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So 2 years after the appearance of Gnome Shell someone still doesn't get that Gnome tries to simplify the whole interface and that Gnome has been trying to crea

by buster 13y ago

So 2 years after the appearance of Gnome Shell someone still doesn't get that Gnome tries to simplify the whole interface and that Gnome has been trying to create a simple interface for the majority of people for many many years. Big news. Good thing is you have alternatives from MATE to KDE, Xfce, E17, etc. etc. It's not like you're forced to use Nautilus either. Personally i never understood the hatred towards change. In the beginning of Gnome 3 it was really extreme and now it's slowly getting better (with the complaints) because people become accustomed to it. It's GOOD that Gnome tries to make it simple, because we all wish for a Linux computer our parents could use. That's just not going to happen with the options-and-complex-information everywhere approach. After all Gnome Shell isn't that bad and i'm sure a guy posting on HN who uses Linux on his Desktop has the skills to check his available diskspace without the status bar ;)

mynegation 13y ago
What _I_ don't get is how removal of type-ahead find, compact view and backspace to parent is making it simpler for users. I consider these the most basic features of any sane file manager. One more confirmation that switching to XFCE was the right thing to do.
- dylan-m 13y ago
  I worry that you're still using Nautilus 3.6, which was definitely an interim version of Nautilus. If you check out 3.8, you'll see that type-ahead search is very much there, and better than ever — especially if you happen to have Tracker installed :) The key difference is it's effectively a file search that is easy to back out of, so it only shows files that match your input. Personally, I find that makes it a lot easier to flip between a bunch of files with similar names, and it's making me really like search — which I had never really used before. It'll search recursively, but the files from the current folder are listed first, so it's harder to get lost among them than it sounds. (And I think there might be something on the roadmap to list files from the current folder and from elsewhere under a separate heading, but I could be mixing that up with something else).
samastur 13y ago
Maybe accustomed or maybe most of them simply switched. In any case Gnome will eventually get users they want. I would love to see data on this, but my impression is not that it is growing its market share.
rubinelli 13y ago
Frankly, I don't want my parents using Linux. Windows has tightened its security, and I no longer have to reformat their machine every six months to remove all the malware. I expect Linux participation in the desktop market to grow in the coming years, but only because this market will naturally shrink. But from reading the mailing lists, the impression I have is that this isn't really the developers' main concern. They aren't removing features to create a more streamlined UX, but because they were horribly implemented, and without this control damage, they would have to reboot the codebase again with a Gnome 4.
nitrogen 13y ago
GNOME is simplifying the desktop in the same way as removing the controls for braking, acceleration, and steering would simplify a car. Maybe Google can pull that off, but GNOME is catering to a made-up audience that doesn't exist. The only reason my parents couldn't use Linux when I installed it on their computer ten years ago was the inability to run Windows software. My younger siblings, however, managed just fine.
pan69 13y ago
The truth is that I/we don't need a Linux interface my parents can operate. They can get some Apple thing or what ever. I need a workstation user interface with which I can do my work. GNOME 2 was this interface and GNOME 3 simply is not.
generic_user 13y ago
"Personally i never understood the hatred towards change." i assume if something changes for the worst you enjoy it? your phone can no longer auto dial. do you celebrate? your word processor no longer has spell check. do you pat the developers on the back? its a bit of fud and tone deaf to say people have hatred for change because gnome3 sucks. this is the same fud that the gnome PR machine keeps trying to spin. no one is that stupid. it's a slap in the face of gnome2 users. it comes off as snobbish and condescending. like a crappy pop band that never makes it and blames the audience because there just not ready for the profound brilliance of there music. honestly the gnome project and its hobby lobby need to get over themselves and learn how to take criticism and learn from there mistakes if they ever want to put the project back on track. people use gnome2 because it's a quality desktop with the efficiency needed for professional workstation users. that was the goal of the gnome project. they radically changed direction to chase the tablet market and fell flat on there face. if gnome on tables was a success i doubt that we would hear one word from them about the desktop anymore. the desktop was thrown out with the bath water. now that they have failed, the only users they have left are an angry group of desktop users who just want some improvements to gonme2. will the gnome project ever care enough to shift back to the desktop in a serious way and make a quality desktop for these users? i think the answer is no. as long as RedHat keeps paying the bills they will keep dancing. gnome3 has zero chance of taking the place of gnome2 and most organizations have shifted to a new desktop or are in the process of doing so. the gnome project is essentially dead, with no vision for the desktop market they still have and no penetration into the tablet market.
PommeDeTerre 13y ago
It was never about "hatred towards change". I don't think that people have a problem with change itself, as long as it leaves them better off, or where they already were, at worst. People do dislike change that leaves them worse off, however. Basically every change imposed by the GNOME team has left many, many users much worse off than they were before. Furthermore, it's very doubtful that these changes have actually made any other users better off. Taking away useful functionality doesn't make a system "simpler" to use. It just makes it impractical at best, but more often than not it makes it outright useless. That's what GNOME has become to a lot of us, and that's why we no longer bother with it. We want to use software that makes us more efficient, rather than software that's "simple", yet forces us to put in much more effort to do basic and essential tasks.
anonymous 13y ago
> 2 years after the appearance of Gnome Shell This is not a new development. They have been moving in this direction since more than a decade ago. Whoever didn't get it when 2.4 came out, probably likes the way Gnome is changing; or just wasn't a Gnome user back then.

by buster 13y ago

mynegation 13y ago

What _I_ don't get is how removal of type-ahead find, compact view and backspace to parent is making it simpler for users. I consider these the most basic features of any sane file manager. One more confirmation that switching to XFCE was the right thing to do.

dylan-m 13y ago
I worry that you're still using Nautilus 3.6, which was definitely an interim version of Nautilus. If you check out 3.8, you'll see that type-ahead search is very much there, and better than ever — especially if you happen to have Tracker installed :) The key difference is it's effectively a file search that is easy to back out of, so it only shows files that match your input. Personally, I find that makes it a lot easier to flip between a bunch of files with similar names, and it's making me really like search — which I had never really used before. It'll search recursively, but the files from the current folder are listed first, so it's harder to get lost among them than it sounds. (And I think there might be something on the roadmap to list files from the current folder and from elsewhere under a separate heading, but I could be mixing that up with something else).

samastur 13y ago

Maybe accustomed or maybe most of them simply switched. In any case Gnome will eventually get users they want. I would love to see data on this, but my impression is not that it is growing its market share.

rubinelli 13y ago

Frankly, I don't want my parents using Linux. Windows has tightened its security, and I no longer have to reformat their machine every six months to remove all the malware. I expect Linux participation in the desktop market to grow in the coming years, but only because this market will naturally shrink. But from reading the mailing lists, the impression I have is that this isn't really the developers' main concern. They aren't removing features to create a more streamlined UX, but because they were horribly implemented, and without this control damage, they would have to reboot the codebase again with a Gnome 4.

nitrogen 13y ago

GNOME is simplifying the desktop in the same way as removing the controls for braking, acceleration, and steering would simplify a car. Maybe Google can pull that off, but GNOME is catering to a made-up audience that doesn't exist. The only reason my parents couldn't use Linux when I installed it on their computer ten years ago was the inability to run Windows software. My younger siblings, however, managed just fine.

pan69 13y ago

The truth is that I/we don't need a Linux interface my parents can operate. They can get some Apple thing or what ever. I need a workstation user interface with which I can do my work. GNOME 2 was this interface and GNOME 3 simply is not.

generic_user 13y ago

"Personally i never understood the hatred towards change." i assume if something changes for the worst you enjoy it? your phone can no longer auto dial. do you celebrate? your word processor no longer has spell check. do you pat the developers on the back? its a bit of fud and tone deaf to say people have hatred for change because gnome3 sucks. this is the same fud that the gnome PR machine keeps trying to spin. no one is that stupid. it's a slap in the face of gnome2 users. it comes off as snobbish and condescending. like a crappy pop band that never makes it and blames the audience because there just not ready for the profound brilliance of there music. honestly the gnome project and its hobby lobby need to get over themselves and learn how to take criticism and learn from there mistakes if they ever want to put the project back on track. people use gnome2 because it's a quality desktop with the efficiency needed for professional workstation users. that was the goal of the gnome project. they radically changed direction to chase the tablet market and fell flat on there face. if gnome on tables was a success i doubt that we would hear one word from them about the desktop anymore. the desktop was thrown out with the bath water. now that they have failed, the only users they have left are an angry group of desktop users who just want some improvements to gonme2. will the gnome project ever care enough to shift back to the desktop in a serious way and make a quality desktop for these users? i think the answer is no. as long as RedHat keeps paying the bills they will keep dancing. gnome3 has zero chance of taking the place of gnome2 and most organizations have shifted to a new desktop or are in the process of doing so. the gnome project is essentially dead, with no vision for the desktop market they still have and no penetration into the tablet market.

PommeDeTerre 13y ago

It was never about "hatred towards change". I don't think that people have a problem with change itself, as long as it leaves them better off, or where they already were, at worst. People do dislike change that leaves them worse off, however. Basically every change imposed by the GNOME team has left many, many users much worse off than they were before. Furthermore, it's very doubtful that these changes have actually made any other users better off. Taking away useful functionality doesn't make a system "simpler" to use. It just makes it impractical at best, but more often than not it makes it outright useless. That's what GNOME has become to a lot of us, and that's why we no longer bother with it. We want to use software that makes us more efficient, rather than software that's "simple", yet forces us to put in much more effort to do basic and essential tasks.

anonymous 13y ago

> 2 years after the appearance of Gnome Shell This is not a new development. They have been moving in this direction since more than a decade ago. Whoever didn't get it when 2.4 came out, probably likes the way Gnome is changing; or just wasn't a Gnome user back then.