4 ms·

> How do you change the GUI theme on Mac? You see, that's the problem: Mac is opinionated, and this is the quality we most often praise it for. Changing the G

by tajen 10y ago

> How do you change the GUI theme on Mac? You see, that's the problem: Mac is opinionated, and this is the quality we most often praise it for. Changing the GUI is functionnaly useless for any job. That means some folks in the Linux GUI thingy thought it was good to make everything a variable, not even a build-time constant, write configuration screens, and poll the value each time you redraw the window in case someone changed it at runtime. For every change they also have to test them with a bunch of GUI themes and write automated tests for them. Plus the added benefit that every line of code is friction. I'd say they're spending their time on the wrong thing because... In Mac, it's fixed. That means as a user I benefit from not spending time choosing a GUI theme. It also means apps can rely on constants. Makes it worth paying a UX designer to interview users and choose the right value™. And this right value will be better than any setting. - Mouse: I remember fiddling with xinput a lot because the UI never allowed me to set the acceleration. On Mac I don't even need to know where that control is. - GUI theme: Ubuntu has a default GUI theme that is wrong, because it has big fonts and big borders, makes it look like a toy and consumes half the real estate of my screen. Not great for work, so you have to change the GUI theme. Mac is just perfect on those two priorities.

erlehmann_ 10y ago
I think I have written about this some time back. Care to read it and find out if it is related to your assessment? http://blog.dieweltistgarnichtso.net/using-mac-os-x-as-a-self-binding-device http://blog.dieweltistgarnichtso.net/using-mac-os-x-as-a-sel... Changing the GUI has a function, btw. Just yesterday I wrote a custom stylesheet for Slack because its developers chose “the right values” for people who can see gray-on-grey “contrast” well (so, not me).
- tajen 10y ago
  There is some time I spend procrastinating, but during my year with Ubuntu at work I was really annoyed by everyday things, enough to suspend my task and fix my configuration, so I wouldn't describe it as procrastination. I didn't fix things I could work with (e.g. when I switched on, I would execute some commands in the shell to fix the mouse...). Anyway we can discuss for long, but in the end I believe if Linux OSes had the amount of money that Apple has to hire UX designers, marketers and devs who don't mind doing mundane bugfixing, at least one version on Linux would become perfect. It was supposed to be Ubuntu, but let's hope it's the next one.
  - erlehmann_ 10y ago
    When I fix something, I immediately send it upstream, did you do that? I just did it now after I fixed a bug, so that neither me nor anyone else has the problem in the future. Debian has a program called „reportbug“ which you invoke with the package or file name related to the bug, even if you do not have a solution. I think a distribution like Debian should appeal to you for its focus on quality. New packages in Debian move first to the Unstable distribution and then after some time to the Testing distribution. Testing is “freezed” before a Stable release to weed out remaining bugs. [1] Debian also has a tool called “apt-listbug” that warns you before installing a new version of a package that has a known bug and gives you an option to not update that package automatically for as long as that bug exists. What Ubuntu does is just putting its own stuff on top of Debian Unstable (or Testing, when it does a Long Term Support release). They have next to no quality control. When I drew glyphs for Unifont, this meant that for half a year, Ubuntu had a half-finished Unifont it imported from Debian Testing at the wrong time. I got complaints as I told people to install Unifont to play my Unicode proof-of-concept roguelike [2]. The guy from the article I wrote eventually did use Debian. I think he fiddled around with Emacs for over a month until he arrived at his “perfect” setup (which is different for everyone, by the way). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debian https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debian [2] http://news.dieweltistgarnichtso.net/notes/zoo-tycoon-roguelike-mockup.html http://news.dieweltistgarnichtso.net/notes/zoo-tycoon-roguel...

by tajen 10y ago

erlehmann_ 10y ago

I think I have written about this some time back. Care to read it and find out if it is related to your assessment? http://blog.dieweltistgarnichtso.net/using-mac-os-x-as-a-self-binding-device http://blog.dieweltistgarnichtso.net/using-mac-os-x-as-a-sel... Changing the GUI has a function, btw. Just yesterday I wrote a custom stylesheet for Slack because its developers chose “the right values” for people who can see gray-on-grey “contrast” well (so, not me).

tajen 10y ago
There is some time I spend procrastinating, but during my year with Ubuntu at work I was really annoyed by everyday things, enough to suspend my task and fix my configuration, so I wouldn't describe it as procrastination. I didn't fix things I could work with (e.g. when I switched on, I would execute some commands in the shell to fix the mouse...). Anyway we can discuss for long, but in the end I believe if Linux OSes had the amount of money that Apple has to hire UX designers, marketers and devs who don't mind doing mundane bugfixing, at least one version on Linux would become perfect. It was supposed to be Ubuntu, but let's hope it's the next one.
- erlehmann_ 10y ago
  When I fix something, I immediately send it upstream, did you do that? I just did it now after I fixed a bug, so that neither me nor anyone else has the problem in the future. Debian has a program called „reportbug“ which you invoke with the package or file name related to the bug, even if you do not have a solution. I think a distribution like Debian should appeal to you for its focus on quality. New packages in Debian move first to the Unstable distribution and then after some time to the Testing distribution. Testing is “freezed” before a Stable release to weed out remaining bugs. [1] Debian also has a tool called “apt-listbug” that warns you before installing a new version of a package that has a known bug and gives you an option to not update that package automatically for as long as that bug exists. What Ubuntu does is just putting its own stuff on top of Debian Unstable (or Testing, when it does a Long Term Support release). They have next to no quality control. When I drew glyphs for Unifont, this meant that for half a year, Ubuntu had a half-finished Unifont it imported from Debian Testing at the wrong time. I got complaints as I told people to install Unifont to play my Unicode proof-of-concept roguelike [2]. The guy from the article I wrote eventually did use Debian. I think he fiddled around with Emacs for over a month until he arrived at his “perfect” setup (which is different for everyone, by the way). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debian https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debian [2] http://news.dieweltistgarnichtso.net/notes/zoo-tycoon-roguelike-mockup.html http://news.dieweltistgarnichtso.net/notes/zoo-tycoon-roguel...