Compiz and complexity

["Allan E. Registos" <allan registos smpc steniel com ph>]

>>From: Rovanion Luckey <rovanion luckey gmail com>

>>
>>  I think it is very helpful for gnome-shell to have the effects turned off
>> when it detects a video card is not capable of 3d acceleration due to these
>> scenarios: old video card or no driver installed.
>>

>The entire Gnome Shell UI is build using Clutter and it uses OpenGL to draw
>everything. So basically, if you don't have a graphics card and a driver
>that supports OpenGL you will not be able tu run Gnome Shell.

Ok. So the option of using gnome 3' gnome-shell is not possible for older video cards I supposed, but the devs may have prepared a way to use a different shell for older video cards.


>>This is only my opinion, effects must be trimmed down to only a few, not

>> like compiz to avoid complexity. Compiz in my opinion is still not
>> production ready, application compatibility must be the primary goal when
>> developing effects for the gnome-shell, for example, if I cannot run 3d
>> games while gnome-shell is the default DE, then it is a show-stopper, not to
>> mention blender, CAD and other 3D applications.
>>

>From: Rovanion Luckey <rovanion luckey gmail com>

>Compiz has been production ready and used in distsributions for very long by
>now. When stating about Compiz as to complex for the end user you might be
>thinking about the Compiz Config Settings Manager which is a very feture
>rich and complex configuration tool.

You are right. My issues of using compiz, I think were isolated, so compiz is production ready for the rest of the population.

>From: Rovanion Luckey <rovanion luckey gmail com>

>    If you feel baffled by the CCSM or feel that your grandmother will
>probably not want to get into all that just for changing an animation you
>might want to look into the Simple Compiz Config Settings Manager, which as
>the name hints is a more simple approach to configuring Compiz. Now
>admittedly it is not a revolution when it comes to design but it does the
>job.
>    The point I'm trying to make is even tough the underlying architecture
>is expandable and configurable in every way the user might want it does not
>mean that the every day user has to face that interface. In fact there are
>few situations in a modern Linux distributions where the user is required to
>edit config files, well except of xorg.conf, which could be regarded as the
>most direct way of configuration. The trick is hiding away the complexities
>for the every day user but still having the configurability there for the
>enthusiast.
>    The reason why it is important to ensnare the enthusiast is because that
>is the very thing that shapes the Linux community. There are a few sets of
>companies that hire have personnel working on various open source projects
>that the end consumer ends up using, *tips his hat at the red one* , but
>that does not diminish the importance of the community.
>
>So I would argue that it is important that Gnome Shell is extensible and
>configurable because that is what will benefit "Linux" as a platform in the
>long run.

I might be confusing the way OSX and MS Windows handling of their respective graphical UIs and comparing it with gnome-shell when suggesting the need of simplicity. The difference is that gnome-shell was developed in an open manner while Aqua and Windows NT's graphical UIs were developed in a closed fashion, so the complexity of those interfaces only lies within their premises not to the public, while gnome-shell and other FOSS projects lies both the complexity and simplicity to the whole public at the same time. So you are also correct this time. But I need to consider that most of the gnome-shell's testers are not developers in the perspective of the gnome-shell.

-Allan E. Registos