Post #233,527
11/11/05 9:58:58 AM
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That's one of the reasons I keep checking it out.
It's a good thing I run all those from within KDE, including having GAIM 'integrated' into the KDE taskbar, eh? Of course, I can't make fine tweaks to the appearance of those apps from KDE, but that's a good thing anyway, right? The only thing I'm missing is drag'n'dropping attachments from the filemanager... I'm crippled! *grin*
At the end of the day, the desktop environment sucks, largely because of Nautilus, to be specific. It's slow, doesn't always behave (network functionality, samba, etc.) and while the 'spatial' paradigm was an order better than the Windows 3.1 filemanager (as shown by Warp), my impression of the implementation w/Nautilus is that it's designed to clutter up my desktop.
If you define usability as 'you can only use it in the manner that the Gnome developers dictate', you might have a point.
As I pointed out in an earlier post, the red herring of characterizing having the ability to configure as 'configuring endlessly...' while characterising the DELIBERATE INABILITY to do fine configuration as a '...desktop with proper usability' is rationalisation, pure and simple. It's a pretty irrational rationalisation, too.
[link|http://www.runningworks.com|
] Imric's Tips for Living
- Paranoia Is a Survival Trait
- Pessimists are never disappointed - but sometimes, if they are very lucky, they can be pleasantly surprised...
- Even though everyone is out to get you, it doesn't matter unless you let them win.
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Nothing is as simple as it seems in the beginning,
As hopeless as it seems in the middle,
Or as finished as it seems in the end.
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Post #233,539
11/11/05 10:35:26 AM
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Forget usability for a moment.
Let's talk about testing.
Now, most [Ff]ree software in this world is tested in a "ship it to the users and see if they break it" kind of way, assuming of course the developers don't just adopt a "it compiles, ship/commit it" methodology.
This produces the kind of stability we've come to know and love. There's a cute KDE Krash Wizard thing. GNOME has something similar - Bug Buddy, I think it's called.
Every option, every checkbox and every slider produces a codepath that needs testing - and not just unit testing, but integration testing. KDE's configurability has brought it to the point of essential untestability - and this is borne out by observing the number of times the KDE Krash Kollektor pops up - in my recent (KDE 3.4 for a week) experiment, I saw it daily, reporting Krashes for all sorts of things; I mean, the panel (inexplicably called "kicker") had a very wobbly afternoon.
If you're an extremist, every configuration option represents a design decision that was shirked by the application designer.
Take a simple thing. OS X buttons. You can make them Aqua (pretty colours) or Graphite (grey). Why does Graphite exist? Is this a design decision that is shirked? Well, sort of. Graphite exists because you can't have spangly buttons in spangly colours if you're trying to do subtle colour work (if you're a professional designer or artist).
The purist in me says "Well, make them graphite all the time, then, and never mind having spangly things. Don't you people have work to do?"
The realist says "OK, give people the choice, but keep it simple; spangly or not-spangly. This provides the sensible limit on what we've got to test."
In KDE, I can not only change my buttons, but their colour, contrast, style, window style. And in the window style, I can move my buttons around (depending on whether the window style them supports this). With my software testing hat on, there's corner cases and whatnot all over this, but you can bet your arse it's been tested on the "well, no-one's filed a bug on it so it must be perfick" approach.
(The snark in me observes that of all the themes and styles and stuff shipped with KDE, there's not a single one that doesn't look like arse, but that's just me).
We've talked an awful lot about usability, but software that stays up is more usable than software that's just shown you the KDE Krash Kollector or the GNOME buG Buddy.
GNOME 2.10 crashes less than KDE on the same linux distro (Ubuntu) than KDE 3.4.
Peter
[link|http://www.no2id.net/|Don't Let The Terrorists Win]
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
[link|http://guildenstern.dyndns.org|Home]
Use P2P for legitimate purposes!
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Post #233,544
11/11/05 10:56:31 AM
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EXACT opposite on Mepis
Where Gnome crashes, and runs poorly if at all. When it runs, functionality is, well, reduced.
KDE is rock solid, never crashes, and I have NEVER SEEN the crash wizard thing you are talking about... And I got KDE3.4 by updating from 3.3 via apt.
Perhaps it is the less vetted/experimental things that Ubuntu uses? You know the focus is NOT on KDE there. I don't go over the 'unstable' branch, myself.
[link|http://www.runningworks.com|
] Imric's Tips for Living
- Paranoia Is a Survival Trait
- Pessimists are never disappointed - but sometimes, if they are very lucky, they can be pleasantly surprised...
- Even though everyone is out to get you, it doesn't matter unless you let them win.
|
Nothing is as simple as it seems in the beginning,
As hopeless as it seems in the middle,
Or as finished as it seems in the end.
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Post #233,570
11/11/05 1:34:34 PM
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That is my biggest irritation about Linux distros
It is not true that free software all just ships and is tested by users. There are many segments of the community which have strong testing philosophies. For instance any decent CPAN module comes with regression tests.
However Linux distributions inevitably throw out all of these tests. I know that my Ubuntu distribution has problems with the locale. When I install CPAN modules by hand, their tests break on that. But the same CPAN modules are available from within Ubuntu, and I have every reason to believe that they still would not pass their unit tests. But there is no way that someone using the Linux distribution would notice that fact. And it is far from obvious where someone like me should report the bug.
Cheers,
Ben
I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
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Post #233,548
11/11/05 11:19:45 AM
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Spatial == ass, IMO
I've never understood why people like that trash. It requires entirely too much navigation and window-popping and other futzery.
Regards,
-scott anderson
"Welcome to Rivendell, Mr. Anderson..."
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Post #233,778
11/12/05 2:07:20 PM
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What is "spatial"?
When I was running Warp I wasn't really satisfied with file management until I bought Object Desktop, which made the folders behave in a lot more convenient fashion.
I miss Object Desktop. I've got it running on XP, but it's really not the same thing. OD on OS/2 was *useful*.
"We are all born originals -- why is it so many of us die copies?"
- Edward Young
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Post #233,782
11/12/05 2:51:56 PM
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Spatial: each folder gets its own window
They stay where you put them, etc.
I can't stand it... To navigate down a directory hierarchy 5-deep you end up with 4 useless windows open. Tree-view is much more convenient to me.
Regards,
-scott anderson
"Welcome to Rivendell, Mr. Anderson..."
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Post #233,785
11/12/05 3:31:09 PM
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Spring-loaded folders roxxor.
You drag your way through, and a seemingly-horrific trail of open windows is left. You drop at the target, and kablooie! The detritus disappears.
Only available on OS X, AFAIK.
Peter
[link|http://www.no2id.net/|Don't Let The Terrorists Win]
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
[link|http://guildenstern.dyndns.org|Home]
Use P2P for legitimate purposes!
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Post #233,787
11/12/05 4:13:42 PM
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They're patented by Apple.
--
Chris Altmann
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Post #233,788
11/12/05 4:18:16 PM
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That's one of the reasons why I prefer File Commander.
IIRC, [link|http://www.xworkplace.org/proj_xwp_features.html|XWorkplace] on OS/2 let one choose between "close parent when opening child" and "just open child" behavior on each folder if desired. That could be handy if you needed to work on a parent and children simultaneously.
Most of the time I do my file management stuff with [link|http://silk.apana.org.au/fc.html|File Commander]. It's available for Win32 and OS/2 and the Win32 .exe is only ~ 320 kB. It's shareware. (Grab the development version to use the latest code.) Unfortunately, Brian hasn't released a Linux version (and it's not clear from the mailing list if he's working on one). If I need to drill down to a deep subdirectory I can use the tree view, or down-arrow+Enter or simply cd subdirname (if subdirname is unique - it knows by examining a special text file it builds after the first refresh of a tree view). When I'm in the directory of interest, ctrl+w(indow) will open a graphical folder view if I want to do GUI things there. Alt-F4 closes it when I'm done.
I really don't like mousing around unless I have to... :-)
I'm aware of [link|http://www.ibiblio.org/mc/|GNU Midnight Commander] but it doesn't seem to be as polished. I have to admit I haven't played with it much so I don't really know how well they compare in their functionality.
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
(Who still sets up Winders to have each child open in a new window.)
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