How dare you be funnier than I ever could be

That’s fair ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Digimon Tamers implies that Digimons evolve from clusters of loose data in much the same way as lifeforms evolved from chemical matter, and since they can apparently interface with those little handheld devices (probably running on z80 or 6502-esque processors with only a simple kernel by way of an “OS” given it was still the early aughts and ARM had a long way to go) as well as PCs (most likely Windows 98, because early aughts Japan), they seem to be platform-agnostic, able to adapt to any machine in much the same way animals adapt to different biomes.

I already mentioned the System Tray, back then I used MegaSync for cloud backups and that app was completely broken due to the lack of a Tray. (I have since switched to using Syncthing and an old laptop with a USB HDD as a ghetto “”“”“NAS”“”“” solution… Which would probably work quite well on Gnome actually, as Syncthing is a service and is controlled through a web interface)

Wine stuff was janky as hell. As were Qt apps. For one thing wine applications, too, expected a Tray, and would instead spawn a tiny window at the corner for tray stuff. Plus there was weird behaviour with some windows and the way they layered. As for Qt apps? Gnome offered no features for setting the look of Qt apps, so if I set Gnome to dark mode (by the way, very neat feature how Gnome’s default theme deals with that, no joke here, very seamless and elegant, even if I’d never use light mode willingly), Qt apps would still be bright and I had to just install a third-party application for it (qt5ct) and set something in my /etc/environment.

All of these things had solutions, to be sure, an extension for the tray, a third-party application for the Qt apps, etc. But then I did an apt upgrade and literally all the extensions broke. So I had to spend an extra hour that day figuring out what I’d do about that. Joy of joys.

Then there is the Gnome File Manager.
Why in the name of all that is unholy did it not let one type in the addresses of folders? Or copy them or… ? Sure, icons and breadcrumbs are nice, but being able to type in an address when you know it saves a ton of time. And maybe I want to copy a location to use it on the terminal? That should have been one of the first things to be implemented. Apparently a recent patch to Gnome has added the address bar “feature” (which has been part of Windows Explorer since 1994 and of every Linux File Manager I’ve known since forever–), but like. Bruh.

So I installed Thunar, the File Manager from XFCE, but now I was using a separate file manager entirely and having to deal with everything that comes with switching file managers from the DE’s default. Like. WOW.

As I said – Same reason I love it.

That system control panel app with all its billions of options and everything being customizable and change-able is very good if you are a user who a. WANTS to customize everything b. Either knows how or is willing to learn.

Most beginners aren’t after that. They want something that is somewhat familiar and that works well. And while, sure, Plasma’s defaults are pretty good… I can totally see a newbie user opening up KCM and immediately becoming overwhelmed. Another user here even mentioned how much time they wasted because all those choices actually got in the way of them getting stuff done

Do not

like come on man, it’s not even a Vaporeon!

Oh no, I entirely agree with the system tray being a leftover from an older era. The Control Center is actually super elegant. But it doesn’t do to come up with a nicer, more elegant solution while telling all legacy support to go &*&$ itself in the same breath because it’s no longer your problem.

That’s some Apple bollocks, and if I wanted to deal with Apple’s shit I’d get a Mac.

See, while I understand that the “the system should be invisible and get out of the way so people can do things with their computers” philosophy isn’t for me, I entirely understand it as not only valid, but preferred by most people. –

– It’s just that Gnome’s approach to “getting out of the way” is at best counterproductive? I used Gnome for like 3 months in 2022, figured I’d give it a try, I’m always down to try new stuff. And I felt like I was just constantly fighting against it, having to do configuration stuff and install third-party addons not as a funtime activity because I like to make my computer look prettier, but because if I didn’t, shit just refused to work. It was only much later that I learned that the reason I had to keep wrestling Gnome is because the peeps behind it had actively decided that the things I needed to do were stupid and didn’t need doing.

You’ll see me praising Cinnamon in a different comment. Cinnamon, a cousin of Gnome’s born of Gnome 2, is what I’d call a DE that gets out of the way. It doesn’t have all the moving parts that KDE does, and that is to its credit. Because it has everything it needs to have and no more but also no less.

I guess congratulations on proving the point I made on my other post?

Gnome’s attitude towards everything seems to be “$#¨$ you, like just actually go &%$# yourself. You do things our way or you use something else. We have decided these things are useless, if you think they are necessary you are a $&@# and %$#$ you and the horse you rode in on”

Also what is the difference between a system tray and a control center?

Functionally, there isn’t one. Both serve the same ultimate purpose: To be an area where background services and system functionality can be accessed quickly and easily, while staying out of the way of whatever you’re doing in the foreground.

The tray is just an older, arguably more primitive metaphor for the same thing: “Just give every service and app its own icon, and make it so that icon can be clicked to access its options and features”. It’s simple, but it works.

The control center is more elegant, like, really, it is. It saves screen real estate and such. Giving you a little scrollable window where every controllable thing has its own little area. But that is contingent on the application itself implementing that functionality. When an application expects an old-fashioned tray, Gnome’s control center just tells that app to go $&#* itself, when they could, if they wanted to, just add a corner on the control center for “legacy apps”. But they don’t wanna, because they think they know better than everyone else.

It’s the default for Fedora and I think Debian too but don’t quote me on the second one.

Me I use SUSE which lets me choose what DE to install.

Hyprland is pretty cool. Used it for a few montths after I broke my KDE Plasma and couldn’t be fucked to fix it (long story)

This thread is the first time I hear about Cosmic though. Looks interesting in pictures.

My complaint with Gnome is just one, but it is overbearing: Gnome devs want to decide what is best for you, which stinks and goes against the very fundament of open software. But would not per se be a problem – If they hadn’t also decided that a bunch of things that are considered basic features that every other DE and even other OSes have implemented for the past 20 years are, in fact, unnecessary.

Consider the humble System Tray.

Gnome removed the System Tray in favour of a “Control Center”. And the Control Center works really well – For inbuilt Gnome stuff and applications that were written for Gnome. But stuff that is DE agnostic, or god forbid, ported over from another OS? Some of them expect a tray to be there. Have functionality that doesn’t work without one. Or do work but are janky. Gnome doesn’t offer a system tray. You have to install a third party extension, which would also be fine… Except every time Gnome updates every other third party extension breaks.

And like, sure, it’s not Gnome Devs’ job to ensure the operability of third party addons, but that you need them to begin with is a failure. Gnome’s attitude towards everything seems to be “$#¨$ you, like just actually go &%$# yourself. You do things our way or you use something else. We have decided these things are useless, if you think they are necessary you are a $&@# and %$#$ you and the horse you rode in on”

As for my personal favourite DE? KDE Plasma. It’s not something I’d ever recommend to a newcomer, but I like it precisely because of how many moving parts it has. I can make my system look, feel, and act just the way I like it. It’s like the polar opposite of Gnome really.

I mean. Yes. But Gnome 2 was actually good. It was before the Gnome team caught the “cutting out literally everything for seemingly no reason” disease.

Before they started thinking they knew better than everyone else.

I actually think general Gnome workflow is pretty alright (even if I prefer other things), but yeah, Gnome devs seem to like. Actively hate their users?

The only thing you got wrong is that the toilet extension would be a third-party thing, and Gnome devs would actively insult anyone who dared be upset they broke it.

Cinnamon is pretty dope

I use Plasma because I’m literally this, but Cinnamon is what I’d recommend to people who say they want something “familiar looking but that just gets out of the way so you can start using your computer to do shit” – Which ironically is what Gnome purports itself to be.

The Bite Boys

It’s a boyband. They play tough in their marketing but anyone who likes them, likes them because they are cute.

The Internet Archive. Technically founded in '96, but didn’t come into its own until the mid aughts. It is an awe-inspiring thing that corporate greed has been trying to take from us.

John Cena school would be great.