GNOME Work Is Underway For Sharper Background Images

[Guest]

Wow, the desktop where is not possible to have desktop icons gets sharper wallpapers...
Wow, this is really funny!

Android tends to compress wallpapers to JPEGs that look like garbage, and I think Windows drops the quality of wallpapers substantially as well. This really seems to be the industry standard, not having a properly looking wallpaper.

[xinorom]

Lets be honest, if we ignore the trolls from both sides of the spectrum, by comparing this thread to others around here, you immediately notice that there is something wrong with gnome3's user interface.

Few topics gather so many negative comments.

Considering that even those who use gnome3 don't really like it "as is" and find the need to make heavy modifications to get things working their way, I think we can all agree that the current user interface is not adequate and requires an overhaul.

I understand that the gnome foundation and some of their developers don't want to face reality and their man hood does not allow them to face the music. If they continue with the current user interface, eventually the gnome foundation and its developers will be the only ones using it.

100% agree. I really tried to like gnome 3, but the constant bugs, severe performance issues and developers trying to force mobile UI paradigms down desktop user's throats made me give up on it eventually. It's sad how stubborn and short sighted the gnome developers are. Jamie Zawinski's criticism is just as relevant today as it was 17 years ago...

[Danny3]

No, you don't need to use an extension. Your file manager can provide the icons, as it always has in Gnome. Gnome removed this from their FM because it was unmaintained and nobody was interested in supporting it, while they said the feature was blocking other things. Personally, I think that the desktop space should be managed by the desktop shell rather than a file manager or web browser, but if all you want are the Windows 95-like icons, your FM provides that for you. Caja is a fork of the traditional Gnome file manager and it still supports desktop icons.

So when I compared this to being able to run Firefox on KDE, I was being quite literal. KDE has its own web browser, but you can use other web browsers if you want to. In the same way, Gnome has its own file manager, but if you want to use another, you're more than welcome to.

Then they didn't improve anything in this area since Gnome 2.
I remember that it was the same talk then about the FM drawing the icons on the desktop and that I tried a compiz plugin which put 4 different wallpapers on the 4 horizontal sides (workspaces) of the cube and I lost the icons on the desktop if I wanted that plugin to be enabled, so after seeing this disadvantage I disabled it.
I agree with you that the desktop space should be managed by something else and not the FM and I know Caja from the time when I was using Ubuntu MATE.
And I'm not sure if installing it in Gnome 3 would complete solve my problem with desktop icons.
I am using desktop icons for the things that I want to open most often like:
Programs
Files, like config files in /etc..., php.ini, log files
Folders, like HTdocs in my web server root or other folder that I need to open often fast
Etcher.AppImage

The programs are shortcuts from the start menu (Add to desktop)
The Files and folders I make them with symlinks from the terminal, probably can be done graphically also, but I don't know how.
Etcher is the full portable executable that I run it everytime when I need to burn some ISO on a flash drive.

So I use different types of shortcuts on my desktop and I don't know if all these would work if I install Caja in Gnome 3.
In any case, I use KDE Plasma which has built-in very good support for all these, even for opening the target of a shortcut on desktop with superuser privileges like some programs require.
I don't see any point into losing so much time to fix a DE that should have this feature built-in like 99% of others.
Linux is already a mess of things glued together with duct tape, I don't need and I don't want to do this even with my DE.

So thanks again for all the explanations and possibilities, but I think it's too much work to fix something that others have fixed for many years.
I don't think I will ever try again Gnome 3, especially now after I discovered KDE Plasma which makes me very happy.

[Britoid]

Britoid Said extension has its own upstream including bug tracker.

Yes, but they see it as "part of GNOME" and have no idea it's not. Desktop icons are also not part of the GNOME workflow so it causes further fragmentation.

[jo-erlend]

Then they didn't improve anything in this area since Gnome 2.

Except for removing the desktop management from the FM and adding it as extensions to the shell itself. I think that it would be a bad idea to hardcode all imaginable features to the shell in case someone, somewhere would want to use it.

I remember that it was the same talk then about the FM drawing the icons on the desktop and that I tried a compiz plugin which put 4 different wallpapers on the 4 horizontal sides (workspaces) of the cube and I lost the icons on the desktop if I wanted that plugin to be enabled, so after seeing this disadvantage I disabled it.

I don't know of any way to avoid that. It's a window. How would many different apps have complete control over the same window at the same time without any strange behaviours occurring?

I agree with you that the desktop space should be managed by something else and not the FM and I know Caja from the time when I was using Ubuntu MATE.

Then you should support the effort to add the features to the shell itself.

So I use different types of shortcuts on my desktop and I don't know if all these would work if I install Caja in Gnome 3.

I don't know why it wouldn't. It's always worked well before?

I don't see any point into losing so much time to fix a DE that should have this feature built-in like 99% of others.
Linux is already a mess of things glued together with duct tape, I don't need and I don't want to do this even with my DE.

Replacing a file manager app is nowhere near as challenging as replacing IE6 with Firefox or Chrome was and that's something normal people did. Are you sure your bias isn't causing you to overreact a bit here?

I don't think I will ever try again Gnome 3, especially now after I discovered KDE Plasma which makes me very happy.

Good for you. KDE has always been a great desktop, but for me, I think it was just a little too much; too many features and settings everywhere. I don't really tinker much with my desktops; I prefer them to be as close as possible to what I need and not much more. The only reasonable way I know how to do that, is to keep the basic desktop very simple and then adding features through extensions. How those extensions are managed, is a separate question. I think they should be managed by distros in-house.

Anyway, this community of ours would be so much better if people could focus on the products they like and use rather than the ones they don't like and don't use. It's not just that we should avoid collaborating on portraying Free Software as complete rubbish, which is the obvious result when we only talk about what makes the other bad. It's also the simple fact that when you talk about products you don't actually use, your information is much more limited and the community gets dumbed down over time.

[Britoid]

Britoid Tough luck. That’s bug triage issues.

I'm sure GNOME developers appreciate having to look at bugs introduced by downstreams.

[Charlie68]

That processor is straight up not capable of running the heaps of high level code Gnome is built on. You should use anything else besides cinnamon or gnome and it should work perfectly.

I have to update my previous post...
I redone the USB stick and I redid the installation of Ubuntu 19.10, I think that in the first installation something went wrong, now Gnome Shell works fairly well, no lag that I previously described, now it seems usable, the only irritating thing, is the slowness in accessing the activities and the dashboard, even clicking super, it takes a little too long for my taste.
However it is now usable ... of course I know the limit of this notebook, but I mainly need it for surfing the internet, mailing and writing texts with LibreOffice.
However, I prefer Gnome Shell vanilla, I find it to be a useless waste of space, the dock on the left and the panel at the top.
Of course, when I work, I always prefer to have everything under visual control, windows, applications etc., but actually as it is set in Ubuntu, the space of the content becomes limited for no reason. Here, however, we are only in the context of personal tastes.
I don't think I'll stay with Gnome, I appreciate their work, but it's not done for me, so I'll go back to Plasma.

[skeevy420]

All you have to do is visit extension.gnome.org and install extension by clicking one switch. You can do it in less than minute including visiting page. Some distros has this extensions in repo so you don't even have to install it manually. What about apps? Are you using only builtin because you don't want to "spend a couple weeks" installing your favorites?

I can agree GNOME has disadvantages but I think this whole desktop icons discussion is way too loud. Some peoples criticize this like somebody from GNOME team would forbid they having icons on their desktops and block it.

What part of "we don't want to update our OS which updates Gnome to a version our plugins aren't compatible with which then breaks our desktop unless we either quit using plugins or downgrade Gnome" do you not get or understand?

I know where to get extensions. Simply put -- my desktop will not rely on 3rd party plugins from some website.

[Mez']

All you have to do is visit extension.gnome.org and install extension by clicking one switch. You can do it in less than minute including visiting page. Some distros has this extensions in repo so you don't even have to install it manually. What about apps? Are you using only builtin because you don't want to "spend a couple weeks" installing your favorites?

I can agree GNOME has disadvantages but I think this whole desktop icons discussion is way too loud. Some peoples criticize this like somebody from GNOME team would forbid they having icons on their desktops and block it.

I suppose that for most people here it is easy to manage through it. But for user lambda it's not that easy. First he has to be aware that he can install extensions. It's not exactly explained anywhere after a fresh install. Then where to get and install them (not even mentioning it's weird to do it from a browser).
That's an active approach involved here that could already be a dealbreaker for some.

When I was forced to switch back to Gnome from Unity 1-2 years ago (having never experienced Gnome since 2011), it took me a short while to understand where to find and how to install those extensions (going on the extension website), and I know my way around Linux... Imagine a computer illiterate trying to figure that out.
You also have to activate these extensions (user themes is one) or configure them through Gnome Tweaks, which is usually not installed by default. That's a step you're not mentioning. I really don't believe it's that easy for potential newcomers. It needs some awareness and some looking up.

Even better, extensions can get installed via Gnome Software under Add-ons section.

I've missed that one. In my defense, I've been using Synaptic for as long as I can remember (2006 I guess).

[Mez']

I use GNOME with no extensions

How is that even possible? Are you allright?