Seven days with gnome.

Tolkem

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Hi everyone! Hope you're all having a nice life! :)

I just finished reading this article series from a guy who spent a week trying Gnome3 and published his experience on his blog:

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days0

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days1

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days2

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days3

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days4

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days5

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days6

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days7

Any Gnome users here? What do you think? Is really Gnome this bad and annoying? I've been using KDE for like 6 months or so, used to use xfce4 + awesome-wm but after reading all that "frenesi" about Plasma being as light as xfce4 decided to give a try and have to say performance's improved in KDE5 when compared to KDE4 where it was practically unsuable for those of us "mere mortals" with a decent machine but not a "powerhouse" to feed the resource hog KDE4 was. I really like KDE5; I can use my pc with the keyboard; navigate the filesystem, open, close, maximize, minimize, switch between windows and much more without having to use the mouse, yeah not a fan of clicking. I haven't used Gnome like for ages and last time I did ... I didn't like it; too slow, too heavy, too annoying ... it was maybe like a couple of weeks ago, I thought I'd try Gnome again just to check how it's doing after reading some posts on the web praising its "improvement" but after reading this guy's posts I'm not so sure anymore LOL
 


I'm using Ubuntu 18,04 and Ubuntu 20.04 and both use Gnome3 desktop.

I like Gnome3 desktop it's a good functional desktop and I have no complaints.

I read that a lot of users dislike Gnome3 Desktop and it's different which is what I like about it.

I can use any desktop one desktop is as good as another desktop as long as it works.
 
So what's the TL;DR?

Is really Gnome this bad and annoying?
Yes.
have to say performance's improved in KDE5 when compared to KDE4
It is actually very good now.

I first tried Gnome3 when it was still in "Beta" perhaps and only available on Fedora.
I thought it was beautiful but, as it was only 'half-baked', lacked much functionality.
Later I tried it again and discovered that much of the functionality the average user may want
was only available through the use of "add-ons" - provided by Devs I had no meaningful relationship with. Currently the trend of Gnome3 and Gnome3 apps seems to be the hiding of functional controls from the user.

Since then my opinion of Gnome3 has only decreased and I do not like it one bit.
I have tried it several times and am even more thankful that we have a choice.
 
I first tried Gnome3 when it was still in "Beta" perhaps and only available on Fedora.
I thought it was beautiful but, as it was only 'half-baked', lacked much functionality.
Later I tried it again and discovered that much of the functionality the average user may want
was only available through the use of "add-ons" - provided by Devs I had no meaningful relationship with. Currently the trend of Gnome3 and Gnome3 apps seems to be the hiding of functional controls from the user.

Since then my opinion of Gnome3 has only decreased and I do not like it one bit.
Please some examples of what you find Gnome3 to be lacking functionality and functional controls.
 
I prefer window managers alone. But as a desktop environment goes, gnome is pretty keyboard centric and it at least tries to be something different than emulating what is seen on Windows or MacOS.
 
I personally find most DEs annoying, including MATE, at times. Trinity (as in PCLOS Community Edition Trinity ) is not bad, at all compared to KDE in the past... and have been pleasantly surprised to be wrong in my assumption KDE was still bloated and slow. "Hold the DE and eye candy, just a WM!"
 
@Jared.
@sp331yi

Exactly.

Window Managers are awesome.

I've tried KDE and don't like it and too many settings that do the same thing or to screw things up from my experience with KDE although a lot of Linux users love it.

I guess if you're into eye candy and bells and whistles KDE is the one way to go and it does have a flashy look however I prefer clean and simple.

Yep I'm thankful we do have many different choices.
 
I prefer window managers alone.
I like WMs too but Plasma's been a most pleasant experience so far.
But as a desktop environment goes, gnome is pretty keyboard centric and it at least tries to be something different than emulating what is seen on Windows or MacOS.

Well, the guy on those posts says differently and actually one of his mayor complaints from day 1 is that of Gnome trying to behave mac-like, he said
what are you trying to be? macOS?

Please some examples of what you find Gnome3 to be lacking functionality and functional controls.

Like I said, I haven't used Gnome in a very long time, since Gnome2 days I think. He - the author of the posts - made some examples and even provided some sreenshots to show those things/details he complaint about. For example, in day 1 he said;
I have to tell you that it does feel odd to have the terminal tabs on top......
...can't I put them at the bottom? and make they say something that makes more sense?
yep, you can. of course. they put it IN THE DCONF AGAIN.
isn't it a tool for advanced users anyway? what about you give me a bit more control?!

32.png


oh you THANK me for using it? like what? did i rescue you or something?
or did you thank me for being smart and finding you?

yeah, as if this was a game

oh my, this is funny now... it's getting beyond dumb...

I think, the average home users may not find some or most of the difficulties he did find since they won't be fiddling around so much but some stuff he mentioned, they definitely will cause it's basic stuff that should be available and visible for everyone. Also, UI design seems to be a bit odd

48.png


That's really weird, is it really that way? With the save and cancel buttons each at a different top corner of the window? Really?
 
This is the Gnome3 desktop I'm used to.

http://www.cyberphoton.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/gnome3-classic3.png
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I use Plasma and love it. I think that I could get used to Gnome if I were to use it, but Plasma is great (and I could probably configure it to look and act like Gnome).
 
Please some examples of what you find Gnome3 to be lacking functionality and functional controls.
O.K. I will. Just for you. Because it means I will have to boot into a distro with Gnome 3 so I can make some notes. ( I don't generally take notes of what I don't like about a certain software :) )

One example of the direction Gnome apps are going is the "Web" web browser included with Linux Mint.
I find it very annoying and unpleasant to use. Over-simplified and controls hidden from the user.
 
Hi everyone! Hope you're all having a nice life! :)

I just finished reading this article series from a guy who spent a week trying Gnome3 and published his experience on his blog:

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days0

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days1

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days2

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days3

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days4

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days5

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days6

https://tildearrow.zapto.org/?p=post&month=7&year=2020&item=7days7

Any Gnome users here? What do you think? Is really Gnome this bad and annoying? I've been using KDE for like 6 months or so, used to use xfce4 + awesome-wm but after reading all that "frenesi" about Plasma being as light as xfce4 decided to give a try and have to say performance's improved in KDE5 when compared to KDE4 where it was practically unsuable for those of us "mere mortals" with a decent machine but not a "powerhouse" to feed the resource hog KDE4 was. I really like KDE5; I can use my pc with the keyboard; navigate the filesystem, open, close, maximize, minimize, switch between windows and much more without having to use the mouse, yeah not a fan of clicking. I haven't used Gnome like for ages and last time I did ... I didn't like it; too slow, too heavy, too annoying ... it was maybe like a couple of weeks ago, I thought I'd try Gnome again just to check how it's doing after reading some posts on the web praising its "improvement" but after reading this guy's posts I'm not so sure anymore LOL
"Unable to Connect"
I think you broke his site! ;)
 
O.K. I will. Just for you. Because it means I will have to boot into a distro with Gnome 3 so I can make some notes. ( I don't generally take notes of what I don't like about a certain software :) )

One example of the direction Gnome apps are going is the "Web" web browser included with Linux Mint.
I find it very annoying and unpleasant to use. Over-simplified and controls hidden from the user.
Appreciate the extra effort. :)

I'm not a fan of Linux Mint although perhaps that is more a fault or doing by the Linux Mint developers, I may be wrong.
 
I'm running Manjaro 20 with Gnome and haven't had any annoying issues at all.
It runs great!

I'm not fond of the large updates (as it's a rolling release) otherwise all is well with Gnome.
 
I’m usually a terminal / keyboard shortcuts kind of user, and the kind of user that gets so annoyed when the system interrupts me or when something catches the eye and distracts me, For that, I usually find Gnome 3 much better than others .

I have been trying others, like MATE, Cinnamon and Plasma, and I find them too distracting. When I’m working I like that Gnome doesn’t get in the way. That hasn’t been always the case: I remember that when it first came out I hated it so much and wanted my gnome 2 UX back, so I stood with MATE for long. But even MATE went south at some point. I like from gnome that when I’m working I can only see my windows, the battery level and the clock, and pretty much nothing else if I don’t want to (I have some other indicators but not many).


I feel that I could achieve even better productivity with a tiling window manager like i3, but didn’t make the leap yet.
 


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