Linux Mint 12, and beyond?

[linuxviolin]

Gnome-3 is merely the better option between two bad choices, Gnome3 and Unity.

Here, I'm not sure to agree. I fear, for me, Unity is better than GNOME 3. But I don't really care, I hate both.

I hope it doesn't follow the Ubuntu Unity, Gnome 3 or Windows 8 nuttiness.

Well, Windows 8 Metro UI may not be bad, even interesting. It is not GNOME 3 or Unity. Yes, Windows 8 is boring to use daily, at least in this initial incarnation: many things need to be refined and switch between Metro and Desktop is annoying. But It seems very light. Wait for the final version to really see. We should stay to Win 7 for now (otherwise... XP)

[xenopeek]

Well, Windows 8 Metro UI may not be bad, even interesting. It is not GNOME 3 or Unity. Yes, Windows 8 is boring to use daily, at least in this initial incarnation: many things need to be refined and switch between Metro and Desktop is annoying. But It seems very light. Wait for the final version to really see. We should stay to Win 7 for now (otherwise... XP)

What blasphemy is this?

[tdockery97]

After watching a couple of video demonstrations of Windows 8, all I can say is bleccchhhh! It's sorta like Gnome3+Unity+the cloud. Nothing there that will ever find a place on my HDD.

[linuxviolin]

After watching a couple of video demonstrations of Windows 8, all I can say is bleccchhhh! It's sorta like Gnome3+Unity+the cloud. Nothing there that will ever find a place on my HDD.

Well, no, it's not like GNOME 3 or Unity. Wait the final version to make a real advice. As I said, many things need to be refined and switch between Metro and Desktop is annoying in this initial incarnation.

xenopeek, blasphemy? No. Ah OK, it is forbidden to speak about another thing than Linux if you don't want to receive the angry of the Linux fanboys... Yeah. I have always liked to be provocative...

[zerozero]

only the brave advocates the indefensible

[KBD47]

I keep hearing about a gnome 3 classic mode. Supposedly people have already tried this on Ubuntu 11.10 and it is supposed to be like gnome 2. Can anyone confirm this? I keep wondering if this is where Mint will end up, with some sort of tweaked gnome 3 that acts like gnome 2. I wonder if Main Mint would be better off with Xfce to please gnome 2 users, perhaps a tweaked Xfce that acts like gnome 2?
KBD47

[craig10x]

It's called "fallback mode" and yes...it is very possible Clem may decide to use that to have both gnome 3 AND classic linux mint desktop for Mint 12...
Using that, you would not see anything related to the shell at all...and he could place the panel on bottom, add mint menu, etc...etc...

google or yahoo it on the internet (gnome 3 fallback mode) to learn more about it

[KBD47]

Thanks!

[HardyH]

I keep hearing about a gnome 3 classic mode. Supposedly people have already tried this on Ubuntu 11.10 and it is supposed to be like gnome 2. Can anyone confirm this? I keep wondering if this is where Mint will end up, with some sort of tweaked gnome 3 that acts like gnome 2. I wonder if Main Mint would be better off with Xfce to please gnome 2 users, perhaps a tweaked Xfce that acts like gnome 2?
KBD47

Just to make it clear, Gnome 3 Fallback is NOT Gnome 2, it looks a little like Gnome 3, but it still uses the damned Gtk+3 base, which lacks of configuration ( Our users are Idiots, they need to press alt plus mouse to even only add a panel applet and they won't be able to rightclick anything). The main problem with Gnome 3 ( Shell and Fallback) is this attitude of the devs who presume that their users are much dumber than bread and the removal of functions and easy configurability in their UIs. They slapped our face with Gnome 3, now let's slap theirs and not use their UI. Their attitude even made me drop Gnome 2 completely after years of using it.
H

[zerozero]

Hardy,
it's not true!
first, the "problem" is not gtk3, gtk3 is a much better code-base than gkt2 ever was or would be, clear, easier to learn and to maintain and even to hack;
gtk2 was full of patchs and patchs of patchs and holes (just see the gnome-panel example and the amount of bugs and errors that were impossible to correct)

second, making it "harder" to mass around with the panel is not necessarily a bad thing - just go through the amount of topics in this forum only with the subject "i deleted X how can i have it back", "where is my [insert any applet here]"

third, what are you missing in ability to configure the UI? your statement was true half-year ago, it's not anymore

forth, if you have nautilus drawing the background, all the right-click functionalities are there.

[blueXrider]

Since this last posting we still have seen some changes. Gnome has forked and it is believed that most Ubuntu derivatives will not follow the Unity campaign. The fitments of Unity into the netbook are like Android for phones. I think desktop pc's and laptops are not going to be a Ubuntu goal in the future.

The current spins of or (off of) Ubuntu tend to be more user friendly than Ubuntu itself. Which brings us to Linux Mint. The direction to separate is headed toward Debian. Why else would the Mint Dev Team spend as much time as they do working on it?

[KBD47]

Just read this:

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), has been joined by rival OpenSUSE, which is jumping to GNOME 3 in its 12.1 beta (see farther below).
Both projects have adopted the latest GNOME 3.2 release, which is said to have squashed many of the bugs of the original, while fixing a few of the most unpopular changes. Yet, GNOME has not backtracked much from its radical UI makeover.

This is important because both Fedora 16 and OpenSUSE 12.1 will block users from booting into GNOME 2.x except for a simplified fallback mode for low-end systems.
http://www.linuxfordevices.com/c/a/News ... -121-beta/

I'm just wondering how 'simplified' that fallback will be. Obviously they are pushing for acceptance of the full Gnome 3 desktop. I think in the end I will likely end up with Torvalds using Xfce. I still say Xfce for Main Mint. I just wonder if a crippled or severely hacked Gnome 3 to look like classic gnome can survive for long.
KBD47

[proxima_centauri]

I'm just wondering how 'simplified' that fallback will be.

I think they're referring to the same old fallback mode that we've already seen in GNOME3.

[tdockery97]

While I still don't care for Gnome 3 and/or the fallback mode, I do have to say that they are going a long way toward making it configurable. There are a number of tools (hacks?) available, both officially sanctioned and not-so-much. I think given enough time Gnome 3 will be configurable enough to have it any way you like it. It's just that you should not have to virtually re-write the code to get what you want in a desktop environment. Adding a few tweaks to your installation is one thing...having to wrestle your desktop into submission is something else entirely.

[proxima_centauri]

As for a lot of settings, yes, one has to rely on gnome-tweak-tool for the time being - but it does a good job at managing themes, fonts, desktop, and extensions. GNOME3 is not for the users who like to customize and tweak every available setting - that's for sure - I think they're trying to distance themselves from this in favour of stability and reliability.

[zerozero]

i believe a picture (or a few) worth a couple pages of words:
Ubuntu 11.10 fallback-mode slightly modded

[linuxviolin]

the "problem" is not gtk3, gtk3 is a much better code-base than gkt2 ever was or would be, clear, easier to learn and to maintain and even to hack;
gtk2 was full of patchs and patchs of patchs and holes (just see the gnome-panel example and the amount of bugs and errors that were impossible to correct)

You'll probably have the same thing with gtk3 in some months/years, in the future. And no, it was not "impossible to correct", if at least they had made some maintenance work from the beginning for instance... But developers don't know that.

[KBD47]

i believe a picture (or a few) worth a couple pages of words:
Ubuntu 11.10 fallback-mode slightly modded

That looks pretty good, thanks for posting the pics.
Just curious, I don't see work spaces on there, are they available in fallback mode?
Thanks!
KBD47

[craig10x]

I could see that applied with moving the panel to the bottom and having the traditional mint menu as well (instead of the old style applications, etc menus that fan out like ubuntu always had)...

Looks very workable and pretty nice looking too...based on looking at the screenshots, it would seem quite doable for Clem to have gnome 3 with traditional mint desk top style in Mint 12 and beyond....

I don't what linuxviolin is "freaking out" so much about

And i'm sure Zorin and other ubuntu based distros that want to stay away from the shell layout, will also do much the same...

[zerozero]

KBD47, yes the workspaces are there, i just modded them to show in one row and have only 2, see this pic, it's more what you would expect to see

ws.png

craig, the inicial setup gives you 2 panels: the top one with menu, calendar and notification area and the botton one with window list and workspace applet;
i deleted the bottom one and added the required items to the top (in the same way we always did in gnome2 - but to interact with the panel now it's alt+right click ( no more accidental mess-ups)

next, i will try to mintify this; mintmenu fails because one lib is not available and you saw the time it was yesterday, not really time to hunt missing lib