[ale] ranting about new Ubuntu UI

[Collin Pruitt]

There were a *lot* of people in the Ubuntu community, both development 
and otherwise, that were opposed to switching to Unity as our default 
User Interface. But, due to our focus on creating a "clean and easy to 
use experience", we did it anyway. Honestly, I despise Unity. It's a 
pain to use, as you figured out. Another thing is the existence of GNOME 
Shell. I can't understand why the high-ups at Canonical feel it's a good 
idea to waste our resources on developing our own UI when we could just 
as easily use GNOME's and not fracture the desktop UI scene even more, 
and when there are far bigger issues in the user experience with Ubuntu 
than the User Interface is concerned. A large number of users still have 
trouble getting Ubuntu to work on their hardware out-of-the-box due to 
support issues, examples being wireless cards and graphics cards. 
Oftentimes users are reduced to a shell prompt and they're clueless as 
to what to do next, and that's generally the point when people give up 
and go back to using what works the easiest: Windows.

I don't understand what the logic behind our current direction is. We 
should focus more on making Ubuntu "just work" like Windows does on as 
wide of a variety of hardware as we possibly can, not make a pretty UI 
that no one can get to because Ubuntu won't work easily on their 
hardware. And even then, why do we need to develop our own UI when we 
can very much more easily use one of the far more developed desktop 
environments out there such as GNOME?

On 6/20/2011 5:44 PM, Ron Frazier wrote:
> Hi guys.  I've been away from the list for a while, so I don't know if
> this has been already discussed.  I also apologize to anyone I offend
> who may totally disagree with me.  No offense is intended.
>
> I decided to do some digital house keeping and download and make CD's of
> the most recent Ubuntu ISO's.  After burning the CD's, I wanted to
> verify that each CD was burned correctly.  I looked up the appropriate
> MD5sum command and saved it in a text file on the hard drive.  Then, I
> booted up the Ubuntu 11.04 desktop CD and clicked Try Ubuntu to get it
> started.  WOW!  I was freaked out because the UI was totally different
> from 10.04 which I'm used to.  From the podcasts, I knew this was
> happening, but hadn't seen it.  Now, I'll admit I'm biased toward what I
> know.  And, I'll admit that I only spent 20-30 minutes looking at it.
> However, my basic first impression is ... hate it, hate it, hate it,
> hate it, hate it, hate it.  It seems everyone is trying to redesign
> their operating system to operate from the point of view of a tablet
> based touch screen.  However, they seem to be throwing mouse based,
> large screen devices under the bus.  I think that's incredibly stupid.
> To do the CD integrity check that I wanted to do, I had to start the
> text editor, copy the command I'd saved, start a terminal window, and
> paste the command into that.  What the @#$%$#$ is wrong with a stinking
> menu?!  It took me 10 minutes just to find out how to start the text
> editor and the terminal with the new system.  Instead of menu,
> accessories, text editor; it's now menu, more applications, see all 75
> apps, scroll scroll scroll all the huge icons down the screen to find
> the "T" section, then click text editor.  Now that I know how to do it,
> it's not THAT hard.  But what's the point.  It definitely takes more
> clicks and mouse movements than it did before.  From the podcasts I
> listen to, It looks like Windows 8 will be doing something similar with
> the UI.  If so, I think it's stupid on their part too.  Why can't the
> designers just realize that desktop / laptop computers and tablets /
> smart phones need different UI's.  I wouldn't try to put all the
> controls from a motorcycle on a car, and I wouldn't try to put all the
> controls from a car on a motorcycle.
>
> Here are some other things I hate at first glance.
>
> * There is a huge bar of icons on the left.  It seems to be a quick
> launch bar and a task bar combined.  I'm OK with that concept.  I've
> been keeping my task bar vertical anyway.  What I hate is that the icons
> are enormous.  They take up a huge amount of vertical space.  Therefore,
> if you have 5 quick launch icons open and 5 apps open, then the task bar
> is full.  I don't know what happens after that.  It may be possible to
> customize it, but there is no obvious way, like right clicking it.  The
> other thing I don't like is that it's not obvious what are quick launch
> icons and what are running applications.  The system seems to put a
> small arrow next to applications, but I don't think it's very effective.
>
> * The traditional Gnome "panels" seem to be gone.  Or, if they're there,
> there's not obvious way to access or customize them, including the top
> panel that appears by default.
>
> * The APPLICATION menu bar (for the text editor, for example) appears in
> the top of the screen panel OF THE OS when you roll your mouse up there
> and disappears when you roll your mouse away.  It does not appear in the
> window for the application.  Why the @$$%%$$# do the designers think
> that I want my APPLICATION MENU to be married to the OS DISPLAY?!  And,
> even if I did, why the $%#$$##$ do the designers think I want it
> vanishing every time I move away from it?!  Stupid.  Stupid.  Stupid.
>
> * Finally, there is no scroll bar on long display items and no up and
> down arrows.  If you roll your mouse over where those features should
> be, a scroll device which can be dragged or clicked magically appears.
> Stupid.  Stupid.  Stupid.
>
> Again, no offense intended.  Others may love these features just as
> passionately as I hate them.  Anyway, I'm definitely NOT installing
> Ubuntu 11.04 or Windows 8 (when it's available) unless I extensively
> test in a VM first.  Probably, I'll just stick with Ubuntu 10.04 and
> Windows Vista or Windows 7 until they stop patching them.  That should
> be about 2 more years for Ubuntu and 7 more years for Windows.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Ron

-- 
Collin Pruitt
Ubuntu Member
http://collinp.com/