[arch-general] Gnome 3 + KDE 4 are both large disappointments.

Yaro Kasear yaro at marupa.net
Sun Apr 10 12:53:50 EDT 2011


On Sunday, April 10, 2011 14:50:41 Dennis Beekman wrote:
> I use linux becuase i think that windows is just to bloated to even be
> considered ... but lately Linux has been going in the same direction
> when it comes to the desktop enviroments Gnome 3 & KDE 4.
> 

This is all a matter of opinion. I like KDE 4 a lot. It's big, but I doubt 
there isn't a hard disk made within the last 15 years that can't fit it. It's 
definitely not bloated nearly as much as Windows is. KDE 4.6 is still 
downright lightweight compared to Windows 7.

My chief complaint against GNOME 3 is that it requires Pulse Audio.

This is not something the Arch developers have any power over. So this is 
not the place to complain about it.

> Gnome 2 was brilliant just a simple easy to use system with load off
> good looking features, gnome 3 however is useless in all respects as far
> as i can tell from whats in testing.
> 

Look, if you like a simple desktop with fewer features and a more 
straightforware approach and less eye candy, all the power to you. Just don't 
assume that's what EVERYONE wants in a desktop. I like the eye candy 
and almost ridiculous amount of options and settings KDE SC 4 gives me.

This is not something the Arch developers have any power over. So this is 
not the place to complain about it.

> 1. You cannot change the panels anymore you stuck with the 2 given by
> gnome 3.

You could alter the themes, get more themes. I don't know how close to 
Plasma the new GNOME desktop is, but even KDE SC 4 offered ways to 
configure its panel look and feel.

This is not something the Arch developers have any power over. So this is 
not the place to complain about it.

> 2. Changing themes also is inpossible.. or so it seems.

Just sounds like you haven't figured out how to change the themes yet. 
GNOME 3 *is* a major change over GNOME 2, after all.

This is not something the Arch developers have any power over. So this is 
not the place to complain about it.

> 3. Why do we need a system settings menu with all the options in one
> menu ? where are my seperate icons i love so much ? why can we choose
> wich icons or options we want ?

I don't understand this complaint. Didn't GNOME 2 also offer settings all in 
one or two menus before?

This is not something the Arch developers have any power over. So this is 
not the place to complain about it.

> 4. What about the people ho don't have or don't wich to use they're
> video hardware to run the these stupid graphics ... are we stuck with
> "fallback mode" wich is even more stupid and backward ?

I'm fairly certain that GNOME 3 doesn't force you to use visual effects. If 
you turn that off it'd likely speed right up.

This is not something the Arch developers have any power over. So this is 
not the place to complain about it.

> 5 Where did all the nice applets go ? and why can i not add them to my
> taskbar anymore....
> 

Aforementioned GNOME developers stripping away nice features because 
they erroneously think they confuse users.

This is not something the Arch developers have any power over. So this is 
not the place to complain about it.

> [flaming]
> I though KDE 4 was bad  and bloated and that i couldn't get any worse...
> it seems i was wrong.

KDE SC 4 is only really bloated when you install all its packages. And it's 
bloat is still nowehre near comparable to Windows Vista or 7. If you can't fit 
KDE SC 4 on a hard disk even an old SMALL one, you need a new hard 
disk, because its a wonder you can fit anything on there.

Also, KDE SC 4 hasn't been nearly that bad since 4.3 came out, and it's 
pretty solid as of 4.6.

This is not something the Arch developers have any power over. So this is 
not the place to complain about it.

> Boy this new Gnome version is even more bloated and buggy then KDE 4
> wich is quite the atchievement from the gnome team...
> 

This is a matter of opinion and experience. As I said. Post-KDE SC 2.3 is 
pretty stable, and bloat is overstated when it's not even clearing a GiB of 
hard disk space.

This is not something the Arch developers have any power over. So this is 
not the place to complain about it.

> Now i finnaly understand why the Ubuntu guys decided to use they're
> netbook unity system rather then this shit, eventhough unity sucks it
> better then Gnome 3 in all respects.

I personally believe Ubuntu moving over to Unity was a mistake. And I fear th 
whining that will come when the planned move to Wayland happens due to it 
not having nearly as good support as Xorg. My opinion is that a lot of people 
overestimate KMS support in Linux. I would have waited a couple more years 
for KMS to mature before planning my desktop around it.

Also, we're Arch, not Ubuntu. We're not forcing you to use GNOME 3 or 
Unity. Not forcing you to use KDE SC 4, either. Instead of bitching on Arch 
general and wasting space on our inboxes, you could have just switched to 
Xfce or LXDE if you wanted a lightweight desktop environment. Or you could 
have switched to the dozens of window managers out there.

This is not something the Arch developers have any power over. So this is 
not the place to complain about it.

> 
> [/flaming]
> 
> Can we not just keeps using the old version and ignore the new version
> of gnome for now until they get they act together ? or hopefully decide
> to go back to the old interface and develop that further instead ...

GNOME 2 isn't even going to be maintained upstream once GNOME 3 goes 
gold. Arch is not in the business of maintaining unmaintained packages 
when newer options are available. GTK+ 2 is still being maintained upstream 
just as GTK+ 1 is largely because of the wide range of non-GNOME software 
that depends on them being available.

Same goes for Qt3. It's still kept up to date in terms of bug reports and new 
libraries, so that Qt3 holdouts aren't left high and dry. We SHOULD be using 
Qt4 now for any new projects we start, largely because Qt4 is where all the 
new development goes on (Plus Qt4 is definitely a worthy follower to Qt3.).

GNOME 2 not being carried in [extra] any further IS something the Arch 
developers have power over, but keeping GNOME 2 around when it's 
inevitably going to break within a few months due to it no longer keeping up 
with its dependencies is just stupid. 

Now stop flaming our mailing list. GNOME 2's getting mothballed upstream. 
The only chance it has is getting forked.


More information about the arch-general mailing list