Re: Gnome objectives

["dE ." <de techno gmail com>]

On Wed, Nov 24, 2010 at 10:37 PM, Alessandro Crismani
<alessandro crismani gmail com> wrote:
> Il giorno mer, 24/11/2010 alle 20.17 +0530, dE . ha scritto:
>> > Alt+Tab for window switching is definately better than anything else
>> > out there. It groups similar windows yet make it clear which window
>> is
>> > on what workspace. Very nice.
>>
>> I find groping windows a big disadvantage, both in the activity menu
>> and the alt-tab grouping and here I'll state why -
>>
>> Suppose there are 2 instances of iceweasel running , and I wanna
>> quickly switch among them, what do I have to do, method 1 -
>>
>> alt tab, unfortunately I have to alt tab many times to get to
>> iceweasel since I'm running a few applications around, to top that
>> off, the 2 instances of that Iceweasle will be stated as 1, as a
>> result, I have to wait on  iceweasel till it shows the different
>> instances running, and then I have to grab a hold of the mouse click
>> on the desired instance (I dont know nor wanna know the shortcut
>> bindings, nor does 95% of the world).
>
> I also support the shell's Alt+Tab behaviour, even though sometimes I am
> still confused by grouping. Despite this, switching apps from all
> workspaces and showing only icons is *FAR* better than other available
> solutions.
The only difference between the classic alt-tab and the shell alt-tab
is grouping, that apparently you don't like... so what's the
advantage?

If you want to switch application from other workspaces, the classic
task bar has the option to show all tasks running in all work spaces,
the solution is already available for years. As compared to
registering multiple alt-tabs a single click on the task bar is easier
to perform if you're in touch with the mouse.

> Adding more, I tried KDE icons only Alt+Tab switching for all
> workspaces, and when I have many apps open (let's say four terminals and
> four gvims) it gets far more confusing than grouping.
> Finally, *I* think that if you want to use Alt+Tab you are willing to
> learn shortcuts.

Ok, so if you've multiple windows opened in a single desktop only then
grouping is useful. But the alternative and better solution to this is
grouping similar applications together with the classic alt tab (if
the user allows). That way you don't have to wait for the groups to
appear.

All the alt tab behavior stated here can be implemented in the classic
desktop So the main advantage of gnome shell doesn't lie here.

> Regarding other aspects of the shell, I am more productive when using it
> because it hides unnecessary windows from my view when I do not need
> them.

Apparently I've not discovered this feature, can you please elaborate?

> I place what I currently need in a workspace and use Alt+Tab or
> the overview to switch between windows. While doing this I am not
> distracted by shiny taskbars, urgent windows, popups or anything which
> disrupt my task.

The shiny task bar can be auto hidden, but that activity bar cannot,
why don't you get districted with that? furthermore it's placed on top
which's a more visible position. And still it'll be easier to access
the tasks than then shell way.

By popups you mean, if some of my daemons crashed, or the hard drive
is crashing, the warning messages will be suppressed by Gnome shell.
This behavior can also be mimicked in the classic gnome-desktop and
KDE does this now, right away.

> You might be right saying that some tasks require more
> clicks to be accomplished, however I do not care as long as the shell
> provides me the means to keep focused on what's on the current
> workspace.
But it can be done with the classic desktop also, after changing a
small amount of code rather remaking the desktop from scratch.

> Before using the gnome shell, I was in and out of compiz Expo
> view and clicking every two seconds on taskbars, losing control over
> what I was doing.
:D :D Clicking every 2 seconds on the task bar means changing a
windows in every 2 seconds, can you do the same that fast in alt tab?
And how will it be more convenient?

> Now I can't and I am glad for that, it improved my
> ways of getting things done. You might say that I could have removed
> taskbars and disabled Expo before, than the options left for switching
> windows would have been definitely worse than what the shell offers now.
> Summarising, read this paragraph as: people think that less clicks
> equals to better design, for me it's not always true.
>
> I am sorry if the shell is broken for you, however do consider that
> other people (me) like it's behaviour, and do not find launchers on the
> panel, taskbars, live previews Al+Tab or other existing solutions more
> convenient.
>

You can get the same convince by modifying the old desktop, or by
adding a few code to it (which the gnome team can do easily).

If you're very much bound to the shortcuts, then the same can be
implemented in Gnome 2.

Most of your problems lie around alt-tab, and that's not the major
change in gnome, the major change is that tool box to the left which
you need to access again and again, minimizing the whole desktop for
it to launch every small application.

Till now I don't see any real reason for developing gnome-shell -- it
appears to be a complete waist of effort. All enhancements that people
are liking here can be easily done in the classic desktop.

If Gnome devs expect people to use alt-tab or other shortcuts, then
only 5% of the people on earth will adopt it, rest 95% will stay away
from Gnome. That's what I'm trying to explain -- Shell should be a
sideways project like KDEs netbook interface. Then Gnome will be the
only DE to have mandatory composting and we're still struggling with
bad drivers on Linux. Also notice that multiple applications with
composting enabled slows down the graphs major + the performance of
things like Blender drops to half. Sadly there's no way to turn it
off.

My concerns are if someone comes with a design with a classic desktop
which refers to all the features of gnome shell, will the gnome team
quit the idea of shell?

> Cheers,
> Alessandro
>
>
>
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