(OT) Explain to me again why Unity is so great...

[Knapp]

On Sun, Apr 24, 2011 at 3:59 PM, Tony Pursell
<ajp at princeswalk.fsnet.co.uk>wrote:

> On Sun, 2011-04-24 at 11:23 +0200, Christoph Bier wrote:
> > Alan Pope schrieb am 22.04.2011 23:42:
> >
> > > On 22 April 2011 22:27, Zach <zach at zcsmith.com> wrote:
> > >> The direction that Linux has always been about choice and you have
> some
> > >> propeller heads at Canonical who have decided that Unity is the way to
> go
> > >> and everything else be damned.
> > >
> > > Steady on Zach.
> > >
> > >
> > >>  A bit of an exaggeration perhaps but you get
> > >> the idea.  I know just about everything in the world of computers has
> an
> > >> expiration date but getting rid of something when it's far from its
> time to
> > >> expire just for the sake of replacing it with some newfangled gadget
> is
> > >> unproductive and in most cases, a poor business practice.
> > >>
> > >
> > > You (and many others) characterise the change in the desktop to Unity
> > > as 'change for changes sake' but that seems to undermine the hard work
> > > done by skilled 'propeller heads' as you put it. These people have
> > > done some considerable analysis and development work to figure out
> > > what actually might be 'better' for the end user. Whilst that's not a
> > > utopia, best for everyone, there's certainly an argument that it could
> > > actually be a pretty decent desktop.
> >
> > [...]
> >
> > > You specifically said it's about choice. The choices are there. Take
> them.
> >
> > That's why my Mac is gathering dust in the corner---because Apple
> > thinks to know what's best for me. And just in case they were wrong
> > I'd like to have choices *within* the environment I'm used to.
> > Changing the environment---i.e. swichting to a different Linux
> > distribution---is sink or swim and not freedom of choice, IMHO. But
> > one of the most important and marvelous aspects of FOSS is
> > participation, at least for me.
> >
> > Useability is always also a matter of what one is used to. Changing
> > a desktop environment in such a radical way it is done with GNOME 3
> > and Unity is not user friendly, IMHO. To be honest I'm very
> > disappointed by Ubuntu because many Ubuntu users were ignored. About
> > seven years ago I switched from Debian to Ubuntu and was very happy
> > with this decision. My wife, my father and some friends followed.
> > Introducing Unity to them is just ridiculous---they have no need for
> > it, neither I do. I'm very glad that I couldn't establish Ubuntu at
> > work. At least with 11.10 my boss and colleagues would be
> > questioning my sanity ;-). Unity may be a good choice for beginners
> > that never used a computer before ...
> >
> > Just my 2 cents
> >
> > Christoph
> > --
> > +++ Typografie-Regeln (1.7): http://zvisionwelt.de/?page_id=56
> >
> >
>
> Having tried 11.04 beta on a USB stick, and having followed some of the
> links previously posted (especially Jorge's) that have told me a lot
> about Unity, I think I am going to like it and stick with it.  It will
> do all I want (I hope) - and it works well with my low powered ATI
> graphics. I'm just wondering if I will still get the odd extra applets
> (Invest and Power Manager inhibit) that I have on my top panel.
>
> Where I do agree with Christoph is how it will be viewed by people who
> have been converted to Ubuntu because its not that different from
> Windows (the French Gendarmarie, perhaps).  Will they feel betrayed by a
> new look that seems more aimed at leisure than business?
>
> I'm sure that the Canonical designers think that Unity is a great
> productivity tool, but they need to do more that the odd blip.tv video
> to convince the world of this.  I found nothing installed to tell me how
> to use Unity in the way the video demonstrates. There is no app simply
> called 'Unity Configuration'.  There is very little to help new users
> (and that will be EVERY Ubuntu user that upgrades to 11.04) to quickly
> become fluent Unity users.   If there is, it is well hidden.  Such
> information needs to be there to greet new users to Unity - a quick
> start guide - a road map - or whatever, that is on the desktop and 'in
> your face' when Unity first starts.
>
> That's my 2p.  I won't be going to Debian - tried that and it was a
> struggle that Ubuntu saved me from.
>
> Tony


You guys keep talking about switching to other distros. Why not just switch
to Kubuntu? It has come a long way and is back to being a very good system.
(have not upgraded to 11.04 yet)

-- 
Douglas E Knapp

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