Reasoning with rocks #24:
Kevin108 wrote:bimsebasse wrote:In what way is Gnome Shell a tablet interface?
Because instead of desktop icons or a nice, clean menu activated from the corner, it has big, stupid buttons spread around for you to push with your fingers. It's pretty obvious what it is to most people. It's fine if you like it. It would be great on a tablet, I'm sure, but on my desktop I have no use for it or the similarly-configured Windows 8.
You and a thousand others are repeating this mantra once a day and it probably helps you a lot mentally in some way but so far no one has actually explained how Gnome Shell would be a great tablet interface, or Unity for that matter. Gnome Shell is optimized for keyboard launching and that fact alone makes it obviously not aimed at tablets (I mean other than that there isn't a gnome shell for tablets, isn't one in the making either). Have you ever seen a tablet interface without icon launchers, where you can't even put things on the desktop? You talk about big buttons,
where are they?.
Imagine Mint 11 on a tablet: there's a nice menu button, push it, choose submenu and find program, easy. Gnome Shell: you can't do it the easy way pressing the windows key, so you press "Activities", a button no larger than the mint menu button, a bit thinner if anything, then you need to press Applications (a button no larger...) and then you can choose to get a list of all programs or a filter option on the right. Which method is easier touchscreen only? Mint 11. Now let's switch to a desktop with a keyboard. Gnome Shell: launch any program or open any home folder you need with a combination of windowskey+2-3-4 letters+enter, easy. In Mint 11, grab your mouse, click on Menu, find the menu category, expand, in the submenu find what you need, click again, takes longer, less easy. There are no panel or desktop icon shortcuts in Gnome Shell. Why? Because the keyboard launching described above takes the same amount of time it takes to move the mouse to an icon an click on it, so shortcuts aren't necessary. Is this tablet friendly? Obviously not, tablet interfaces strives to make do without a keyboard, they are pulling in the opposite direction of Gnome Shell. Please just some of you, do a good deed, save the internet from just a little mindless drivel: gnome shell not only not tablet friendly as it is, it's less tablet friendly than gnome-panel in Gnome 2. It's a desktop interface, it's more tied to a desktop computer because more tied to a keyboard. Big icons in the overview menu do not a tablet interface make. Thanks! And then pairing it with the completely different mosaic interface of Windows 8 metro ... What on earth is the great similarity between
this and
this??? What's the point in being ignorant on purpose, what can there possibly be in that worth striving for?
Kevin108 wrote:Mint's main edition includes Gnome. Whatever else the users of other variations are waiting for, they are prioritized differently. Not quickly recognizing and addressing the obvious displeasure with Mint 12 and Gnome 3 would be equivalent to ignoring the sudden appearance of a large hole in your beer mug. I'm sure Clem has no interest in watching Mint users spill out into other distros, so he's doing the right thing and working to fix what most of us see as a significant problem with the main edition development. I, for one, applaud the decision. For the first time in over a decade, I've been able to stick with Linux and it's thanks in no small part to his work and good decision making concerning this distro. What you call cutting us off from Gnome's main desktop, many of us see as making a proper move to pioneer a better interface that stands to benefit all Gnome-based distros and a move that is certainly saving Mint from what the Gnome devs are doing. If someone decided to no longer use Mint because of Gnome 3, what would he move on to? Ubuntu and Fedora are just as broken. If Clem wasn't doing the work he currently is, there are a lot of us who would stay on Mint 11 until EOL then go to Mint 12 with LXDE or some other DE that was not Gnome 3 or KDE 4.
Again, Cinnamon is Gnome 3, it shares everything with MGSE except the panel layout and the overview - it's not Gnome 2, it's not Gnome 2 reborn, it's Gnome 3 running a slightly modified Gnome Shell. If I had a penny every time I had to state something obvious to a stubborn Gnome 2 sentimentalist, I'd have about 11 pennies. Cinnamon is no doubt handy for users who can't or won't configure Gnome Shell to have a more classic setup but it's not Gnome 2, it has all the problems Gnome 3 has, less configurability, less stability, no compiz all these things Cinnamon aren't changing, it's Gnome 3 with a single bottom panel and no possibility of changing it, that's all.
there are also plans to release a separate MATE only edition for those who want strictly a Gnome 2 experience.
