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Lasulu
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 16, 2012 8:29 am    Post subject: Gnome 3, What is happening? Reply with quote

Gnome 3 looms over my head like a dark cloud. I am a relatively content with Gnome 2. From what I have read about Gnome 3, it does not sound like an improvement over Gnome 2, but rather like a complete departure. Gnome 3 is apparently intended to be attractive to non-linux users. Apparently standard features of Gnome 2 (like workspaces & Icons on the the desktop) are missing. It is not completely clear to me what is there and what is not or what new feature is in Gnome 3 that might be be useful for me. It is right now a fair amount of work to switch desktop environments under Gentoo, but I am thinking of experimenting with the options on one machine.

I am continuing to use Gnome 2. I have Gentoo/Gnome-2 installed on 4 machines. Is Gentoo going to switch to Gnome 3, and if so when? Will Gnome 2 be removed from portage? Is Gnome 3 possibly headed in a direction that would make it more useful. Are the Gnome developers at all responsive to user input? What are reasonable alternatives to Gnome 3? Is there someplace I can find a clear unbiased simple description of the changes between Gnome 2 and 3?
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 16, 2012 8:41 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
I am continuing to use Gnome 2. I have Gentoo/Gnome-2 installed on 4 machines. Is Gentoo going to switch to Gnome 3, and if so when? Will Gnome 2 be removed from portage? Is Gnome 3 possibly headed in a direction that would make it more useful. Are the Gnome developers at all responsive to user input? What are reasonable alternatives to Gnome 3? Is there someplace I can find a clear unbiased simple description of the changes between Gnome 2 and 3?

Yes, Gentoo will drop gnome2 at some point, after gnome3 hits the stable tree. IIRC there were some talks about 3.4, but I am not too up-to-date in that discussion.

If you mean responsive to input like, I do not like what you did to gnome, and change it back, then the dev are not likely to respond to input - this discussion is already one year old, if not older!

the is an 'alternative' to upgrading called cinnamon, which continues to maintain gnome2. IMO this can only be an intermediary solution, and you have to look around for some real (reading activly developed) alternative. If I understood correctly, cinnamon is the couter-part to kde trinity.


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PostPosted: Mon Jul 16, 2012 8:42 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I would recommend looking into KDE4 as an alternative.
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 16, 2012 1:15 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

There is nothing wrong with gnome 3. I have been using it since the early days.
I don't understand why people are getting in a state because it does not have Icons on the desktop.
It does.
They are not enabled by default, and they are easy to "turn on" just by enabling them in the desktop section of advanced settings.
The workspaces are there to.
I use 5 in all, and each application I configure to launch on a specific workspace. Just like I did in gnome 2.
I point to the hot corner, or hit the winblows key and all workspaces are revealed. Easy.
There are hundreds of posts all over the internet slating gnome-3. If you are new to linux, you will love it.
If you are a die hard gnome-2 fan, you will hate it. Why? Change. As simple as that, some people just won't accept change.
Gnome 3 does all the same things as Gnome 2, just happens to look a little sexier.
Thanks to the people developing gnome-shell-extensions, gnome-3 is just as configurable as gnome-2.
I don't see what the problem is frankly.
I urge you Lasulu to try out Gnome 3 on one of your spare boxes.
There is so much terrific documentation and support in the Gentoo community, you will always have access to a helping hand.
Believe me when I say you will wonder what all the fuss was about after you have dipped your toes in gnome-shell for a month or so.
Please try it out. We are all here to help.
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disi
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 16, 2012 2:06 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thistled wrote:
There is nothing wrong with gnome 3. I have been using it since the early days.
I don't understand why people are getting in a state because it does not have Icons on the desktop.
It does.
They are not enabled by default, and they are easy to "turn on" just by enabling them in the desktop section of advanced settings.
The workspaces are there to.
I use 5 in all, and each application I configure to launch on a specific workspace. Just like I did in gnome 2.
I point to the hot corner, or hit the winblows key and all workspaces are revealed. Easy.
There are hundreds of posts all over the internet slating gnome-3. If you are new to linux, you will love it.
If you are a die hard gnome-2 fan, you will hate it. Why? Change. As simple as that, some people just won't accept change.
Gnome 3 does all the same things as Gnome 2, just happens to look a little sexier.
Thanks to the people developing gnome-shell-extensions, gnome-3 is just as configurable as gnome-2.
I don't see what the problem is frankly.
I urge you Lasulu to try out Gnome 3 on one of your spare boxes.
There is so much terrific documentation and support in the Gentoo community, you will always have access to a helping hand.
Believe me when I say you will wonder what all the fuss was about after you have dipped your toes in gnome-shell for a month or so.
Please try it out. We are all here to help.


I think it is a way into the right direction.
GTK/Gnome was always the more clear and straightforward interface IMHO. No 3mio settings+buttons but big buttons to get stuff done.
Gnome2 also got cluttered with tiny stuff in the end and I tended to use xfce4 instead.

Extensions are probably the best of Gnome3, it takes you ~4 seconds to install a start menu as in Gnome2 or a quick launch etc. via https://extensions.gnome.org/
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 17, 2012 1:45 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

disi wrote:
I tended to use xfce4 instead.


I'm actually running Xfce now, and would say it's certainly worth looking into. I actually have it set up with nautilus managing the desktop, so part of it kind of behaves Gnome-like. You can even mess with the panels and get a kind of Gnome2 feel working.

I didn't mind Gnome3 that much, but I was having some issues with it crashing which I think were related to nVidia drivers. I'll probably check it again soon.
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 17, 2012 2:04 am    Post subject: Re: Gnome 3, What is happening? Reply with quote

Lasulu wrote:
Gnome 3 looms over my head like a dark cloud. I am a relatively content with Gnome 2. From what I have read about Gnome 3, it does not sound like an improvement over Gnome 2, but rather like a complete departure.


I tried gnome 3 when it first came out due to curiosity. I found it to have some interesting features and concept. If you like the gnome 2 fell, then you can use the fallback mode, so it really does not need to change you entire world. It's default interface is a big redesign over the old style, but if you give it a chance you may like it.

Lasulu wrote:
Is there someplace I can find a clear unbiased simple description of the changes between Gnome 2 and 3?


No. Every writer carries a bias. Besides you are the one who must ultimately be satisfied. If I were you I would install virtualbox, or virtualbox-bin if you don't want to spend hours compiling, and then install Fedora or some other distro that comes with gnome 3 as the default. (EDIT: if you have a few extra hours and want a pure experience, you could use arch and get a pure gnome 3) You can delete the virtual hard drive when you are done and completely reclaim the space.

This will take more work than asking for opinions on a forum, but it will be well worth it. If you do this you can test gnome3 without uninstalling your current version of gnome, and within a few hours of using it, you will know if you love it, like it, can live with it, dislike it, hate it, or despise it.
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Lasulu
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 17, 2012 12:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I really appreciate all the comments :D . I am going to have to try Gnome 3 myself before I make a decision. It's hard for me to believe it is as bad as some people say, although I do take Linus's comments seriously. I think I'll try putting it up on the one machine that is not used and is badly in need of an "emerge world". I have used Gnome since its beginnings when I compiled it manually on slackware and I will not give up on it easily. I'd rather install it on Gentoo as I will have to do anyway if I decide to go with it.
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 17, 2012 10:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

You should definitely try it, it is true that many people don't like it (me also) but only you can make that decision. You can try latest fedora in virtualbox, before that it was not possible to try it in vbox because of video card requirements.

As for me, there are many things I don't like, but the main issue is with options. Gnome 2 never had many exposed options, some of them were in gconf, but now it looks like there is none at all. Third party extensions (suspicious quality) for something that should be there as user configurable options is not a good solution. I believe there are also users who are not afraid to look at the settings. Also, one great thing about Linux desktops was that we could use whatever window manager we prefer (gnome 2 had this in gconf), not possible anymore...

If you want really powerful DE then KDE is the only option for now. In KDE user have the power to configure everything! I can click to choose WM I want, configure it as classic desktop or as "modern" desktop with all bells and whistles. And all that without hacks and extensions...

M
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bigbangnet
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 18, 2012 5:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I wont install or try gnome 3 on my gentoo box unless those issues are fixed :)

in the mean time, I use xfce and I'm very happy with it.
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 18, 2012 5:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

bigbangnet wrote:
I wont install or try gnome 3 on my gentoo box unless those issues are fixed :)

in the mean time, I use xfce and I'm very happy with it.


last update:
Quote:
00:20, 4 April 2012 Nirbheek (Talk | contribs) (2,991 bytes) (→Bugs) (undo)

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PostPosted: Wed Jul 18, 2012 6:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hello,

I use xfce 4.10 instead of gnome2 and it is possible to let it look very similar to gnome2.

To get a picture in mind:
http://tridex.net/wp-content/gallery/xfce-der-schnellere-gnome/xfce03menu.png
But there is some work to do before it looks very gnomish (more gnomish than the example above).

If you decide to use xfce4 then you would find out that there is a bug, which make it sometimes impossible to store the panel adjustments. If this is the case then you can overcome this bug, if you use in terminal
Code:
xfce4-panel -s

to store the adjustments truly.

Besides this xfce4 hasn't it's own login-manager, but slim is a good choice while lightdm causes instability and performance leakage (at least on my machine).

Best regards
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PS: In my opinion gnome3 isn't usable for someone who would really do work with his machine. It is not even possible to see always the active tasks. To my mind it is designed to impress MS-Windows users with little knowledge, but would these users really change to Linux or Unix-like systems. Not really! They don't even get in mind that gnome3 is existing!

PS2: Excuse my English. That is my field with little knowledge.
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 19, 2012 10:23 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

GOS wrote:
In my opinion gnome3 isn't usable for someone who would really do work with his machine. It is not even possible to see always the active tasks.


I disagree. And by disagree I mean "have been using it at work and home for months now". Most of the major issues are fixable with extensions, which are 1-click installable from https://extensions.gnome.org

For example: “Alternative Status Menu” puts shutdown back on the menu. “Window Icon List” adds icons of the currently running programs to the panel. “Applications Menu” puts a proper menu back. And I think “Classic Systray” gets the systray back - but I'm using something else at the moment. And “Media player indicator” puts all of Clementine's controls up on the panel for you.

Worst issue I've had is with ati-drivers crashing gnome-shell all the time, but ATIMD have dropped support for my card anyway now, so I'm happily on the open source drivers now.

In short, Gnome 3 is clearly being run by the insane, but with some fiddling you can claw back most of the usability. And if you don't want to fiddle, I don't know why you're running Gentoo :)
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GOS
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 19, 2012 1:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
In short, Gnome 3 is clearly being run by the insane, but with some fiddling you can claw back most of the usability. And if you don't want to fiddle, I don't know why you're running Gentoo :)


Why I don't like it that good working systems are remodelled for the insane in an idiotic way? Very good question!!! :lol:

I use Gentoo, because it is very adaptable and free of crapware I don't want. And, that is right, some fiddling isn't that bad. Therefore I fiddled a bid and kicked gnome out of my machine (free of crapware :wink: ).

Quote:
I disagree. And by disagree I mean "have been using it at work and home for months now". Most of the major issues are fixable with extensions, which are 1-click installable from https://extensions.gnome.org


I wouldn't say that you disagree. I think you had the same problems like I had. But the way you overcome them it is different to my way. You changed the behaviour of gnome3 with the well-known extensions. But to my mind the extensions look not as good as the clear style of gnome2, but XFCE4 does.

Best regards
GOS
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disi
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 19, 2012 1:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

My xfce4 desktops always looked a little like this:
http://ompldr.org/vMm80cw
http://ompldr.org/vNXNxaA
http://ompldr.org/vNXNxag

I liked to minimize programs to desktop icons...
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PostPosted: Sat Jul 21, 2012 3:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

disi wrote:
My xfce4 desktops always looked a little like this:
http://ompldr.org/vMm80cw
http://ompldr.org/vNXNxaA
http://ompldr.org/vNXNxag

I liked to minimize programs to desktop icons...


Sacred...man I loved that game. Great Diablo clone. Sorry for being offtopic...had to say it...Nostalgia took over me.
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Lasulu
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 04, 2012 9:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I am following the path of least resistance - doing nothing. Still using Gnome 2 until Gentoo marks 3 as stable. Enjoying the controversy - It looks like there are a number of good options.
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 06, 2012 5:36 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

You could also consider switching to MATE, which is a fork of GNOME 2 that is maintained and adding new features without changing the traditional desktop metaphor:

http://mate-desktop.org/

The Sabayon folks are maintaining an overlay containing the latest mate packages, you can add it via:

Code:
layman -a mate


And then:

Code:
emerge mate


Note that if you want to remove gnome and do a depclean be sure to keep some packages like gdm around, since mate doesn't explicitly depend on it like gnome does.
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 06, 2012 8:21 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'll probably use gnome 3 once it is stable, but having tried 3.4 I definitely don't think it is ready yet. Maybe 3.6 will be better?

On both Debian (wheezy) and Ubuntu (12.04), gnome-shell 3.4 is pretty crash-happy at startup with both nvidia AND intel graphics. Not to mention that evolution manages to crash gnome-shell a few times a day as well.
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2012 12:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

So, it's another 1-2 months and still the latest version 3.2 in portage is from April 2012 for testing?

KDE on the other hand 01/08/2012 new release and 01/08/2012 new version in portage...

//edit: sorry, just checked the changelog:
Quote:
*gnome-3.2.1 (07 Nov 2011)

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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2012 12:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yeah but your point is still relevant Disi.
3.4 is still unstable in portage, and yet 3.6 was released a few weeks ago.
At this rate gnome-4.0 will be released before we even get a glimmer of 3.6
I am sure some devels will read this and shake their head.
I am not having a go at the devs.
This dilemma is a good example of how there are so few devs in the Gentoo community who can actually make gnome transitions happen.
Whereas Fedora and Ubuntu and the like communities have many more devs who can make things happen. Some of them even get paid for it.
That just doesn't happen in Gentoo land.
We will just have to sit and wait. :roll:
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2012 1:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thistled wrote:
Yeah but your point is still relevant Disi.
3.4 is still unstable in portage, and yet 3.6 was released a few weeks ago.
At this rate gnome-4.0 will be released before we even get a glimmer of 3.6
I am sure some devels will read this and shake their head.
I am not having a go at the devs.
This dilemma is a good example of how there are so few devs in the Gentoo community who can actually make gnome transitions happen.
Whereas Fedora and Ubuntu and the like communities have many more devs who can make things happen. Some of them even get paid for it.
That just doesn't happen in Gentoo land.
We will just have to sit and wait. :roll:


Sorry, I didn't see this changelog: *gnome-3.4.1 (10 Sep 2012) :oops:
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PostPosted: Wed Oct 17, 2012 8:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thistled wrote:
This dilemma is a good example of how there are so few devs in the Gentoo community who can actually make gnome transitions happen.
Whereas Fedora and Ubuntu and the like communities have many more devs who can make things happen.

Fedora and Ubuntu have to care much less for build dependencies and failures, Gentoo devs absolutely must do that. Naturally, when there's big changes, it will take more time to get it even into portage and then ~arch. KDE4 packages also didn't make it so fast during their first few major releases, now that the codebase is much more stable the ebuilds appear in the overlay even before release day. That, and I've no idea of the size of the Gentoo Gnome team. Anyone can help though by adding the gnome overlay to hunt down bugs.
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PostPosted: Wed Oct 17, 2012 1:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hey Genstorm, I would love to help hunt down bugs, but the last time I used gnome from the overlay, it borked my system for about 2 months.
I can't afford to do that now, as I need my puter for my studies.
As far as I can tell, it looks like there are about 10 Gentoo devs working on Gnome, with Tetromino doing a lot of the posting on Bugzilla.
He is a very very busy man. Apologies if I have underestimated how many devs there are on the Gentoo GNOME team.
Your hard work and effort you put into the project is appreciated.
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PostPosted: Thu Oct 18, 2012 2:13 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

genstorm wrote:
Thistled wrote:
This dilemma is a good example of how there are so few devs in the Gentoo community who can actually make gnome transitions happen.
Whereas Fedora and Ubuntu and the like communities have many more devs who can make things happen.

Fedora and Ubuntu have to care much less for build dependencies and failures, Gentoo devs absolutely must do that. Naturally, when there's big changes, it will take more time to get it even into portage and then ~arch. KDE4 packages also didn't make it so fast during their first few major releases, now that the codebase is much more stable the ebuilds appear in the overlay even before release day. That, and I've no idea of the size of the Gentoo Gnome team. Anyone can help though by adding the gnome overlay to hunt down bugs.
Also, those distros seem to consider software stable long before it actually is as long as it has the bling-coolness factor. Doesn't seem acceptable for serious users.

On a side not, I suppose it's time for me to have a look at the MATE overlay ( https://github.com/Sabayon/mate-overlay ).
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