minority of dress-wearing Unix relics; there is some evidence that this might be happening. In the mean time, the "just works" users may become hooked on the free software experience, and, eventually, discover the power of being able to optimize the desktop for their own needs and workload.
But, even if GNOME truly becomes the "desktop for idiots," there are other
desktop alternatives out there, including (but not limited to) KDE. One
might well ask why we should have multiple desktop projects if their end
projects are indistinguishable. Let them, instead, choose their user bases
and provide those users with the best desktop they can. If the desktops
diverge from each other, the result will be more choice for users - and
plenty of material to feed our GNOME/KDE flame war tradition well into the
future.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 17:47 UTC (Tue)
by alspnost (guest, #2763)
[Link] (38 responses)
The classic KDE criticisms are valid, too, but overall, it's a technically-elegant, attractive and usable desktop that showcases the state of the Linux desktop art. I'm very pleased that Ubuntu has raised Kubuntu to first-class citizen status, because Ubuntu's Gnome-centricity was one of its few black marks in my personal book.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 17:56 UTC (Tue)
by erwbgy (subscriber, #4104)
[Link] (35 responses)
GNOME uses GTK as its toolkit, which is LGPL. KDE uses Qt as its
toolkit, which is GPL. This means that corporate developers can write
proprietary applications using GTK, while they would need to pay Trolltech
for a license to write a similar proprietary application using QT. Hence
the popularity of GNOME with "corporate types". I don't like GNOME much myself, but I know a few non-idiots who do.
Choice is good as long as they interoperate, which is getting better all
the time.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 18:25 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (21 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 18:49 UTC (Tue)
by Lockjaw (guest, #4611)
[Link] (3 responses)
As far as GNOME goes - I stopped using it when metacity became the window manager and I saw all those "crack smoking" replies to requests for reasonable features. It sounds like not much has changed on that front.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:14 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:15 UTC (Tue)
by mepr (guest, #4819)
[Link]
Welcome to library dependency hell.
Posted Dec 16, 2005 1:10 UTC (Fri)
by thedevil (guest, #32913)
[Link]
Interestingly enough, though, Acrobat Reader 7.x is gtk. And in terms of
Posted Dec 13, 2005 21:26 UTC (Tue)
by dhess (guest, #7827)
[Link] (16 responses)
One problem with Qt is that, instead of leveraging the C++ STL, it comes with its own STL-equivalent classes (QList, etc.). What a waste of effort! I could understand this choice 5 years ago when many popular C++ compilers still lacked ISO-compliant STL implementations, but now it's just a weight around the neck of Qt.
And don't even get me started on Qt's "moc" nonsense.
I agree with you that GTK+ has a bunch of terrible API, but that's what you get when you go too far with the "OO in C" model. How C programmers can tolerate functions with names like
On the other hand, gtkmm is a really nice C++ wrapper around the GTK+ APIs, and there's gnomemm for the GNOME side, too. Unlike Qt, they make extensive use of the STL, and they support the signal/slot model without the need for a pre-processing step ala moc.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:40 UTC (Tue)
by halla (subscriber, #14185)
[Link] (12 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:28 UTC (Tue)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (6 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 9:28 UTC (Wed)
by cloose (guest, #5066)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 20:19 UTC (Wed)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (3 responses)
This has been true for longer than Qt has existed, I believe: certainly it was true for years before the standardization process was complete.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 21:32 UTC (Wed)
by cloose (guest, #5066)
[Link] (2 responses)
std::string does not dictate representation. That's what traits
classes are for. Traits classes for UTF-8, UCS-16, and so on would not be
very difficult to write. No, you also need codecvt<> facets to convert between different
representations (UCS-4, UTF-8, etc). And that's were it gets ugly. AFAIK even "the C++ standard loving" gtkmm created there own string
class for UTF-8 (see Glib::ustring). So I would say a) it's not as easy as you make sound and b) as a app
developer i have better things to do and just use QString. ;)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 10:04 UTC (Thu)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 22, 2005 8:20 UTC (Thu)
by oever (guest, #987)
[Link]
Actually it's about ten lines of calling iconv. I've done it. It's not hard. That sounds interesting. I've been looking for a way to handle different encodings nicely with just the STL. Could you give me a pointer to an example?
Posted Dec 26, 2005 23:54 UTC (Mon)
by Baylink (guest, #755)
[Link]
:-)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:39 UTC (Tue)
by smitty_one_each (subscriber, #28989)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:46 UTC (Tue)
by dhess (guest, #7827)
[Link]
I was hoping that Qt 4 would deprecate some of the redundant classes, but that doesn't appear to be the case.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:43 UTC (Tue)
by dhess (guest, #7827)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 9:41 UTC (Wed)
by cloose (guest, #5066)
[Link] (1 responses)
Oh, come on, that's ridiculous.
Then please tell me where does std::string support Unicode? Where are the often needed features like toInt(), toFloat(), replace(), trimmed(), rightJustified(). Sure I can write all those functions myself, but I have better things to do.
A handy tool is great, except when I'm forced to use it. Then it's not so handy anymore; I'd call it a nuisance.
moc provides Qt Meta-Object System. This is much more than just signal/slots. It's also dynamic properties and introspection. Those things are very useful for scripting engines or GUI builders. Please see http://doc.trolltech.com/4.1/metaobjects.html.
Regarding STL:
There is nothing that prevents you from using STL instead of QTL in your Qt applications. Also you can even use the STL algorithm with the QTL containers.
But a few things make QTL containers easier to use. Please see http://doc.trolltech.com/4.1/containers.html for reference.
Bye, Christian
Posted Dec 16, 2005 22:26 UTC (Fri)
by dhess (guest, #7827)
[Link]
Even for internationalized applications, std::string may be sufficient for storing, e.g., UTF-8 encodings, depending on what your application is doing with strings. nix alludes to this in his comment above. All you have to do is Google Groups for "unicode std::string", and you'll find several threads with postings from some very good C++ programmers debating the merits of using std::string for storing international strings. The consensus seems to be that as long as you're not trying to process the strings (e.g., find a substring), std::string may suffice. And depending on the implementation of your STL, std::wstring may be good enough for UCS-4 encodings with "real" string semantics.
By the way, in my original comment criticizing Qt's "QTL," I didn't mention QString as one of the offending classes. I think it's clear that for a toolkit like Qt or GTK+, you need a portable, convenient class for dealing with Unicode strings until the C++ ISO committee cleans up the internationalization mess. (Though I would prefer a strictly UTF-8 class, can't we all just switch to this particular encoding?) So I never actually complained about QString. I was objecting to boudewijn's comment that, "C++ standard string class still isn't suitable for real-world use," which is complete nonsense. Maybe it's unsuitable for a GUI toolkit -- *maybe*, I would still prefer a toolkit that's templated on string types so that I can choose the appropriate representation for my application, e.g., I don't need multi-byte strings and don't want to pay the cost of one -- but certainly not unsuitable across the board.
I don't know what the other methods do, Boost may have similar functionality, but in any case, lack of these methods hardly makes std::string unsuitable for "real-world use." Millions of real-world applications do just fine without them.
p.s. ... which reminds me of one more thing I don't like about Qt. Passing around raw pointers is really inexcusable in modern C++ design. Passing around containers of raw pointers (ala
Posted Dec 16, 2005 1:20 UTC (Fri)
by thedevil (guest, #32913)
[Link] (2 responses)
If you keep the runtime typing inherent in the signal/slot mechanism,
And signals/slots aren't even the worst instance of this in Gtk; that
There's a reason why pretty much any Gtk app, if run manually from
Posted Dec 16, 2005 22:32 UTC (Fri)
by dhess (guest, #7827)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 17, 2005 4:05 UTC (Sat)
by thedevil (guest, #32913)
[Link]
If I should summarize the sentiment behind my post (and that's the
Posted Dec 13, 2005 18:57 UTC (Tue)
by hazelsct (guest, #3659)
[Link] (3 responses)
The real issue is the annual -- and always "final" -- change of the C++ ABI which breaks every binary app linked to C++ libs. In contrast, one can write against the GNOME 2.0 ABI and be guaranteed nearly five years of stability. As long as this keeps up, corporate developers will continue to stay away from KDE, Qt, and all other projects whose infrastructure libs are written in C++.
Linux, the GNU toolchain, X, GTK, GNOME, all one big happy C family!
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:37 UTC (Tue)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:38 UTC (Tue)
by airlied (subscriber, #9104)
[Link] (1 responses)
I think some shader code recently added might be in C++ but again no ABI...
Posted Dec 14, 2005 7:23 UTC (Wed)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:18 UTC (Tue)
by jmorris42 (guest, #2203)
[Link] (8 responses)
The license issue is important, but equally important is the language divide. GTK is C, Qt is C++. C can be wrapped in OO clothing well enough that it seems to be able to make everyone happy, language wise. Imagine a C++ horror like Qt running on a palmtop. Say the new Nokia gadget with only 64M of ram.
Note that GNOME seems to have found a way to negate this underlying advantage however.... needing 7.5M of resident set for a battery status applet is simply obscene.
Seriously, I'd like to see a KDE like desktop environment built on GTK2. The combination would be solid, scalable and free of license problems. Of course it would still be the wrong solution to my problem.
KDE is obsessed with recreating the popular but defective look and feel of Windows and gushing about Qt so much they were willing to ignore the fact it was proprietary software for most of KDE's life. GNOME appears obsessed with creating an environment as sterile and boring as a Mac while trying to import all of the defective plumbing found in Windows (binary registries, C#, .Net, etc.)
Both of which have a place in the evangelistic mission and all that, but what about once they get here? What are we offering? Have we lost our confidence in The Unix Way? Do we still believe we have a better philosophy of how things Should Be?
I want a graphical environment for UNIX that doesn't feels like it is a port. Something that is simple, elegant well designed and feels like it belongs in UNIX.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:49 UTC (Tue)
by halla (subscriber, #14185)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:31 UTC (Tue)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
Posted Dec 14, 2005 1:54 UTC (Wed)
by daniel (guest, #3181)
[Link]
Posted Dec 14, 2005 6:14 UTC (Wed)
by astrand (guest, #4908)
[Link]
Agree! GTK2 is the best toolkit[*], but KDE is the best desktop environment.
[*]: There are some really bad parts, like the file chooser, but that can easily be fixed.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 23:29 UTC (Thu)
by pynm0001 (guest, #18379)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 16, 2005 22:42 UTC (Fri)
by dhess (guest, #7827)
[Link] (2 responses)
But maybe you're talking about something else.
Posted Dec 18, 2005 2:25 UTC (Sun)
by pynm0001 (guest, #18379)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 19, 2005 10:16 UTC (Mon)
by dhess (guest, #7827)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:35 UTC (Tue)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
His posts to the GCC list over the years have been memorable for a high heat to light ratio...
I entirely agree with your characterizations of KDE and GNOME; I avoided moving from GNOME 1 for as long as possible, then finally when it was too rotted to use I ate my dislike for moc and jumped to KDE, entirely because the permanently-active parts of GNOME 2, like the panel, couldn't come close to acting as I wished, or as they had acted in GNOME 1. I've never looked back.
Posted Dec 26, 2005 22:20 UTC (Mon)
by Arker (guest, #14205)
[Link]
Gnome doesn't just leave me unmoved - it moved me all right. It moved me to the point I will never again use GTK for anything that I can possibly accomplish without it. I was, by the way, a very early Gnome adopter, until they decided they didn't want users like me anymore and started throwing every insult and injury they could come up with my way.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 17:50 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (110 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 18:27 UTC (Tue)
by jdub (guest, #27)
[Link] (60 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 18:57 UTC (Tue)
by hmh (subscriber, #3838)
[Link] (15 responses)
Why don't you place the so-called advanced functionality behind an Advanced button or in another dialog tab, then?
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:05 UTC (Tue)
by jdub (guest, #27)
[Link] (9 responses)
(Functionality and options are different things, and "functionality" generally doesn't hide in the same kind of places options do...)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:33 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 27, 2005 0:03 UTC (Tue)
by Baylink (guest, #755)
[Link]
It *is* a problem, though, and the *real* problem that it is, is this:
Non-power-users *don't stay that way*.
People learn. And regardless whether your interface failed to scare them away when they were newbies, if they *can't get their work done* now that they're *not*, they're leaving, anyway.
So the "progressive complexity" partisans are the ones closest to right.
The as-yet unsolved problem is one corollary to "*why* is that menu item greyed out when I want to use it?" -- *how* do you let the user know that there are more powerful commands hidden from them that are pertinent to what they're doing?
Once someone comes up with a good, portable, intuitive solution to that which app writers can deploy without great pain, we'll really be going somewhere.
You heard it here first. ;-)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:58 UTC (Tue)
by mightyduck (guest, #23760)
[Link] (6 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 21:13 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link]
Posted Dec 14, 2005 0:51 UTC (Wed)
by diakka (guest, #10310)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 17:35 UTC (Wed)
by tjw.org (guest, #20716)
[Link] (3 responses)
Settings you make with gconf-editor will only be used if gnome-settings-daemon is running when you start firefox. If you don't use gnome-settings-daemon, you are correct in editing your ~/.gtkrc-2.0 file.
Note that ~/.gtkrc-2.0 is just silently ignored if gnome-settings-daemon is running.
There's also the possibility that you don't have the Emacs theme in /usr/share/themes/.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 14:24 UTC (Thu)
by mightyduck (guest, #23760)
[Link]
Posted Dec 15, 2005 14:25 UTC (Thu)
by gallir (guest, #5735)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 14:37 UTC (Thu)
by mightyduck (guest, #23760)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 21:43 UTC (Tue)
by b7j0c (guest, #27559)
[Link] (4 responses)
yuck!
Posted Dec 15, 2005 0:37 UTC (Thu)
by dmarti (subscriber, #11625)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 7:25 UTC (Thu)
by AnswerGuy (guest, #1256)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 10:09 UTC (Thu)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
Perhaps the GNOME project should change the expansion of its acronym: with the near-demise of Bonobo the amount of `network object model' in there is minimal anyway. Given the GNOME attitude (`on crack' and dismissive contempt) to suggestions that perhaps not all features that the program's maintainer doesn't use are useless, I suggest the recursive acronym `GNOME Now for Obtuse Morons Exclusively'. It's not true, but at times it seems to be their goal :(
Posted Dec 15, 2005 7:53 UTC (Thu)
by komarek (guest, #7295)
[Link]
-Paul Komarek
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:08 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (43 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:17 UTC (Tue)
by jdub (guest, #27)
[Link] (23 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:23 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (20 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:37 UTC (Tue)
by jdub (guest, #27)
[Link] (15 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:05 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (6 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:42 UTC (Tue)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
Posted Dec 14, 2005 5:17 UTC (Wed)
by zlynx (guest, #2285)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 11:45 UTC (Wed)
by csamuel (✭ supporter ✭, #2624)
[Link]
Posted Dec 14, 2005 13:58 UTC (Wed)
by mauvaisours (guest, #6130)
[Link]
Posted Dec 15, 2005 22:25 UTC (Thu)
by emj (guest, #14307)
[Link]
On bigger multiuser system it's even worse, have you ever tried to find the account of your friend John in the local /afs.. "Now was is /afs/fnord.se/homes/h/dk/sf/u2313n23? I can't really remmeber... "
Posted Dec 27, 2005 23:05 UTC (Tue)
by quintesse (guest, #14569)
[Link]
OMG!!! Do you know how many times I screamed at that stupid dialog because I thought I couldn't enter a location?
I positively hate hidden functionality and think all GUIs should be "discoverable" which means that you should be able to learn at least 99% of its functionality just by "looking around".
I find that most of the time for me Gnome either does not have the functionality I want or they have hidden it so well that even I as a very experienced user can't find it.
But it's not only Gnome, I love Firefox for example but I still miss some of the settings that you could find in the Mozilla preferences. I want a button "Trust me, I know what I'm doing" that show me all those option pages they removed! (And please, do NOT tell me about about:config!!)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:16 UTC (Tue)
by smoogen (subscriber, #97)
[Link] (1 responses)
Well I am just wanting to open up a document that I filed away in the way that I wanted, but I when I have finished opening up
I now have 4 windows I dont want to stay open and 2 that I do.. so I end up spending a lot of time closing stuff.
[And switching to 'classic' mode makes everything look like it is GNOME-0.8 and not as featured as the KDE desktop.]
I currently use GNOME, but I am coming this close to switching over to KDE even if it means being a third class citizen on Fedora.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 6:55 UTC (Wed)
by Mithrandir (guest, #3031)
[Link]
Posted Dec 14, 2005 8:25 UTC (Wed)
by heini (guest, #33614)
[Link] (5 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 20:12 UTC (Wed)
by Los__D (guest, #15263)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 7:15 UTC (Thu)
by heini (guest, #33614)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 9:48 UTC (Thu)
by Los__D (guest, #15263)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 10:33 UTC (Thu)
by dvdeug (guest, #10998)
[Link]
Posted Dec 16, 2005 17:47 UTC (Fri)
by cortana (subscriber, #24596)
[Link]
I do agree that there should be some kind of regional settings option in the preferences menu that would allow one to change the value of LANG. LANGUAGE and the various LC_* variables that will be used the next time one logs in.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 20:26 UTC (Wed)
by aigarius (subscriber, #7329)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 7:41 UTC (Thu)
by pascal.martin (guest, #2995)
[Link]
As logon time kept increasing, the frustration of not being able to restore my config convinced me to switch to Xfce:
Posted Dec 15, 2005 15:23 UTC (Thu)
by mightyduck (guest, #23760)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 23, 2005 4:54 UTC (Fri)
by obi (guest, #5784)
[Link]
I'm a programmer too, and I do appreciate Gnome's "not-in-your-face"-ness. Yes, there is some functionality missing, but I'm willing to bet it's not by design, but simply because they didn't get round to it yet, or in the worst case that it's not really a high priority.
Every time I try KDE, I appreciate the polish and some great technology, but I just can't cope with the UI feel for a very long time. Considering how many pro-KDE comments there were, I can see not everyone feels the same way as me. It just goes to show that it's good there are choices, and I'd encourage all the desktop projects out there to continue finding their unique identity.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:43 UTC (Tue)
by proski (subscriber, #104)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:28 UTC (Tue)
by elanthis (guest, #6227)
[Link]
They just care that the computer does what they need. The details of how it does it is irrelevant to them. They especially do not want to have to learn how to edit rc files or memorize patterns of double-click icon -> right-click interface -> select Options -> select Advanced tab -> click Computer button -> check checkbox -> click OK or so on.
The designer wants an efficient application for doing their work, and they want to be able to ensure colors are correct, preferably by using a likewise efficient and simple tool. They do not want to need 12 steps to do it, either.
The pilot likewise couldn't give a crap about how the software works. He just wants to know that it works. Whether it's well-written real-time software or a staving kid in a box with a chalkboard and an abacus is entirely unimportant, so long as the helicopter stays up in the air and goes where the pilot wants it to.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:18 UTC (Tue)
by mgb (guest, #3226)
[Link] (17 responses)
Yesterday I had a problem with an application window that had content off the right side and resizing disabled. It took ten seconds of clicking to discover some KDE controls which allowed me to temporarily override the window size. Right click title bar - Advanced - Special Window Settings - Geometry. Exactly where any logical person would look for them.
And the Qt libraries are just as logical. GUI programming is easy and fun with Qt. GTK may be easier than Xlibs, but its nowhere near as productive as Qt.
We've started with the default Gnome in several distros but always become frustrated and switched to KDE. Now we always install Kubuntu - on our own systems and for our clients.
And yet: Long live Gnome! Competition helps both.
--Mike Bird
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:06 UTC (Tue)
by job (guest, #670)
[Link] (5 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 6:00 UTC (Wed)
by zblaxell (subscriber, #26385)
[Link] (4 responses)
Hints that disable window controls seem kind of silly to me. Putting on my naive-user hat for a moment, I expect that if you can resize one window, you can resize any and all windows. Actually, before I actually used a Macintosh for the first time many years ago, I had read about user interfaces and I assumed that you'd be able to pretty much move, edit, and resize anything you like in any application while it was running. Needless to say, I've been disappointed with everything that has come since.
IMHO, applications that can't cope with window resize at all (e.g. those that behave in some anti-social or useless way when the WM blithely ignores the application and reconfigures its window anyway) should have some kind of default panning or scaling behavior imposed on them, preferably transparently so that the clueless application has no idea this is happening. The only reasonable excuse for disabling WM controls would be in an airport-kiosk type of situation--in which case it would make more sense to disable the controls globally in the window manager, so having the application WM hints makes no sense in that situation either.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 7:27 UTC (Wed)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 14:19 UTC (Wed)
by Ross (guest, #4065)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 20:16 UTC (Wed)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 23:45 UTC (Wed)
by zblaxell (subscriber, #26385)
[Link]
I don't see a reason why transients (even real transients like dialog boxes) should not be organized or decorated differently--in fact, I think that's usually a good idea. The thing I insist on is that I retain the ability to arbitrarily move, size, raise and lower them (including the often-denied privilege of restacking a dialog window behind its parent, and independently minimizing parents and transients), regardless of decoration or initial position.
I do see many cases where the transient windows *themselves* are often a bad idea, but that's application misdesign that a window manager can't fix.
I've used truly hintless window managers (ones that don't move the keyboard focus from parent to transient and place the transient randomly, so I have to aim at the appropriate window with the mouse cursor for every single transient) and hintful window managers (ones that respect all of the hints to the letter and even impose restrictions of their own). If these were the only choices (thankfully they're not) then I'd pick the hintless WM, because it's at least possible to sensibly arrange windows with the hintless WM, even if I have to do a lot of extra work manually.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 3:55 UTC (Wed)
by njhurst (guest, #6022)
[Link] (10 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 15:05 UTC (Wed)
by cloose (guest, #5066)
[Link] (8 responses)
On the other hand, we have the gimp, inkscape, abiword, gnumeric and gnucash; none of which have comparable QT versions. IMHO it the success of the corresponding KDE apps (krita, kword, kspread, kmymoney) that lowers the interest in writing Qt equivalents for those apps. Maybe it is just the company I keep, but most of the top notch programmers I know prefer Gtk. Why is that do you think?
Maybe you're only looking for/attracting C programmers? I'm a C++/Java/Delphi programmer and I would never ever use a OO in C API.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 7:11 UTC (Thu)
by njhurst (guest, #6022)
[Link] (7 responses)
Actually, it may be unfair, but the feeling I get from the koffice suite is that they are mainly playing catch up to their gtk counterparts and have just lifted chunks of code wholus-bolus (nothing wrong with this, but it makes me wonder what their aim is).
If you are a C++ programmer you should take a look at gtkmm. It is a lot more C++ than QT. Murray Cumming has done a much better job of understanding the C++ paradigm (ouch, did I just use that word..) than the Troll developers. And the people I'm talking about tend to program in more esoteric languages (they would say 'real languages') such as Haskell, ocaml and Mercury.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 8:25 UTC (Thu)
by cloose (guest, #5066)
[Link] (3 responses)
If you are a C++ programmer you should take a look at gtkmm. It is a lot more C++ than QT. Murray Cumming has done a much better job of understanding the C++ paradigm (ouch, did I just use that word..) than the Troll developers.
After looking at the following you will sure understand that I have a different opinion about gtkmm <-> Qt and KOffice. :)
http://cia.navi.cx/stats/author/cloose
Posted Dec 15, 2005 8:41 UTC (Thu)
by njhurst (guest, #6022)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 10:14 UTC (Thu)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (1 responses)
So yes, I'd say it's not surprising he likes Qt and friends. :)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 11:07 UTC (Thu)
by njhurst (guest, #6022)
[Link]
Posted Dec 16, 2005 3:27 UTC (Fri)
by thedevil (guest, #32913)
[Link] (2 responses)
Your sense is not clear here. (Who are the "people I'm talking about", Qt people or Gtk?) Can you please explain?
From my post way above you'll see that I quite disagree with you, but
Posted Dec 16, 2005 4:36 UTC (Fri)
by njhurst (guest, #6022)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 17, 2005 4:18 UTC (Sat)
by thedevil (guest, #32913)
[Link]
I think the preference of Real Language people for gtk is very simple -
One aspect of Qt is annoying - its dependence on database libraries.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 23:49 UTC (Thu)
by pynm0001 (guest, #18379)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:04 UTC (Tue)
by job (guest, #670)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 18:35 UTC (Tue)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (46 responses)
99% of the current Linux desktop market probably doesn't have damn bit of need for a screen reader / magnifier / sticky keys. This argument is weak. There is a difference between features a minority of users desire, which the things Gnome doesn't do might be, and essential features which a minority of users simply can't do without. You can use a command line tool to configure PPD files. A blind user has no alternative if accessiblity features like screen readers are missing.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 18:44 UTC (Tue)
by JoeBuck (subscriber, #2330)
[Link] (45 responses)
While I use Gnome myself, I wasn't surprised to see Linus get all pissed
off in response to justifications given for not supporting full PPD
functionality because it might confuse the users. If this is an issue,
then it's up to the Gnome project to figure out a way of giving access
to the full set of printer capabilities, not to argue why they shouldn't.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:05 UTC (Tue)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (31 responses)
When you use the phrase "configure PPD files" you make it sound geeky. Excuse me for using plain language. But what you're really talking about is giving the user access to all of the printer's capabilities. Wrong. What I'm really talking about is the difference between providing acess to "all of a printer's capabilities" to a user who won't look up the instructions for using lower level mechanisms and providing any kind of access to any feature of a computer for a user with a physical disability. Why is that so difficult to understand?
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:21 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (30 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:33 UTC (Tue)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (29 responses)
Making the last remark you made is a bit like me saying "Why can't
disabled people have their Human assistants read the screen for them?"
Because if they won't do so, it's their fault they can't use the computer
- right? This is purile sophistry. Why do you have so much trouble admitting that there is an important difference between being unable to access a computer at all and losing the benefit of advanced printer features?
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:40 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (16 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:01 UTC (Tue)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (14 responses)
you seemed to be implying that accessability
software got some kind of magic exception from the "don't implement
unless it's used by a majority of users" rule just because we were
talking about disabled people instead of non-technical people. I've said nothing about the policy by which Gnome developers select features to implement (though actual Gnome developers on this thread have explictly disclaimed your characterization), but you've almost grasped the point I'm making. Being a non-technical person is a choice, such a person can gain technical knowledge and getting a more technical person to install a PPD file is an operation that needs to be done once. Being blind is not a choice, there is no practical way to regain sight and having an assistant read the screen must be done continously forever. These qualitative differences make your argument weak.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:21 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (11 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 21:06 UTC (Tue)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (10 responses)
Your argument is dangerous to the future of the Linux desktop, if it is to have one! Nonsense. 1) Accessability software enables a small portion of the public to do
something they couldn't otherwise. While technically true this is simplistic. A commitment to support disabled users where possible speaks to the values of a society in a way that advanced laser printing does not. 2) Advanced printer configuration would enable a larger portion of the public to do something they couldn't otherwise. Do you have sound statistical evidence to support this claim? Most of the printers people buy for their homes don't need PPD configuration and not all of those that do need it for basic features. Most advanced laser printers are installed in office environments where a system adminstrator can deal with configuration. In between there are people who are not affraid to read enough documentation to configure PPD files with or without a pretty graphical tool. Are the remaining users who have such printers and refuse to use the command line more numerous than the blind or elderly who need assistive technologies? I don't know. But don't pretend to know if you don't. 3) Learning to work with PPDs directly is not practical for the vast
majority of these users. Really? So the vast majority of users who want advanced laser printing can't operate a search engine or read CUPS documentation? 4) Hiring an assistant to read the screen is not practical for the vast majority of disabled users. Irrelevant. Even where it is practical assistive technology will cost less and provide more independence and privacy for such users. 1) Blind people can get around being blind on the computer by hiring an assistant, in theory. It would quite suck, but it's a *choice*.
2) Corporate users can get around not understanding PPD files by hiring a
assistant, in theory. It would quite suck, but it's a *choice*. Do you really not see the glaring differences here? Corporate users generally call such assistants system administrators and they hire them regardless of whether they need to make advanced laser printer features. Asking them to spend an hour or two out of a year to deal with such a routine task is not comparable to asking a disabled person to have their experience with a computer mediated by a full time assistant. But in any case, if your desktop design philosophy makes this expectation, how often do you suppose a user might run into these unrecoverable pot holes during their computing
experience, requiring the attention of a seasoned expert? You don't know anything about my design philosophy, on the desktop or anywhere else. I don't particularly care whether the Gnome print dialog supports PPD configuration or not. Go ahead and use KDE if you are disappointed with the way Gnome works. Go ahead and encourage othersto do the same too. All I ask is that you stop pretending that support for disabled users and advanced laser printing are comparable. They're not.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 21:35 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (9 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:13 UTC (Tue)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (8 responses)
I've been making the comparison [between assistive technology and PPD printer configuration] along with many others. Perhaps your
trouble is that you're unable to acknowledge that a world exists outside
your little bubble. No, my "trouble" (to the extent that I have any) is that this is the only point I'm interested in. I don't care about your messianic predictions about people abandoning Gnome or your pseudo-science explanations of the reasons Gnome developers implement some features and not others. The reason I haven't responded to your rants on these subjects is simply that I don't care what your opinions are. And while I'm touched by your concern about my business sense and success as a software designer, I'm afraid I don't find you credible enough to pay much attention to your opinions in these fields either. All I want is for you to admit that bringning the disabled into the online world is more important than configuring PPD printers. Is that so hard for you?
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:39 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (7 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 0:11 UTC (Wed)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (6 responses)
It's very hard for me when you keep changing what you want me to claim. Exactly what about my position do you imagine I've changed? Maybe the reason this is so hard for you is that you're not especially bright. That's a tempting conclusion when considering the "arguments" you've presented so far. It sounds to me like you want to use the inverse of the argument you wish I never made as an excuse for not implementing good printer support in
Gnome. Is that the case? No. That's a completely preposterous question. Are you even reading what you respond to? Show me where I have taken a position one way or another on whether Gnome or KDE has better printing support. Show me where I have compared the design philosophy of the two teams or in any way advocated one over the other on this thread. Here's a hint: I haven't. I'm certainly not going to begin debating such things with someone too dim witted to understand that accessibility is more important than printers that staple pages.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 3:14 UTC (Wed)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (5 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 15:08 UTC (Thu)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (4 responses)
You posit an important difference... Then you say there is no way to compare them... Then you say that bringing disabled users into the 'online world' is more important than the printer features. This is nothing but word games -- that is, sophistry. In context, when I say the two things are not comparable I'm refering to the absurd comparison you made at the beginning: "99% of the
current Linux desktop market probably doesn't have damn bit of need for a
screen reader / magnifier / sticky keys." You are comparing a refusal to support printer PPD configuration with refusing to support accessibility features. This comparison is invalid (regardless of whether Gnome developers actually have done so as you allege and others refute) because there is a qualitative difference between the two. You could admit this rather obvious fact without otherwise modifying your militant stance against Gnome. But then you wouldn't seem like such a moron and what fun would that be? When did the 'online world' enter
into this debate? More word games. "Online" in this context is merely a shorthand for direct access to computers and the internet. I am clearly not attempting to expand the detate to some other subject with this phrase. The same way the morals / ethics kneejerk
to the comment that "printer drivers are equally important to
accessibility tools" did - you simply thought it would be a nice way to
argue? Your creative grammer makes it impossible to be sure, but I can only assume you mean by this to accuse me of introducing nastly old morals into a lofty debate about technical issues. If so you're wrong as usual. This has more to do with logic and common sense than morals or ethics. I've explained this elsewhere. You won't convert me to GNOME, Why do you have so much difficulty grasping that I don't care which desktop you or anyone else uses? You are so bent out of shape over the difference between Gnome and KDE that merely by pointing out a flaw in your windy and incoherent statements that is completley unrelated to which is better I have become some sort of evangelist for the enemy in your eyes. Amusing.
Posted Dec 16, 2005 6:56 UTC (Fri)
by dvdeug (guest, #10998)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 17, 2005 0:19 UTC (Sat)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 17, 2005 22:21 UTC (Sat)
by dvdeug (guest, #10998)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 19, 2005 1:09 UTC (Mon)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 21:18 UTC (Tue)
by rfunk (subscriber, #4054)
[Link] (1 responses)
If this is the general opinion of GNOME developers, then I'm keeping
GNOME far away from nontechnical people who rely on me for technical
advice. They shouldn't need to jump the chasm from dumbed-down GUI to
command line, or call me, in order to take full advantage of their
computers. They should be able to discover the more advanced features
for themselves through their own exploration. They shouldn't have to go
off and independently become the sort of Unix people that GNOME expressly
prefers to dismiss anyway.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 21:54 UTC (Tue)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:37 UTC (Tue)
by rleigh (guest, #14622)
[Link]
>The point is that requiring a user to look up instructions for using low
>The only difference between not being able to access the computer at all
The PPD file tells the printing system what the capabilities of the printer are. They are useful for all printers, from a top of the range beast that occupies an entire room, through to small cheap inkjets. Without them, the printing system wouldn't let you choose the print quality and speed, paper type and size, and other basic options through to more esoteric features such as stapling, colour profiles, duplexing etc. They aren't something that can be ignored.
As a result of not supporting PPDs in *any* form, you can't do anything but print with the print queue defaults, giving the user zero control over printing. It can't even let you choose a paper size the printer can cope with. Printing under Gnome is painful at best, and completely inadequate the rest of the time. This is not usability. Rather than hiding advanced options, it provides no options at all...
KDEPrint (kprinter) has solved the problem for several years now, and supports all the major print spoolers in a general fashion (with plugins). Its printing support is top-notch. The reason why it wasn't done for Gnome is because instead of reimplementing this ideal solution, they wanted to reinvent the wheel, and avoid PPDs (supporting them just as an option). I discussed this with the maintainer at the Linux Printing Summit in Bordeax in 2004.
Roger
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:54 UTC (Tue)
by felixfix (subscriber, #242)
[Link]
Tell me again the difference between hiring a sysadmin and hiring a reading and typing assistant. --- No wait, I'll tell you. Sysadmins cost a lot more and thus are only used by rich wealthy bastards, while reading and typing assistants humiliate the differently enabled persons who have to hire them. That sounds about right. Pardon me if my politically correct jargon is not quite up to snuff, my personal translator assistant hasn't shown up for work today.
I have been rolling my own fvwm-based X for years. Once in a while I will try Gnome or KDE just to se what I am supposedly missing. I was a bit distressed when Slackware dropped Gnome. But your politically correct posts have convinced me that the Gnome mindset has nothing to do with my future.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:59 UTC (Tue)
by farnz (subscriber, #17727)
[Link] (10 responses)
In any case, even without a screen magnifier, someone blind could use
a braille terminal, or get a friend. In addition, you could have the
person who'd set your magnifier up set your screen up at a ridiculously
low res (e.g. 300x200 on a 25" 4:3 CRT), with a larger (e.g. 1024x768)
virtual desktop. The software isn't needed if you have the right
hardware, but it sure helps make life easier.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:19 UTC (Tue)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (8 responses)
Or are those of us who want to use cheap and readily available laser printers at high altitudes supposed to know that we can't find the feature in the GUI, and will have to tackle complex command line stuff? Yes. Using a command line is not rocket science. Or use KDE. But stop pretending that support for PPD files in the graphical interface is as important as accessibility features. It's not.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:25 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 12:53 UTC (Wed)
by bronson (subscriber, #4806)
[Link]
3. Printers become obsolete in 2012 so nobody cares anymore.
...and so on.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:34 UTC (Tue)
by farnz (subscriber, #17727)
[Link] (5 responses)
Why do you say that the minority
of
users who need a magnifier application (but not other accessibility
features) are so much more important than the minority of users who need
access to "advanced" PPD features to make their printer work at all that
GNOME needs several ways to make things OK for the magnifier users, but
that people who want to print should learn the command line?
Posted Dec 13, 2005 21:45 UTC (Tue)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (4 responses)
Why do you say that the minority of users who need a magnifier application (but not other accessibility features) are so much more important than the minority of users who need access to "advanced" PPD features to make their printer work at all that GNOME needs several ways to make things OK for the magnifier users, but that people who want to print should learn the command line? I didn't. Those are your words. The subtext of your question is this: why is bringing the disabled into the online world more important than making it as easy as possible to configure PPD printers? That the answer isn't obvious to you speaks volumes.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:49 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 15:08 UTC (Thu)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link] (2 responses)
Advanced PPD configuration is NOT more important to bring disabled into the online world. At last you admit the equivalent of two plus two is four. Well done! What a pity you couldn't resist adding that this holds only for some values of two: The only way that accessibility becomes a more important concern is if you're talking about moral / ethical concerns. This debate is not at all
about morals or ethics, but you were so eager to shred any part of my
original argument that you foolishly attempted to turn it into one. Accessibility is more important on the basis of logic and common sense. Let's replace disability with something more morally and ethically neutral and see what happens: Suppose we have two users with no physical handicaps. Both have computers and PPD printers that they would like to use their full capacity. The first user has an operating system which is perfect in every way except that it has no graphical support for configuring the printer. The command line is available but very scary. The second user has an operating system which is perfect in every way except that it has no support for graphical display of any kind, including text consoles. Which of these users has the more important problem? Now that you're focusing on accessibility being "more important" than a "different issue you can't compare" as you did originally, These seem different only because you are so determined to twist words that you can't see the forest behind all the trees. Accessibility is not comparable to PPD printing in the crabbed way you attempted in your original post. This is true because you started with the assumption that both were of equal importance. Maybe if you made fewer "random assumptions" this would not be so difficult to understand.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 21:06 UTC (Thu)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 17, 2005 1:58 UTC (Sat)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link]
Scenario 1: A large number of corporate users can't use GNOME because it sucks bad at printing. Scenario 2: A small number of people can't use GNOME because they can't see and it lacks a screen reader (hypothetically, if it did). I've already pointed out that you have presented no credible data to substantiate your claim about which group of users is larger. Without that you're merely speculating. But even so you're on shaky ground for two reasons. For one thing, whether you care to admit it or not, most so-called "corporate users" are supported by system administrators who are quite capable of reading documentation and configuring things on the command line. For another, the second group will include elderly users who are not necessarily blind but have impaired visual and motor abilities which probably makes it larger than you imagine. Nevertheless, the relative sizes of the groups is not the real issue. But to claim that people who print aren't at least as important is
(see Linus's big F word) INSANE. Nowhere have I claimed that one person or group of people was more important than any other. Quote the text that lead to you to believe that and I'll clarify what you have misunderstood. The point I've been making (again and again and again...) is that coping with a missing feature that prevents a user from accessing a computer in any way is qualitatively different from coping with a missing feature that prevents a user from accessing a subset of features of a subset of printers. Leaving a user unable to make a printer staple automatically is preferable to leaving one without access to email, the web, office productivity tools or indeed anything a computer could possible do -- not because the second user is more important but because the first has a much smaller burden to bear. Admitting this does not require you to concede that Gnome is in any way better than KDE, that the printing support the former provides is adequate in general or that any particular decision made by the designers of the former is appropriate. But it does require you to think of something other than your bruised ego. Can you manage that?
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:42 UTC (Tue)
by Frej (guest, #4165)
[Link]
It all comes down to someone doing the work.
There is a gnome-cups-manager module in cvs. But you have to know it exists. It seems to provide every ppd option for my driver here.
More often than not issues are bugs and missing features and not forced by "design".
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:21 UTC (Tue)
by jdub (guest, #27)
[Link] (5 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:48 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:52 UTC (Tue)
by Frej (guest, #4165)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 21:10 UTC (Tue)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:49 UTC (Tue)
by Frej (guest, #4165)
[Link]
I agree that the file selector was included in a release to early. It was quite a hot topic on a mailing list.
But really, i don't think anyone has really _TRIED HARD_ to make a print dialog. GNOME lacks developers, as every software project does ;).
If something bothers you that much, try to fix it(patches, bugzilla, docs)? Just don't assume that your first idea for fixing the issue is the right to do it for everyone.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:38 UTC (Tue)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:36 UTC (Tue)
by elanthis (guest, #6227)
[Link] (6 responses)
Next you're going to tell me that Linux doesn't have support for the BCM43xx chipsets because Linus thinks they're dumb, or that X.org can't do 3D acceleration on an ATI card because the developers think it would be bad design. In reality, both cases are because Free Software hackers have managed to get partially working code for both devices, but just have yet to have enough time to get the support complete.
Same with the GNOME print dialog. It's a work in progress. I wrestled with it for months because it lacked features, and here's what happened: I submitted bugs, the developers eventually got the time and motivation to fix them, and now recent GNOME print dialogs have more features. If that seems wrong to anyone, I'm (almost) interested in hearing what you think is the right way for this to go down.
Quit whining about the stupid print dialog already.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:31 UTC (Tue)
by Lockjaw (guest, #4611)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 3:25 UTC (Wed)
by coulamac (guest, #21690)
[Link] (2 responses)
The sad part about all of this is that the original poster in the linked thread, Till, wrote a very constructive e-mail on how to improve printing in Linux in general and Gnome in particular: Linus dove in and started the flamewar that is now running on Slashdot, LWN, OSNews, LinuxToday, et al. Just think of all the stop-energy hitting the Gnome developers who work hard to make their desktop better every day.
It's easy to ignore a troll-post unless that troll is named Linus Torvalds. ::sigh::
Posted Dec 14, 2005 5:34 UTC (Wed)
by b7j0c (guest, #27559)
[Link] (1 responses)
why? they could just all go use freebsd and tell him to bugger off...or keep using linux and still tell him to bugger off.
his comments don't appear to be disproportionately more informed than any other competent developers.
Posted Dec 26, 2005 21:59 UTC (Mon)
by oak (guest, #2786)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:48 UTC (Tue)
by JoeBuck (subscriber, #2330)
[Link] (1 responses)
As it turns out, a number of the people making this argument didn't know what they were talking about, and there had not been a decision on the matter. The result of all this is that Gnome's reputation is suffering some damage from its own advocates (including the dude who's posted about 20 messages in this thread telling people to go to command line approaches to configure their printers).
If the Gnome developers can assure us that they are working on improving printer support, cool. To my mind, intermediate solutions that expose too many options in too raw a form (the KDE approach, as some would argue) are better than not being able to do the job at all. On the other hand, configurability is overrated; I remember the days of X on Unix workstations in the early 90s, when every user had a different configuration and broke applications because they'd set the window manager to steal keys and clicks needed by the app, and I couldn't help anyone because every mouse movement was rebound to some strange thing.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 13:44 UTC (Thu)
by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
[Link]
(including the dude who's posted about 20 messages in this thread telling people to go to command line approaches to configure their printers) Maybe you should improve your reading comprehension skills before attempting to summarize the remarks other people make. Had you been paying attention you would have discovered the actual point of my remarks, which is that a missing feature in a GUI that's present on the command line is not comparable to missing accessibility features. This has nothing to do with advocating Gnome over KDE and does not represent any position on whether the print dialog should or shouldn't support PPD in general, so your comment demonstrates extreme ignorance.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:03 UTC (Tue)
by brugolsky (subscriber, #28)
[Link]
Posted Dec 14, 2005 16:22 UTC (Wed)
by kirkengaard (guest, #15022)
[Link]
Firefox is one of the champions of getting this right. Default interface is simple and eminently usable. The heavy stuff that some smaller set of users wants to manipulate is not excluded, it's hidden inside of a configuration set that is a hop away from the default interface. Look/feel/behaviour in the gross sense is in the standard Preferences dialog. about:config may be cumbersome to wade through casually, but practically anything deep you want to do is there. And if you really need to do something different, write an extension. Everything available, in a tiered setup, with the default usability-designed interface paramount.
Usable, extensible configuration: it's not an anti-Gnome-y. :)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 18:09 UTC (Tue)
by b7j0c (guest, #27559)
[Link] (1 responses)
JUST KIDDING
linus should just issue a charles barkley-like "i ain't your role model!" statement and move on.
amazingly there will be people who ditch gnome and switch to kde purely on the basis of this posting. now thats idiocy.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:11 UTC (Tue)
by lypanov (guest, #8858)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 18:24 UTC (Tue)
by madscientist (subscriber, #16861)
[Link] (19 responses)
I use Gnome/Ubuntu now, though, because I just don't care about that stuff anymore. I don't have time to mess with it, and I don't have the desire to mess with it. Been there, done that. With the exception of the particular software I develop (which I'm building locally myself anyway), I just want stuff to work. Gnome gives me that.
However! I don't use metacity. It's far too anemic for me. I have some serious requirements for my window manager and that's why the first thing I do on a new system is install FVWM: it's the only WM flexible enough to handle the requirements that I have, so far. But, now that EWMH is pretty well standardized, FVWM works quite well with Gnome. Not perfectly, but more than well enough for me. If someone were to implement something similar to FvwmButtons in Gnome, with as much flexibility (in particular, I _have_ to be able to define actions for all three of the mouse buttons, which is against the Gnome concept), then maybe I could do without FVWM. Maybe. Until then, my current setup is fine for me.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:16 UTC (Tue)
by tomsi (subscriber, #2306)
[Link] (10 responses)
My sentiments too. I want to use my computer to do stuff, not fiddle with the pretty bling-bling ;) So Gnome fits my bill perfectly. But I also agree with a lot of the posters here, that Gnome should still make the difficult things possible (using Advanced Settings) instead of not implementing at all!
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:34 UTC (Tue)
by justi9 (guest, #7522)
[Link] (6 responses)
http://gtweakui.sourceforge.net/screen.php
The GNOME developers clearly want to keep that stuff partitioned off--very difficult for "your mom" to run into by accident--but they are not against its existence.
While this is clearly not the only approach to the problem of desktop audience, it is clearly one *reasonable* approach. So what's the big deal?
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:48 UTC (Tue)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (4 responses)
(Is that really what you're saying?)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:32 UTC (Tue)
by justi9 (guest, #7522)
[Link]
So, no, I don't agree with you that inexperienced users want (demand!) the functionality offered in gTweakUI or Devil's Pie. They don't, because they don't care.
You, however, do care a lot, it seems. *And* you're smart and can install gTweakUI or something similar with ease. So go to it.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:57 UTC (Tue)
by allesfresser (guest, #216)
[Link] (2 responses)
I wished many times that we had been able to do this when I was a desktop support tech.
This is not the only target market for a GUI environment, of course. But it is an important one, and one that would generate a significant part of any revenue that companies would pay for a free-software desktop. So I understand completely why it would be a high priority for Gnome developers that are working for Novell via Ximian. Making all the options available to individuals would be a nice thing too. But the simple case probably has to come first... and, also, I would assume that in such a situation the printers and such would be administrated remotely by an sysadmin, rather than adjusting things on each individual desktop. But as always, I could be wrong...
Posted Dec 14, 2005 5:14 UTC (Wed)
by zlynx (guest, #2285)
[Link]
You'd better have a remote desktop program or some way to reset them to a default GUI.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 10:51 UTC (Wed)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:51 UTC (Tue)
by jmorris42 (guest, #2203)
[Link]
Which is exactly my problem with GNOME. You see, I am a UNIX user. If I were a Mac user I would buy a Mac. If I wanted the Windows look and feel I wouldn't switch to KDE, I'd buy an XP license.
We have a crisis brought about by our success. These non unix folk migrated in because Windows sucked donkey balls throughout the 90's and is still not ready for prime time and Macs are overpriced straightjackets. They have no interest in our ways and expect US to assimilate into their culture and like most of Western Civilization, most of us are only too willing to surrender, lacking the confidence that our Ways, Customs and Culture are worthy of preserving and teaching to the immigrants.
Make GNOME easy to use for most tasks? Heck yea, I am no fan of overcomplication. But we need a graphical face for UNIX that looks like it belongs on a UNIX system. Remember that old fortune line, "Unix IS user friendly, it is just particular who it's friends are."? We don't need 100% market penetration for any one graphical interface and probably will never see anything achieve it, because one size doesn't fit all. The question is which group of users does GNOME want, and increasingly it is becoming apparent that people like myself are NOT in the target audience for either GNOME or KDE.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 17:20 UTC (Thu)
by mightyduck (guest, #23760)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 18:10 UTC (Thu)
by madscientist (subscriber, #16861)
[Link] (1 responses)
I haven't used KDE in a while now, so I can't pretend to speak about whether that's still true or not, but it definitely used to be an issue.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 19:04 UTC (Thu)
by mightyduck (guest, #23760)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:17 UTC (Tue)
by halla (subscriber, #14185)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:19 UTC (Tue)
by madscientist (subscriber, #16861)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:08 UTC (Tue)
by halla (subscriber, #14185)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 0:37 UTC (Wed)
by madscientist (subscriber, #16861)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 16, 2005 0:06 UTC (Fri)
by pynm0001 (guest, #18379)
[Link]
Posted Dec 14, 2005 15:21 UTC (Wed)
by tjc (guest, #137)
[Link] (1 responses)
Sawfish takes about half the pain out of Gnome for me. If sawfish didn't exist, I probably would have gone back to KDE a long time ago. In fact, on my development system I run sawfish with fspanel, which is pretty spartan, but it works.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 10:18 UTC (Thu)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
Posted Dec 15, 2005 21:27 UTC (Thu)
by MLKahnt (guest, #6642)
[Link]
I run Debian now - both Gnome and KDE are on this box, but my account is Gnome based and other than KBluetoothd, I run Gnome applications and applets. Some of it is honestly the underlying appearances - I could never make KDE look as good as I have GNOME looking, but predominantly it is the functionality and choice of applications under GNOME that make it my preferred option.
If Evolution is overkill for email, there is Balsa and other choices. Until Galeon converted to be extensions to Epiphany, there were multiple browsers. With KDE, typically only one program for a task is available, and while some have solid functionality and performance, other areas aren't quite as featureful - applets, for instance, are a significant part of the functionality on my GNOME desktop, including weather reports for my location and four other places around the world where friends are, stock indices, system and network monitors, mini-commander, notification area, window and desktop lists, a clock and of course Wanda. Part of how I do this is small icons, but I also have three panels rather than the normal one or two.
On systems I have set up for people, I always give the GNOME/KDE choice, alongside other popular and functional environments such as WindowMaker and XFCE - with them I try to be agnostic about the desktops because it is the variety of options that I think is very valuable, with power users possibly turning to most tuneable desktops such as FVWM, BlackBox or the like, KDE for those for whom it meets their tastes, GNOME for those for whom its choices meets their tastes (as well as businesses that like to lock down employee desktops as it seems to be easier from my efforts for that - although that may be a combination of their design and my familiarity.) I've noted that Gnome seems to be the popular choice even when I try to prod some to move to KDE due to it being a better fit for the tasks they are doing.
As to the actual window manager - iirc, the first one available capable of interacting with GNOME was Enlightenment - haven't tried it recently but if you want something more configurable - particularly in terms of eye candy, it is an option. That said, if you don't agree with the functional approach, there is always the option of forking work - be it in GNOME, KDE or whatever.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 18:27 UTC (Tue)
by hazelsct (guest, #3659)
[Link]
Those who associate "Metacity is bad therefore GNOME is bad" clearly lack imagination. Let a hundred window managers bloom, and let GNOME work well with all of them!
Posted Dec 13, 2005 19:47 UTC (Tue)
by tajyrink (subscriber, #2750)
[Link]
I _was_ the kind of user that wants to fiddle with all the settings to the max. Nowadays I do all my daily tasks with the nice & clean GNOME programs, and have realized that, as a power-user as I am, I prefer doing the more complicated stuff on the command line or with nice little scripts than having Konqueror-like amount of GUI settings / menus to configure. And that "more complicated stuff" isn't a lot, since nowadays GNOME programs have actually quite a lot of features already. There could be more, that's true, but that's also why waiting for a new GNOME&Ubuntu is also so anticipated by me :)
But definitely when I was a SUSE & KDE user, I'd have first thought that I wouldn't switch to GNOME... but now I'm happy, and still also think that KDE is nice. With the cleanup operation for KDE 4, it might again offer so much more, too - KDE has a lot of nice applications, and I use some of them even despite the UI clutter which depends a bit on the application. And yes, some Gnome applications (Rhythmbox comes to my mind) are currently even a bit too "empty".
Adding features in a reasonable way is easier than cleaning up already-added features - that's one of the main points that I've noticed, even though the clean-up process was long in GNOME. I happily missed most of it, because I started with GNOME 2.8. I'd probably be pissed off with Gnome if I had tried to endure Gnome from 1.4 through 2.4 or so :) It just took so long to realize the benefits, and the process is of course still on-going. But I don't know if it could have been done in any other way.
And all in all, the Gnome & KDE & others co-operation (fd.o etc.) is a benefit for all - even for the more Gnome-oriented distros, with the nicer and nicer KDE/Qt integration we're seeing (and vice versa), KDE/Gnome can offer nice applications to complement each other. I hope that the interoperability will continue to increase, even though currently it seems I'm going to stay with Gnome (and some others are seemingly going to stay with KDE).
Posted Dec 13, 2005 20:18 UTC (Tue)
by Richard_J_Neill (subscriber, #23093)
[Link] (5 responses)
This means, for example:
A few other random thoughts:
1)I really like GTK. In particular, on lower-end systems, it's much faster. For example, on the Zaurus, GPE is very good, whereas qtopia is, I think, unusably sluggish.
2)GNOME is the only environment I know of which has *lost* features in the last 2 years!
3)Whatever one says about GNOME vs KDE, it's a different ball-game wrt the applications. Many of the "G" applications trounce the "K" applications. eg Abiword >> KWord, GRIP >> KAudiocreator, eog >> kview, xscreensaver >> kscreensaver. But not always. Eg Konqueror >> Nautilus, KPPP >> GnomePPP.
Interoperability, choice, and cross-pollenation of ideas are vital!
4)Som specific rants:
* Why does Mandrake have tools which break the principle of "growing up"? They work by "magic", and break any custom configurations you may have.
* The Gnome filepicker. WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?!
* Complexity. The most recent versions of the DEs seem to be too interwoven. This is Unix - we're suppposed to have small, discrete applications which are modular. I'd rather have less interdependencies. For example, a recent update of KDE pulled in a new version of DBUS and HAL. Fine. But *why* did that break, of all things, the VLC player, which uses WxWidgets? Or when KDED crashes, why does it kill off khotkeys, and make kicker un-restartable?
Posted Dec 14, 2005 2:05 UTC (Wed)
by tjc (guest, #137)
[Link] (4 responses)
Which is really the source of much of the frustration that some users experience when using current versions of Gnome. If Gnome 1.x had never existed, there probably wouldn't be so many people complaining about 2.x. From the time Gnome 1.x became stable enough to use (in Oct. 1999, IIRC) until the time it became too ill-maintained to depend on, it picked up a lot of users who came to have certain expectations about the next release. 2.x was a big dissapointment, but there was hope that 2.2 (or 2.4, or 2.6, or 2.8...) would be better. But instead of features reappearing, they just kept dissappering. For example, one of the first things I noticed about 2.12 is that one can no longer open a terminal window from the desktop menu. I fully expect the Gnome desktop to eventually just disappear entirely (maybe this is a feature that they're saving for 3.x), leaving behind about 50 processes running in the background and consuming hundereds of megabytes of memory for no apparent reason. OK, I'll admit it: my frustration has given way to a sort of resigned facetiousness. :^)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 4:56 UTC (Wed)
by bojan (subscriber, #14302)
[Link] (3 responses)
You do have nautilus-open-terminal installed, right?
Posted Dec 14, 2005 10:23 UTC (Wed)
by mepr (guest, #4819)
[Link]
:-!
Posted Dec 14, 2005 15:02 UTC (Wed)
by tjc (guest, #137)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 18:58 UTC (Wed)
by bojan (subscriber, #14302)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2005 22:54 UTC (Tue)
by dann (guest, #11621)
[Link] (1 responses)
It seems that what started this discussion is a reaction to the fact that GNOME (well GNOME developers) are perceived as having an extremely arrogant attitude especially towards advanced users.
Yes, the goal of simplifying the desktop is laudable, but it can probably be achieved without alienating the power users. Why? Because such users have a great influence on other users (by recommending people what to use/not use) and because they are the most likely to become GNOME developers.
As an example: removing the desktop right-click menu entry "Open Terminal".
And the above is only one of the many examples.
The way to answer to power user requests is also strange, referring to
(I do like GNOME, and I have used it since it was first released)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 10:38 UTC (Wed)
by mepr (guest, #4819)
[Link]
and nautilus-open-terminal isn't available on debian sid.
BTW, ubuntu gnome fixes most of the worst decisions of the gnome team, such as by turning off spatial mode by default.
And that gives the lie to the idea stated repeatedly here that gnome misses features only because the developers don't have time. They tried to force spatial mode on users, and told people to use gconf-editor to turn it off. No, that doesn't have to be done once. Is it really that difficult to put an option in the nautlius preferences menu? But I read the email threads where gnome developers said that users needed to be forced to be taught to use the "right" way. But I tried the "right" way, and it was a horrible hack of a metaphore. It tried to do the old windows 3.1 thing of remembering where you placed the window for a given folder, which ignores the fact that where I want the window depends on what else is going on on the desktop at the moment, and when it didn't know where to put it, it usually ended up in BFE, such as at the edge of the monitor with most of the window hidden beyond the edge of the screen.
And good god! "middle click doesn't open another window!" What if I have a two button mouse?
and I'm still a loyal gnome user, because the look and feel is so elegant, and kde just has too many picky options to be practical. But it still finds a way to be a PITA.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:00 UTC (Tue)
by pointwood (guest, #2814)
[Link]
Havoc Pennington also compared the implementation of one often-requested feature (the ability to arbitrarily rebind mouse buttons in metacity) to selling maternity clothes for men. One can only assume he is not implying that people who want to rebind buttons are, in fact, pot-bellied transvestites. ROFLMAO!!! Thanks for giving me the biggest laugh this week so far :) I haven't read much of the thread (yet), but as others have written, he's just another user. The only reason this is being mentioned at all is because the comment isn't from some random unknown person but the #1 kernel guy. I consider the fact that a given person prefers open source, much more important than whether she/he prefers KDE or GNOME. I will go even further and say that I don't even consider it that particularly important (whether she/he prefers ot use open source or not), I consider free, open standards to be a much bigger issue.
Posted Dec 13, 2005 23:21 UTC (Tue)
by bojan (subscriber, #14302)
[Link] (6 responses)
Linus needs to get over himself this time. Not everyone is a nerd/geek/tech/power-user/whatever like most of us here. Most people don't need complicated stuff, they need stuff that just works. This doesn't make them idiots.
My better half is a happy Gnome user (not that she would know what Gnome actually is). She does all her work (completely IT unreleated) on the platform and never complained about things missing from her desktop. And no, she doesn't need to use the command line, nor would she know how. And yes, about 80% of the office workforce falls into the same category - they just don't need complicated stuff.
I also use Gnome for most of my work (except for the Windows-only stuff, which runs inside VMWare) and a major difference between the old, very configurable Gnome (i.e. pre 2.x) and the new one is that I don't spend time fiddling with nonsense. The new version looks and works a _lot_ better. Maybe people that use Windows/KDE are somehow more productive then myself, I don't know. I seem to be able to finish all my tasks on time, even with an "idiotic" environment like Gnome.
In conclusion, coming up with blanket statements, appears to be idiotic in itself, doesn't it?
Posted Dec 14, 2005 2:14 UTC (Wed)
by tjc (guest, #137)
[Link] (5 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 4:30 UTC (Wed)
by bojan (subscriber, #14302)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 15:13 UTC (Wed)
by tjc (guest, #137)
[Link] (3 responses)
The phrase "Most people don't need complicated stuff, they need stuff that just works." pushed me over the edge. I've spent too many hours in design meetings where the project manager shared this "revelation."
Posted Dec 14, 2005 20:39 UTC (Wed)
by hingo (guest, #14792)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 22:16 UTC (Wed)
by bojan (subscriber, #14302)
[Link] (1 responses)
It wasn't. I certainly never claimed anything about KDE, primarily because I don't use it, so I can't tell. I fully support that people have a choice and pick KDE if they so wish.
What I was referring to in my original post is somewhat similar to the choice of transmissions one can make when buying a car. Most folks are just find with an automatic - it just works, you don't have to change gears, press the clutch, think about revs etc. That doesn't make them idiots - they just what the thing to work. So, Gnome developers appear to be in the business of designing a desktop with an "automatic transmission", if you wish (disclaimer: this is not saying anything about KDE - I simply don't know). Not everyone's cup of tea, I know. And, not all choices they make are correct - sometimes things are left out that should have been kept in. That's OK. People make mistakes, other people point them out and the world moves on.
I think Linus was wrong to come up with the blanket statement I quoted: "If you think your users are idiots, only idiots will use it." Neither Gnome developers think of their users as idiots, nor are those users idiots. I don't claim to be a very smart guy, but I don't like being put into a bucket like that, together with my better half and heaps of other people. And the language he used in the thread to explain himself makes it even worse. And all because the right mouse button doesn't do (in Gnome) what Linus would like it to do on his notebook.
PS. All the cars that I ever owned were manual. Go figure ;-)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 11:49 UTC (Thu)
by njhurst (guest, #6022)
[Link]
I think we all have a certain amount of room in our brains for details, your choice to use a manual is my choice to build my own greenhouse management software and hardware. We could each take the 'easy' option and drive an automatic, or buy commercial plug-and-go greenhouse equipment, but then we'd just find a new hobby :)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 0:18 UTC (Wed)
by rleigh (guest, #14622)
[Link]
A list of a few of my frustrations may be found here:
http://groups.google.com/group/uk.comp.os.linux/tree/brow...
As a result of this, I've spent the last four days converting a GObject-based project to C++, and if it turns out well, I have several others which will be converted as well. So far, it's going rather well, and the code size should be halved when complete.
A major problem is the strict ABI versioning. While it sounds nice for the corporate types, it means there has been no real work on the core components since well before GTK+ 2.0 was released, that is several years ago. While new bits have been added, fundamental design flaws (and bugs) have gone unfixed. Additionally, a lot of the "portability" code in GLib is broken. gint? Please. A lot of the "g" types serve little purpose, others are dangerous because they actually hinder portability (e.g. GTime) due to basic misunderstandings on the part of the original authors.
Some other examples of things which don't work properly:
GtkAction: Why are there only three action types? Why can't I use any sensible widget type as an action?
GtkUIManager: Why does it replicate part of libglade? Both are useful, but why are they not combined into something that works properly for every case?
GtkCellRenderer: Why can't any widget be a cell renderer? With Cocoa, widgets exist as two separate parts, the part that does the rendering (view), and the part that does the presentation. With a similar split, this would enable all widgets to be used in the tree view, and at the same time would fix the main weaknesses of the widget drawing and theming system.
Canvas: why are there about six different implementations? Why is the official one completely unmaintained and buggy? Why can't it be incorporated directly into GTK+, so that all widgets are canvas items?
File chooser: The original wasn't pretty, but at least it worked efficiently. The current chooser is worse than useless. Hello, keyboard?
Glade: Why can't I extend it with my own GtkWidget-derived widgets?
As a result of all the problems, each of which is minor on its own, development is rather more difficult, and more importantly, time-wasting, than it should be. Taking a look at the various Gnome libraries, most are a complete mess, with applications reinventing the wheel many times over, with the result that functionality which should really be in core libraries is written several times over in slightly different ways.
Ultimately, I've been gradually turned off as a user, as it has become increasing frustrating to use. But more importantly, I've been turned off as a developer, because unless the fundamental problems are fixed, Gnome application development is no longer fun or enjoyable, because I can no longer be *productive* when I have to spend long periods of time working around simple to fix problems in the core libraries. This is a shame because GTK+ itself is a fantastic toolkit, just one where a lot of the individual parts were left 70% complete.
Regards,
Posted Dec 14, 2005 1:47 UTC (Wed)
by dskoll (subscriber, #1630)
[Link]
However, on balance, I do find the KDE developers are more reasonable and more receptive to suggestions than the GNOME people. Case in point: KDE's mail reader and news reader support external editors, one of the most fundamental features of a UNIX-based program. Evolution still does not, years and years after I (and several others) filed a bug about it.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 2:12 UTC (Wed)
by shredwheat (guest, #4188)
[Link] (2 responses)
Gnome just works.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 2:34 UTC (Wed)
by tjc (guest, #137)
[Link]
Posted Dec 15, 2005 19:21 UTC (Thu)
by mightyduck (guest, #23760)
[Link]
Posted Dec 14, 2005 6:58 UTC (Wed)
by toufeeq_hussain (guest, #25235)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 9:49 UTC (Wed)
by NightMonkey (subscriber, #23051)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 10:52 UTC (Wed)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link]
Posted Dec 14, 2005 10:57 UTC (Wed)
by vblum (guest, #1151)
[Link]
Here's my bit of fuel to the fire:
Written on KDE because it just works for me - and always has. In contrast, my very limited experience with Gnome on RH 8 was ... ummm ... spartanic, and I have never missed that spartanity since.
Happy roasting! :-)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 12:58 UTC (Wed)
by grouch (guest, #27289)
[Link] (13 responses)
Maybe by Firefox 2.0 someone will figure out how to allow user customization without scaring first-time users.
As for GNOME and KDE, no thanks. Too cluttered, too busy, too hard to make them fit my way of working. Each represents a tremendous amount of work and each has helped a great many people. Fvwm just works, for me, any way I choose.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 14:25 UTC (Wed)
by bk (guest, #25617)
[Link] (10 responses)
Posted Dec 14, 2005 18:12 UTC (Wed)
by grouch (guest, #27289)
[Link] (4 responses)
No, to both of your assumptions. It is not the "only really widely used [f]ree application" and the number of users does not define the value.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 0:16 UTC (Thu)
by bk (guest, #25617)
[Link] (3 responses)
As far as usability goes, what metric would *you* use to define success, if not popularity?
Posted Dec 15, 2005 10:32 UTC (Thu)
by grouch (guest, #27289)
[Link] (2 responses)
Concerning the first assumption, which you framed as "possibly the only really widely used Free application", it's simply too broad to measure. The problem could be defined and refined to fit the assumption or to deny the assumption. For example, Apache is free and used by many millions of people, but maybe that doesn't fit what you had in mind for "application". Mplayer? Gaim? GCC (without which it might be that neither Linux nor Firefox would exist)? It's just too loose to make a count.
Refining the question more won't help because you would still be left with the old problem of counting who actually uses what. Even counting hits by Firefox on websites wouldn't help because (a) some people deliberately change the user agent and (b) that restricts the software you're counting to only browsers. These counting problems leave you with nothing to measure except the amount of publicity surrounding a particular piece of software, which does not evaluate the effect of the configurability of the user interface.
The other part, "[t]he proof is in the results, right?", ignores the effects of marketing. I probably messed up by assuming on top of your assumption (we're looping!) that you were talking about the proof of user interface design being shown by how many people voluntarily use some piece of software.
Firefox received a great deal of publicity by groups and individuals. Even security organizations advised IE users to switch to Firefox. This was not advised because of the user interface. "Take back the Web" icons appeared on a very great many web pages, including my own, linking people to where they could download Firefox. This was due, in part, to security concerns, to concerns about non-standard extensions to Web protocols, to desires by some people to promote freedom, and to a kind of "me too!" attitude we all fall into at one time or another.
The ease of use of Firefox played a role in some downloads, but by no means all downloads or continued use. I would guess that a lot of secondary marketing, that is, people recommending Firefox after switching from IE, came about because of the great relief from all the breakage and ties in IE.
The ease of use of Firefox again played some role in getting that second tier of people to try it. That is probably a good indicator of how well the Firefox developers managed to make a user interface that does what is expected and kept the user interface from being scary. It does not prove that a simple user interface explains the popularity of Firefox nor does it prove that a lack of configurability explains the popularity of Firefox.
I realize you were not using the word "proof" in any strict sense, so please don't take the above as just playing semantics. Consider that it could just as easily be argued that much of Firefox's popularity could be explained by the ease of add-ons. Extensions seem to be extremely popular.
Once you consider marketing, relief from a dangerously broken alternative, familiarity and expected controls of the user interface, and the extensibility of Firefox, the idea that reducing access to configurable features and functions increases the popularity or usability of Firefox just doesn't hold up any longer. It also doesn't hold up when applied to any other software.
Finally:
"As far as usability goes, what metric would *you* use to define success, if not popularity?"
One way is to check feedback in all its forms. For example, if it is _known_ that there are lots of users of a program but there are few bug reports, suggestions or complaints buzzing around concerning the user interface, it could very well be that the developer(s) got it just the way people want and expect it to act.
This actually could argue against Firefox's design. Instead of all those extensions (and the talk about them) being a vote in favor of Firefox as it is, they could be construed as being many votes against those features being left out. The good thing is that Firefox's developers can evaluate those extensions to see which might be worth including by default to serve a great many users without too much "cost", as they put it, to those users who do not want them.
Dang it, I didn't mean to prattle on so much but you asked a question that interests me and I'm a motormouth when started. If you'd flamed or trolled, it would have been easy to just snap back something nasty. I hope some of the ramblings make some kind of sense, for a change.
(Just because I can't resist, here's what I think of one notorious piece of software that came with a very, very simple user interface: SonyBMG)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 14:39 UTC (Thu)
by bronson (subscriber, #4806)
[Link] (1 responses)
"One way is to check feedback in all its forms..."
A lack of feedback implies success? You're not serious are you? If you are, then let me suggest, at the very least, reading http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selection_bias
Posted Dec 15, 2005 16:40 UTC (Thu)
by grouch (guest, #27289)
[Link]
A lack of feedback of the type proposed and under the conditions given could indeed imply success. Your link to selection bias does not change that. As a program matures, it should naturally generate less feedback or else it isn't really maturing, it's stagnating or abandoned.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 21:12 UTC (Wed)
by grouch (guest, #27289)
[Link]
I think the Linux desktop is at its best
when it promotes experimentation, big bold ballsy gambles, and lets
market evolution pick the best results with bloody claw and gleaming
fang. I think it's _not_ at its best when it is beholden to gods of
a HIG, enterprise requirements, what Microsoft has done with its
products, or even (more controversially) the expectations of the
users it inherited from twm.
[...]
Make it _easy_ for people
to do totally new stuff, like Gimmie, and then promote the hell out
of it. If it sucks, find a new one. The Linux desktop should be
what lets you do what you _can't_ do elsewhere, not the one where you
can do _most_ of the stuff you can do elsewhere, but with better
software licensing terms on some of it.
I am also greatly relieved to be wrong about why Firefox seems to lack configurability. It only appeared to me to have caught the dumbing-down disease in comparison to its parent. Earlier in the thread,
he explained:
We have among our design principles that users shouldn't
pay complexity cost for things that they don't use, but we expend
significant effort supporting the extension community and writing our
own extensions to allow users to choose which other things they
_will_ use.
[...]
Where a user wants to do something with our software and can't,
because we haven't figured out how to make it possible without adding
complexity cost for everyone who _doesn't_ want to do that, it means
that we have a design bug.
The first part of that I had seen before, but not the 2nd. The latter makes a huge difference.
I still think the lock-in view of the browser history, "about:config" and having to install 3rd party extensions for so many things are just plain wrong, but there's hope. It's young and growing fast.
Posted Dec 15, 2005 1:21 UTC (Thu)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 11:53 UTC (Thu)
by njhurst (guest, #6022)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 15, 2005 15:03 UTC (Thu)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link]
Posted Dec 22, 2005 12:39 UTC (Thu)
by niner (subscriber, #26151)
[Link]
By the time the Mozilla Foundation was founded, there was already the Phoenix/Firebird/Firefox pet project that was chosen as the product that should be marketed to end users.
Firefox was a marketing success which is not related to any superiority compared to Mozilla, konqueror or any other _modern_ browser. They marketed it with arguments about security and bloat. Well, nowadays we know that Firefox does not have a significantly lower memory footprint and that it's also not perfect regarding security.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 14:32 UTC (Wed)
by pizza (subscriber, #46)
[Link] (1 responses)
Those last two are crucial.
It's one thing to say "yeah, I have three thousand features" but if you turn a certian combination on, something else breaks.
Reducing the feature set is a way of taking care of this; they figure out what their users *need* (not what they *want*), make sure those features are solid and thus supportable, and get rid of everything else that conflicts.
So-called power-users are the worst ones; they expect to be supported yet are the ones who muck with the settings the most and thus are the least supportable.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 18:58 UTC (Wed)
by grouch (guest, #27289)
[Link]
The first time GNOME refused to print because of some unknown breakage in some mysterious sound daemon, it was banished from all such users' systems. I don't remember what year that was nor which version of GNOME was involved, but a system so brain-damaged as to _require_ sound production before it will pass a document to a printer is not something I will again trust to withstand the stumblings of inexperienced users.
Recently I tried setting up one such user with KDE. He rejected it as too complicated and scary. He is happy now with a very simplified and customized desktop using fvwm. Nothing is hidden from him; he is free to configure everything the window manager and the underlying system allows. If he chooses to alter every aspect of his desktop, and then has to call on me to fix something, it will be no hindrance to my work at all.
My experience has been that people learn a lot by being allowed to break their toys. The need for support rapidly decreases when you:
1. Configure things based upon the individual user's priorities and needs.
2. Allow each user as much freedom as possible or practical to fine-tune their own workspace.
3. Provide easy access to as much information as they _might_ want on how the system works. (The majority of users, especially those in office environments, do not seem to want to dig very deep in documentation if item 1 above is performed with care. They do place a premium on being able to get things to look and act as they expect, which can be very different from individual to individual.)
4. Make sure the user understands how stupid computers are compared to the user and that if the stupid computer is not acting as the user wants, it's probably fixable. (Almost every new computer user I've encountered, and almost every former MS Windows user migrated to GNU/Linux, begins with the idea that they are dumb and the computer is smart. What usually dispels this type of brain-washing is, "If the computer is so smart, why can't you explain the problems to it just like you are explaining them to me? Thankfully, Linux is built by a lot of smart people who realize this dumb machine needs to be adaptable to _you_.")
5. Check on the user often for the first week or so and _ask_ if anything is troubling or needs to be changed. Observe for a while, if possible, to see if the user is having to jump through hoops that you can eliminate.
6. Don't hide your methods of fixing things. Even a running commentary while you work can lead quite a few users to look for ways to streamline things for themselves. (That doesn't mean give them root access. Most do not want the ability to destroy their systems. It also doesn't mean you need to read the bash manual to the dispatcher who just wants a custom button to launch her "app" with a single click).
Being a pompous ass with a dictatorial overlord attitude will increase the amount of support needed. Tools should be made to fit the user. Users should not have to dumb down to some dictated, restrictive, homogenous, one-size-fits-bill interface.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 15:34 UTC (Wed)
by zooko (guest, #2589)
[Link]
I use Mac OS X, Windows XP, and Ion every single day (except not Windows XP on weekends), and I used Gnome every now and then when I sit down at my wife's or son's machines. From the set of {Mac OS X, Windows XP, Gnome, Ion+XEmacs+screen+bash+Galeon}, I definitely prefer Ion.
Posted Dec 14, 2005 23:19 UTC (Wed)
by lamikr (guest, #2289)
[Link] (3 responses)
Nautilus has two very good examples
Mika
Posted Dec 15, 2005 16:59 UTC (Thu)
by tjc (guest, #137)
[Link] (2 responses)
I find all the extra windows to be a real nuisance. What I've done to adapt is to resize all my Nautilus windows to be the same size so that when I alt-tab back to the previous window the close icon is in the same location. So instead of "click, click, click", it's now "click alt-tab close, click alt-tab close, click alt-tab close." At least with the windows the same size I don't have to reaquire the close icon for each new window.
Posted Dec 16, 2005 5:15 UTC (Fri)
by coulamac (guest, #21690)
[Link] (1 responses)
(From the FreeBSD FAQ for Gnome 2.12)
How do I disable spatial Nautilus?
As of GNOME 2.8, Nautilus operates in what is known as a "spatial" mode. This means that each item is opened in a new window. This may not be desirable to all users. If you wish to revert back to the old Nautilus file system browser, go to Desktop->Preferences->File Management, click on the Behavior tab, and check the "Always open in browser windows" checkbox.
Another way is to use gconf-editor:
change /apps/nautilus/preferences/always_use_browser to true
Posted Dec 17, 2005 17:18 UTC (Sat)
by tjc (guest, #137)
[Link]
Posted Dec 15, 2005 3:53 UTC (Thu)
by dwheeler (guest, #1216)
[Link] (2 responses)
BUT - I have little interest in endless tweaking, I want it to "just work". So, for me, I find I'm happier with GNOME than with KDE.
I also worry somewhat about control over Qt by a single organization if there are many proprietary programs that use it (making forking impractical).
But this arguing is pointless. What is needed is good standards so that you can run any program, from any desktop, and have everything integrate. And for the most part, that's already here -- you can already run most KDE or GNOME applications from either environment. This is in part due to the hard work at freedesktop.org and other places. The KDE and GNOME developers in general work well together; we should encourage them to continue to work together, through forums like freedesktop.org, so that users can choose their desktop preference.
Posted Dec 16, 2005 2:50 UTC (Fri)
by bk (guest, #25617)
[Link]
I agree, a Qt fork would be extremely difficult and would probably stagnate and set back the KDE project by *years*. The reason, though, is that Qt is designed poorly, from a free software perspective.
It's obese, monolithic and very un-Unix like. I can nearly guarantee that, in the event of a fork, you will have several factions of hackers determined to correct these design deficiencies in their own way. What might emerge is an orthodox KDE based on the official proprietary Qt (freedom be damned!) and then several "KDE lite" projects based on the various forks (at least one as part of the GNU project). KDE will cease to be relevant and GNOME will become the undisputed default free desktop.
Posted Dec 16, 2005 9:27 UTC (Fri)
by ronaldcole (guest, #1462)
[Link]
Now how is it "less confusing" for the first window to not follow the behavior of the second and subsequent windows? Arrrrrgh!!!!!!
Posted Dec 15, 2005 15:35 UTC (Thu)
by cventers (guest, #31465)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 20, 2005 12:51 UTC (Tue)
by stock (guest, #5849)
[Link]
Posted Dec 22, 2005 21:03 UTC (Thu)
by scharkalvin (guest, #7372)
[Link]
Posted Dec 31, 2005 18:43 UTC (Sat)
by petegn (guest, #847)
[Link]
It seems unusual for Linus to get involved in a debate like this, but I'm with him, as is often the case. JMHO, but Gnome leaves me deeply unmoved, and I'm mystified by its overwhelming support by corporate types. I sort of appreciate what Gnome is trying to do, but it has ended up rather primitive and ugly.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
You're right about the library licensing issue, and this caused me to GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
almost choose GNOME a little ways back (yes, even after Qt went GPL).
Today, though, I've spent over a year using KDE full time at home and
work, and I've watched the rapid progress this desktop has been making
with keen eyes.
And now, I think that KDE using Qt (even given the Trolltech
dual-license) is *brilliant*. Qt is simply best-in-class in terms of a
cross-platform networked desktop toolkit. It's quite fast (and getting
better), very flexible, very easy to use, well documented, well supported
and well maintained. KDE can leverage on this massively successful
toolkit to deliver a massively successful desktop.
Every dollar Trolltech spends on engineering benefits KDE as much as it
does Trolltech, and hence Trolltech's commercial success will benefit
KDE. KDE's commercial success will in turn benefit Trolltech, and indeed,
Trolltech has started hiring KDE developers to work full time on KDE.
As for the licensing issue being the basis of GNOME's popularity with
"corporate types", I think this is pure speculation, and quite possibly
wrong. Trolltech doesn't charge royalties on their licensing - they
charge per-developer, at a low enough rate to be rather insignificant to
any company that employs full-time developers. (Think about it - a
developer costs between 50 and 100+ thousand a year, plus money spent on
benefits / support services / etc, and you're adding, what do they charge
- $1500 a year?). I have some of my own speculation about why the
"corporate types" choose GNOME over KDE, but this is neither the time nor
the place, I think.
From my programmer's perspective: I've used both Qt and GTK, and while I
think the unstable C++ ABI is a nightmare kind of problem to deal with,
I'd still pick Qt any day of the week because it's far more mature,
capable and easy to use. The collective GNOME APIs are, well, muddy. Very
muddy.
And you're right about choice. We share that sentiment.
When working at a small company I chose GTK (not GNOME) over Qt in part because of the licensing issues (the other parts being C++ and Glade). At a large company, I could see that $1500/year isn't so much, except then you have to ask permission to get the $1500, go through purchasing, etc. I wouldn't underestimate the advantage of not having to ask permission.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Fair enough - GTK can be swallowed easily by an individual developer GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
without the authority of management. But for some project (or series of
projects) in, say, Linux desktop applications at even a tiny companty to
be at all successful, your revenue will probably have to exceed
$1500/year quite a bit. So what's $1500/a head/a year to you, especially
when it includes support? Not saying blow your money... not saying you
made the wrong decision. Just saying Qt isn't particularly expensive.
If you look at Trolltech's commercial customers, they include companies
like Adobe. I'm seriously hoping that their Qt license purchases go to
making portable Photoshop, etc. Because frankly, for large projects like
Photoshop, especially, Qt is more "commercial grade". And it's backed by
a company with money to lose in lawsuits, which companies like for
reasons of assurance. And they sell support. If Adobe were to port its
suite to Linux, it still wouldn't be open source, but it would be very
good news for the Linux desktop.
Forge ahead, Trolltech. Forge ahead full speed.
You have put your finger on maybe the most relevant reason why a corporate, closed project would choose gtk over qt, the issue of releasing software packages for public use. Using QT means every time the c++ libraries go through another abi incompatability, the packages relying on that abi have to be rebuilt and rereleased. So you have redhat, ubuntu, suse, debian as probably the 4 most popular linux desktop packages, and none of them guarantee abi compatibility amongst themselves at any time. I upgraded my ubuntu install to breezy, and now flash is half broke, where by half broke I mean any given flash app has a 50/50 chance of working. And macromedia is one of the more supportive companies, as far as client, desktop, consumer software.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
cventers wrote:GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
If you look at Trolltech's commercial customers, they include companies
like Adobe.
ui it seems to me better than any of the free PDF readers.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
From my programmer's perspective: I've used both Qt and GTK, and while I
think the unstable C++ ABI is a nightmare kind of problem to deal with,
I'd still pick Qt any day of the week because it's far more mature,
capable and easy to use. The collective GNOME APIs are, well, muddy. Very
muddy.
gtk_file_chooser_button_new_with_backend is beyond me.
Er... You know what? All that nonsense that you decry so forcibly was GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
started more than five years ago. Of course C++ standard string class
still isn't suitable for real-world use, and the moc is actually
incredibly handy. It's almost as if you wouldn't have to write your own
preprocessor to write the repetitive stuff for you.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Of course C++ standard string class still isn't suitable for real-world use
This turns out not to be the case.
Oh, yeah. The Unicode support is so great in std::string, right??GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
std::string does not dictate representation. That's what traits classes are for. Traits classes for UTF-8, UCS-16, and so on would not be very difficult to write.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
<blockquote>GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
No, you also need codecvt<> facets to convert between different representations (UCS-4, UTF-8, etc). And that's were it gets ugly.
</blockquote>
Actually it's about ten lines of calling iconv. I've done it. It's not hard.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Is that the same as "bullshit"?GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I think the best defense of Qt is that its roots predate the C++98 standard. Nevertheless, it's still non-standard, and loses appeal thereby.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I think the best defense of Qt is that its roots predate the C++98 standard. Nevertheless, it's still non-standard, and loses appeal thereby.
Right, like I said, it made sense before reasonable STL implementations were available, but now it's just a pain.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Of course C++ standard string class still isn't suitable for real-world use
Oh, come on, that's ridiculous.
and the moc is actually incredibly handy. It's almost as if you wouldn't have to write your own preprocessor to write the repetitive stuff for you.
A handy tool is great, except when I'm forced to use it. Then it's not so handy anymore; I'd call it a nuisance.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Then please tell me where does std::string support Unicode?
Believe it or not, there are many, many C++ apps which do not need to be internationalized. I work on a very large (10m+ lines of code) in-house C++ application for a medium-sized, privately-held U.S. corporation, and all that Unicode strings would do for our application is a) slow it down and b) increase its memory footprint.
Where are the often needed features like toInt(), toFloat(), replace(), trimmed(), rightJustified()
For toInt and toFloat, please see boost::lexical_cast. Its approach is much better than adding methods to your string class, because a) it's extensible to any type I can dream of, not just the ones that the Qt designers felt were important and b) I can override the conversion if needed (e.g., say I want my toFloat() to accept "+inf", or maybe I want to throw when I encounter that). QString's to* methods are non-virtual, so I'm SOL if I don't like their implementation.
moc provides Qt Meta-Object System. This is much more than just signal/slots. It's also dynamic properties and introspection. Those things are very useful for scripting engines or GUI builders. Please see http://doc.trolltech.com/4.1/metaobjects.html.
You're not reading what I'm saying! I don't care if moc does my dishes and takes out the garbage. I object to the requirement that I use it for my Qt application, not its convenience! gtkmm requires no such thing and I can always use moc (or any other code generation system) with a gtkmm app for all the other "good things" it does, if I choose to do so. These things should be orthogonal, not intimately tied together as they are in Qt.
Regarding STL:
There is nothing that prevents you from using STL instead of QTL in your Qt applications. Also you can even use the STL algorithm with the QTL containers.
But a few things make QTL containers easier to use. Please see http://doc.trolltech.com/4.1/containers.html for reference.
As far as I can tell, what you say doesn't apply to the Qt widget classes, since they're not templated. For example, if I want a list of selected items in a QListWidget, I get back a QList of QListWidgetItem *. So I don't see how I can avoid using QTL in Qt. Please correct me if I'm wrong, I would love to hear about it because this is one of my main objections to using Qt.
QListWidget::selectedItems()) is even worse! Please give me reference-counted pointers, preferably boost::shared_ptr, though templating on pointer type is even better. gtkmm is slightly better than Qt in this regard, but still inconsistent (some methods return raw pointers and others do not, though maybe there's a rhyme to their reason).
dhess wrote:GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
On the other hand, gtkmm is a really nice C++ wrapper around the GTK+ APIs, and there's gnomemm for the GNOME side, too. Unlike Qt, they make extensive use of the STL, and they support the signal/slot model without the need for a pre-processing step ala moc.
I don't see what the advantage of C++ is. If you read any of Stroustrup's
books you know that the whole point was to marry OO and static typing.
distinction belongs to the horrible string-named properties. That's
back to Smalltalk, folks. When shall we ever learn?
an xterm, will spew an ungodly amount of warnings.
I'm sorry, I'm having trouble understanding your comment. Are you talking about gtkmm, or GTK+? I was talking about gtkmm. It sounds like you're complaining about GTK+, which, as I said in my original comment, I don't like, either, so I think we see eye-to-eye on that one, at least.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Sorry, I forgot that in a flamewar one's supposed to pick a side :-)GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
important part, right?) it's approximately this: Gtk design is so wrong
that not even a C++ wrapper can save it.
Bzzzt! Wrong answer. Qt license costs are trivial compared to developer time, except perhaps in India or China.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Parts of X, specifically Mesa, are written in C++.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
libGLU is the only major C++ component in Mesa and it provides only a C ABI... so doesn't have any of these issues...GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Hm, true. I hadn't noticed that none of the C++ness gets exported. The ABI problems will still be present with respect to libstdc++ itself, unless libGLU is linked with -Bgroup, which is a) unsupported and b) doesn't seem to be the case. (A good thing too: linking libstdc++ to *anything* with -Bgroup gives me the willies.)GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
> GNOME uses GTK as its toolkit, which is LGPL. KDE uses Qt as itsGNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
> toolkit, which is GPL.
That endless repetition of the old, hoary chestnut of "c is easy to wrap, GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
c++ is not" is so bloody annoying by now. It is NOT TRUE. AT ALL. Look at
the tremendous usability and functionality of PyQt. The Ruby bindings,
the Java bindings, the C# bindings, the C bindings, the Objective C
bindings, the Perl bindings, the Javascript bindings -- they have all
been usable and functional. PyQt, the Ruby, Java, C# and Javascript
bindings are alive and kicking. The ONLY reason the rest of them is no
longer maintained is that no-one wanted to use them. They were not
needed. C++ is, after all, and certainly in conjunction with Qt, a
satisfactory high-level programming language for people interested in
results, not in purity-posturing.
So, one more time: Qt bindings exist, are complete, are usable, are used
a lot.
(And as an aside, about palmtops and so on: ever heard of QTopia?)
It doesn't need to look like Windows either. Mine looks totally different thanks to the Dark Blue colour scheme and Keramik widget style. (I think the colour change does most to change the look of it.)GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Imagine a C++ horror like Qt running on a palmtop. Say the new Nokia gadget with only 64M of ram.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Perhaps you have not heard of qtopia.
>Seriously, I'd like to see a KDE like desktop environment built on GTK2. The >combination would be solid, scalable and free of license problems. KDE and GTK2 are the best
> C can be wrapped in OO clothing well enough that it seems to be able to GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
> make everyone happy, language wise.
No it can't. :)
My first GUI programming experience was using the C-based Win32 API (no
MFC or anything, just the pure C calls).
When I transited to Linux, I wanted to be able to take that experience
over, so I started to learn GTK+. I simply couldn't grok it. The OO
layer they use there is wrapped behind lots of things the programmer has
to do, such as naming conventions, remembering to declare things in your
struct that counts as a subclass in the right order, and using (and
defining) macros EVERYWHERE in order to break C's typing system so that
you can simulate OO.
It sucked. So, I took the jump and started to learn Qt. I was vaguely
aware of C++ and how it worked from trying (and failing) to learn
Microsoft's MFC and Borland's Object Windows Library (OWL).
Luckily the Qt API and programmer documentation were simply excellent.
It was hard at first but once I got C++ down Qt itself was pretty easy.
Or to make a long story short, not everyone is content with the
monstrosity that is OO in C. ;)
> Imagine a C++ horror like Qt running on a palmtop.
Others have already mentioned Qtopia, but I wanted to point out why it is
that C++ software on portables can actually work. C++ isn't actually a
"bloated" language. Indeed, many of the frustrating things about it stem
from the requirements its designers impose on it that the code doesn't
pay for features it doesn't actually use.
In fact, well-designed C++ code can usually outperform equivalent C code
because the C++ language provides more information for the optimizer.
One program with C++ is the vast number of symbols generated, but most
are not actually required, and there is ongoing work in place to make
linking and loading C++ libraries suck less on Linux (Ever notice that it
doesn't suck on Windows? ;)
> KDE is obsessed with recreating the popular but defective look and feel
> of Windows
No we aren't. The default KDE combines elements from most major DEs.
I'll agree it looks most like Windows but there is nothing stopping you
from using e.g. Mac OS-style menus or the UNIX-traditional
focus-follows-mouse. You can even change the standard key bindings (and
KPersonalizer does this for you on the first startup).
I thing I want to know is why it is a crime if a GUI system allows their
user to emulate the feel of Windows... I know if I spent 10 years
learning keyboard shortcuts I wouldn't want to have to re-learn different
ones to switch.
> and gushing about Qt so much they were willing to ignore the fact it
> was proprietary software for most of KDE's life.
No it wasn't. KDE was started in 1996, making it almost 10 years old. Qt
has been Open Source since 1998, and was dual-licensed with GPL since
Sept. 2000. So it was only proprietary for 2 out of 9 years of KDE's
existence.
As far as The Unix Way, I feel that's what we're striving for with KDE.
Think of Konqueror as the shell and KParts as the I/O pipes. ;)
But let me tell you, this kind of stuff is hard. :(
Regards,
- Michael Pyne
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
One program with C++ is the vast number of symbols generated, but most
are not actually required, and there is ongoing work in place to make
linking and loading C++ libraries suck less on Linux
Are you talking about gcc 4.0's support for symbol exports? Or is there more to it? In the case of my employer's large C++ app, gcc 4.0's symbol exporting doesn't help us much because we throw exceptions, and as far as I can tell, that means we need to export any symbols across which exceptions can be thrown (which is practically... well, everything). So if there's some other efforts going on in this area that are unrelated to gcc, I'd love to hear about it.
(Ever notice that it doesn't suck on Windows? ;)
Are you talking about the fact that you don't have C++ DLL ABI issues on Windows? I thought that had more to do with the fact that every modern Windows app ships with all of the DLLs that it links against and effectively does the equivalent of GNU's LD_LIBRARY_PATH trick for each application, than any magic in Windows's runtime linker or MSVC++. In other words, Windows doesn't have any "system" C++ libraries, as far as I'm aware.
> Are you talking about gcc 4.0's support for symbol exports? GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
That's a part of it. The feature is called visibility. I regret to say
that it is still only 90% baked, as it's hard to use visibility correctly
in certain times when using C++ libraries that don't support it. For
example, using it with Qt 3 brings issues of its own for KDE 3.5. And
the STL implementation in gcc 4.0.x is buggy when using the pooled
allocator and visibility.
However, for the most part it is a great advancement, and when code is
updated to use it properly can substantially reduce the symbol count of a
C++ program or library, which greatly reduces linking time.
Another benefit of visibility is that it seems to make more optimizations
potentially possible. I forget the exact explanation though.
You can read about visibility here:
http://www.nedprod.com/programs/gccvisibility.html
> In the case of my employer's large C++ app, gcc 4.0's symbol exporting
> doesn't help us much because we throw exceptions, and as far as I can
> tell, that means we need to export any symbols across which exceptions
> can be thrown
AFAICT that isn't the case. You do need to export with default
visibility the definition of the class which you are throwing. I'd need
to ask around before saying that what you describe is definitely untrue
but I've never heard anything like that.
One other thing I want to describe is the prelink tool, which as it may
imply, will perform much of the work of the dynamic linker, and cache the
result, which will result in much less work loading the binary later.
It's useful all-around, but especially useful for C++ binaries.
This is what I was talking about with Windows, where for some reason
their C++ ABI seems to not suffer as much loading times as the ELF/Linux
ABI. But then again, I've heard of some useful C++ constructs which we
actually use in KDE that break with the Win32 mechanism.
Regards,
- Michael Pyne
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
AFAICT that isn't the case. You do need to export with default
visibility the definition of the class which you are throwing. I'd need
to ask around before saying that what you describe is definitely untrue
but I've never heard anything like that.
Yes, you're right. I went back and re-read the wiki entry on visibility, and you only need to export the exception class. Thanks for clarifying.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
It seems unusual for Linus to get involved in a debate like this
Oh, no: he's mildly famous for popping up on mailing lists and emitting well-reasoned posts baked in high-temperature flame. He was doing it before the Linux kernel even existed.
'The classic KDE criticism' so far as I know is licensing. That issue was solved long ago. Currently the licensing for KDE is more free than for GNOME, in fact. GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I'd call this article a mostly fair analysis of the issue at hand (which GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
is refreshing because much of the 'analysis' done by the likes of /. and
other sites has been anything but).
And to get disclaimers out of the way, I'm currently typing this post
inside of Akregator, on a KHTML-rendered LWN, on KDE.
The way I see it, Linus was pointing out his frustrations with GNOME, and
I want to take a moment to address one of his points in that discussion
that I think was quite golden.
Minimizing *available* versus *default* functionality on the grounds that
"the majority of users" don't want it is a bad thing. The problem, as
Linus very clearly defines, is that while it's true that "some" majority
of users may not need, say, control of their mouse and another "majority"
of users may not need control of their printer, it's not the same
majority.
The problem is that the "majority" of the users may each have some
special desire - Linus wants to screw with his mouse buttons, and I want
to make full use of my Tektronix printer. Now let's say Linus's desire to
screw with his buttons puts him in a minority, as does my desire to fully
use my Tektronix, so the GNOME developers exclude extensive mouse control
and extensive printer control. Now they've pissed off more than a
"minority" of users, because we each had a separate (simple) expectation
for being able to use our computer that was denied by some usability
crusade.
If you want an extreme example of where this "minority" attitude breaks
down, let's consider accessibility features for a moment. 99% of the
current Linux desktop market probably doesn't have damn bit of need for a
screen reader / magnifier / sticky keys. But you'd get flamed off the
planet for suggesting that we forget about this 'accessibility nonsense'
on the grounds that the desktop should Just Work for the Majority.
Indeed, adding acccessibility has been a hugely highlighted issue due to
the recent Massachussets/ODF debacle.
The opposite problem, of course, is the KDE Control Center where I have
Laptop configuration settings present even though it's running on a tower
PC.
In any case, I think the mistake everyone is making is that they're
assuming that Linus's popularity / affiliation with Linux means that his
words are somehow spoken rule or so powerful they should be tamed. Come
on guys... this is open source. We're all adults here. Who cares if
people get a little vocal from time to time? The alternative is that we
all agree to sit around with our thumbs up our asses while we get left by
Win/OS X. Part of the reason open source often works so well is because
of engineering flamewars. Big "government" or diplomacy just doesn't help
here.
Linus wasn't trying to force his decision on anyone. He was making a
point, albeit very directly (which I quite enjoyed). And his biggest
point of all is one that I think was actually missed most in this LWN
article:
> But hey, just continue to remove all that confusing functionality from
> Gnome. I don't care. I voted with my feet.
He's just another man speaking his mind.
A few things to note from the thread that answer some of the things you've raised in your post:
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
You said:
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
There are plenty of places in GNOME where options exist on separate tabs, dialogues and behind disclosure triangles. It is not as if GNOME has no preferences or options whatsoever.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
You're right, but the critical swinging point here is the concept of GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
'plenty'. You see, you can make lots and lots of users happy (the 5-nines
you refer to elsewhere) by having an advanced desktop that has a
well-designed layering exposing more advanced functionality to more
advanced users as they drill down. The cost is that you will occasionally
get the layering wrong and make small minds be overwhelemed. Here we have
KDE.
The other option is to use the idea that you're designing for the
majority as a reason to not implement features or configurables at all.
You'll *please* a small number of users this way because you're going to
be lucky and get a good handful of them that find not a thing more than
they need. But these people would have been *happy* if you had more, as
long as you managed it wisely. Here we have GNOME.
And I know you've stated that you don't design for the "majority", but as
far as I can tell you're just saying that:
>> That's a very different class of user to, say, my doctor. He's a smart
>> guy, but totally doesn't give a shit about computers. I want to make
>> Free Software that works for him.
Is the "totally doesn't give a shit about computers" not the majority
crowd? What exactly do you call it if the word "majority" is banished?
The problem on point is referred to as What You See Is *All* You Get, and it's the traditional argument made against GUI's by command-line partisans, as well.WYSIAYG
But even for an experienced user it's sometimes nearly impossible to find GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
out how to change some very trivial things. For instance, the only
GNOME-like application I use at times is Firefox (I know it's GTK and not
GNOME but that all comes from the same stable to me). What drives me nuts
in Firefox are the freakin' wrong button order and the key bindings in
the location bar (every time I press CNTRL-U it wants to show me the
HTML-source). Now, after googling for quite some time I found that I have
to put the following stuff into my .gtkrc-2.0 file:
gtk-key-theme-name = "Emacs"
gtk-alternative-button-order = 1
I did that and you know what, it STILL doesn't work! I tried all kinds of
things with gconf-editor and whatnot in order to fix that broken stuff
but until now I couldn't figure out how to change it! The result is, I
stay away more and more from GTK- and GNOME-apps because it drives me
nuts. Now you can call me an oldtime UNIX user (the ones you apparently
don't care about and try to piss off as much as possible) but I still
have some influence and I really can't recommend something (even to your
doctor) which I'm not able to use myself.
While we're griping about GTK, can someone please tell me why every time GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I hit + in GAIM or another GTK app, it renders as a tiny superscript plus
sign? Why do I always get these weird "binary character" graphics in the
course of normal IM conversations with a small amount of copy/paste? Why
does copying text out of a syntax-highlighting editor result in broken,
non-newline-terminated colourized text showing up in the GTK edit box I'm
pasting into?
use gconf-editor and set /desktop/gnome/interface/gtk_key_theme to "Emacs".GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
use gconf-editor and set /desktop/gnome/interface/gtk_key_theme to "Emacs".
I made the change with gconf-editor but it still didn't work at first. GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Now I switched to KDE 3.5 and the gtk-key-theme suddenly works! I have no
idea why it decided to respect my settings now. The only thing which
started up together with firefox is gconfd-2. Maybe that's the
gnome-settings-daemon which makes it work? I don't know.
Anyway, thanks for all the hints, but my point is that it's extremely
complicated even for experienced users to change such simple things.
Maybe GNOME should provide an "idiot" and a "poweruser" mode if they
don't want to confuse their doctors. Then at least the ones who want to
tweak obscure settings and know what they're doing can switch to
"poweruser" and mess up their UI in whatever way THEY want. I still
believe the UI should adapt to the user and not the other way around.
Oh my freaking God. Is that "usable", "simple", "it just works". I'm GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
still parsing what I should do to change key bindings in Firefox.
So, to be sure it reads my resource file I should first do some "ps -
kill -9" commands? No, I can't believe it.
BTW, I'm a vim user. What's the "emacs' style"? :-)
BTW, I'm a vim user. What's the "emacs' style"? :-) GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I'm a vi/vim user myself but I frequently use CNTRL-U in the shell in
order to clear the command line and I want to do the same in the firefox
location bar. But the default binding for CNTRL-U in firefox is "view the
HTML source" which drives me nuts if I hit it by accident. And, believe
me, I'm not the only one here, most of my coworkers complained about
that. Maybe it appeases the Windows crowd (which we don't have here
except for our secretaries and they're not used to keybindings at all,
they just point and click with the mouse) but it drives UNIX users
insane.
>> Why don't you place the so-called advanced functionality behind an Advanced button GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Please don't do "Advanced" tabs. If you're looking for a feature, you have to look twice, in the relevant tab and in "Advanced". It's like record stores that have a separate "Alternative" section. You have to look twice to see if they're out of something.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Just have one option somewhere near the top that enables the "Advanced" (more options) throughout all configuration dialogs and widgets.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Apparently this `confuses the users', too. (Well, that's what I was told when they took it out of Nautilus, along with every feature of that program that I actually used it for.)GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
And please, don't call it "Advanced". It's not advanced. Perhaps it is rarely used, or obscure. But emacs key bindings are not any more advanced then remapping ctrl-c (ascii ETX, which we all learned was used to abort a program) to "copy". The same thing goes for hundreds of other options that devs like Havoc Pennington don't like to expose.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Maybe you're right about some of these points having been addressed. If GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
it's not usability and not confusing users that you're after, than what
is it exactly?
One of the reasons KDE continues to be such a joy for me is because of
how many features are hiding right under the covers. I often discover
them by thinking at some random moment, "Wouldn't it be cool if I could
-- wow! They thought of that and implemented it! Way cool". In that
moment I've just discovered that I can detach tabs in Konqueror. Or get
Wiki feeds about my artists as I'm listening to music in amaroK. Or one
of hundreds of other things that makes my computing experience a joy and
doesn't get in my way.
Honestly - every time I use GNOME I just end up getting let down. I'll
admit that I put it on my teenage sister's laptop (she's not a computer
person)... but that was more because I had an old Ubuntu CD laying
around.
She loves Linux - likes it better than Windows (and has since expressed
interest in try KDE after seeing me use it). But little things just annoy
you. One in particular I remember - she nudged her Synaptics touchpad too
much and the GNOME top bar or whatever it's called ended up right-aligned
with HUGE quick-launch icons. I couldn't for the life of me figure out
anywhere on that panel to right-click in order to get to the screen I
needed to in order to get it re-aligned. In the end, I had to delete all
the quick-launch icons to make room to click through to the panel. This
exercise took me 10-15 minutes of frustration, and I'm a goddamned
programmer! All of my intuition about the ways to control the thing you
guys *might* have thought of were useless, whereas generally in KDE if I
have an intuition they might have implemented some random feature,
chances are I'm right and it's there, more powerful than I imagined.
I don't mean to just slam on GNOME, but once again, what's your goal? Why
is GNOME software often so much less desireable / powerful than KDE
counterparts? Why do my GNOME-using friends use Konqueror and K3B and
amaroK and Kaffeine, using GNOME for nothing more than the pretty window
decorations? I run one GTK app - GAIM. And occasionally when I go to send
someone a file, I get reminded of how much I hate some of your project's
decisions about the UI. The moment all the IM clients decide to support a
common encryption standard, GAIM will be leaving my desktop (unless GTK
apps magically start looking / working better by then).
Perhaps Linus (and myself) are totally wrong about GNOME devs being
motivated by "not confusing users". Why have you excluded all useful
functionality then?
What's our goal? To bring software freedom - and the deeper freedoms it defends - to the 99.999% of people around the world who don't care about computing technology quite as much as we do.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Mine too. Now in the process, can you guys make your GNOME desktop a GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
little more functional and powerful so that it doesn't feel like I'm
using an airport kiosk?
Perhaps some constructive feedback may actually get you where you want to go.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Well, my apologies for stepping over the line a bit with that last post. GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
The airport kiosk remark is just the best describing remark I've come up
with after tinkering with GNOME a few times in between spans on KDE over
the years. (IIRC, my earliest time spent running around on an actual
Linux *desktop* was Red Hat 5 or 6).
My biggest criticism (is this constructive?) of GNOME is that every app
and dialog feels like it was deliberately reduced from what it could have
been. In some cases, this is genius and the dialog is simple / elegant /
pretty. But way too often does it simply get in the way (Your file picker
is a *big* example - why won't it let me sort by file type and why isn't
it immediately evident that I can type a location?)
If GNOME stood alone on the desktop market, I think it would be a great
desktop. The fact is that it stands next to KDE, and even though I admire
your looks and in *some* places the simplicity, any time I spend any
length of time at all in GNOME I come away frustrated after X number of
important things appear to have been intentionally excluded. (X is
porportional to the amount of time I spend on GNOME)
I only learned about the `Ctrl-L to type' thing by following that mailing list thread. Affordances in GNOME are frequently absolutely *awful*, even in very widely-used common dialogs.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
In my opinion, Gnome shouldn't even have a file picker. Saving a document should just ask for a name and drop it in a default location. After that you can put it somewhere different with Nautilus. Opening a document shouldn't even get a dialog: open it from Nautilus or drag and drop it.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Gah, do that and I'll give up helping the folks I know who use GNOME get GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
themselves out of trouble!
Have you learned about this useful little thing called "Folders" that helps you organize what you do ?GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Well you are right in one sense, what should a user do in the root? You really should have everything in your home directory, perhaps in the "my Documents" folder. Or even better let people "tag" their files, and make it a database.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
"why isn't it immediately evident that I can type a location?"GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
One of the big things I have to do for customers is to turn off the spatial perspective in nautilus. People hate having to close 15 windows as they went searching for something in their directory tree structure.. but every time I and others mention it.. its that we arent understanding what we should do.. Here is a sample of what multiple customers have complained about:GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Desktop
Work Documents
Project XYZ
2005
Work Orders
Agreed. At least my default desktop distro (Ubuntu) has made that change for me. :)GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
One simple thing: You mentioned this doctor w/o computer knowledge. GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Imagine it was a german doctor, who simply would like to see his desktop
in german language. I am a KDE user and when I start KDE the first time, a
configuration wizard pops up where the very first thing I can choose is
the language.
Now on to Gnome (or XFCE). Whenever a new version is released, I try it
out. I am not asked to choose my language. I spend 15 to 30 minutes to
find out how to change it to german (other than setting some ENV vars, I
know how to do that). I finally give up and stay with KDE, and so will the
german doctor, he doesn't know how to set ENV vars.
GDM, choose the language before you log in... Now that was hard, huh?GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
You really think this is a good idea, don't you? GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
No other display manager out there let's you choose the language,
because it's simply stupid to put it there.
1) This locks Gnome users to using GDM, but what if they have no
control over what display manager is used (because it's not their
machine)?
2) You have to re-login to change the language.
3) What if you don't use any display manager at all?
So this makes the situation even more worse, sorry.
1) I expected you wanted the whole package.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
2) New user = new login... Or are we schizo here?
3) If you don't use a display manager, you'd mostly be a shell user (Or one of those strange people who login with the text console and do a startx as the only command there), and used to LC_LANG if you want another language.
Changing the display manager is simply not possible for anyone using a multiuser system where the admin doesn't use Gnome. And it gets real tiring when every program expects that you're running the whole system; is it that unreasonable to try and choose the better program instead of the one from GNOME?GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Surely you always have to re-login to change the language: a process may only alter its own environment, and anyway translated strings are usually loaded by an application at startup, and never altered.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I am a programmer, but I still want my desktop to "just work". I do not want to configure things - I have work to do. Maybe sometimes there is an option missing, but the time I spend configuring my desktop is tiny compared to time I spend working. If there are more options - I will spend more time on useless configuration just because I *have to* look through all the options.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I am all on Gnome about this one - if you want to work, just work and forget about configuring.
I am in a similar situation, except for a few things:GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
- Gnome removed some of the options I did setup. I felt cheated.
- Despite its "keep it simple" mantra, Gnome has become really heavy.
- Gnome has had a tendency to forget my config on upgrade (debian specific?)
- Xfce is simple and has not much more options than Gnome,
- but it starts much faster and takes up less memory.
- It tends to loose the user's config less often (your mileage may vary).
- It still use GTK (I don't like C++, the language made complicated so to maximize memory leaks :-)
Oh, come on, this is just BS. Nobody forces you to look through all GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
available config options, you don't *have to*. I use KDE and I never scan
the whole control center and go through all the options. I have maybe a
handful of things I change on a new system (like "focus follows mouse"
for instance) and then I'm able to work. But if for some reason I decide
to tweak some option because my habit changed or I discovered a more
practical way of doing things I know the option is there and I can easily
find and change it.
Maybe it's BS for you, but you seem to think that everyone thinks like you. I agree with the parent - seeing boatloads of options just irk me. And this visual annoyance happens every time I have to search for an option. And I always feel something is set up "wrong", but I don't know what (maybe I'm paranoid). GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Where did you get that 99.999% number? Many people care about computing technology, they just care about different aspects of it. I think that the 99.999% myth is used as an excuse for lazy programming. You may be surprised how much a designer cares about color quality of the monitor or how much a helicopter pilot cares about real time properties of the flight control software.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Those users don't care about either of those things.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
>One of the reasons KDE continues to be such a joy for me is because ofKDE = Joy
>how many features are hiding right under the covers.
For comparison, where does other window managers put that control? How would you go about doing the same thing in Gnome?KDE = Joy
Historically I've reconfigured all the window managers I've used for more than a few hours such that they don't understand the "disallow resize" window hint to begin with. Sometimes the "reconfiguration" is done by editing the config files...you know the ones...every window manager has them...they typically come in a big tarball, and you edit the ones ending in ".c", then type "make" or something similar to update the WM config. ;_)KDE = Joy
Every WM respects at least one hint to disable controls: the transience property. As long as you have to support that, why not make the control more configurable?KDE = Joy
That hint doesn't really mean to do that, it just means the window is associated with another application window and that it is likely to be short-lived. In fact, some window managers don't disable controls on transients. Many do, but there is no requirement that they work that way.Hints
The vast majority that provide any decorations at all disable them on transients: in fact, given the common use of transients for things like pop-up help bubbles, any wm that didn't disable decorations on them would be unbearable to use.Hints
Pop-up help bubbles (and menus and drag+drop handles and other weird window cases) usually use override_redirect, not wm_transient.Hints
People often comment that QT is more productive than Gtk, yet the only big QT apps I use are scribus and qcad (and both rarely). On the other hand, we have the gimp, inkscape, abiword, gnumeric and gnucash; none of which have comparable QT versions. Maybe it is just the company I keep, but most of the top notch programmers I know prefer Gtk. Why is that do you think?KDE = Joy
KDE = Joy
I had a look at koffice recently and though I was impressed by the progress, none of them are close to their gtk equivalents. kspread, for example, couldn't open a few computational excel spreadsheets I've collected over the years, yet gnumeric had no trouble. Karbon's renderer seems to generate wrong results regularly and couldn't open even some simple svg diagrams. The connector routing in kivio is crap compared to that of inkscape. Krita feels like gimp 1.4, though my wife prefers the oil paint effect in krita :) KDE = Joy
KDE = Joy
Sorry, I don't understand that comment - could you expand a little bit? As far as I can see you've just shown me a CVS log for some project I've never heard of...KDE = Joy
It's the (extremely nifty) KDE CVS interface program, with changes to kdebase scattered throughout as well.KDE = Joy
Ah, so he's heavily biased, and I should discount his opinion... ;) Full disclosure: I work on inkscape, a gtkmm app :)KDE = Joy
njhurst wrote:KDE = Joy
If you are a C++ programmer you should take a look at gtkmm. It is a lot more C++ than QT. Murray Cumming has done a much better job of understanding the C++ paradigm (ouch, did I just use that word..) than the Troll developers. And the people I'm talking about tend to program in more esoteric languages (they would say 'real languages') such as Haskell, ocaml and Mercury.
until you clarify I won't repeat that again :-)
I said 'good programmer', cloose seemed to think I meant C++ instead of C or something, I said Haskell etc.KDE = Joy
Ok, now I see, you referred to a post up the thread. Here's where theKDE = Joy
disadvantage of a web forum over a newsgroup or mailing list shows ...
there are, by historical accident (or is there another tangible reason?)
bindings for Gtk in those languages, while there aren't any for Qt.
I don't know if that played any role in making Gtk bindings preferred.
There are indeed a lot of good GTK apps. KDE = Joy
But please let me know when GnuCash has finally left the stone age of GTK
1.4, then I might be able to stomach using it. ;)
Regards,
- Michael Pyne
On the subject of Gaim, have you tried Kopete from KDE 3.5 yet? It has all sorts of nifty features such as webcam support, and the integration with kaddressbook was what finally made me switch.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
When you use the phrase "configure PPD files" you make it sound geeky.
But what you're really talking about is giving the user access to all
of the printer's capabilities. If the user can't get the job done in
Gnome, and isn't an experienced hacker, then features of the printer
that the user might have paid extra money for are inaccessible. Crippled support for printers has long been a major issue for Linux and Unix.
PPD files
PPD files
You seem to be misunderstanding him. The difference you posit does not PPD files
exist in the way you think it does. Corporate users - some of the very
people your GNOME devs target - might very well want access to all of
their expensive office printer's capabilities. And they probably don't
know what a PPD file is, or how to configure it. So if you don't expose
the configuration to them behind a few clicks, then they as *disabled*
users (in the sense that they are not systems people) have absolutely 0
access to their printer's expensive and advanced capabilities.
Making the last remark you made is a bit like me saying "Why can't
disabled people have their Human assistants read the screen for them?"
Because if they won't do so, it's their fault they can't use the computer
- right?
PPD files
>> What I'm really talking about is the difference between providing PPD files
>> acess to "all of a printer's capabilities" to a user who won't look up
>> the instructions for using lower level mechanisms
The point is that requiring a user to look up instructions for using low
level mechanisms makes that functionality 'off-limits' to most users,
despite how many of them might actually find it useful.
The only difference between not being able to access the computer at all
and not being able to access advanced printer features is a mangitude of
how much you cannot do. Both concerns are addressed by adding features to
software that a vast majority of the users won't end up using. This was
my original point, and you seemed to be implying that accessability
software got some kind of magic exception from the "don't implement
unless it's used by a majority of users" rule just because we were
talking about disabled people instead of non-technical people.
PPD files
>> These qualitative differences make your argument weak. PPD files
Your argument is dangerous to the future of the Linux desktop, if it is
to have one! Advanced printer utilization is not rare enough that it is
acceptable to require end-users to seek out technical people, or to cover
the VAST domain of knowledge between working with a GUI and working with
text-based configuration on the command line (complete with all the
idioms you need to understand to get from point A to point B), merely to
print a report!
Let's break this down into pieces and find out which parts you disagree
with. Please address 1 point at a time.
1) Accessability software enables a small portion of the public to do
something they couldn't otherwise.
2) Advanced printer configuration would enable a larger portion of the
public to do something they couldn't otherwise.
3) Learning to work with PPDs directly is not practical for the vast
majority of these users.
4) Hiring an assistant to read the screen is not practical for the vast
majority of disabled users.
If you agree with 1-4 (and you should), then the only possible thing you
are left with is this idea of 'choice'. I submit that not understanding
PPD files isn't much of a choice either.
1) Blind people can get around being blind on the computer by hiring an
assistant, in theory. It would quite suck, but it's a *choice*.
2) Corporate users can get around not understanding PPD files by hiring a
assistant, in theory. It would quite suck, but it's a *choice*.
You made some smaller points, so just for thoroughness:
1) Well, it depends on what exactly we're talking about when you say that
the PPD scenario would only occur once. But in any case, if your desktop
design philosophy makes this expectation, how often do you suppose a user
might run into these unrecoverable pot holes during their computing
experience, requiring the attention of a seasoned expert?
2) As for GNOME developers disclaiming my idea of their policy, well,
they've verbally disclaimed it, but I so far have not seen an ounce of
reason that leads me to believe they are telling me something that is
consistent with the actual philosophy in practice. If so, perhaps you or
someone else could tell me - if advanced printer features were not to be
excluded because (a) most people don't need them, or (b) they confuse
people, why were they going to be excluded?
Now where exactly am I going wrong?
PPD files
1. Yes, well I was under the impression we were debating technology - not PPD files
politics or ethics.
2. Ignore the home users, because they'll start using desktop Linux after
their office does. The office is the #1 important ground for desktop
Linux to take first. And sure you don't need configuration for basic
printing in most cases. But should you banish your users to the command
line every time they want their printer to do staples for them, when
they're in a hurry to make it to the next meeting? I should hope not!
And I *am* making the assertion that this "minority" is larger than the
percentage of people using accessibility tools, because I've never seen
anyone use an accessibility tool (though I know people do) while I'm
sitting here in telecom corridor surrounded by office buildings with lots
of computer users and lots of printers. If Desktop Linux is to make it
here, the only way full printing support could ever be considered less
important than accessibility support is if someone is deliberately trying
to appeal to people's sensibilities over simple practicality.
3) They can operate a search engine, and they can technically read CUPS
documents. But my grandma could technically read a car's FSM -- that
doesn't mean it would be *at all* practical for her to rebuild her Honda
2 liter.
4) "Assistive technology" like being able to use your printer without
reading CUPS docs and hitting the damn command line will cost less and
provide more independence for corporate users!
>> Asking them to spend an hour or two out of a year to deal with such a
>> routine task is not comparable to asking a disabled person to have
>> their experience with a computer mediated by a full time assistant.
If you don't understand that this requirement for a third party assistant
is equally prohibitive in a corporate environment then you know nothing
about business. The big Linux vendors will never sell into an enterprise
if the customer knows they'll need system admins to assist on a user's
command line for changes to simple things like printing. Shared calendar
support in Outlook that *no one* used at my own company was enough reason
to drop a flawless, high-performance, already-paid-for Linux/qmail IT
rack in favor of recurring-expense, off-site, hosted Exchange. Business
features are important to businesses and while YOU may think it's fine to
leave your users out in the cold, the rest of the world is going to do
like Linus Torvalds and vote with their feet.
>> All I ask is that you stop pretending that support for disabled users
>> and advanced laser printing are comparable. They're not.
I've been making the comparison along with many others. Perhaps your
trouble is that you're unable to acknowledge that a world exists outside
your little bubble. If you're into software design, I should hope you
correct this, because you're not going to please many users that way.
PPD files
It's very hard for me when you keep changing what you want me to claim. I PPD files
said nothing about bringing users into the online world. In fact, I never
said accessibility utilities weren't important - quite the contrary,
since my argument for the equal necessity of good PPD support in the GUI
rides on it!
>> All I want is for you to admit that bringning the disabled into the
>> online world is more important than configuring PPD printers.
It sounds to me like you want to use the inverse of the argument you wish
I never made as an excuse for not implementing good printer support in
Gnome. Is that the case?
PPD files
Well, let's list out three specific quotes from you and see if we can PPD files
find the (in)consistency.
>> Why do you have so much trouble admitting that there is an important
>> difference between being unable to access a computer at all and losing
>> the benefit of advanced printer features?
You posit an important difference...
>> All I ask is that you stop pretending that support for disabled users
>> and advanced laser printing are comparable. They're not.
Then you say there is no way to compare them...
>> All I want is for you to admit that bringning the disabled into the
>> online world is more important than configuring PPD printers. Is that'
>> so hard for you?
Then you say that bringing disabled users into the 'online world' is more
important than the printer features. When did the 'online world' enter
into this debate? Why and how? The same way the morals / ethics kneejerk
to the comment that "printer drivers are equally important to
accessibility tools" did - you simply thought it would be a nice way to
argue?
You might want to take your head out of the sand and look around... many
more people care about this issue than I, and your attitude is very
obviously defective for someone that's supposed to care about things that
work well for their users. You won't convert me to GNOME, but that's OK,
because I'm just another programmer. But there are a lot of users that
haven't been converted to either KDE or GNOME, or perhaps ones looking to
switch. If you care at all about attracting these people, banishing the
capability to do anything non-default about their printer to the command
line is very much not the way to welcome them with open arms.
And that makes you a run of the mill stupid engineer, because stupid
engineers are the people that not only design for themselves (which isn't
wrong as often as it's sometimes said) but actually flat out ignore the
idea that anyone else without an engineering degree might one day want to
use the product. Good job :)
In any case, I'm going to stop responding to your nonsense... if anything
makes me feel "not very bright," it's the feeling like I've been baited
into wasting my afternoon to argue with the functional equivalent of a
coke machine.
PPD files
Back in the real world, there is no qualitative difference between the two. They're both people who can't use the system to do what they need. There's always going to be someone out there who could use the system if only you made some small change.PPD files
Do you actually want to pretend there's no qualitative difference between being unable to use a subset of the features of a subset of printers (assuming the command line is off limits) and having no way to access to email, the web, office productivity tools or any of the innumerable things a computer can offer? You seem less like a credible emissary from the "real world" than just another space cadet.PPD files
Not a subset of printers, their printer. Assuming the command line is not off limits, the blind can access email, the web, and most of the innumerable things a computer can offer without GNOME's assistence.PPD files
By that reasoning, there could be no qualitative difference between Gnome and Bash because both offer enough features for some users but lack features others require. But common sense recognizes that they are not directly comparable. That's why alternative implementations of accessibility features are irrelevant. A Gnome that didn't have such features would have to be abandoned entirely by disabled users while a Gnome without PPD configuration could be used for everything except that relatively narrow task. This difference in the quality of the user experience is the issue.PPD files
Being a non-technical person is a choice, such a person can gain
technical knowledge and getting a more technical person to install a PPD
file is an operation that needs to be done once.
PPD files
First, I never claimed to speak for the Gnome developers. Pretending otherwise in order to smear a group of people is intellectually dishonest on your part. Second, you have completely misunderstood what you are responding to. I never said it was good for PPD configuration to be more difficult, all else being equal. Everything I've written on this thread concerns the relative importance of accessibility and PPD configuration, which your comments don't address at all. You've taken a quote out of context and used it as an excuse for an ignorant rant. Pay attention before posting angry words unless you enjoy making an fool of yourself in this way.PPD files
>>> What I'm really talking about is the difference between providingPPD files
>>> acess to "all of a printer's capabilities" to a user who won't look up
>>> the instructions for using lower level mechanisms
>level mechanisms makes that functionality 'off-limits' to most users,
>despite how many of them might actually find it useful.
>and not being able to access advanced printer features is a mangitude of
>how much you cannot do. Both concerns are addressed by adding features to
>software that a vast majority of the users won't end up using.
(a Gnome user and Gimp-Print developer)
You say magnifiers and sticky keys are essential to some people who otherwise can't use their computers, even though they could have a hired assistant reading or typing for them at extra expense, yet you deride people wanting GUI access to all PPD capabilities which enable them to use their printers, by saying they should hire a sysadmin to use a command line for them.No sophistry involved
Why do you have so much trouble admitting that on some printers, the
"advanced" functionality may be essential to getting it working at all?
Or are those of us who want to use cheap and readily available laser
printers at high altitudes supposed to know that we can't find the
feature in the GUI, and will have to tackle complex command line stuff?
PPD files
PPD files
If you don't think GUI support for PPD files is as important as PPD files
accessability features, don't implement it. Just watch how fast people
continue to bitch about your archaic printer support, especially as KDE's
print system continues to leave you in the dust, even being the deciding
point in a GNOME vs KDE Linux desktop rollout of size.
Sooner or later one or two things simply has to happen:
1) GNOME gets real printing support
-or-
2) People stop/don't start using GNOME in environments where printing is
at all important
You're not very imaginative, cventers. I suggest you look up the fallacy of the false dichotomy.PPD files
4. The patent system makes it impossible to use open source in the U.S. causing both Gnome and KDE both wither and die.
5. Microsoft suddenly embraces Gnome wholeheartedly and ports the Windows printing system over.
6. Space aliens land and share their technology with us. Gnome and KDE (and vi and emacs) become irrelevant overnight.
7. Ubuntu writes front-ends for every PPD ever made, fixing yet *another* serious screwup made by the Gnome decision makers.
8. J. Random Hacker writes a PPD->GnomePrint converter so you can just download your printer's profile from the fine folks at linuxprinting.org.
I used the example of a screen magnifier for a reason; with a default
X.org configuration on an EDID capable system, or a correctly set up
XFree86 on any system, you don't need a magnifier application. You can
use Ctrl-KP Plus and Ctrl-KP Minus to switch down to some small
resolutions (400x300 is the smallest EDID resolution on my 21" CRT, which
is normally run at 1600x1200).PPD files
PPD files
Look, do you want a quick and simple answer to your stupid question? PPD files
Advanced PPD configuration is NOT more important to bring disabled into
the online world. These two items, in both a technological and a business
perspective, in the context of GNOME being anything beyond a child's toy
in the office environment, are equally important!
The only way that accessibility becomes a more important concern is if
you're talking about moral / ethical concerns. This debate is not at all
about morals or ethics, but you were so eager to shred any part of my
original argument that you foolishly attempted to turn it into one.
Now that you're focusing on accessibility being "more important" than a
"different issue you can't compare" as you did originally, you're seeming
to imply that because there are remaining accessibility battles to be
fought, PPD configuration doesn't matter. If that's really the case, so
be it. I'm making a random assumption at the moment that you are at all
involved with the development of GNOME - if so, open source being more
evolutionary than its proprietary brother, you can be quite sure Darwin
will come knocking.
PPD files
I want you to re-read my original remarks to which you objected: PPD files
>> If you want an extreme example of where this "minority" attitude
>> breaks down, let's consider accessibility features for a moment. 99%
>> of the current Linux desktop market probably doesn't have damn bit of
>> need for a screen reader / magnifier / sticky keys. But you'd get
>> flamed off the planet for suggesting that we forget about this
>> 'accessibility nonsense' on the grounds that the desktop should Just
>> Work for the Majority.
If you think for a second that reading documentation and
interacting with CUPS on the command line for non-default printing is not
an _absolute_ barrier to usage for 90% of corporate computer users on the
planet, you're missing:
>> logic and common sense
Scenario 1: A large number of corporate users can't use GNOME because it
sucks bad at printing.
Scenario 2: A small number of people can't use GNOME because they can't
see and it lacks a screen reader (hypothetically, if it did).
In Scenario 1, a group of users cannot use GNOME because it lacks
critical functionality.
In Scenario 2, a group of users cannot use GNOME because it lacks
critical functionality.
Now, tell me, what piece of critical functionality are _YOU_ missing to
imply that these two things are totally different / can't be compared?
I never implied the disabled weren't important - quite the contrary, in
fact. But to claim that people who print aren't at least as important is
(see Linus's big F word) INSANE.
PPD files
I'm guessing the choice wasPPD files
1) a working printer dialog without every ppd option
2) fantasy print dialog with every option
Though we did point out that those justifications were not the real reasons for any of the issues raised. The "too confusing for users" rationale comes up as shorthand or regurgitation. It does not even remotely represent the way we approach GNOME design or usability.PPD files
Can I ask an honest question? How often do features in GNOME programs PPD files
that KDE counterparts include get excluded specifically because you guys
are worried they will get in people's way?
I'm not saying my MP3 player should make coffee, bit it would be awesome
if, for example, my File Open dialogs were a bit more powerful. What if I
want to sort by filetype? Or type a location (ok, start typing, but
nothing on the dialog indicates this. Perhaps a 'Type Location' button is
needed!)
We may be totally wrong about your motivations or intentions. As far as
Linus or I can really see, GNOME development is a big black box as much
as kernel development is to most users. But when the whole normal GNOME
user interface feels "reduced" from this File Open dialog, down through
the rest of your applications and dialogs, and we then hear shorthand and
regurgitation saying "we didn't implement it because it's too confusing
for users", what are we supposed to believe?
If there is a feature missing, don't assume it is because of design decisions. GNOME is an incremental approach with releases every 6 months. Nothing is perfect.PPD files
When were they going to get around to doing an incremental release on the PPD files
file dialogs then? Perhaps they really should leave printers alone if
they can't get this simple thing right!
Sorry, apologies for missing GNOME features aren't going to go anywhere
for me. No one is being forced or required to author GNOME - this much is
true. The same is true of KDE.
But if all these "missing features" that fill the delta between KDE and
GNOME are simply because no one has had time to implement them, how does
KDE have all of the following superior apps when GNOME has, by far, more
support from the enterprise distributions?
A) Our very own fast CSS3 HTML renderer and JS component
B) amaroK, one of the highest regarded OSS music players (so good that
Ubuntu, a Gnome distribution, broke its release plan just to include the
latest amaroK)
C) K3B for burning, excellent at what it does
D) Kontact, I think it's a lot better than Evolution but to avoid another
tangent we'll call it "on par"
E) Entire KOffice Suite (though it has a long ways to go)
F) Kaffeine, a simply superb media player
G) KPDF, one of the best open source PDF readers
H) Kate for advanced text editing
I) KDevelop for all your IDE needs
J) Quanta for HTML
Now, I've left off a few apps like Kopete. I think Kopete is very good
but I'll be honest - I'm still using GAIM for GAIM-encryption. But look
at the above list. "Web surfing, playing music, burning CDs, working on
documents, watching movies, reading documents, editing text, writing
software, writing websites"... that sounds like some pretty good coverage
when you consider that all items on those list are either "as good as" or
"far better" than their GNOME alternatives.
This is yet another reason I don't use GNOME. Because if I used GNOME, I
wouldn't stop using Konqueror, amaroK, K3b, Kontact, KPDF or Kate, and
that's a lot of K's not to be running on a K desktop.
KDE has great apps. Great devs and a great toolkit :) Not arguing that you should change your desktop to gnome. PPD files
Also, compare KParts and what it lets you do with e.g. Konqueror pluggability with the steaming mostly-unused wreck that is Bonobo in GNOME. :/PPD files
The freakin' file print dialog isn't done yet. It isn't lacking features intentionally, it just hasn't had enough loving.PPD files
Read the linked thread - the "freakin' print dialog" is going to intentionally lack features because "the usability team of GNOME was againstPPD files
listing these options". That's what got peoples panties in knots...
You should also read the linked thread. The Gnome developers debunked the assertion that the feature was missing on purpose so as not to confuse users.PPD files
>> It's easy to ignore a troll-post unless that troll is named Linus TorvaldsPPD files
I wonder why Havoc just didn't say to Linus "Show me the code". PPD files
Havoc explained later in the thread that the real reason why Metacity
doesn't have the requested feature is developer time. Sure, there could
be an "easy" patch, but to make something which lets the defaults "Just
Work" and still have nice code design, nobody had yet come up. I think
these are the same reasons why Linus turns down patches, feature requests
& trolls, Linus is just sometimes a bit more "direct" in his comments.
If you go back to Linus's original complaint, he said that he understood perfectly well that features might be missing because they have not been implemented. What cheesed him off was people claiming that the features should not be implemented because they would be confusing to average users.
PPD files
PPD files
Linus's comment on how everyone is at one point or the other a "minority" user reminded me of Joel Spolsky's piece on Leaky Abstractions. In the typical use case, the simple abstract model wins, but when it comes time to deal with the difficult cases, abstraction/layering gets in the way. It also reminded of Kiem Phong Vo's paper The Discipline and Method Architecture for Reusable Libraries. This is exactly the problem that I have with layers of infrastructure like GNOME: it is fine to have a default policy, but please factor the policy into an interface that is extensible and/or can be readily reimplemented! I certainly am an "idiot user" in the sense that I want things that I don't care about to "just work." But if I do care about it, then I want it to be (1) discoverable [other than by reading the source code], and (2) tweakable, preferably with a nearly 1:1 correspondence between settings and the underlying reality.
Leaky Abstractions
" Minimizing *available* versus *default* functionality on the grounds thatGNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
"the majority of users" don't want it is a bad thing. The problem, as
Linus very clearly defines, is that while it's true that "some" majority
of users may not need, say, control of their mouse and another "majority"
of users may not need control of their printer, it's not the same
majority."
printers? hel-lo the 90s are calling, they want their peripherals back.all this over the print dialog?
either that or boredom. (in my case, says the ex kde developing gnome user that just switched back all this over the print dialog?
for the hell of it, even better, khtml in 3.5 actually works now on the site i needed firefox for most!)
I'm a VERY long-time UNIX user; over 20 years. I started on actual vt100 terminals. My desktop typically consists of one big Emacs window, a FireFox browser window, and 50+ xterms. Plus an Evolution (because I work in a corporate environment that requires group calendaring with Exchange), a Gaim for IM, and some OOo windows if someone sent me some MS docs. In my 20+ years I've put in my time tweaking every little thing: I built FSF software in the 80's, before autotools, when it was a _LOT_ of work. I dd'd 20 floppies' worth of Linux 0.x from my SunOS 4 box to take home to my Intel box back in 1993, and configured it myself. Etc.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I use Gnome/Ubuntu now, though, because I just don't care about that stuff anymore. I don't have time to mess with it, and I don't have the desire to mess with it. Been there, done that.
GNOME developers have said on many occasions that, while they are not focused on the unix-familiar user, they suggest that others might, by creating tools like gTweakUI or Devil's Pie.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
http://www.burtonini.com/blog/computers/devilspie
Because of course it should be made `very difficult' for inexperienced users to configure the system to work as they would like. They should adapt to the system, not vice versa, dammit!GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Inexperienced users do not say "I wish I could configure things more". That's just not one of their top concerns. Most inexperienced users don't use much of the configuration that GNOME offers.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
If one is trying to make a corporate environment uniform so that desktop support costs don't bankrupt the company, then making it 'very difficult' for inexperienced users to change things is an absolute requirement. ('Impossible' would be even better.)GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Yeah. Can you imagine doing phone support for someone running with a window manager they downloaded, with a theme from somewhere else, with changed mouse button bindings?GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Then perhaps you'd be interested in KDE's advanced Kiosk controls, which GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
have been a major selling point for the project overseas?
> while they are not focused on the unix-familiar userGNOME isn't for UNIX
Your reasoning doesn't make sense. I too want to use my computer to do GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
stuff and the "pretty bling-bling" from KDE doesn't bother me at all. I
know it's there if I need it but it's not preventing me from doing stuff.
I think the argument is that there's so much bling-bling that you can't figure out how to do the fairly simple things you really want to do: blinded by the bling, so to speak.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
That's why there is the kpersonalizer which comes up the first time you GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
use KDE and it has a "bling-bling" slider (if you want to call it that)
which you can slide all the way to the left and all the "bling-bling" is
gone. It's that easy! I can imagine even the doctors of GNOME developers
can operate that slider ;-).
Now, why can't GNOME have such a practical "bling-bling" slider?
I've used Linux since 1993, and I can remember the fun of GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
configuring X with a pocket calculator, of getting Taylor UUCP to work
and a plip network so I could run a remote X session on my 4MB Compaq
Contura Aero laptop. (More than an xclock and I'd get a crash.) I
remember that fvwm was a step-up usability-wise from Windows 3.1.
And like you, I'm no longer longing to mess endlessly with my system. I'm
even thinking of decommissioning my web, mail, dhcp, bind, mailman, cvs
and other servers. I stopped thinking firewalls were fun after the second
new & improved firewall engine. I now prefer to spend my time working on
my big project: Krita and KOffice.
So I'm using Kubuntu or SuSE (depending on the machine, I have a hard
time deciding.) No messing about with hardware, no frustration trying to
get software to do what it isn't designed to do. KDE just works for me.
But in the end, your and my old fogey reminiscences are irrelevant.
Neither Gnome nor KDE completely works out of the box, and neither is bad
enough out of the box that customization is really necessary. Both have a
pleasant enough look & feel, both will probably satisfy the first-time
user. But KDE and Qt are more fun to program for and I couldn't live
without fish, the shortcuts in the minicli and all the other
conveniences.
Your arguments for Gnome (no matter with which window manager, and my
arguments for KDE are just the reflection of a personal preference,
probably caused by some personal history -- which could be as simple as
"I bought a computer with more than 8 MB of memory just when KDE 1.1.1
was released, so I used KDE and never saw enough reason to change."
You may be right about ease-of-programming; I don't hack GUIs. All my work is system programming. On the other hand, I've never really warmed up to C++, although I've used it a good bit, so without actually doing it I'm still not confident I'd enjoy programming for KDE.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I never thought I would be able to work on a big C++ application either. GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I just rolled into it. From a simple, lowly Oracle forms baker to a
Visual Basic muddler to a Python afficcionado to a Java developer -- and
then, when I needed an application to make my new Wacom pad useful, I
found Krita, and decided to try my hand at making it actually change
pixels.
I discovered that there's little to choose between C++ with Qt and Java,
but that it's amazing how much easier Python is. Pity Python isn't
suitable for iterating over five million pixels every second or so.
Of course, I already loved Qt, because when I wanted to create my first
GUI on Linux, PyQt was the most mature solution not demanding the use of
difficult languages with braces and semicolons.
I _have_ worked on big C++ apps. Huge ones in fact. I just never warmed up to the language... and if you're hacking for pleasure it's not a good thing if you don't enjoy the language you're using.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Well he said "C++ with Qt". GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Having worked with both I'll agree wholeheartedly that C++ itself can be
a bear.
Which is why I'm so glad they split up Qt with Qt 4. Now you can use the
core Qt classes even in console apps without linking in the GUI stuff as
well. It's pretty sweet.
Regards,
- Michael Pyne
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I have some serious requirements for my window manager and that's why the first thing I do on a new system is install FVWM: it's the only WM flexible enough to handle the requirements that I have, so far.
Um, Sawfish supports EWMH, so you can use it with GNOME, KDE, or on its own :)GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I come from the same era of Unix(tm) usage - starting on 4.2BSD back in 1984, I wrote scripts, hacked troff drivers in support of the earliest laser printers and otherwise set up every .rc file to accomplish necessary miracles. This was after writing interpreters and compilers for Watcom, and before heading home to explore RISC programming on the 6502 based Atari 600 at home.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Speaking of competition and bindings, why be bound to a single window manager like Metacity? Yes, it's the default for GNOME, but I still use Enlightenment 0.16 for its neat features (edge resistance which Metacity just now picked up, window grouping) and eye candy (flying windows and sound effects, screen bottom ripples -- for which I've aligned a number of background images with very pretty results). I don't know KDE on this front, but it's been a design goal of GNOME since 1.0 to work with multiple WMs.Metacity vs. other WMs
I used KDE with SUSE for about 6 years, and liked it a lot. Then I switched to Ubuntu, and noticed that, after about 3-6 months (or even larger time frame, gradually), I actually don't give a damn about all the configuration options that eg. KDE is offering. Especially Ubuntu's GNOME desktop is much, cleaner than any KDE desktop I've seen (or been able to even configure easily, actually), and cleaner than eg. Debian's or Fedora Core's default GNOME desktops / menus.My story
One of the joys of Linux is that it allows users to learn. Sure, most people find things complex to begin with, and that's why we need sensible defaults. But for the system to be a joy to use, one must be able to grow with it. The design should, in my view, allow users who wish to just "use it" to do so easily, but it should lead the curious gently to learn how to do more. Teaching users
- Good documentation
- Online help (eg tooltips, and detailed information in the GUI)
- Discoverability (no hidden options, keyboard shortcuts visible in menus (*cough*, XP *cough*)
- The assumption that many times, users will "grow out of" GUI tools, and therefore the GUI tools must explain what hidden "magic" they are doing, and must also assume that the user might edit the file by hand.
KDE is in many ways exceptionally good for this.
* WHY does firefox have so many hidden gnome dependencies? Eg firefox uses the gnome system default email client. Even if we use KDE. Some of these ought to be customised internal to firefox.
Teaching users
2)GNOME is the only environment I know of which has *lost* features in the last 2 years!
> For example, one of the first things I noticed about 2.12 is that one can no longer open a terminal window from the desktop menu.Teaching users
> you do have nautilus-open-terminal installed, right?Teaching users
No:
Package nautilus-open=terminal is not available, but is referred to by another package.
This may mean that the package is missing, has been obsoleted, or
is only available from another source
E: Package nautilus-terminal has no installation candidate
Nope, never heard of it until now. It installed OK (Ubuntu Breezy), but it doesn't seem to do anything. Perhaps I need to restart Gnome.
Teaching users
Dunno. Works fine in Rawhide.Teaching users
GNOME bad attitude
It generated a flamewar and then an extension was developed to add it back up. Yes, there are plenty of other things to work on than to remove an option that is very useful for power users, but not that useful for other users (and not something that was in the way of progress anyway). Doing thing the other way around: first develop an extension and then remove the option would have been much better from the PR point of view.
features as "this is crack" is not exactly encouraging constructive dialog.
wow. as my last post suggessts, I thought that was a joke (although I, too, was upset when "open new terminal" disappeared from right click).GNOME bad attitude
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
> If you think your users are idiots, only idiots will use it.Thanks Linus
Thanks Linus
In conclusion, coming up with blanket statements, appears to be idiotic in itself, doesn't it?
So... are you talking about Linus' statements, or your's? ;-)
He, he, nice try ;-)Thanks Linus
Sorry, I shouldn't have even tried...Thanks Linus
When was it agreed that Gnome "Just works" and KDE doesn't? I see this sentiment repeated all over, soon I'll start believing it myself. Oh wait, now that I think of it, last time I updated Mandriva, KDE was one of the few things that Just Worked!
KDE Just works
> When was it agreed that Gnome "Just works" and KDE doesn't?KDE Just works
"PS. All the cars that I ever owned were manual. Go figure ;-)"KDE Just works
While it's become common to bash Gnome for taking "usability" to the logical extreme, the problems are really symptomatic of more fundamental infrastructural problems which are not being fixed. The lack of unity between the components of the core libraries does not make application development pleasant.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Roger
I do not like GNOME. And I don't like KDE either. (For the record, I use XFCE version 3 as my "desktop".)They both suck, but....
I use KDE at work because I have too. I use Gnome at home because I can.GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Actually, I've got most of a garnome build running in my home directory, so I can finally use some of Gnome even at work too now.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Gnome just works.
I'm pretty sure the "just works" phrase is from a TV commercial for laxative from 15 or 20 years ago, but I can't remember the details. Or it might have been ant-acid tablets. I can still see the look on the guy's face.
Well, if we want to go down to that level: GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
KDE just works!
Great!GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
This flame-war has now spilled over to LWN.
Well, at least it is only subscribers. ;)GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
We better hurry up and finish... at this rate, we're still going to be GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
arguing when the free users are let in! :)
Thank you for this entertaining article - really! It made me smile. GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
IMO, Firefox caught that "users are idiots, and are confused by functionality" disease, too. Users are left with trying to make sense of "about:config" or chasing down 3rd party extensions to make what used to be simple configuration choices. The browser history is presented only as the developers decide, except for the sort order.Firefox succumbs to GNOME disease
...and look at the success of Firefox, possibly the only really widely used Free application. The proof is in the results, right?Firefox succumbs to GNOME disease
"..and look at the success of Firefox, possibly the only really widely used Free application. The proof is in the results, right?"Firefox succumbs to GNOME disease
Other than OOo (which has the design of a proprietary application), I honestly can't think of another free application that has the user base of Firefox. So please enlighten me as to why that assumption is wrong.
Firefox succumbs to GNOME disease
Sorry about the delay.
Firefox
The original poster is comparing, not measuring. It's perfectly easy to compare. Do any of your suggested apps have anywhere *near* the number of active users as Firefox? Of Mplayer/Gaim/GCC, definitely not. I suspect a difference of at least two orders of magnitude, probably more. Apache doesn't count, of course, because it's not installed on the user's machine.Firefox
The original poster made a very easy leap from observing the popularity of Firefox to attributing that popularity to the simplification of its user interface. You haven't addressed that at all nor have you addressed any other factor that influenced Firefox's popularity. You assert that comparison rather than measuring is the point, yet you immediately begin asking about numbers of users. Make up your mind. If you choose to stick with comparing numbers, let's see some numbers. What numbers will you use to prove your assertions? Downloads? Surveys? Apache is installed on my machine and a great many others as well.Firefox
I've just found
Mike Shaver's message in that Desktop_Architects thread and am greatly encouraged about how Firefox may mature. If Mr. Shaver's philosophy about "the Linux desktop" has sufficient sway in Firefox's development, that browser is likely to own the Web, eventually.
Firefox
Nah, Firefox was released to perfect timing. They rode in on a wave of Firefox succumbs to GNOME disease
Microsoft's terrible Internet Explorer browser and all of the rotten
spyware it caused. Many (most?) of the Firefox converts were simply geeks
telling non-geeks "There's finally another choice you can make! Choose
Firefox - choose anything but IE!"
But konqueror and mozilla predate firefox. How does this affect your argument?Firefox succumbs to GNOME disease
Konqueror wasn't available on Windows yet (and still isn't), and Mozilla Firefox succumbs to GNOME disease
was too early. Again, timing.
The Mozilla Application Suite was _never_ promoted as an end user product. As long as Mozilla.org belonged to Netscape/AOL they explicitly stated, that it was a technology to make browsers and other applications.Firefox succumbs to GNOME disease
I wonder how many of those involved in this so-called discussion have actually developed software that *people* have to use. Software that must be *supported* and *supportable*.Firefox succumbs to GNOME disease
I have been supporting some pretty clueless users on GNU/Linux systems for quite a few years. Firefox succumbs to GNOME disease
I used to use ratpoison exclusively, but it had too many bugs (race conditions causing it to lock up, I think), and I switched to Ion. Ion is sweet! I'm quite happy. It uses the "all windows always maximized" philosophy of ratpoison but handles pop-up dialogs in a very nice way, offers easy frame splitting a la emacs and screen, supports mouse usage if desired (it has tabs, etc.), it looks good, and it doesn't lock up.Ion!
Gnome is getting better, but sometimes this "gap is there explicitly by design" thing feels like a religious war or something like "well we do in this way because it is our principle. and because of principles we are prepared to do even bad things".GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
- No option to turn off the spatial mode
- No turn to force to open by default in the tree mode
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Nautilus has two very good examples
I was afraid that might be the case. I couldn't find anything in the configuration/preferences/properties menus, but can't this be disabled in gconf?
- No option to turn off the spatial mode
There are several ways to turn off spatial Nautilus. These two come to mind:GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
Yeah, that worked. I've been through Nautilus configuration dozens of times, but somehow I never associated "Always open in browser windows" with "don't open new windows." Thanks.
GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
I've used just about every GUI out there (Windows 1.0 / 2.0 / 3.0 / 3.1 / 95 / 98 / NT / 2000 / XP, MacOS, CDE/Motif, Amiga, NextStep, GNOME/GTK+, KDE/Qt, and a host of window managers including E). I know how to edit text configuration files. So I can use anything.
The answer is: Standards! Esp. freedesktop.org.
I also worry somewhat about control over Qt by a single organization if there are many proprietary programs that use it (making forking impractical).
The answer is: Standards! Esp. freedesktop.org.
I learned to use gnome on successive Red Hat releases pretty much uncustomized due to the difficulty of moving all my setting over easily on each upgrade. But finally at RHEL4, I cannot get the first window to pop up in the upper left corner, it insists on popping up in the middle of the screen and I can find no way to get the previous RHEL3 behavior of starting in the upper left corner!The answer is: Standards! Esp. freedesktop.org.
Linus
explains his outburst in this message. Personally, I think his
comments were (once again) quite insightful and sensical.
Linus follows up
OK the word is OUT! : Linus follows up
"I think the KDE development process has been a lot more "lively", and I
think a _lot_ of the reason for that has been that they haven't allowed
the "interface nazi" kind of stifling of what people feel they need to
do."
O'Reilly Flame Mode ON:
This touches the core issue. The semi-commercial quasi-marketing attitude
with Open Source companies in the USA, be it RedHat or Novell, is very
annoying with respect to the level of being a "FUCKING IDIOT"
If Torvalds means that the U.S. based linux companies really think that
dumbing down the Linux desktop is needed in order to compete with Bill
Gates and his total brain-lost clientele, He's absolutely right.
Why would one allow the Linux Desktop to be moved into the same direction
as the Vista of XP Desktop? That's a sick idea. It maybe a brilliant
marketing idea for Novell or RedHat, but most people seem not to realize
that the windows desktop is part of a total dumbdown campaign inside the
USA.
O'Reilly Flame Mode OFF
Robert
Linus's comments reminded me of a quote by Albert Einstein,GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not
any simplier" Seems the Gnome people forgot this.
I have said it before and i will say it again there has been a Big spelling mistake the correct name for what is bieng called Gnome is actuall GONE (and not fishing either) Gone(gnome) = windows dumb as shit .GNOME v. KDE, December 2005 edition