Re: I PLEASE A NEW GOBOLINU-RELEASE!

On 23 March 2013 16:47, Martín Cigorraga <[email protected]> wrote:
> Dear Viola:
>
> Bloatware can be defined as a software that bogs
> your computer down and clearly makes you un-
> productive or, at worst, make it difficult to use your
> system to do anything useful at all.
>
> This clearly isn't the case of both KDE SC and
> GNOME when there's the needed muscles to run
> them.

Well, good for you. Apparently you only have fast, powerful, high-spec
computers. That's nice. I don't.

Also, all your computers must have decent hardware 3D acceleration --
not all mine do -- and you must never access them remotely or run
software inside VMs which don't support 3D acceleration. I do.

Also, apparently you are happy to spend some of your CPU cycles on
snazzy visual effects: drop shadows and so on. I am, /on those
machines that can do it/, but not all mine do.

Also, apparently, you are happy to spend RAM on object frameworks and
so on. I'm not; I still use machines with 1GB of RAM regularly and my
lowest-spec PC has 320MB, which is well past the maximum it officially
supports and gives errors.

My point here is that many of us /do/ consider KDE and GNOME to be
bloated and inefficient and we don't much like them. I am perfectly
happy that you do, but you do not get to tell us that we are wrong. We
do not all have the same values. We do not all want the same things.

Trying to impose your values on us is wrong of you, and that is what
you are doing. You are telling us that these desktops are not
bloatware.

I am not telling you not to use them. I am merely trying to point out
to you that your personal preferences and opinions are your personal
preferences, and that they are *not* universal truths.

Your tone is one of lecturing from on high, explaining stuff to we
poor foolish ignorant peons who know no better. It is rather
offensive. I advise you not to do it.

Additionally, from the odd use of "KDE SC", which I had to Google, I
presume you are a KDE aficionado. Fine, good for you. Note that others
are not. Some of us hate the bloated, inefficient mess that it has
become. Some of us also hate its ugly themes, its crass over-use of
colour, its nasty blocky fonts.

In the last week I have tried both Fedora 18 (horribly ugly and
overstated) and SUSE 12.3 (still nasty, garish, oversaturated and
bold, but slightly more understated). I am not being out-of-date here;
I check regularly and base my personal opinions on the latest
releases.

Saying that...

I agree with your general point about desktops versus window managers.
I think people expect a rich desktop these days.

My argument is simple:

[1] Gobo is a distinctive distro. Its single distinctive aspect is its
very different directory layout. That is really its *sole* difference.

[2] I propose that it should also have a distinctive desktop to go
with it, so that as well as being different, it should look different.

[3] People expect a rich desktop these days.

[4] Therefore, the challenge is this: find a rich desktop that is also
distinctive, i.e., unlike that used by any other distro.

[5] I propose ROX is an ideal candidate as its concept of an
application meshes well with Gobo's.

The only other one I know that does this is GNUstep. That is a valid
contender, but it is not very mature - I find it very easy to crash
Gworkspace.app and lose your entire desktop. Also, while Window Maker
is GNUstep's recommended WM, Gworkspace.app actually conflicts with
Window Maker - both try to draw a Dock, but in different places and
sizes, with difference usage metaphors. Gworkspace.app overrides and
hides Window Maker's desktop backgroup and app-launch menu, but it
does not provide a replacement app-launch menu. And so on.

I am sure that these are soluble, but they are, perhaps, not trivial.

> While *everything* is customizable in KDE SC

Sadly, no it isn't. I can give detailed examples but this is not the
place. Suffice it to say that I cannot reproduce my preferred Windows
taskbar vertical layout in KDE. It has 1,000 irrelevant options to
twiddle but it cannot do what Windows can do.

Here is an example:
http://www.edmundtse.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/taskbar.jpg

Note, wide bar, wide readable app buttons, but lots of tiny app-launch
icons and tiny notification-area icons.

This appears simply never to have occurred to the KDE developers. It
has not been doable since KDE 1.0 in 1997 or so, which was my
preferred desktop back then.

KDE has lots of customisation options - far too many, IMHO, a
bewildering, confusing plethora - but it doesn't have the ones I need.
Xfce does this better, and it does not do it at all well.

>> 5. All program need start in maximized window, as default.
>
> That's debatable but I tend to agree with this statement :)

I'd really seriously disagree with this one. I want them to reopen
where they were last time, please.


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