
Ubuntu Reveal Results of Gnome Desktop Survey - yannski
https://insights.ubuntu.com/2017/06/12/ubuntu-desktop-gnome-extensions-poll-results/
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jpalmer
I've used Gnome (on Fedora) for 10+ years as my daily driver and just recently
have been using the pre-installed Ubuntu 16.04 and Unity that came with my new
Dell laptop. One of the things I immediately loved is the global menu. This
greatly expands application space especially on small laptop screens. I
figured I would wipe the laptop soon after delivery and install Fedora/Gnome
but the look and integration of global menu has me staying on Unity for the
time being. This was a small thing I had no idea existed after years of Gnome
2/3.

I would love for this to be an option in Gnome Shell or just the default. I've
seen hints of an extension coming, hope it gets some traction.

~~~
digi_owl
Funny thing is that i seem to recall KDE supported that as an option back in
the 3.x days. But come the 4.0 debacle i walked away. Had a long stint with
XFCE, but as i increasingly had to deal with Gnome-derived "plumbing" (aka
sewage) i have now moved to IceWM.

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tpush
Why do you call it "sewage"?

~~~
digi_owl
Because it leaves a stinking mess whenever it breaks (and it seems to break
worryingly often).

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NoGravitas
This survey and the article show a remarkable amount of humility, which is
something new to Ubuntu. I'm quite pleased to see this new direction for them.

~~~
reviementhority
Maybe they finally started to learn from Unity fiasco.

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lnx01
Unity became usable in recent releases. But I've never been 100% comfortable
with it, I've always felt like I'm interacting with my computer through a bowl
of treacle. I've been using Ubuntu Mate for a few years now, I much prefer the
old Gnome 2.x look and feel. And with compton it's lightning fast

~~~
reviementhority
Yeah the problem is it's not even proper desktop interface, it was made for
touch screens i.e. tablets, also 7 years ago ubuntu was first distro on
distrowatch.com hits per day ranking, today its 4th and it really goes down
every month, so I'm assuming it has something to do with Unity and
pragmatically it was a fiasco that was bringing Ubuntu down, I also doubt they
can do much about it at this point in time.

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dsr_
Users are split on whether window controls should be on the left or right.

Hint: make it easily configurable.

Otherwise, you get to irritate 40-60% of your users.

~~~
CJefferson
I think this more suggests just pick one.

I don't think one is particularly superior to the other, and every
configuration option is another thing to test, making sure everything else
window related renders properly. Also every configuration option is another
thing to confuse users with.

I would much prefer a single well thought out consistent interface than a
"build your own" grab bag.

~~~
peller
Right or wrong, this does seem more inline with "the Gnome way."

It's also why I stopped using Gnome (and in fact, Ubuntu all together). But I
suspect I was never their target user, and that's OK. If they can make it
easier for more typical computer users, good for them, and they should stick
to what works.

~~~
digi_owl
Sadly it feels like the "target user" of Gnome (and thus Freedesktop related
projects) are dyed in the wool Mac users, but the Gnome people will not admit
this even as they drive away more and more existing Linux users.

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kps
They are clearly _not_ targeting Mac users, as Gnome/GTK programs continue to
insist on the Windows shortcut model of overloading Control. KDE/Qt programs
are at least configurable, with effort, to the Mac (and historical Unix) model
of a Meta key for GUI shortcuts and Control for control characters.

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ikurei
Now that I think of it, what will happen with the Unity HUD (`alt` key brings
a search hud that indexes the app's menu, kind of like Sublime/Atom/VSCode's
Control+Shift+P command palette)? Will they port it as a Shell add-on?

After using that for a while and switching to another desktop, I sorely missed
it.

~~~
bkor
It relies on various hacky patches to e.g. gtk+2.x. There's an extension to
add it to GNOME 3, but it still relies on those patches. Ubuntu planned to
remove as many patches as possible. So with the extension and those patches it
will currently be possible, but might not in future when they remove the
patches.

So basically: maybe yes, maybe no.

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bsharitt
Of the extensions they surveyed, the only one I really see as a must have is
Top Icons Plus. That weird little corner tray that Gnome puts the legacy tray
icons in is, well weird. It just seems so out of place.

Of the rest of them, the only one I'd really loathe to see enabled by default
is Dash to Dock. I really hate the that when I first log in to a fresh install
there's a big static dock(initially filled with utter useless short cuts)
eating big bite of screen real estate.

~~~
curiousgal
Dash to dock can be configured to disappear when a window is maximized. I
personally can't use Gnome without it.

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wodenokoto
The people who have knowledge about these extensions cannot be said to be the
target audience of Ubuntu Desktop. Or are they going all-in on the multiple
desktop environment crowd?

I'm kinda surprised they are not aiming at making Gnome as similar to Unity as
possible. I expect the majority of Ubuntu users to be familiar with Unity and
not much else in the Linux Desktop ecosystem.

~~~
ralfn
That expectation would be wrong. Most Ubuntu users either have a more
technical friend that picked the desktop environment for them or they are
developers.

I have seen hundreds Ubuntu desktops the last couple of years. Seeing unity
was the exception.

Why do you think Canonical moved away from Unity? After the effort and money
they invested? Its because such a large group of users was actively avoiding
it (myself included - although i like many of its design elements in isolation
the execution, the thing being a compiz plugin and the user iteraction design
was just unbalanced).

It actually has this Vista like quality where the trade off between power
users and casual users ended up worse for both. The unity desktop wasnt the
best choice for any group of users, although it may have been the best
compromise.

If Canonical has any sense, they just focus all their energy on being the best
desktop for developers and monetize from that perspective. The years they
wasted trying to compete for a market (desktop consumer) that was going to be
eaten from every direction.

Well hindsight is easy i guess

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unethical_ban
As a longtime Unity user, I hope they maintain the tiling-by-keyboard function
of Unity in the new GNOME (or maybe it's a part of GNOME already).

I like using the keyboard as my main input for everything except scrolling.
The more I can use the keyboard on a laptop, and the easier it is to know
those hotkeys (holding down Meta key on Unity), the better.

If you haven't used Unity in a while, spin up a 17.04 VM to give it an hour or
so of use. Makes you appreciate how far it's come.

~~~
bkor
> tiling-by-keyboard function of Unity in the new GNOME

At the moment you can only maximize to the left or right. Depending on the
work done during GUADEC the quarter tiling functionality might be ready for
GNOME 3.26. It actually already was available in one unstable version, then
taken out in the next version.

I'm really looking forward to better support to divide your screen. With
screens such as 2560x1440 it helps to have more options than just "two on one
screen". Some people also use e.g. a huge (e.g. 40") 4K monitor. Then you'd
want really good window management.

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some62345
If your platform needs a bunch of extensions for CORE functionality, something
is wrong.

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curiousgal
What exactly _is_ CORE functionality?

(not really a question)

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some62345
For a desktop environment?

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plazmatic
Appreciate the Ubuntu Gnome articles. Keep em coming!

Long live Gnome!

