[ale] ranting about new Ubuntu UI

Rich Faulkner rfaulkner at 34thprs.org
Thu Jun 23 09:13:37 EDT 2011


IMHO any DE is fine and good for a purpose.  But if computers are built
around the idea that you don't have to "learn" how to use them and just
press "buttons" until it gives you what you want that's rather like
teaching humans to behave like lab rats.  Press the level until you get
what you want.  There's nothing empowering about that and I'd hate to
see that happen.

The good news is there is plenty of room for all in the *nix world.
Those of us (myself included) who enjoy the freedom of the DIY/roll your
own vibe have it.  Those who want to evangelize the freedom of FLOSS and
spread the word have it.  Those who want to innovate and try new ideas
(however good or bad) have it.  

I for one am a late adopter of changes in distros.  I am just now making
the switch to 10.10 on my "new" (old) desktop system and keeping Fedora
on my laptop (will sample F14 otherwise will stay with F12).  Both run
awesome for their intended roles and I couldn't be happier.  

A final note:  my 5-year old mastered 9.10 in nothing flat!  Tablet,
Windows, Linux it doesn't matter.  He can use it and was BARELY trained
by us on how to do it.  But then, you show him something once and he has
it.  He enjoys playing chess, learning games, surfing the net (likes
legos) and finding fun videos on Youtube (but we watch that one very
closely!)  Linux learning games have been a favorite of his and have
been a great tool in his learning to read and write.  He's not half bad
at flight sims either.  

Now our 3-year old is showing interest in learning computers.  Time to
do it all over again!  

RinL



On Thu, 2011-06-23 at 07:22 -0400, Richard Bronosky wrote:
> Again, I'm speaking without using it. Have they not implemented a
> shortcut for a quick search? Every app on my Mac is one key chord then
> a few characters away. Having a permanent icon for anything is kind of
> silly.
> 
> We have 3TB drives and hundreds of thousands of apps at our disposal.
> Traditional organization no longer applies and that its only going to
> get worse in the future.
> 
> It's not just people in third world countries that benefit from these
> new UIs. It's my children. They shouldn't be burdened with some 50
> year old UI because it is what my Dad knew. Today's children are
> exposed to touch UIs first. They are going to have the same vitriol
> for the traditional UIs as what you are seeing here for the FIRST
> RELEASE of Unity. It will get better.
> 
> On Jun 21, 2011 11:45 PM, "Wolf Halton" <wolf at wolfhalton.info> wrote:
> 
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