Re: On User Interface, again..

[Steve Tyler <styler ventro com>]

Hi,

I've been reading the discussion on what should go into Gnome 2.0, 2.x,
etc, and I've read a lot of great things, probably all of which
should/will be done at some point or another.  I have faith that the
changes required to make the user experience better will happen, but
before that can happen the platform needs to be ready.  This, as far as
I can tell, is a simple fact of life..

..if you build a house without any foundations it'll fall down so you
should dig the foundations first even though you may be getting wet from
the rain....

So, my point is, regardless of what the world says about Gnome 2.0 upon
it's release, if it doesn't have a good foundation it stands a chance of
falling down.  I believe that it's better to get rained on with the
knowledge that the good things will come.

I very much appreciate all the effort of the Gnome Hackers (whomever the
may be...) as they have created something that I not only like to use
but that I believe has what it takes to evolve into something world
beating and that's no easy feat.

This message has been an attempt to provide encouragement to those who
need it, for what it is worth.

Thanks,

Steve Tyler


On Fri, 2001-10-12 at 09:30, Alan wrote:
    On Fri, Oct 12, 2001 at 05:34:07PM +0200, Raphael Bosshard wrote:
    > i'm using Gnome for quite a while now, and i like it. But, to be
    > honest,I don't know why i like it. Perhaps 'cause im like fantasy-stuff,
    > and keep imaging that little gnome working behind my windows.
    > 
    > I truely don't know. But what i know is, that is isn't because of
    > beautyness and the style of gnome. kde wins here, three thumbs up. when
    > i first heard sun's usability-project i jumped and expected major ui
    > changes for the next gnome. now i am afraid that these hopes were just
    > dreams.
    > 
    > People expect major changes for Gnome 2.0. These changes are here, for
    > the underlying libraries, for gtk, pango and so on. But from what i
    > heard until now, not for the UI.
    > 
    > I dont have much experience in programming. I can code c, i even
    > programed some gtk-applications and some stupid little sdl-games, but
    > thats it. I see gnome from a user-perspecive. and from this perspecive
    > gnome is a bis... well.. disappointing. gtkText and gtkTree will change.
    > But the new text-selector wont get into gnome 2.0 and all other things
    > (i'm a user, remeber. no develpoer) will stay as they are.
    > Don't do that. Don't disappoint the user base.
    
    I have to agree with Ralphael.  I love gnome, and use it over kde, but
    lets be honest, in a way it's just a glorified program launcher, or at
    least that's what I (as a programmer) use it for.... I have my browser
    (galeon), my email (xfmail) and a bunch of powershells.  I don't know
    whether I use it this way because it's just a program launcher, or
    because that's the way I work.  I realize that there's the underlying
    bonobo and COM type communication, and don't get me wrong, it's very
    cool, but it still doesn't *feel* cohesive, you know?
    
    KDE I don't like, it's slow, and I don't like the L&F of it, but what it
    does have is a feel of everything working togeather and being connected.
    
    Gnome 2.0, being a pretty major revision number, should have far more
    visible changes IMHO.  There have been some great ideas thrown around
    this list for the last year or so including changes to the panel, the
    menus, the way things are organized, and the way that things should work
    togeather, but none of those seem to be adopted (at least from what I've
    seen).  I'm looking forward to 2.0 of course, and anticipate the
    antialiased text and so on, and the minor changes, but from the
    conversation I've seen there aren't going to be any major amazing
    wonderful wacky zany changes to the *user* experience.  
    
    I guess that once the new libs are all in and stabalized things will
    start changing, as if everything in the core libs are still changing
    thers's not a lot of sense in redoing component X right now.  IMHO I
    still think that the GNOME desktop user experience has to do something
    new to make itself stand out from KDE, windows, Mac, etc.  
    
    Ok, 'nuff ranting for now.
    
    > ps. Gnome needs a mascot. Perhaps a gnome.
    
    Right click on the panel, choose 'about gnome', and then type 'gnome' on
    the window :)   (Not really a mascot so much, but still cool).
    
    Best regards,
    
    Alan
    
    -- 
    Arcterex <arcterex userfriendly org>   -==-   http://arcterex.net
    "I used to herd dairy cows. Now I herd lusers. Apart from the isolation, I
    think I preferred the cows. They were better conversation, easier to milk, and
    if they annoyed me enough, I could shoot them and eat them." -Rodger Donaldson
    
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