Is Gnome user-friendly?

Chat about Zorin
#67

Kedric, I am sorry but a statement that it simply "looks better" is not really evidence. Which parts look better and in what way? It is not that I doubt you any but... I cannot see that as a way of supporting the idea that Gnome is as represented the most polished Linux Desktop. As I said, there is much I like about Gnome. When I address certain aspects that all of us should consider, this is not an attack, but addressing aspects that deserve consideration.
Yet, in doing so, it seems easier for members to attack me for doing so. I have no intention of accepting these attacks, since listening to these points fairly is far more constructive than assuming their meaning, then trying to apply a defense that was never needed in the first place.

IS Gnome the most user-friendly desktop?
In this, we cannot say it is totally user friendly or that it is totally unfriendly. I raise points that certain aspects of Gnome development are not user-friendly and if Gnome has added options (which you have not specified what these are), then this would demonstrate that very point. You can see in this that we would actually agree, not disagree.
So, whether I like and use Gnome or not or whether you do or not (You also like KDE, this doesn't mean you suddenly hate Gnome and if using Gnome you don't suddenly hate KDE, right?) is not relevant to us all meeting on common ground and critically examining points that Have Merit.

#68

I will little take a distance from this topic which one is better.
Give me answear when it will finished and who is winner.
Gnome going the way the same what W11, the same epithany what i saw review connect all with your mobile to gived you more control. Everything going this way because mostly all production in my country what i saw have a poor computers with processor arm with SoC. Mobile processors. This is not the war about the design. This is monopoly in future a market bussiness.

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#69

Bingo. You hit it Right On The Head.

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#70

In school the teachers in Poland when learning a children they have prohibition what they thinking and what they want creativity what they thinking alone in mind. They must doing exactly what a teacher sayed any another subjective response are prohibited. I don't know if someone little watching on the world what is going but they want blind people eyes to xvi century where we will be working for a plate a rice.

#71

Can someone please rephrase that?
@Bourne, no offence.

#72

I can edit that no problem or cut something.

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#73

Yes..do that.. :sweat_smile:

#74

Edited post

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#75

You removed it, I asked to rephrase...if you found that statement not very important then its all right now.

#76

Yes. Better to focus assumptions, everyone have another experience and life that i guess is best choice not put some words what could be collected personally.

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#77

About xfce.

"If there is a weak point in the Zorin OS 16 Lite experience (in my testing) it’s GNOME Software.

I know: a resource-constrained computer is never going to run ‘modern’ tools like GNOME Software comfortably. But just opening the app maxes out memory, slows the entire system down. With so many software backends to plug into, Ubuntu repos, Flathub, and Snap store, the client takes an eon to refresh its software catalog on startup."

#78

I agree with the reviewer here wholeheartedly. I did not know that Gnome had its reach even in 16 Lite when I was waiting for the release. It would be great, in my opinion, if the developers could de-Gnome future releases so it is truly Xfce. Of course I know they are extremely busy with other things. This would be future wishlist.

#79

I have not read all the posts on this subject but a lot of them so I think I get the idea of what others think of Gnome. Whether Gnome is user friendly or not depends a lot on your background and how you use your PC. I have many many years of using Windows going all the way back to 3.1. I checked out Linux about 10 years ago and at that time I just didn't have the time to try and learn about repositories and dependencies and compiling and building in order to get a program to work. So I dropped Linux even though I didn't than and still don't like M$.

A few months ago I decided to try Linux again and found Zorin. I installed Z15 core and spent some time learning what I could do with it. Since it had Gnome that of course is what I used. I didn't know any better but found that coming from Windows, Gnome seemed fairly intuitive and pretty similar to W7 which I was pretty familiar with. So for me Gnome did what I expected it to do. From that standpoint Gnome was user friendly.

As I said I have a pretty extensive background in using PCs. I also worked on industrial machines that were computer controlled. Most people know them as CNC machines. So of course I am a tinkerer. I just hadn't bothered yet with trying any other DEs.

However yesterday Aravisian posted in another thread that Cinnamon seemed to work well in Zorin so I thought I would give it a try. I installed it and spent a few hours checking it out. I found that most things were just easier to do in Cinnamon than it Gnome. The menu is much easier to navigate. The options for what you can do to customize your system are much better than Gnome. Since I am a tinkerer I probably won't go back to Gnome. I may check out some other DEs but Cinnamon so far is looking pretty good to me.

I do understand why some people would rather use Gnome than a DE like Cinnamon. My wife is one of those people that just does not want a lot of options for how to do things. If there are three ways to go somewhere she only wants to know one way. Don't confuse her with more than that. The same way with her PC. Show her one way to open her email and no other. So for those kinds of people Gnome is probably better and more friendly than Cinnamon or some of the other DEs.

But for people like me that want to explore all the options Gnome is not the most user friendly. I don't think it is fair to claim that Gnome or any other DE is not user friendly just because it doesn't suit your personal needs.

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#80

Exactly. Cifta, thanks for narrowing right down on the crux of the issue. I would argue that all D.E.s are pre-configured (Usable out of the box) and that all are, generally, user-friendly. I do not believe that any D.E., be it XFCE, Cinnamon, KDE or Gnome, is The most of any of these claims.

To this end, I find it disturbing that Gnome is promoted this way while other D.E.'s are not promoted this way. Opinions are fine and they are relevant and important in how a user chooses their D.E. One person may Love what Gnome offers them while another does not. Just like themes, really.

However, the most important part of this is not in choosing your D.E. but in having the ability to choose your D.E.

That ability is dying.

It is dying because in having control over the Gnu ToolKit (GTK), Gnome is altering GTK to favor Only Gnome.
This means that all D.E.'s functioning on GTK are being turned into Gnome-Clones and if that is what they become (due to lack of choices by those D.E.s given the available toolkit), then it becomes more and more pointless to choose a D.E. other than Gnome.
This is Logical. Gnome wants to be on top, get the most share of the money. That is how all businesses work.

When Gnome is disproportionately promoted; it favors this outcome. When users like me speak up and then get hushed; called "gnome-haters" or "troublemakers" or other, this silences opposition instead of addressing the concerns.
If only it was as simple as users debating over which D.E. they prefer. It Is Not. It is that we soon, will not be able to debate that and our Choices will be:
Gnome
KDE
And that's it.
For some, they may not care. But considering how Gnome removes features that users rely on... in my own opinion... That is not the one I'd want to be stuck with. They act the most like Microsoft, they take without regard to user feedback and they are Domineering in their developmental approach. I cannot say "I do not like Gnome, so I use another D.E." if those other D.E.'s are deprecated and abandoned.
And that - is Gnomes Goal.

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#81

https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/4679/burn-my-windows/

#82

One way to assess the question posed in the thread title is to run vanilla Gnome with no extensions enabled for 30 days. I have not done this since gnome 3 was released. Extensions to add new or restore Gnome 2 functionality were introduced by third parties all most immediately after release. I suspect running Gnome without extensions as originally intended would an interesting challenge for those who rely on them daily.

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#83

As it would for many whether Gnome or not. One could use the same argument with any desktop environment they all have their plus points and minus points.

#84

Not necessarily. Gnome hopes to disable / remove Extensions, considering them to be "hacks."
Other desktop environments do not consider plugins to be "hacks" and encourage their use.

This is a pretty big difference.

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#85

To get a pure Gnome experience try Fedora, it comes without Gnome Tweaks or extensions. It also has the latest version of Gnome. Extensions are not part of the the intended Gnome experience.They have never been officially supported and only tolerated to date.

#86

Is GNOME slower than XFCE?

XFCE takes half the RAM, but still with a lot of features and customizability. KDE is midweight, Cinnamon almost as heavy as Gnome. But if you have a lot of RAM (4 GB and up) it probably doesn't make much difference. Your browser is going to slow you down more than your desktop.

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