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Release Team Proposes Gnome 3.0 Plans
Posted by
timothy
on Thu Jul 10, 2008 12:44 PM
from the gnome-rocks-and-so-does-kde dept.
from the gnome-rocks-and-so-does-kde dept.
benuski writes "Today at GUADEC, the Gnome User and Developer European Conference, the gtk+ team announced their plans for gtk+ 3.0; immediately after, the Gnome release team announced their plans for Gnome 2.30 to be changed into Gnome 3.0. This would mean a release date a year and a half to a year in the future. Details are short at the moment, but the Gnome team seems to be following in KDE's footsteps, but hopefully will avoid the problems that plagued KDE 4.0's release."
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Screens???? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Screens???? (Score:4, Interesting)
Probably clutter (http://clutter-project.org/)
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Speed it up (Score:5, Funny)
Just re-name 2.2 to 3.0 and you've released ahead of schedule!
Will it be backward compatible with Web 2.0? (Score:5, Funny)
I don't want to upgrade to Web 3.0 yet.
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I run 2.0 (Score:5, Funny)
It gets 40 rods to the hogshead and that's how I likes it.
Background (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Background (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Background (Score:5, Informative)
Probably /apps/nautilus/preferences/show_desktop.
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it's all about the mindset (Score:5, Interesting)
In other words, at this stage this is about the development team, not about the technical issues.
Content free article (Score:5, Informative)
let's wait and see (Score:5, Informative)
"but hopefully will avoid the problems that plagued KDE 4.0's release."
instead they're gonna have all sorts of their own problems. it happened before, it'll happen again.
all major projects have this kind of stuff when major releases come out the door. examples ?
MacOS X 10.0
Windows Vista
Gnome 2.0
Netscape 4.0
.
.
.
maybe it'll be a set of completely diferent problems. but they'll be there. murphy is unforgiven.
Re:let's wait and see (Score:5, Funny)
murphy is unforgiven.
Damn straight he is... not one of us would ever forgive that fscker after all the trouble his stupid law has caused for us!
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KDE's footsteps? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:KDE's footsteps? (Score:5, Insightful)
I think he's implying that Gnome has no features.
Which, while not entirely true, is not entirely unfair.
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Re:KDE's footsteps? (Score:4, Interesting)
KDE3 was bloated to a fault, and had an unhealthy obsession with identical-looking blue toolbar icons. It was also due for an architectural revamp.
GNOME started going down the "less is more" minimalistic path a few years ago, encouraged by Apple's similar philosophy that seemed to go over well with consumers. Unfortunately, many feel that they stripped a bit too much out (still, I prefer this approach, and was a rabid Xfce [xfce.org] user for quite some time).
KDE4 on the other hand, doesn't feel like it was designed with a minimalistic philosophy in mind. Granted, there was a clear and commendable goal to cut out most of the cruft from KDE3, but it currently still feels a bit incomplete
Do you think that's a fair assesment?
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Re:KDE's footsteps? (Score:4, Interesting)
KDE4 is still in development, so yes it is incomplete.
That withstanding, I would say it is a fair assessment. Although I like XFCE more for its small footprint than lack-of-features (simple without being, er, simplified). But to be honest, KDE is my favorite and KDE4 is looking to be very nice (for me) once it's 'done'.
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Problems with KDE4? What problems?.. (Score:5, Informative)
I made the folly of installing KDE-4 on my mom's new computer (she had KDE-3.5.x before). There were no "problems". There was a total disaster.
The amount of features available in KDE-3 for years, that did not make it into KDE-4 is staggering... Add bugs to that.
And I was not entirely unprepared — I knew better, than to try KDE-4.0, when it came out with the enormous (and Google-sponsored [kde.org]) hoopla. I waited for 4.0.2... You can't even move widgets around on your task-bar yet — that's "scheduled" for version 4.1!
The all-new "plasma"-desktop can't show you the contents of files in ~/Desktop/ — that's still "in the works". Showing the list of files themselves is buggy — every time you login, a new set of icons (one for each of your files) is added to the desktop.
And to think, that I was getting impatient with FreeBSD KDE-team [kde.org] for not upgrading the KDE-ports! These guys were simply protecting me, but no, I wouldn't listen... I installed the much tauted Kubuntu and paid the price (don't even get me started on Ubuntu itself)...
Re:Problems with KDE4? What problems?.. (Score:4, Informative)
As far as I know KDE4.0 was never meant for the end user but for developers. I tried it once and told myself: "Looks promising but is not ready to use for me.[0]"
So I waited and at times looked a bit a the latest progress with packages from the svn trunk for my distribution. My impression is that the progress, that KDE4.0 to now made, is just amazing. I am currently using the svn packages more often than my old KDE3.5.9 install, simply because it is a very pleasant experience. I would have switched already, if it was not a "unstable"[1] version and I will definitly switch when 4.1 sees the light of the day.
So let's go on to your issues: Moving widgets in the panel (the task bar is only for displaying your applications) should have been added yesterday or so (according to a blog post at planetkde.org).
Showing the contents of ~/Desktop: The folderview can do that, but not only that. It can also display any folder (for instance on a remote machine as well). It will be able to show the results of nepomuk searches, but this is not ready yet. I for my part had never any icons on my old desktop, because, I think, it looks like I still have lot of work to do. Now I can easily display the folder(s) that I am currently working on and hide them when I am done. I must say, it is way better than the old system for me.
For launching applications, I never used icons (Keyboard > mouse for me) but used the old "Run command". Now there is krunner which is way better than the old system.
As another developer to the KDE team: I love what you are doing with KDE4 and I hope that you can keep the good work up.
[0] I am a developer as well.
[1] unstable as in not finished. I have not experienced lots of bugs, but instead it almost never crashes, which is quite impressive for this kind of packages (compiled directly from the latest source code).
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An Ode to the GNOME dialog box (Score:5, Insightful)
Pledge to stick with unencumbered technology? (Score:5, Insightful)
Miguel de Icaza may enjoy appeasing Microsoft, but most of the Free World does not.
Re:Pledge to stick with unencumbered technology? (Score:4, Insightful)
You could, you know, wait for them to finish KDE4. Nobody held a gun to your head and forbade you from using 3.5 did they?
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Where's The Story? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:All hail letter "g" (Score:5, Funny)
Gwow, this is Great Gnews! Let's Ghope they are Gstill Going to Geep Gusing the Gletter "G".
A kbit klike kthe kpeople kthen ksince kthey kdo kthis kfar ktoo koften. kmuch kmore koften kthan kthe kGNOME kpeople
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Re:All hail letter "g" (Score:5, Interesting)
I know people will think I'm crazy, but I have a vision for kGnome.
QT 4 actually has a Clearlooks engine designed to look like Gnome. Dolphin can be configured to operate largely like Natilus (except it works better these days).
If QT 4 actully really does use less memory and runs faster, why not do a test and port a small Gnome app or two over to QT 4?
The app can run with the QT 4 Clearlooks engine, and look largely like Gnome apps, except they can take advantage of many of the KDE features like Phonon, Solid, Sonnet, etc.
As for the people who prefer C to C++, aren't there language bindings for both for QT and GTK?
I'd love to see just a few small apps as a proof of concept. It could demonstrate the feasibility of a Gnome desktop built upon QT, especially considering the annoucement of Gnome 3, and the decision to break API.
If you're going to build anew, shouldn't this concept at least be considered for a moment? Both projects can have their seperate apps, desktops, defaults, window decorations, features, etc. But more common libraries and toolkits are a win for everyone.
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Re:All hail letter "g" (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:All hail letter "g" (Score:5, Interesting)
If that isn't enough, Trolltech will also provide QGtkStyle [trolltech.com] which will draw using native GTK widgets in the same way it uses native Cocoa/Carbon on OS X to make all Qt/KDE 4 applications have a Gnome look and feel, including things like the order of the dialog buttons.
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Re:All hail letter "g" (Score:5, Funny)
I have yet to figure out what the Apple fascination with the prefix i- on absolutely everything is supposed to signify?
The only person that matters to Steve, course.
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:5, Interesting)
In terms of graphic capabilities, it can natively suppport every feature available on OSX and in Vista, besides a few new features that are unique to KDE 4. In theory, it would be possible to create a desktop that looks-and-feels EXACTLY like OSX or Vista.
However, the best features are not those, but rather the platform independence with native API support. This means that, unlike JAVA, you can create one piece of software that compiles in Linux, OSX and Windows, using the OS-specific APIs. So, the same software compiled in OSX and in Windows look completely different and they didn't have a single line of code changed. The platform independence is not available for everything... for now, you can only compile things like Openoffice. However, the multimedia API, as well as other APIs are being developed.
The other thing great about KDE4 is that it is done with SVG instead of bitmaps. This means that scaling to very small devices like smartphones is quite simple to achieve.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
There are many great advantages of KDE, such as platform independence and SVG rendering like you mentioned.
Again, I suggested the problem isn't the features.
As for making KDE 4 operate or look like OS X or Vista, that depends how much control we have over the interface. My fear/concern is that given recent discussions and posts with Aaron suggest we will have less control.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:4, Insightful)
Also a recent comment of his was that non-coders on the whole shouldn't be allowed to comment on design issues.
Well this is not going to make it feel any better but those who do not have experience coding often do not understand why their proposed design change does not or cannot work. Not always, but if you're good enough to design it you're typically good enough to code it. Code is just transferring a design into a language syntax. Designing it in the first place to work correctly (or not... ;) is hard.
He also repeatedly said that if you don't read the code, you can't understand the UI. That itself is a problem.
Again, this is probably actually true. Of course you can *see* the UI and point out what sucks about it but sometimes a "trivial" UI change involves a large code change. This is easier to see if you understand how the UI is actually formed from the code in question (i.e. Containments, Applets, Activities, etc. in Plasma-land).
Frankly, end users should be able to pick things up and learn them intuitively. Suggesting that if you don't read the source code, you can't understand the project means there is a serious usability issue.
Sure, but there's also the type of user (and I don't know if this is true in the case you're talking about but bear with me) that does something to the effect of:
User: Hey I noticed this is going on and it sucks, fix it!
Dev: One of:
User: Why don't you just do something like integrate the frobnitz?
Dev: Because it doesn't work like that.
User: No seriously, just integrate here and you're done.
Dev: No you don't get it. The code does not work like that. It cannot work because of reason foo
Now most bug reports we get are good reports and if the dev is actually here to work on it even get resolved to everyone's satisfaction. But we do get reports like these and when it turns into a pissing match between the user and the developer politeness is usually the first thing to go out the window. I've seen Aaron be ganged up on by multiple users in this fashion and it's really disheartening to see as a developer.
Hey, sometimes the developer is even wrong and it can be implemented somehow but that typically happens with a patch (oh, maybe it does work...), which you're not going to get from the same developers by pissing in his Cheerios and acting like a jerk. And in the end (at least in KDE) those who actually do the work get to decide so if Aaron is holding off on changing something because no one has presented a satisfactory technical solution (i.e. no "evil hacks" for bug fixes) then that's how it'll be.
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:4, Interesting)
I believe KDE uses a bitmap cache of pre-scaled SVG icons.
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:5, Insightful)
I see your $0.02 and raise you a nickel.
My problem with KDE 4 is that I can't drag a box over several desktop to select multiple desktop icons. That drives me nuts!
My problem with Gnome is the fact that I can't adjust the screen saver properties without some ugly hack.
I know, these are minor issues, but annoying nonetheless. And your post was probably the nickel's worth anyway.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Community software should mean that people can easily post bug reports and get issues like these addressed.
Open a bug for each issue and hopefully they will be addressed.
I think it is beneficial to the entire community when people report these things.
Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:5, Insightful)
Community software should mean that people can easily post bug reports and get issues like these addressed.
Open a bug for each issue and hopefully they will be addressed.
I think it is beneficial to the entire community when people report these things.
The problem is that these don't appear to be bugs, but design choices. I believe that the gnome developers intentionally removed the option to configure each of the different screen savers and that the KDE dev's set up their horrid desktop icon system by design.
What's to file?
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The KDE 4.0 icon fiasco is going out the window. In KDE 4.1, you have a folder view applet on your desktop that operates largely like a file manager window. You can change the folder it views, and even filter it with smart searches, and Nepomuk meta-data.
I hate having the applet on my desktop, but in the future supposedly it will be the desktop, and support themeing/wallpapers, etc.
Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:5, Informative)
Community software should mean that people can easily post bug reports and get issues like these addressed.
Open a bug for each issue and hopefully they will be addressed.
I think it is beneficial to the entire community when people report these things.
Here is the GNome developer response [gnome.org] to the screensaver thingie:
Comment #1 from William Jon McCann (gnome-screensaver developer, points: 22)
2005-09-19 13:32 UTC [reply]
I don't have any plans to support this. My view is that any screensaver theme
that requires configuration is inherently broken.
Is developer arrogance a bug or a feature?
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:5, Informative)
Here is the GNome developer response [gnome.org] to the screensaver thingie:
Is this a troll or do you suffer from short attention span? This was his first comment, but the discussion on bugzilla was very long, and further down he identified technical issues that prevent this from being done sanely atm, wrote an FAQ on the matter, asked for help from those who see this feature, and so on. Anyone interest in the issue is well-advised not to rely on the parent but read the discussion themselves.
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:4, Insightful)
You know, maybe he chose to be the maintainer because nobody else stepped up and it needed one. He was (is?) a volunteer who donated his own time. You have zero right to demand anything of him. If you want a feature implemented badly, pay someone to do it.
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:5, Informative)
On top of that you have Aaron Segio now suggesting that users should have less control over configuration, fewer choices, and saying that end users are dumb. He also has suggested repeatedly lately that if you're not a coder, then you can't comment on UI issues.
Can you prove those 2 statements? Can you provide links to statements where he says that?
From my use of KDE 4.1, I, a user, have the exact same configuration menu in konqueror that I used to have, and I now have dolphin, with simpler configuration, that has been added which I can use standalone, or along konqueror or not.
As a user, it seems I now have more choice.
Plasmoid seems a little raw right now, but I have the feeling they are the equivalent of firefox extensions.
Basically, they are putting the desktop in the hand of the users. You will have extension, sorry, plasmoid, whith little or no configuration, and some some with heavy configuration and you will just choose and build your own personnal desktop. Just like firefox with its extensions.
So your comment about them dumbing down the desktop or removing it from the users hand is pretty much out of the picture, it's quite the opposite.
As for aseigo, I follow his blog and I can't remember him saying users can't comment on UI issues. If you'd give links to that than I might find your comment informative, right now, it seems mostly flamebait.
(My bet is that he said that as long as the underlying technology is not ready, the discussion about with or without 'insert your preferred desktop item or usability issue' are irrelevant.)
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:4, Insightful)
Can you prove those 2 statements? Can you provide links to statements where he says that?
You didn't ask that from me but what kind impression I have had from what Aaron has told, is that KDE4 is coming smarter, so there is no need for configurations, because KDE will notice what user wants and leave more easier working enviroment for user when.
Feature and Configuration are two different things.
KDE has lots of features and lots of configurations. Gnome has few features and even less configurations. Now KDE4 will move kde to direction that there will be lots of features but much less configurations. Default look will be very simple and clean so all "dumb" gnome users can use kde easily but power user who knows what wants, can turn things ON and customize whole enviroment.
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:4, Informative)
As for aseigo, I follow his blog and I can't remember him saying users can't comment on UI issues. If you'd give links to that than I might find your comment informative, right now, it seems mostly flamebait.
Bug 154535 is a user request for the ability to optionally remove the toolbox "cashew". 154535 has the second highest number of votes of any plasma bug. Aaron marked it as WONTFIX ("that is the final resolution of this issue as per the maintainer of the project"). Here are two examples of his attitude:
#53
it would be nice, however, if in situations like this you refrained from commenting ... i don't particularly need to open my inbox, go through the bug reports and read this kind of stuff.
#84
please, please, please people: don't try and get involved in discussions of design. if you are technically capable of doing so, read the code and jump on panel-devel and discuss things with the rest of the team in a reasoned and well-informed manner.Parent
Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:4, Informative)
His blog was unavailable for a while but it came back online several days ago.
http://aseigo.blogspot.com/ [blogspot.com]
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:5, Informative)
this is one reason why I continue to use gnome or xfce instead of the new KDE. Of all things they removed one feature most important to me:
the ability to change tabs in konsole by pressing alt-# (ie, alt-1 = go to tab 1, alt-2 to tab 2 etc.)
I asked in the #kde-devel channel if it was removed intentionally or just hadn't been re-added. Aaron's first response was to claim I must not use a terminal much (I'm a systems admin and programmer, I spend nearly all day in a terminal.) He then said that terminal programs should bind as few keys as possible because terminal programs have already assumed nearly all possibly combinations.
I offered a patch that would re-insert them as an option -- not enabled by default but there for people that decided they wanted to set it. It was turned down.
Fuck it all, KDE is going the same way GNOME did. I'll stick with vim, mutt, and move back to freaking wmaker or fvwm if it's the only way to have a system that doesn't treat me like I'm five years old.
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:5, Interesting)
> I asked in the #kde-devel channel if it
> was removed intentionally or just hadn't
> been re-added.
It just hasn't been re-implemented.
You should have been pointed at me rather than Aaron. Terminal related queries will reach me if they are sent to konsole-devel@kde.org , robertknight on #kde-devel or be filed as bugs against Konsole at http://bugs.kde.org/ [kde.org] . Your patch hasn't crossed my path yet and I cannot comment on it until I see it.
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course, we are dumb... We want KMail to preserve the HTML-layout of the original [kde.org], when we are replying to or forwarding it. The enlightened developers have been telling us for years, how stupid [kde.org] it is, but we continue to foolishly insist.
If that's not valid grounds for contempt towards users, I don't know, what is.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
On top of that you have Aaron Segio now suggesting that users should have less control over configuration, fewer choices, and saying that end users are dumb. He also has suggested repeatedly lately that if you're not a coder, then you can't comment on UI issues.
Citation needed
Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:4, Interesting)
I have two problems with KDE4, only one of which is due to the KDE people.
First, I believe the development team should have kept it in Beta until it was feature-complete. Feature complete, in my mind, is at minimum the feature set of 3.x. It shouldn't even be a release candidate until "done" and stable.
Second, distros should avoid including immature projects like KDE 4 until they *are* feature complete and stable. Yeah, Kubuntu, I'm looking at you!
Hopefully, the Gnome folks (and Ubuntu) will wait until everything's ready for prime time before releasing 3.0
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Re:Problem with KDE 4 (Score:4, Informative)
Kubuntu defaults to KDE 3.5 last time I checked. Yup, running Kubuntu 8.04 right here, using KDE 3.5. The remix is KDE4, but hey, they're experimenting with it. You can OPTIONALLY install it, but you don't have to run with it if you don't want to. But they can't get feedback if no one uses it.
What was it you were bitching about again?
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