Desktop Metaphor

On Wed, 24 Oct 2018 at 17:35, Rick Bensene <rickb at bensene.com> wrote: Oh good. I am relieved. :-) For clarity, for example -- GNOME 3 isn't Win95-like. But it was designed by removing the bits MS said were its patented IP -- taskbar with buttons for each app window, start menu, etc. -- and replacing them with a dock-like app launcher/switcher and a full-screen iconic app launcher. It's also very instructive to look at the mockups of GNOME 3 before release: http://www.vuntz.net/journal/post/2008/10/22/494-desktop-shell-from-the-use… https://wiki.gnome.org/ThreePointZero/DesignHistory https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/GnomeShell/Design/Iterations/AppBrowsingAlt… https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/GnomeShell/Design/Iterations/AppBrowsingAlt… Very text-heavy and cluttered. Then the test versions of Unity started to appear in late 2010: http://www.webupd8.org/2011/03/ubuntu-1104-alpha-3-is-out-screenshots.html Then look how GNOME 3.0 looked! https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1123050/ https://www.gnome-look.org/s/Gnome/p/1111022/ Unity, of course, is very visibly Mac OS X-like. Single panel at the top, containing an app name at the left, then a global menu bar, then status icons. Down the left, a Dock-like launcher containing both app launchers and running apps (with an indicator to show they're open), folder shortcuts and minimised windows. OS X defaults to putting this at the bottom but I personally move it to the left -- more efficient use of space on widescreens, and doesn't clash with menu bars on the right. Window controls are on the left, so that if a window is maximised, they don't get lose in among the indicators on the right... but again, like on a Mac. (NeXT's dock was on the right, but then its scrollbars were on the left. There was also a wharf for minimised windows at the bottom, which is a bit confusing.) To keep things a _little_ different from OS X, Ubuntu's app name is truncated, the global menus are hidden until mouseover, and the dock doesn't grow or shrink, but these are fairly superficial differences. The GNOME foundation refused Ubuntu's attempted code contributions, but I think that it's visible that they took design cues from Unity. But GNOME is trying to do something a little different. There's an almost frantic effort to remove anything which isn't essential. Generic app-global functions are moved into a single menu in the top panel; there's no global menu bar. The launcher/dock thing is only visible in overview mode, in other words, more aggressively hidden than mere autohide. Maximise/minimise buttons are hidden by default, and menu bars are discouraged, as are separate toolbars and separate title bars -- all are merged into a single strip. This is a desktop for people who don't do much window management. The tooling is for people who run apps full-screen all the time, and switch between them. I don't work like that, so it annoys me. But I digress. I think the points here are two-fold: [1] There is one extant FOSS Linux desktop that's totally un-Windows-like... but the influence, albeit 2nd-hand, of the Mac is plainly visible. Additionally, it was created by removing elements of a Win95-style desktop and changing the functions of what was left, and it shows. [2] The eventual relative popularity of GNOME 3 at least demonstrates people's willingness to _try_ something different if there are benefits. Budgie, TBH, I don't understand. I don't know why it exists. It's basically a very jiggered-about Win9x desktop, with a sort of top-panel-cum-taskbar and a dock bolted on. It does nothing you couldn't achieve far easier by reconfiguring Xfce or LXDE, so I don't know why they bothered. It seems to me to offer no benefits or improvements. It's just a bit of a different spin on GNOME 3, making it slightly more Mac-like, without being Mac-like enough to interest me. :-) -- Liam Proven - Profile: https://about.me/liamproven Email: lproven at cix.co.uk - Google Mail/Hangouts/Plus: lproven at gmail.com Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven - Skype/LinkedIn: liamproven UK: +44 7939-087884 - ?R (+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal): +420 702 829 053