GNOME 40 Beta Released With Many Improvements

[oiaohm]

Gnome certainly has a number of accessibility functions, including mouse keys, zoom, click assist, etc. Maybe you can recommend them to birdie .

Not really. Having those functions don't make the desktop perfect for all disable cases.

maybe because i didn't waste so much time as you on kde and windows, i know that gnome is perfectly usable without mouse/touch

I do accessibility. I will say that gnome is not perfectly usable in all cases. KDE is more useable in some of the cases without mouse/touch.

Both of you try getting around gnome keeping count of number of keyclicks required and the number of keys required.

You can get a long way around windows only using 8 keyboard keys. 4 arrow keys, space bar, enter, alt and windows key. KDE you need to mix in a alt-f key because alt + arrow will not get you into menu these days.

Please note disabled person may have a limited number of keys they can functionally push. Being able to get around something on a full keyboard does not mean it has the best accessibility for the disabled. Mouse keys driving desktop this way normally results in massive increase in number of keypresses required to drive the thing its not that the mouse keys don't have their place but if basic navigation around the desktop and applications is requiring them you are in trouble.


KDE vs Windows is only slightly worse to the point that its close enough. Gnome in a lot of cases is not close enough because you need to use too many keys and do too many keypress when you don't have a mouse to drive it. There are may changes that could be done to fix this without major alteration. KDE/qt allow alt+arrow to equal access menu in applications is all KDE would have todo as the menu in KDE/qt do have arrow key navigation all ready. Gnome try get around their current application menus with just the arrow keys. Gnome has made a mistake forcing alt+letter solution for accessibility as this expends the number of keys you must press massively when operating without a mouse.

Yes mouse keys when it comes to accessibility basically count as using a mouse.

[Sonadow]

Lastly, a desktop PC DE must be usable without the mouse/touch{screen|pad}. Gnome =>3, KDE => 4 and Windows >= 8 are all complete failures in this regard. Can't say anything about MacOS - never used it.

Why should a desktop GUI be able to be entirely keyboard driven? It's not as if it makes life any simpler.

Besides, it is possible to use Windows, Gnome3 and Plasma 5 with little mouse input. I'm doing it everyday.

Also, lots of people say that switching windows with a keyboard is much faster than using a mouse. That's really only true for desktops that aren't cluttered to the brim with windows. When there are more than 10 windows onscreen, the mouse is so much faster than even the 'window grid' view.

[pal666]

accessibility

i was meaning for non-disabled person with 10 fingers. what you do "in de" is largely switch between apps and run new app by name - those are simple and quick tasks in gnome. menu and other in-app widgets are not de-specific, it depends on application

[DKJones]

Originally posted by DKJones View Post
But sure, the people who like KDE, and not that GNOME garbage, are the trolls.

Funny.
Isn't hypocritical to post that comment especially from those disliking GNOME in this topic related to that desktop environment?

.

Maybe, but I was originally going to post something funny in the middle there, and kind of lost my thread. Besides, maybe the people who are saying KDE is better than GNOME aren't really trolling. Maybe they just think KDE is better than GNOME, and it's unfair to accuse them of trolling. I'm sure I could find comments on articles about KDE from GNOME fans saying GNOME is better, anyway. I disagree with them vehemently - I really don't see what GNOME fans see in GNOME, and going through its supposed advantages again isn't going to help, because IMO they're not advantages- but are they trolling?

[Sonadow]

You might want to be careful with running that command... 😋

Not going to try it myself, but logically it won't do anything bad. At least, until the next run of cp

[oiaohm]

i was meaning for non-disabled person with 10 fingers. what you do "in de" is largely switch between apps and run new app by name - those are simple and quick tasks in gnome. menu and other in-app widgets are not de-specific, it depends on application

Sorry to bring lot of bad news here there are still a lot of two finger typists out there as well as the disabled. Yes those two finger typist under gnome are lot more likely to be 100 percent mouse driving then under KDE or windows.

Basic rules of good keyboard control was basically written before 1990s in the 1980s. The more keys on a keyboard a person had to find to have functional navigation the less likely they will.

Mouse navigation productivity wise is slower than keyboard navigation. It was in the 1980s where the first write up for working out if keyboard navigation was good or bad was using the count the keys need and the number of presses to perform a task. The assessment method need to work out if you keyboard navigation is good or bad had not changed in over 40 years and still gives proper results.

Yes that assessment method was modified to also be useable for working out if mouse usage is OK or or horrible. Yes this mouse method you are tracking the distance the mouse pointer need to move to perform the tasks.

That old assessment method all tasks were not weighted evenly. The old method in fact allows you to create a score for how good the interface is. So you have a benchmark form of metric here.

[Mez']

Lastly, a desktop PC DE must be usable without the mouse/touch{screen|pad}. Gnome =>3, KDE => 4 and Windows >= 8 are all complete failures in this regard. Can't say anything about MacOS - never used it.

I'm a bit surprised by this statement. Gnome is notably keyboard- and therefore developer- centric. It's been an argument of those loving Vanilla Gnome that they can do everything faster with the keyboard since forever.

Like Sonadow, I disagree with that (probably to a different extent). If you have multiple windows open, picking your window in the activities overview (more appropriately named "window picker" in Gnome 40) when its position has changed almost every time means you need to spot it first then and only then select it. Which is a less slow hassle with the mouse.
If pinned on a dock or task bar though, it's always on the same place and reachable with a consistent short mouse movement. Especially when you've configured the cursor to be a tad faster. Beats the overview anyway, at least in my workflow.

On a different note, when using the overview/picker you don't minimize the now-in-the-background window, and your foreground window has a lot of clutter in the background which might lead to confusion/illusion on window borders (with inactive windows) and that doesn't feel too convenient to me. I prefer to keep it clean. And a dock is fast to do just that.

Which is why, on both these aspects, I am of the opinion that it's faster with Dash-to-Dock than it'll ever be with the window picker. Maybe with Dash-to-panel too but I've never used it. Now of course if the window picker is more convenient for you and you feel like it's faster for you, it's your workflow and you need to feel confortable with it. Whatever floats your b/goat.

N.B.: The you is a general you, not addressed specifically to the person in the quote I reply to.

[Mez']

my workflow doesn't use extensions

Good for you.

since gnome 3.0. turns out they aren't needed

And good for you.

[pal666]

And good for you.

try it, maybe it'll be good for you too

[Mez']

try it, maybe it'll be good for you too

I did back when I started using Gnome Shell, around Gnome 3.26.
Even with it being the 14th iteration, it took me about 30 minutes of frustration and a few Google searches on how to do some actual stuff before stumbling upon and learning about the extensions system. That's what saved Gnome for me. And still does.
Otherwise I would probably be on a different DE now. Budgie and Lomiri being the candidates looming in the shadow. And I believe they will soon emerge in plain daylight.