[PLUG] Ubuntu Dapper Drake Officially Delayed

Michael M. nixlists at writemoore.net
Mon Mar 27 20:51:23 UTC 2006


On Mon, 2006-03-27 at 06:24 -0800, Rich Shepard wrote:

> >> Xfce is good, however gnome for a new user is where it's at,
>
>    Let me comment on the embedded quote first. I believe the assumption in
> stating that "gnome for a new user is where it's at" comes from believing
> that everyone who defenestrates wants a desktop that looks just like Winduhs,
> 'cause anything different is too difficult to understand. To this I say,
> "feh!." I did not like fvwm2 because it looked too much like Winduhs. That's
> also what I don't like about Gnome and KDE (in addition to their bloat).

Interesting discussion, for me.  My assumption has been that people who
prefer a DE to a WM tend to choose one based upon the apps they prefer
-- i.e, like Konqueror, k3b, Kmail, use KDE; like Nautilus,
Epiphany/Galeon, Gaim, Evolution, use Gnome.  Basically, I thought "it's
the apps, stupid."  That's why I've always wondered what XFCE brought to
the table, in it's capacity as a DE rather than a WM.  Once you've
decided not to use KDE or Gnome, it's not clear to me what extra benefit
you get from using XFCE vs. any of Blackbox, fvwm, Afterstep, IceWM,
etc.  That's not to say I don't think there's any good reason to use
XFCE, just that I don't understand how it being a lightweight desktop
environment makes it more useful or desirable than the others being
lightweight (to varying degrees) window managers.  This may be because
my assumptions are incorrect.

I would have said, contrary to your characterization of the assumptions
made about new users, that the reason new users are directed to KDE or
Gnome is because those include a complete set of native apps for most
common desktop tasks.  The heavyweight DE's have ready-made answers to
the common questions that new users have:  how do I send email?, how do
I listen to music?, how do I change my background image?, etc.  What's
more, the answers are more-or-less integrated, so that you can email a
file with Evolution from Nautilus with a right-click, for example.  A
window manager does not provide these answers; from what I can tell,
XFCE provides some of the answers, but not as complete a set as provided
by KDE or Gnome.  Maybe the degree of integration is the same, though?

But distros can, of course, set up their installations to provide what a
DE like XFCE or even a window manager does not.  I was looking over the
project page for Xubuntu yesterday.  It was interesting to see the notes
about what default apps they're considering for inclusion.  (Xubuntu
uses XFCE as the DE.  See: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Xubuntu ,
specifically the "Proposed Packages" section.)  Damn Small Linux is
another good example.  Since it has to be small, it uses Fluxbox as the
WM and selects some apps for common tasks, like web browsing, that
Fluxbox doesn't provide.  Last time I checked, VectorLinux also used
Fluxbox by default.

-- 
Michael M. -- Portland, OR -- USA
"No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions
of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to
dream." -S. Jackson




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