The Grumpy Editor's GNOME 3 experience [LWN.net]

The Grumpy Editor's GNOME 3 experience

Posted Mar 16, 2011 18:31 UTC (Wed) by johannbg (guest, #65743)
In reply to: The Grumpy Editor's GNOME 3 experience by sramkrishna
Parent article: The Grumpy Editor's GNOME 3 experience

"You can browse some of the thoughts behind the design here:

http://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell/Design/"

I had already familiarized myself with upstream design documentation including Williams paper but my question was "Was there done any usability research before starting to develop Gnome3" and I guess you answered my question with "No" which is what I suspected.

"I realize that this is completely far afield from the usual desktop of a panels, applets, widgets and what not. But really, how much more work do you think we're going to be able to do on this particular interface, honestly? At this point, we've taken this interface as far as it will go, there is no where else to go. We can just change the internals a little, make new themes, new widgets. There is only so many ways you're going to be able to cut this. if we didn't try something new, the whole thing is going to be dead in a couple years."

I'm not arguing against the need for Gnome to adopt it self to the changes that are happening now, desktop in it's sense is slowly migrating into smartphones and into the "cloud" which will serve majority of regular computer usage on the planet and that's a computer you carry around with you at all time in your pocket and you simply "dock" to hook it up to a keyboard mouse and additional larger display and a continues power source and external storage device.

That's happening right here right now and the battle is being fought between Apple IOS and Android and the traditional desktop in the sense as we know it, is dying and in couple of years it will be gone so any DE on any OS will need to adapt itself to those changes as in being able to run on smartphones,tablet pc, laptops and regular workstation if it's going to continue to exist and succeed at the same time. This is just common knowledge.

The most irony with regards to Gnome that after all these years it continues to ignore it's current and only users base it has and continues on a path of it's own failure by developing a desktop targeted only at novice end users which in return will never use it since that novice end user it is targeting is incapable of installing Gnome in the first place.

They could have exposed various configuration options in various application in "Admin" accounts if they had any intention of keeping advanced/experienced and at the same time their current and only user base happy but they did not..

Linux on Desktop wont become commonly widely used amongst home end users until that novice end user can walk into a store and buy it ( also common knowledge ) and up to this point only one distribution has done something about it which is probably the only thing it has manage to do right and that's Canonical, it has managed to deliver it's triple U distro in the hands of that novice end user right from the store and that's why it is so *popular*.

Gnome-Shell has potentiality to become a great success and already fixes some issue I know novice end users have been struggling with in Gnome2 unfortunately it seems to bring several new ones to them instead as has been pointed out by various existing Gnome users most of which I agree with thou not all.

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The Grumpy Editor's GNOME 3 experience

Posted Mar 16, 2011 20:45 UTC (Wed) by jku (subscriber, #42379) [Link] (1 responses)

It helps the discussion if everyone avoids generalizations... You claim GNOME is ignoring its current user base and is on the path to failure.

I'm a power user by most meanings of the word, a software developer and a long time linux/unix user. First of all, I love the fact that different paths are being explored -- this is why it makes sense to have several desktop environments. Second, I really like the direction GNOME is now going. I think the panel implementation especially is a step in the direction of "Just Works" and the activity mode has potential. I'm also very happy that when it improves the overall experience, someone is ready to go through the painful battle that removing and rearranging configuration options always is.

I hope we can agree that GNOME 3 is not "targeted only at novice end users" and that not all experienced users want problems solved by "exposing various configuration options in various applications".

The Grumpy Editor's GNOME 3 experience

Posted Mar 16, 2011 23:07 UTC (Wed) by johannbg (guest, #65743) [Link]

"It helps the discussion if everyone avoids generalizations... You claim GNOME is ignoring its current user base and is on the path to failure."

Yes I feel that Gnome is moving further towards what it has been criticised most in the past and by doing so it is on the path to failure.

It can achieve both by exposing various option and knobs in accounts with type set as "Administrators" while keeping it's "simplicity" by completely hide all the that stuff along with for example workspaces and various other things in accounts with type set as "Supervised".

"I think the panel implementation especially is a step in the direction of "Just Works" and the activity mode has potential."

How do you feel like it's an closer step into "Just Works" as to previous experience?

From my perspective from the moment you log in you have a less usable and productive environment for example as it's currently implemented the activity mode is adding another step to the previous users experience from the moment you log in.

The first thing you have to do after you log in is to move the mouse point and click "Activities" for you to be able to start doing any kind of work and that's a step backwards in usability and productivity compared to Gnome 2 where you logged in and you could click an icon in the panel or on the desktop of course that can be solved by by putting the user in "Activities" immediately when he logs in.

"I'm also very happy that when it improves the overall experience, someone is ready to go through the painful battle that removing and rearranging configuration options always is."

Well yes "when" this is what the novice end users complained to me one of the most about with regards to Gnome 2 as in the continues change in the Menus.

From a developers perspective it was cleaning/tidying up the menus which had the side effect that it caused the novice end user to "learn" again and again where things are which they did not like so much..

"I hope we can agree that GNOME 3 is not "targeted only at novice end users" and that not all experienced users want problems solved by "exposing various configuration options in various applications"."

Every indication in the design points otherwise...