[OpenIndiana-discuss] Gnome and the future

[Magnus]

On Nov 1, 2012, at 12:10 PM, Udo Grabowski (IMK) wrote:

> Gnome 2 is perfect (apart from a few annoying bugs), Gnome3/Unity
> would be a drawback indeed, and nobody here wants to go back to
> such basic stuff as xfce and other incapable desktop systems (KDE
> may would be an option). As long as gtk3 is not needed by any programs
> in use, there's no need to really do work in the gnome packages,
> apart from some fixes. Schillix OS shows that this can be handled
> even with just two people, so I don't see that this sucks up
> significant manpower.

This is a very informative contribution. Thank you for taking the time. I do want to ask, though: what is missing from Xfce that classifies it in your eyes as an "incapable desktop"? That's a pretty loaded statement and I think it deserves some explanation.

My direct interest in your answer is actually because I'm cobbling together a package building system mostly for my OmniOS zones, but I expect to be running OI on my next laptop so I have a vested interest in having a stable and up to date desktop environment stack. It's been a couple of years since I ran anything but OS X on the desktop so while my recollection of Xfce is that it's a stable and complete DE, I'm ready to be corrected if there's an objective reason to not focus on bringing it to OI.

> The current Gnome on OI works, there's absolutely no reason to
> delete that from OI.

Now that is something I can take issue with. While it may be perfectly usable, it's rather archaic. The DE is the first impression that many have of OI, and this is rather like going to Wal*mart (in the USA) and being greeted by an octogenarian in a blue smock. The senior citizen may do a fine job, but where's the appeal for newcomers? So you can put Lance Henrikson up front, or Miranda Kerr. I know which one I'd rather have greeting me. :)
> 
> Nobody wants Linux

I'll avoid the complete fallacy of that statement and merely point out that nobody is talking about Linux; we're talking about DE's.

> Please accept that there are people that are doing much more with
> OI than just running a home NAS server with music and videos. We
> still feel that we are a legitimate part of the OI/illumos community,
> and not just a legacy (yes, I know, the desktop is dead, blablabla…).

Want to adopt the Gnome 2 collection? :)

I'm building out some infrastructure for package building and will likely be putting together an Xfce collection. I think it would be really grand if more OI users figured out how to do this and started putting together (and maintaining!) collections for things like their favorite DE.

-Magnus