8 ms·

GNOME to release official "classic mode" extensions

60 points by hendi_ 14y ago

PieSquared 14y ago
As much as people enjoy ragging on GNOME 3, I think the developers have been doing a great job, and that this is a smart move that will allow them to move forward while satisfying those that prefer the current fallback mode. I am a huge fan of their extension mechanism, and use a bunch of them. It seems like the mechanism is extremely flexible, as people use it for things from creating quasi-tiling window managers (see shellshape or gtile) to customizing the search dialog (like Unity's lenses) to just adding various buttons in different parts of the UI. All in all, I am a huge fan of GNOME 3, but I really do wish the extension mechanism were a bit more well-documented...
- rogerbinns 14y ago
  The current problem with extensions is they break with each Gnome release. This forces a lot of user work with each upgrade wasting a lot of time (eg having to wait for author to update, picking a different extension for the same functionality, doing without). It would also be beneficial if there were an official set of well maintained extensions - ones that if you use them you know you will be fine through upgrades etc. This also solves the problem of there being so many extensions (you get 3 pages of search results for system monitor - how is any user reasonably expected to deal with that?) The area where Gnome shell is seriously lacking is for people who have multiple monitors, and/or have many windows of the same app open. So far a panel/taskbar has turned out to be the least worst UI way of handling this. That is why I use fallback mode.
  - PieSquared 14y ago
    Just to be clear, I certainly wasn't criticising those who use fallback mode, or trying to imply "they" (you) were all just whining for no reason. I think they still have a lot of work to do. When I upgraded from 3.4 to 3.6, I was pretty annoyed because out of the eight or so extensions that I used, all but one stopped working. Luckily, the extensions that I used were all upgraded within several weeks, but it's still a major issue. I think it's pretty clear from the extensions site that this is still a work in progress. That's part of the reason I really like this announcement, though - exactly as you've said, it looks like they're going down the path of "official set of well-maintained extensions", which I think is the right choice. I guess that GNOME 3 isn't entirely ready for everyone yet, but the future that I see for it is pretty awesome. For me, personally, it already far surpasses GNOME 2, and I think it still has a lot of potential that it hasn't utilized. (I can't really comment on multiple monitor setups, though. I just have a laptop.)
  - drivebyacct2 14y ago
    They manage to break GTK3 theming too. I find that to be even more insane, especially how god damn awful Adwaita is. Sorry, I bought a high res monitor for more space, not so my GTK3 widgets could be enormous.
- donniezazen 14y ago
  Deployment of Gnome is going to be a big problem in my understanding. Fedora is using Gnome 3.4 till january when they release Fedora 18. Ubuntu has switched to stable versions of Gnome. Only bleeding edge distos like Arch are using latest versions. This in my sense will lead to fragmentation of Gnome - different distros running different versions of Gnome.
  - gizmo686 14y ago
    You always have different distributions running different versions of everything. Each software project makes progress on their own, then distributions periodicly take the newest stable version of stuff, make sure things work together and make a new release. If you want cutting edge software, use a cutting edge distro.
    - keithpeter 14y ago
      I welcome the development of a classic mode regardless of how it is implemented, but I think the use of extensions makes a lot of sense. Red Hat Enterprise 7 desktops will be based on Fedora 18 I understand, and I gather that release has Gnome 3.6 and therefore the fall-back session as currently provided, i.e. not an extension.
silon3 14y ago
I just replace the window manager. If that can't be done, GNOME is not for me anymore.
- mpyne 14y ago
  As far as I know, the GNOME 3 "experience" relies heavily on the Mutter window manager and so it can't be easily replaced. Maybe someone else can chime in to confirm one way or the other though.
  - mseepgood 14y ago
    In fact, gnome-shell is the window manager binary by linking to libmutter. Running gnome-shell with another window manager is as feasible as running twm with fvwm (i.e. not feasible).
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- bkor 14y ago
  Just as "gnome-shell" is an extension to Mutter, you can also add other extensions to Mutter IIRC (I mean Mutter extensions, these are different than the stuff on extensions.gnome.org). Furthermore, you should be able to change the behaviour of GNOME shell window manager behaviour via GNOME shell extensions as well. The latter might be a bit buggy though.
  - mseepgood 14y ago
    Gnome Shell is not an extension to Mutter (it once was, but that changed before the 3.0 release; it's still wrong in Wikipedia). Today Gnome Shell is a window manager implemented by using libmutter.
randallu 14y ago
Nice. It's neat that the top layer is written in JS and is malleable -- Cinnamon ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinnamon_%28user_interface%29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinnamon_%28user_interface%29 ) is an interesting project too (uses the GNOME3 platform, but implements a new UI which looks more like GNOME2 in JS).
- naner 14y ago
  I've been using Cinnamon after getting frustrated with Gnome Shell, it works quite well.
mindstab 14y ago
Could be the best news in the Linux desktop wars I've heard this year
hvs 14y ago
After many attempts to use the Unity desktop, I decided that I just didn't like it (some do, and I'm fine with that as well). What it has done is to make me aware of the fine work that the Xubuntu team has done. http://xubuntu.org/ http://xubuntu.org/
- nileshtrivedi 14y ago
  Did you mean to say GNOME desktop, instead of Unity?
  - hvs 14y ago
    No, I meant Unity. I did try the GNOME 3 desktop on Fedora as well, and liked it less than Unity. I was a GNOME desktop user until I switched to Xubuntu.
dicroce 14y ago
I hate gnome 3. I had to spend a day installing extensions and tweak tools just to make it usable. Note To UI People: Tablet interfaces DO NOT MAKE SENSE FOR PEOPLE WITHOUT TABLETS.
- mseepgood 14y ago
  What's your definition of a tablet interface?
  - mindstab 14y ago
    touch centric design for people using a keyboard and mouse?
    - sn 14y ago
      So, with the right extensions I believe gnome 3 is actually /more/ usable with the keyboard. Specifically https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/10/windownavigator/ https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/10/windownavigator/ and https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/302/windowoverlay-icons/ https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/302/windowoverlay-ico... combined with just having to type in the program name on the overview pane to open it. That functionality works much better than it did in gnome 2. The most annoying thing I've found is the multiple monitor support; apparently one of the developers wants the second screen to always have the same windows when switching workspaces and I want the workspaces to switch on all monitors.
mariuolo 14y ago
It's called Cinnamon.

60 points by hendi_ 14y ago

As much as people enjoy ragging on GNOME 3, I think the developers have been doing a great job, and that this is a smart move that will allow them to move forward while satisfying those that prefer the current fallback mode. I am a huge fan of their extension mechanism, and use a bunch of them. It seems like the mechanism is extremely flexible, as people use it for things from creating quasi-tiling window managers (see shellshape or gtile) to customizing the search dialog (like Unity's lenses) to just adding various buttons in different parts of the UI. All in all, I am a huge fan of GNOME 3, but I really do wish the extension mechanism were a bit more well-documented...

rogerbinns 14y ago
The current problem with extensions is they break with each Gnome release. This forces a lot of user work with each upgrade wasting a lot of time (eg having to wait for author to update, picking a different extension for the same functionality, doing without). It would also be beneficial if there were an official set of well maintained extensions - ones that if you use them you know you will be fine through upgrades etc. This also solves the problem of there being so many extensions (you get 3 pages of search results for system monitor - how is any user reasonably expected to deal with that?) The area where Gnome shell is seriously lacking is for people who have multiple monitors, and/or have many windows of the same app open. So far a panel/taskbar has turned out to be the least worst UI way of handling this. That is why I use fallback mode.
- PieSquared 14y ago
  Just to be clear, I certainly wasn't criticising those who use fallback mode, or trying to imply "they" (you) were all just whining for no reason. I think they still have a lot of work to do. When I upgraded from 3.4 to 3.6, I was pretty annoyed because out of the eight or so extensions that I used, all but one stopped working. Luckily, the extensions that I used were all upgraded within several weeks, but it's still a major issue. I think it's pretty clear from the extensions site that this is still a work in progress. That's part of the reason I really like this announcement, though - exactly as you've said, it looks like they're going down the path of "official set of well-maintained extensions", which I think is the right choice. I guess that GNOME 3 isn't entirely ready for everyone yet, but the future that I see for it is pretty awesome. For me, personally, it already far surpasses GNOME 2, and I think it still has a lot of potential that it hasn't utilized. (I can't really comment on multiple monitor setups, though. I just have a laptop.)
- drivebyacct2 14y ago
  They manage to break GTK3 theming too. I find that to be even more insane, especially how god damn awful Adwaita is. Sorry, I bought a high res monitor for more space, not so my GTK3 widgets could be enormous.
donniezazen 14y ago
Deployment of Gnome is going to be a big problem in my understanding. Fedora is using Gnome 3.4 till january when they release Fedora 18. Ubuntu has switched to stable versions of Gnome. Only bleeding edge distos like Arch are using latest versions. This in my sense will lead to fragmentation of Gnome - different distros running different versions of Gnome.
- gizmo686 14y ago
  You always have different distributions running different versions of everything. Each software project makes progress on their own, then distributions periodicly take the newest stable version of stuff, make sure things work together and make a new release. If you want cutting edge software, use a cutting edge distro.
  - keithpeter 14y ago
    I welcome the development of a classic mode regardless of how it is implemented, but I think the use of extensions makes a lot of sense. Red Hat Enterprise 7 desktops will be based on Fedora 18 I understand, and I gather that release has Gnome 3.6 and therefore the fall-back session as currently provided, i.e. not an extension.

silon3 14y ago

I just replace the window manager. If that can't be done, GNOME is not for me anymore.

mpyne 14y ago
As far as I know, the GNOME 3 "experience" relies heavily on the Mutter window manager and so it can't be easily replaced. Maybe someone else can chime in to confirm one way or the other though.
- mseepgood 14y ago
  In fact, gnome-shell is the window manager binary by linking to libmutter. Running gnome-shell with another window manager is as feasible as running twm with fvwm (i.e. not feasible).
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
bkor 14y ago
Just as "gnome-shell" is an extension to Mutter, you can also add other extensions to Mutter IIRC (I mean Mutter extensions, these are different than the stuff on extensions.gnome.org). Furthermore, you should be able to change the behaviour of GNOME shell window manager behaviour via GNOME shell extensions as well. The latter might be a bit buggy though.
- mseepgood 14y ago
  Gnome Shell is not an extension to Mutter (it once was, but that changed before the 3.0 release; it's still wrong in Wikipedia). Today Gnome Shell is a window manager implemented by using libmutter.

randallu 14y ago

Nice. It's neat that the top layer is written in JS and is malleable -- Cinnamon ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinnamon_%28user_interface%29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinnamon_%28user_interface%29 ) is an interesting project too (uses the GNOME3 platform, but implements a new UI which looks more like GNOME2 in JS).

naner 14y ago
I've been using Cinnamon after getting frustrated with Gnome Shell, it works quite well.

mindstab 14y ago

Could be the best news in the Linux desktop wars I've heard this year

hvs 14y ago

After many attempts to use the Unity desktop, I decided that I just didn't like it (some do, and I'm fine with that as well). What it has done is to make me aware of the fine work that the Xubuntu team has done. http://xubuntu.org/ http://xubuntu.org/

nileshtrivedi 14y ago
Did you mean to say GNOME desktop, instead of Unity?
- hvs 14y ago
  No, I meant Unity. I did try the GNOME 3 desktop on Fedora as well, and liked it less than Unity. I was a GNOME desktop user until I switched to Xubuntu.

dicroce 14y ago

I hate gnome 3. I had to spend a day installing extensions and tweak tools just to make it usable. Note To UI People: Tablet interfaces DO NOT MAKE SENSE FOR PEOPLE WITHOUT TABLETS.

mseepgood 14y ago
What's your definition of a tablet interface?
- mindstab 14y ago
  touch centric design for people using a keyboard and mouse?
  - sn 14y ago
    So, with the right extensions I believe gnome 3 is actually /more/ usable with the keyboard. Specifically https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/10/windownavigator/ https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/10/windownavigator/ and https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/302/windowoverlay-icons/ https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/302/windowoverlay-ico... combined with just having to type in the program name on the overview pane to open it. That functionality works much better than it did in gnome 2. The most annoying thing I've found is the multiple monitor support; apparently one of the developers wants the second screen to always have the same windows when switching workspaces and I want the workspaces to switch on all monitors.

mariuolo 14y ago

It's called Cinnamon.