4 ms·

> The problems that GNOME 3.X has always had continue to be present -- chiefly the UI scale is too large on low-res screens (the machine I was testing with has

by alxlaz 7y ago

> The problems that GNOME 3.X has always had continue to be present -- chiefly the UI scale is too large on low-res screens (the machine I was testing with has a 1366x768 display) It's not just Gnome that does that. There's an entire generation of designers that's cargo-culting mobile designs at the moment. Breeze, KDE's default theme, is equally space-wasting. They're great if you have a touch screen but it would be really cool if you could turn them off on systems without touch screens, i.e. about 99% of the current Linux installations I'm guessing :-). If you're willing to fiddle around, there are a few good themes that don't waste so much space.

frutiger 7y ago
I totally agree with your overall point, but: > about 99% of the current Linux installations Not if you include Android!
- ufo 7y ago
  In these contexts people usually mean "GNU/Linux desktop" when they say "Linux". It is not as if we have any meaningful choice of desktop environment on Android-land anyway.
- alxlaz 7y ago
  > Not if you include Android! How many Android installations running Gnome have you seen in the wild :-)?
dagmx 7y ago
The person you're replying to said scaling not spacing. Very different issues. They may have optimal spacing but their scaling is being handled incorrectly by the system, or they may have perfect scaling but suboptimal spacing. Or they're both good or they both suck. It's best not to conflate the two.
- charlesdaniels 7y ago
  I could also criticize the spacing, but much ink has already been spilled on Gnome 3.X on both sides of the argument; I'm not looking to start a flame war. However, I was under the impression that previous versions of Gnome supported non-integer scaling factors, which seems to be gone from current GTK versions(?). Just being able to set the scale to 0.5 or 0.75 would go a long way for people with lower res screens. Even though I don't use Gnome myself, this still affects me, since many applications use GTK, and thus have massive Fisher Price buttons compared to other programs I use.
pmontra 7y ago
There are themes that address the spacing / padding problem. I want to try Nextwaita [1] when I'll find the time to upgrade my Ubuntu 16.04 system. I have a try to Ubuntu 18.04 on a separate partition and padding is really unbearable. [1] https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1289376/ https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1289376/ Furthermore the Nvidia driver and Gnome Shell work only at 40 Hz. The screen flickers noticeably at 60 Hz (Quadro K1000m). No problems on 16.04 with Gnome Flashback, which is GTK3 and Compiz. I didn't check 19.04 yet.
- charlesdaniels 7y ago
  Themes are not supported: https://stopthemingmy.app/ https://stopthemingmy.app/ and cannot be changed via the happy path GUI, though I did see that Debian 10 includes Gnome Tweak Tool out of the box.
  - pmontra 7y ago
    Maybe theming is still supported in Ubuntu? There is going to be a way as long it's based on CSS files on the file system. I definitely don't want the default theme, I prefer scrollbars and other things my way. Developers of Linux apps should accept they have difficult users. I'll buy a Mac when I'll settle for UIs I don't like.
    - charlesdaniels 7y ago
      I believe Ubuntu also ships a tool for changing the theme in the default install. However the upstream (Gnome) is adversarial to this (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20376442 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20376442).
charlesdaniels 7y ago
> If you're willing to fiddle around, there are a few good themes that don't waste so much space. The point of this "first impressions" exercise was to explore the happy path. > It's not just Gnome that does that. There's an entire generation of designers that's cargo-culting mobile designs at the moment. Breeze, KDE's default theme, is equally space-wasting. I would agree with that sentiment, though I didn't want to get into that flame war today. I think a lot of other people have already written extensively on this subject and I don't feel I can contribute anything new. Here are some relevant articles... Several of these are about CSDs, which I think are a big point of contention with respect to the design philosophy of GTK/Gnome 3.X. This list does not include much about the KDE/Qt side, which I'm less familiar with. I would certainly like to expand the side of this list on the "Pro Gnome" side in the interest of a more fair and balanced debate. Pro Gnome 3.x: Client-Side Decorations Initiative - https://wiki.gnome.org/Initiatives/CSD https://wiki.gnome.org/Initiatives/CSD Restyling apps at scale - https://blogs.gnome.org/tbernard/2018/10/15/restyling-apps-at-scale/ https://blogs.gnome.org/tbernard/2018/10/15/restyling-apps-a... Introducing the CSD Initiative - https://blogs.gnome.org/tbernard/2018/01/26/csd-initiative/ https://blogs.gnome.org/tbernard/2018/01/26/csd-initiative/ Against Gnome 3.x: Why do we keep building rotten foundations? - https://davmac.wordpress.com/2016/07/05/why-do-we-keep-building-rotten-foundations/ https://davmac.wordpress.com/2016/07/05/why-do-we-keep-build... GNOME (et al): Rotting In Threes - https://igurublog.wordpress.com/2012/11/05/gnome-et-al-rotting-in-threes/ https://igurublog.wordpress.com/2012/11/05/gnome-et-al-rotti... Torvalds on Gnome - https://web.archive.org/web/20190313090648/https://plus.google.com/+LinusTorvalds/posts/UkoAaLDpF4i https://web.archive.org/web/20190313090648/https://plus.goog... Sway and client side decorations - https://drewdevault.com/2018/01/27/Sway-and-client-side-decorations.html https://drewdevault.com/2018/01/27/Sway-and-client-side-deco... Server side decorations and Wayland - https://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2018/01/server-side-decorations-and-wayland/ https://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2018/01/server-side-d... The problem with GNOME 3 - https://felipec.wordpress.com/2013/06/12/the-problem-with-gnome-3/ https://felipec.wordpress.com/2013/06/12/the-problem-with-gn...

by alxlaz 7y ago

frutiger 7y ago

I totally agree with your overall point, but: > about 99% of the current Linux installations Not if you include Android!

ufo 7y ago
In these contexts people usually mean "GNU/Linux desktop" when they say "Linux". It is not as if we have any meaningful choice of desktop environment on Android-land anyway.
alxlaz 7y ago
> Not if you include Android! How many Android installations running Gnome have you seen in the wild :-)?

dagmx 7y ago

The person you're replying to said scaling not spacing. Very different issues. They may have optimal spacing but their scaling is being handled incorrectly by the system, or they may have perfect scaling but suboptimal spacing. Or they're both good or they both suck. It's best not to conflate the two.

charlesdaniels 7y ago
I could also criticize the spacing, but much ink has already been spilled on Gnome 3.X on both sides of the argument; I'm not looking to start a flame war. However, I was under the impression that previous versions of Gnome supported non-integer scaling factors, which seems to be gone from current GTK versions(?). Just being able to set the scale to 0.5 or 0.75 would go a long way for people with lower res screens. Even though I don't use Gnome myself, this still affects me, since many applications use GTK, and thus have massive Fisher Price buttons compared to other programs I use.

pmontra 7y ago

There are themes that address the spacing / padding problem. I want to try Nextwaita [1] when I'll find the time to upgrade my Ubuntu 16.04 system. I have a try to Ubuntu 18.04 on a separate partition and padding is really unbearable. [1] https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1289376/ https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1289376/ Furthermore the Nvidia driver and Gnome Shell work only at 40 Hz. The screen flickers noticeably at 60 Hz (Quadro K1000m). No problems on 16.04 with Gnome Flashback, which is GTK3 and Compiz. I didn't check 19.04 yet.

charlesdaniels 7y ago
Themes are not supported: https://stopthemingmy.app/ https://stopthemingmy.app/ and cannot be changed via the happy path GUI, though I did see that Debian 10 includes Gnome Tweak Tool out of the box.
- pmontra 7y ago
  Maybe theming is still supported in Ubuntu? There is going to be a way as long it's based on CSS files on the file system. I definitely don't want the default theme, I prefer scrollbars and other things my way. Developers of Linux apps should accept they have difficult users. I'll buy a Mac when I'll settle for UIs I don't like.
  - charlesdaniels 7y ago
    I believe Ubuntu also ships a tool for changing the theme in the default install. However the upstream (Gnome) is adversarial to this (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20376442 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20376442).

charlesdaniels 7y ago

> If you're willing to fiddle around, there are a few good themes that don't waste so much space. The point of this "first impressions" exercise was to explore the happy path. > It's not just Gnome that does that. There's an entire generation of designers that's cargo-culting mobile designs at the moment. Breeze, KDE's default theme, is equally space-wasting. I would agree with that sentiment, though I didn't want to get into that flame war today. I think a lot of other people have already written extensively on this subject and I don't feel I can contribute anything new. Here are some relevant articles... Several of these are about CSDs, which I think are a big point of contention with respect to the design philosophy of GTK/Gnome 3.X. This list does not include much about the KDE/Qt side, which I'm less familiar with. I would certainly like to expand the side of this list on the "Pro Gnome" side in the interest of a more fair and balanced debate. Pro Gnome 3.x: Client-Side Decorations Initiative - https://wiki.gnome.org/Initiatives/CSD https://wiki.gnome.org/Initiatives/CSD Restyling apps at scale - https://blogs.gnome.org/tbernard/2018/10/15/restyling-apps-at-scale/ https://blogs.gnome.org/tbernard/2018/10/15/restyling-apps-a... Introducing the CSD Initiative - https://blogs.gnome.org/tbernard/2018/01/26/csd-initiative/ https://blogs.gnome.org/tbernard/2018/01/26/csd-initiative/ Against Gnome 3.x: Why do we keep building rotten foundations? - https://davmac.wordpress.com/2016/07/05/why-do-we-keep-building-rotten-foundations/ https://davmac.wordpress.com/2016/07/05/why-do-we-keep-build... GNOME (et al): Rotting In Threes - https://igurublog.wordpress.com/2012/11/05/gnome-et-al-rotting-in-threes/ https://igurublog.wordpress.com/2012/11/05/gnome-et-al-rotti... Torvalds on Gnome - https://web.archive.org/web/20190313090648/https://plus.google.com/+LinusTorvalds/posts/UkoAaLDpF4i https://web.archive.org/web/20190313090648/https://plus.goog... Sway and client side decorations - https://drewdevault.com/2018/01/27/Sway-and-client-side-decorations.html https://drewdevault.com/2018/01/27/Sway-and-client-side-deco... Server side decorations and Wayland - https://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2018/01/server-side-decorations-and-wayland/ https://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2018/01/server-side-d... The problem with GNOME 3 - https://felipec.wordpress.com/2013/06/12/the-problem-with-gnome-3/ https://felipec.wordpress.com/2013/06/12/the-problem-with-gn...