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Speaking as someone who never used Gnome, has only ever used Cinnamon, I was recently shopping for distros to try on an old work laptop. My only real awareness of Gnome was via the Gnome Terminal that ships with Linux Mint, which I’ve replaced with Konsole because Gnome Terminal has really minimal functionality and feels like Baby’s First Terminal. I browsed the Gnome org’s website to try to see why I should choose Gnome, in their words. I noped out as soon as they started trying to sell Gnome as being a phone-like experience on my desktop. This article confirms that that instinct was correct. It was both tragically hilarious and informative. Thanks for sharing!
“don’t care for” is just a polite way to say “don’t like”. The author does care, at least enough to write a fairly lengthy blog post, they just don’t like Gnome and expressed in in a somewhat dated manner. You of course don’t have to care, and as the blog says, if you like Gnome, you do you.
Out of curiosity, was there anything in the post that resonated with you? “Oh yeah, that could be better” or “that does annoy me”, something along those lines?
There are only two things that resonate with me/that annoys me.
its outdated and or factually wrong and or the author actively tries to be dumb.
What do I mean with that? Take a look at the outdated tour section. The tour nowadays says not just super key, but super (windows) key. And you use that key to open up overview. The next screen tells about how to type anywhere when you in the overview. The author tries to play dumb and writes that writing anywhere on the tour doesn’t do anything. The user was literally told how to access the overview 1 second ago! The only good thing about that section is, that yes gnome-tour should detect when there is a touchscreen device so instead of offering the super (windows) key way it should offer the gesture way.
Then another one in the “Double-click to Maximize: Challange Mode”. The user could just rightclick and then choose Maximize. Or double click on the Files text. Why Gnome and derivatives (looking at you ElementaryOS) choose to hide Minimize and Maximize from Window Controls I don’t know, but its okay, as I just drag the Window to the border or use the double/right click or use Super Arrow Keys to manage my windows.
Then another one when it comes to the Display settings. The author fails to play dumb and immediately knows what those Rotation Icons mean on the KDE settingspage, maybe because their Screen has a stand (mine does not its mounted). So why do they give gnome flack for using text? Landscape is Landscape mode, everyone knows how that looks like. Portrait Left / Right. Yeah I guess the author never hold a Phone or a Photo in their hand?
Oh no! An opionated desktop environment, what should we do?!
In the case of GNOME they take their whole toolkit with them. Obviously you can switch DEs but it’s still sad and annoying to see. From 5 years ago but still holds up: https://ubuntu-mate.community/t/horrible-gtk3-gnome-ui-design-is-leaking-into-ubuntu-mate-applications-in-20-04/22028/58.
The problem is that they have bad opinions. Very, very bad ones
The fix is on most of the distros you can switch easily without losing data
And which would that be?
Warning: long read
https://woltman.com/gnome-bad/
Speaking as someone who never used Gnome, has only ever used Cinnamon, I was recently shopping for distros to try on an old work laptop. My only real awareness of Gnome was via the Gnome Terminal that ships with Linux Mint, which I’ve replaced with Konsole because Gnome Terminal has really minimal functionality and feels like Baby’s First Terminal. I browsed the Gnome org’s website to try to see why I should choose Gnome, in their words. I noped out as soon as they started trying to sell Gnome as being a phone-like experience on my desktop. This article confirms that that instinct was correct. It was both tragically hilarious and informative. Thanks for sharing!
okay finished, as the first sentence literally said that the writer doesn’t care, and why should I?
“don’t care for” is just a polite way to say “don’t like”. The author does care, at least enough to write a fairly lengthy blog post, they just don’t like Gnome and expressed in in a somewhat dated manner. You of course don’t have to care, and as the blog says, if you like Gnome, you do you.
Out of curiosity, was there anything in the post that resonated with you? “Oh yeah, that could be better” or “that does annoy me”, something along those lines?
There are only two things that resonate with me/that annoys me.
What do I mean with that? Take a look at the outdated tour section. The tour nowadays says not just super key, but super (windows) key. And you use that key to open up overview. The next screen tells about how to type anywhere when you in the overview. The author tries to play dumb and writes that writing anywhere on the tour doesn’t do anything. The user was literally told how to access the overview 1 second ago! The only good thing about that section is, that yes gnome-tour should detect when there is a touchscreen device so instead of offering the super (windows) key way it should offer the gesture way.
Then another one in the “Double-click to Maximize: Challange Mode”. The user could just rightclick and then choose Maximize. Or double click on the Files text. Why Gnome and derivatives (looking at you ElementaryOS) choose to hide Minimize and Maximize from Window Controls I don’t know, but its okay, as I just drag the Window to the border or use the double/right click or use Super Arrow Keys to manage my windows.
Then another one when it comes to the Display settings. The author fails to play dumb and immediately knows what those Rotation Icons mean on the KDE settingspage, maybe because their Screen has a stand (mine does not its mounted). So why do they give gnome flack for using text? Landscape is Landscape mode, everyone knows how that looks like. Portrait Left / Right. Yeah I guess the author never hold a Phone or a Photo in their hand?
I could go on and on… but I don’t wanna.