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Re: We want task bar back. Pretty please.

On 05/06/2011 06:37 AM, Denys Vlasenko wrote:

On Thu, 2011-05-05 at 17:36 -0500, Ryan Peters wrote:

Somebody needs to take this thread out back behind the shed and put a
bullet through it's head for the good of humanity, so I volunteer to do so.

Denys, GNOME 3 is a radical change and you have a right to be upset, but
your responses have been rather rude. Asserting that the designers made
the change for no reason insults their intelligence; just because you
didn't read the design documents/pages that outlined what problems GNOME
3 would fix with it's design doesn't mean that they "changed for the
sake of it".

I *don't have to* read design documents every time I upgrade
to a new version of software. If I do, then said software is user
unfriendly.
You misread me. What I *said* was that you claimed that they changed the way things were simply for the sake of change; something proven false as soon as you read any design pages they have. I did not say that you have to read design pages to know how Shell works. It's very discoverable on it's own, but you can always use the built-in help application "yelp" to tell you how to use GNOME 3. Expecting GNOME 3 to be the same as every other OS is unrealistic; GNOME 3 is not a straightforward upgrade from GNOME 2 and requires re-training. I thought that was understood. 
Second, imitation isn't always the way to go. If GNOME simply stood the
same for years without changing, there would be no innovation.

I didn't say I am against any innovation. Scaled-down windows in window
switching are useful. Combining "app launch icon" and "switch to a
running app" icon is useful.

...Which GNOME 3 does, if I'm not mistaken.

I don't like disruptive innovation when it is not presented as an
option, but showed down my throat by force.
Tell me, how the particular bit of innovation which removed the
possibility to have app launch icons in top panes is useful?
Why this new thing (or rather, absence of old, perfectly working thing)
is not optional?
Explain to me how it's so hard to move your mouse to the left instead of upwards. All it takes to switch windows is an easy, fast tap on the windows key and clicking the window or icon you want. As I explained in my previous email, this can even be faster and more efficient than the GNOME 2 way of doing things if you get used to it. 
In
addition, your claim that GNOME "gives users no choice" is incredibly
false: you can enable Forced Fallback mode in System Settings to a GNOME
2-like UI which is meant for setups that cannot run the new GNOME 3.

Wrong. Fallback mode is not a choice, it was stated numerous times it
exists only because not every GPU supports features necessary
for Gnome 3. Whoever took refuge in fallback mode (most of my colleagues
did) is in for a nasty surprise a year from now or so.
...So, it's not a choice, yet it's a user-configurable option? Do you understand what the word "choice" means? I don't mean to sound rude; it really is a choice. Simply because it runs by default if you don't have a modern GPU doesn't mean that it isn't a choice. GNOME 3 is a modern desktop, and thus requires modern hardware. It's better in the long run to be this way. Most desktops and laptops (and even some netbooks) made in the last 5, maybe 7 years should be able to handle GNOME 3 without Fallback Mode just fine. 
However, it's called "Fallback Mode" for a reason; it's deprecated,
won't receive future updates unless they're extremely important, and

Exactly. It's not a viable long term choice.
I never said it was. If you want a "viable, long term choice" then I'd HIGHLY suggest to stop upgrading your Fedora install or get something like Red Hat or CentOS. Fedora, Ubuntu, OpenSUSE and the like are all semi-bleeding-edge distros (as opposed to, say, Arch, which is bleeding-edge). You don't *have* to upgrade every six months if you don't want to. The older versions are supported for a little while, but you'll get much more time out of Red Hat or CentOS, which are meant for enterprise deployment (and thus have slower release cycles). GNOME gives you choice: either try GNOME 3 as it is now (which has been suggested several times), use the Fallback Mode (which is discouraged), or simply wait until 3.2, 3.4, or another milestone later down the line where GNOME 3 will be more usable and configurable.
Do you remember the backlash when KDE4 came out? Vista? Even XP? Everybody loves Windows XP; there's a huge resistance to upgrade because people are so used to it. And yet, XP received a lot of negative backlash at first. Even GNOME 2 got a lot of negative comments when it was first released, but now that GNOME 2.32 is out and people are used to GNOME, they're now defending it as if it's the perfect desktop environment. If GNOME 3 truly isn't fit for you right now, there's a very good chance that it will be down the road. 
GNOME 3's default desktop is much better for a variety of reasons.

To me statements like these sound like a thinly veiled "we know better
what is good for you, dumbo" attitude. This isn't rude?
I'm talking design-wise. It fixes several problems with the old GNOME 2 UI. For example, no more annoying submenus <https://afaikblog.wordpress.com/2011/05/02/on-pointer-control/>, a consistent visual interface, better hardware integration, much better documentation (seriously, launch yelp; it's fantastic), and other problems. I didn't mean that it's better no matter what, I'm saying that they analyzed GNOME 2 and seriously think that GNOME 3 fixes several of it's problems. Also, many parts of GNOME 2 were hard to maintain, and GNOME 3, being fresh, is much simpler to maintain. 
I, as
well as the people working on developing and marketing GNOME 3, firmly
believe that GNOME 3 is the future, which is a good thing and not bad
like you suggest.

Don't you think that a bit of listening to your "customers" may be a
good thing?
Of course it is. When your "customers" refuse to learn a new way to use the desktop and demand that we drop everything we've done and go back to the old days, no matter what responses they've been given, though... Do you get my point? I'm trying as hard as I can to answer your concerns, and I'm not entirely sure what you're asking. I'm sorry that GNOME 3 apparently isn't usable for you, but unless you have evidence that the old ways are better, GNOME 3 won't change any time soon. You can, as has been suggested, use a GNOME Shell extension or a third-party dock to replicate the old behavior. It's relatively trivial to do so as well. 
You can switch windows with Alt+Tab and Alt+[key above Tab, usually `],
the former switching applications and the latter switching windows in an
application. It works very well and you should try it!

You missed the point. I miss task bar because it was showing me what
apps are running, not because it allowed me to switch between apps.
Hit the windows key and you get the titles *and* thumbnails of every window on your current workspace. Ctrl+Alt+Up/Down, or the workspace switcher on the right, lets you change workspaces. I'd argue that this is a much better solution than a window list, as it lets you pick you pick out the window you want simply from what it looks like, even without reading the window title (which is still present). In this way, GNOME 3 improves on GNOME 2's default functionality by combining the standard window list with an "Expose" type feature (as well as a dock on the left, referred to as the "dash"). 
in GNOME 2). Your claim that GNOME doesn't let you add launchers is also
false: right-click any running application (or any application in the
Applications menu or Search function) and click "Add to Favorites".

Again, you missed the point. Favorites are harder to access than old
launchers in top bar. For me it feels like totally unnecessary
regression. Why can't favorites sit on a top bar? Why they are hidden?
As I said, hit the windows key and move your mouse to the left. They stay hidden because they reduce distractions and make your workspace look minimal. It's relatively trivial to hit the windows key and move your mouse; once you're used to it, you might find yourself performing at least as well as you did under GNOME 2. It took me a few days to get used to it, for example.
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