Fedora 17 - my impressions

[witek]

The real *nasty* thing about Debian and Red-hat based distros is the !@#$% separation of libraries and headers. I mean WTF why would anyone who trust the power of a GNU/Linux box do that!? I looked at my previously installed Slackware installation and even with a good bunch of SBo's installed the /usr/include directory occupied less than 500MB!

Assuming you don`t need to compile anything (and an average Joe doesn`t as he can choose among myriads of packages) the separation won`t hurt.

Besides Slackware based distros, which other Linux "lineage" does NOT practice this?

Not sure but Sabayon seems to NOT practice the separation.

[gaucho]

I feel like I'm the only person in the world who actually liked GNOME 3! But my mother and a friend who never ever used Linux got their way in quite well so... YES, the removal of features and customization options is bullshit - they should ship GNOME 3 with gnome-tweak-tool, nautilus-actions (this solves GJones' example) and nautilus-open-terminal by default. A functional menu-editor should be developed also... but it's a different desktop experience and that's the main reason I like it - it doesn't feel like a Windows clone like KDE does.

I don't think you're the only Gnome 3 fan; its release generated a lot of passionate debate in the Fedora forum. I read through most of those threads, and it seemed there was no middle ground; people either hated it or loved it (although the haters appeared to outnumber the fans). I remember some anecdotes that Gnome 3 was quickly liked/adopted by new Linux users -- as you observed firsthand -- and by younger folks who had been exposed to tablets.

I decided to try Fedora 17's implementation of Gnome 3 a couple of months ago, before I wrote it off completely. I was prepared to dislike it and in the beginning, it did indeed feel very "alien." I was fumbling around, lost ... But after installing the gnome-tweak tool, the DE behaved more like the old Gnome 2. Gnome 3 has started to grow on me, and although I wouldn't say that I love it or that it would be my first choice in DE, I like it. It does not deserve the bashing it has received. I think it's a similar situation to the first release(s) of KDE 4, which was soundly criticized and the developers were demonized. I was also ready to hate KDE 4, but gradually adapted to it.

[flebber]

I don't think you're the only Gnome 3 fan; its release generated a lot of passionate debate in the Fedora forum. I read through most of those threads, and it seemed there was no middle ground; people either hated it or loved it (although the haters appeared to outnumber the fans). I remember some anecdotes that Gnome 3 was quickly liked/adopted by new Linux users -- as you observed firsthand -- and by younger folks who had been exposed to tablets.

"

People bagged unity but it is basically Gnome3 fixed up to have nice defaults and a sane workflow. I mean the first few releases were hard to like but where it(unity) is now it is one of the most easy to use desktops going around.

[thenktor]

The real *nasty* thing about Debian and Red-hat based distros is the !@#$% separation of libraries and headers. I mean WTF why would anyone who trust the power of a GNU/Linux box do that!? I looked at my previously installed Slackware installation and even with a good bunch of SBo's installed the /usr/include directory occupied less than 500MB!

Assuming you don`t need to compile anything (and an average Joe doesn`t as he can choose among myriads of packages) the separation won`t hurt.

Actually I think the separation of libraries and headers is the worst thing ever happened to desktop Linux distributions (it may be a good idea on embedded systems to save space).
With every distribution I come to a point where I miss some package and have to build it myself. It's just a pain to get all needed dev packages then. Also when you are talking about the "average Joe" I remember my first days with Linux (IIRC some Suse 6.0). I was a beginner these days and still I came to the point where I had to compile something very fast (repositories have been much smaller these days). I remember that I failed in 90 % of the cases because my lack of knowledge and missing headers. That was a very frustrating experience, until I've found Slackware

[lmello]

It does not deserve the bashing it has received.

No, it doesn't. Specially after you read this.

Actually I think the separation of libraries and headers is the worst thing ever happened to desktop Linux distributions (it may be a good idea on embedded systems to save space). (...) That was a very frustrating experience, until I've found Slackware

Yes I agree. But you know what? I gave Arch Linux a try and it *does not* split the libraries and headers! Actually Slackware/Salix users will find themselves 'at home' with Arch and it's simple boot system. Now I'm running Slackware 14.0 with KDE on my desktop and Arch with GNOME on my laptop.

[jessejazza]

Could the problems with Gnome be why Patrick Volkerding decided not to bother with it a year or so ago.

In each gnome distro there seem to be problems. Fedora 18 was barely bootable. I tried Centos to find that they share repos... yet it's supposed to be a stable release. As the saying goes "Go Slack... and you won't look back".