Theodore Ts'o finds Gnome 3.4 and XFCE "unusable"

Note: Theodore Ts'o is the lead developer of ext3/4.

https://plus.google.com/117091380454742934025/posts/VjbFCa7X5NJ

 

Personally I've never had issues with Xfce, but I get where he's coming from. Stuff (usually related to polkit) is broken all the damn time on many distros, including purportedly stable ones like Debian, because people upstream feel the need to reinvent the wheel every six months.

The kludgy answer to this is, if you want to use a minimal WM, you install the full desktop first and then slap Openbox or whatever on top of it. Otherwise you will simply be unable to use huge swaths of functionality, functionality that used to be available before polkit became The In Thing.

As for Gnome 3, I think it would help if the developers provided a decent control panel instead of hiding half the features in gconf/dconf. End users should not have to dive through dconf settings just to arrange their desktops the way they like; that is not user friendly, whatever the devs say.

Edit: while we're at it, how about removing the IM rubbish from the panel? If I wanted to IM I'd launch Pidgin or whatever.

 

How surprising, really ...
Mrk

 

Linux users doing what they do best

Anyway, contrary to the title of this Wilders thread, in a comment dated June 22, he says, "So Xfce seems like the right balance point for now, although it definitely still has some rough edges."

 

This is my single biggest complaint with all things linux.

1. Run into a problem:
2. Search for a solution:
3. Find solution:
4. Try and implement solution:
5. Realize utilities have changed because I'm running a newer release than "solution" was written for:
6. Go back to step 1 for new problem.

More often than not you eventually solve your problem, but this cycle means I take far longer to "fix" my issues with linux than I take with Windows. And that is a sad commentary.

The problems don't seem to change as often as the utilities or user interface to the utilities.

 

Gnome 3 unusable? No surprise there.
XFCE unusable?

 

Xfce can be problematic for some people due to lack of functionality.

IMO one of the big problems in the Linux world, right now, is that there's no real substitute for KDE 3 or Gnome 2. Especially KDE 3... KDE 4 and Gnome 3 aren't bad per se (other than being too bloated for low-end machines); they just fill hugely different niches than their predecessors.

(Mate and Trinity are changing that though. Trinity, barely anyone uses right now, probably because of slow development, and lack of features like built-in bluetooth support. Mate OTOH seems to be gaining a larger user base. I hope both of them become more popular and continue to be developed, but honestly I have more confidence in Mate than Trinity right now.)

 

I don't think it's sad, it's just a fact of life. Accept it and you'll feel happier.

My Gnome 3 works the same as Gnome 2 did. People just need to learn how to use things properly.