8 ms·

Gnome has always been this way. It's kind of sad, but if it was that way in 2006 and 2008 and 2010 it's hardly surprising that it's still that way in 2013. :/

Gnome has always been this way. It's kind of sad, but if it was that way in 2006 and 2008 and 2010 it's hardly surprising that it's still that way in 2013. :/ In general, Gnome tends to make decisions internally and then refuse to communicate what's behind said decisions to the broader community. That said, I don't think I agree with the people who seem to think of transparent terminals as massively important feature, though I do find them nice.

Udo 14y ago
I'm with you. I'm not a Gnome user, nor is my terminal background (semi-)transparent. I just thought this was a great window into the attitude among the project's developers.
adregan 14y ago
I often read discussions asking for designers to get involved in open source software, but maybe some PR folks are needed as well.
laureny 14y ago
> I don't think I agree with the people who seem to think of transparent terminals as massively important feature, though I do find them nice. I don't like transparent terminals myself but the bottom line is that Linux users spend a lot of time in their terminal. Terminals are the #1 productivity tools for Linux. You just can't remove features from such tools willy nilly without consulting with your users.
- Someone 14y ago
  On the other hand, http://www.gnome.org/ http://www.gnome.org/ describes itself as: "GNOME 3: Ease, comfort and control GNOME 3 is an easy and elegant way to use your computer. It is designed to put you in control and bring freedom to everybody." From that, I don't think they aim to support the group of users that "spend a lot of time in their terminal". They might even look forward to the day they manage to ship a system without a terminal.
  - pyre 14y ago
    If that's their stated goal, then they should just come out with it and let all of the users that spend a good majority of their time in terminals migrate to something else. I have a sneaking suspicion that GNOME usage would take a nosedive if they were to do this.
    - mpyne 14y ago
      Honestly I don't think that would happen even if they plainly stated it. At this point the writing has been on the wall for years and yet the "power users" who would care about this still haven't switched. Whether it's Stockholm syndrome, or self-blaming, or "oh, that wouldn't happen to me" I don't know, but it's getting increasing harder to blame the GNOME devs... they've made their opinion very clear and they're the ones driving the ship. If you're a passenger and you think you see icebergs you need to abandon ship, not whine with the Captain about where to steer.
      - juhanima 14y ago
        > If you're a passenger and you think you see icebergs > you need to abandon ship, not whine with the Captain > about where to steer. Really? Not even in the case you think the captain failed to notice the iceberg, and a simple heads up would save not only yours but all the other passengers' lives? Nothing ot do with Gnome, I suppose, but this was a really bad analogy.
        mpyne 14y ago
        Perhaps I shouldn't have used "iceberg" as that implies some upcoming inevitable disaster, which I don't think is true of this situation. The GNOME devs could certainly end up very successful. I happen to disagree with the course, but it's their right as developers to choose a different direction. At some point as a user you have to come to grips with the fact that their vision and yours have diverged. There are undoubtedly many other users who prefer this different direction and they can't all be right. Find the boat going the direction you want to go and climb aboard and help out.
foobarian 14y ago
It's kind of ironic that a project with a non-transparent development process decides to remove transparency features in this manner.

Udo 14y ago

I'm with you. I'm not a Gnome user, nor is my terminal background (semi-)transparent. I just thought this was a great window into the attitude among the project's developers.

adregan 14y ago

I often read discussions asking for designers to get involved in open source software, but maybe some PR folks are needed as well.

laureny 14y ago

> I don't think I agree with the people who seem to think of transparent terminals as massively important feature, though I do find them nice. I don't like transparent terminals myself but the bottom line is that Linux users spend a lot of time in their terminal. Terminals are the #1 productivity tools for Linux. You just can't remove features from such tools willy nilly without consulting with your users.

Someone 14y ago
On the other hand, http://www.gnome.org/ http://www.gnome.org/ describes itself as: "GNOME 3: Ease, comfort and control GNOME 3 is an easy and elegant way to use your computer. It is designed to put you in control and bring freedom to everybody." From that, I don't think they aim to support the group of users that "spend a lot of time in their terminal". They might even look forward to the day they manage to ship a system without a terminal.
- pyre 14y ago
  If that's their stated goal, then they should just come out with it and let all of the users that spend a good majority of their time in terminals migrate to something else. I have a sneaking suspicion that GNOME usage would take a nosedive if they were to do this.
  - mpyne 14y ago
    Honestly I don't think that would happen even if they plainly stated it. At this point the writing has been on the wall for years and yet the "power users" who would care about this still haven't switched. Whether it's Stockholm syndrome, or self-blaming, or "oh, that wouldn't happen to me" I don't know, but it's getting increasing harder to blame the GNOME devs... they've made their opinion very clear and they're the ones driving the ship. If you're a passenger and you think you see icebergs you need to abandon ship, not whine with the Captain about where to steer.
    - juhanima 14y ago
      > If you're a passenger and you think you see icebergs > you need to abandon ship, not whine with the Captain > about where to steer. Really? Not even in the case you think the captain failed to notice the iceberg, and a simple heads up would save not only yours but all the other passengers' lives? Nothing ot do with Gnome, I suppose, but this was a really bad analogy.
      - mpyne 14y ago
        Perhaps I shouldn't have used "iceberg" as that implies some upcoming inevitable disaster, which I don't think is true of this situation. The GNOME devs could certainly end up very successful. I happen to disagree with the course, but it's their right as developers to choose a different direction. At some point as a user you have to come to grips with the fact that their vision and yours have diverged. There are undoubtedly many other users who prefer this different direction and they can't all be right. Find the boat going the direction you want to go and climb aboard and help out.

foobarian 14y ago

It's kind of ironic that a project with a non-transparent development process decides to remove transparency features in this manner.