GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released

Posted Feb 23, 2011 23:35 UTC (Wed) by russell (guest, #10458)
In reply to: GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released by aliguori
Parent article: GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released

Why wouldn't they apply the same collaboration to design that they apply to writing the code? GNOME Shell should have been GNOME ShellS, where the S is a frame work for people to create shells how they like it (bring back configuration). Then just let the best design evolve out of that. But, no, they have decreed that this is the way everyone will work.

GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released

Posted Feb 24, 2011 0:20 UTC (Thu) by njs (subscriber, #40338) [Link]

"let the best design evolve ... they have decreed"

Uh, this is FOSS. The people doing the evolving and the people doing the decreeing are the same.

GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released

Posted Feb 24, 2011 0:53 UTC (Thu) by drag (guest, #31333) [Link] (6 responses)

> Why wouldn't they apply the same collaboration to design that they apply to writing the code?

Who says they don't? It seems to me that Gnome folks program in the best manner they see fit and they design in the best manner they see fit.

> GNOME Shell should have been GNOME ShellS, where the S is a frame work for people to create shells how they like it (bring back configuration). Then just let the best design evolve out of that. But, no, they have decreed that this is the way everyone will work.

No. If you want to make your own 'shell' and let people use it Gnome isn't doing anything to stop you. It's all open source, modular, and you can do whatever you like with it.

Unity itself is a perfect example of this.

Your making it sound like if you don't use the default settings for Gnome then they will come out and shoot you in the head or something. It's really a wrong way to look at things.

GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released

Posted Feb 24, 2011 10:05 UTC (Thu) by russell (guest, #10458) [Link] (5 responses)

No they won't come out and shoot anyone in the head. With the diminishing set of settings there won't be anything but the default settings.

>No. If you want to make your own 'shell' and let people use it Gnome isn't >doing anything to stop you. It's all open source, modular, and you can do >whatever you like with it.

Typical, show us the code comment... Yeah I'll just knock one up in my lunch time to suit the job I've got to do in the afternoon. It will probably take my entire lunch because I have to start from scratch.

Really, I would like to just change a few configuration files instead. Maybe script some behaviour into the window manager, you know the stuff that you can do in a lunch time and share with your friends and colleges.

Eventually certain scripted behaviour, settings, themes, etc would become popular, highlighting what people really want. This works better than an academic process of predicting what people want.

GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released

Posted Feb 24, 2011 10:16 UTC (Thu) by AlexHudson (guest, #41828) [Link] (3 responses)

GNOME Shell has javascript built in to do all that scripting stuff. So you wouldn't have to start from scratch. This is a lot more power-user friendly than GNOME 2 imho.

GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released

Posted Feb 24, 2011 12:22 UTC (Thu) by sorpigal (guest, #36106) [Link] (2 responses)

Great. Can you use javascript to put the minimize button back? Also, where is this documented?

GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released

Posted Feb 24, 2011 13:11 UTC (Thu) by AlexHudson (guest, #41828) [Link] (1 responses)

Putting "the button back" is probably little more effort than tweaking a dconf variable. I've no idea if this specific thing has a documented code tweak, but there's a good amount about the scripting setup here: http://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell/Development

GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released

Posted Feb 24, 2011 17:21 UTC (Thu) by fmuellner (subscriber, #70150) [Link]

For the time being it's still gconf, but yeah - the "removal" of the buttons is actually a changed default setting, so nothing fancy is required to get them back.

GNOME Shell 2.91.90 released

Posted Feb 25, 2011 7:01 UTC (Fri) by jmalcolm (subscriber, #8876) [Link]

I do not feel this is a 'show us the code' comment at all. The key word for me in the original comment is 'modular'.

Unity is essentially a competing GNOME environment that, although providing a completely different user experience, shares the majority of it's ecosystem with GNOME 3.

XFCE is also a GTK+ based environment as is LXDE I believe. You can use these for the desktop experience if you like and still enjoy pretty much everything that GNOME has to offer and it will still feel pretty native.

In fact, I believe that one of the environments competing with GNOME Shell will be updated versions of Metacity and the GNOME panels. You can run the exact desktop you are used to now with GNOME 2 but with upgraded GTK+ and a lot more.

Beyond all that there are many different Window Managers and other environments. There is an embarrassment of riches when it comes to how you want to consume the parts of GNOME that you do find useful.

Demanding that we want to be able to configure and then wining that we would have to configure something to get back the behaviour we want seems silly. "I am a POWER USER dammit so you should design the system exactly as I like right out of the box!"

Pretending that GNOME is as restrictive and prescriptive as something like OS X or even Windows is misleading to my mind. I can run GNOME platform features and GNOME applications a lot of different ways without writing a line of code. I can also write a bunch of complimentary code pretty easily if I like. Thanks GNOME team.

I may or may not like the GNOME Shell. I will probably give it a try. I have not loved Unity based on the little I have tried it. I will probably run GNOME in a 'classic' configuration because, as with others here, that is what I am personally used to and feel productive with. What I will not do is to throw a tantrum because the GNOME developers feel the desktop can be done better and are trying to give it a shot.

After all, as far as I can tell, the GNOME team is explicitly providing the option to stay with the old metaphor if that is what you prefer.

I believe this is what the original poster was getting at.