Five Things I Dislike About Gnome
Gnome is a great desktop environment. But it’s not perfect. If I could pick five things for the Gnome developers to change or improve, here’s what they’d be.
Before I criticize Gnome, however, let me emphasize how much I like it. I’ve been through half-a-dozen desktop environments in numerous Linux distributions, and have settled on Gnome as the best of all of them. KDE is too unstable, XFCE‘s missing features aren’t worth the minimal resource savings, and Fluxbox is only fun if you like editing text files in order to turn your GUI on. For me, Gnome isn’t perfect, but it’s better than the alternatives.
I should also clarify that this article discusses Gnome is its broadest sense, as both a graphical interface and a collection of applications and utilities for managing the system–so any software that falls under the auspices of the Gnome project is fair game for criticism.
1. Greedy NetworkManager
NetworkManager is a wonderful tool for managing network connections. My biggest gripe with it, however, is that it likes to try to take over my life and decide what’s best for me, even when I disagree.
For example, if I happen to have wired and wireless connections available at the same time, NetworkManager will always prefer the wired connection, which isn’t necessarily the one I want to be connected to. Similarly, if I’m trying to manage an interface from the command line, NetworkManager likes to keep trying to control it, invalidating my manual settings.
The only way around these problems is to kill the NetworkManager daemon and manage the network from the command line, which is hardly a practical option for non-geeks. It would be great if there were an easy way to tell NetworkManager to prefer wireless over wired if desired–or, even better, to ignore certain interfaces altogether.
2. Filename extensions
One of the things I hate most about Windows is how it relies solely on filename extensions in order to determine the encoding of a given file and how to handle it–which means a crisis ensues when the unthinkable happens and Windows comes across a file without an extension, or with an incorrect one.
Ubuntu, in contrast, ships with a great utility called ‘file’ that can figure out what the system should do with almost any kind of data stream in the world, regardless of the name it happens to be given. Unfortunately, Gnome suppresses this functionality by behaving just like Windows, looking at filename extensions in order to determine which applications should be used to open a file, rather than examining the file itself. Although some might argue that this is a feature, I think it’s silly, and would love to see it changed.
3. gnome-panel musical chairs
No matter how hard I try, I can never seem to make the items in my Gnome panel stay where I put them. Even with the ‘lock to panel’ option set, my applets occasionally end up moving around for no discernible reason when I log out and back into Gnome. This isn’t a show stopper, but it is annoying.
4. Plain-text XDMCP
Although it’s probably rarely used by non-geeks, Gnome’s built-in support for XDMCP, which makes it trivially easy to share an X server complete with Gnome sessions over the network, is a great feature. Unfortunately, the data transfer is not encrypted, which raises a lot of security issues. Sure, there are ways to encrypt the sessions if you like the command line and have ssh servers available, but it’s silly that the data isn’t just protected by default.
Supposedly gdm can be compiled with a flag to enable XDMCP encryption, so perhaps the blame lies with distributions rather than the Gnome people. But it would still seem to make more sense for XDMCP encryption to be a runtime option, or the default setting at build time rather than an extra parameter.
5. Seahorse
Gnome ships with Seahorse (otherwise known as ‘Passwords and Encryption Keys’) built-in for easy management of passwords and similar items. I like Seahorse a lot, and if it didn’t make it so simple to manage dozens of passwords and keys, I would probably be less responsible about not using the same passwords for different services.
What I don’t like about Seahorse and its integration into Gnome is how it asks incessantly for authorization to open the keyring, no matter how many times I click the “Allow Always” option. Connect to a wireless network, open the keyring. Check email in Evolution, open the keyring. Mount an SFTP share, open the keyring. Surely this could be improved without comprising security.
None of the gripes outlined above is serious enough to cut into daily productivity or make me think about switching to a different desktop environment. But they’re all worthy of improvement, and the Gnome developers should take note of items like these in order to continue to produce the best desktop environment around.
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the argument about point (1) is that anyone should prefer a wired network over a less reliable wireless. I disagree too; what I have run out of allowed bandwidth for my wired connection or something?
About point (2): am not too sure about this one. Is it correct? I thought even when I removed the extension Ubuntu knew what to do with that file…
The Seahorse thing sounds like something to do with your profile, as it works perfectly for me. Have you filed bugs for these?
Things I do immediately after installing Ubuntu to make it halfway usable:
– remove network-manager and network-manager-gnome (replace with wicd);
– remove PulseAudio;
– remove trackerd;
– remove Mono and any Mono apps (Tomboy, F-Spot) – replace with Gnote and gThumb/digiKam.
“It would be great if there were an easy way to tell NetworkManager to prefer wireless over wired if desired–or, even better, to ignore certain interfaces altogether.”
Any device listed in /etc/network/interfaces will be ignored by NetworkManager. You can also remove devices from NetworkManager in the Edit Connections dialog.
“Unfortunately, Gnome suppresses this functionality by behaving just like Windows, looking at filename extensions in order to determine which applications should be used to open a file, rather than examining the file itself.”
Can you cite an example? Nautilus correctly determines the file type, regardless of extension, for me.
What I dislike is using the command line (I try to find a Desktop for people not able to use a terminal …).
Try, graphicaly, to create a Folder in /opt, using Nautilus, for example to install SweetHome3D (http://www.sweethome3d.eu)
The “normal” behaviour should be to prompt the user for its “administration” password. But instead, the “Create Folder” action is simply disabled !!!
You have to use a terminal: sudo mkdir /opt/Sweethome3D
It works fine on MacOSX, or even better, because if the user is not an administrator, then a login/password is asked (not only a password), in order to perform the task !
Sometime, I wonder if opensource developper are using their products… And I agree, Gnome is fairly more usable than KDE !
Fred
Evan and LVS: regarding file extensions, I should have been clearer. If there is no extension, Gnome will usually figure out how to open it. But if it does have an extension, Gnome will use that information to determine how to deal with the file, regardless of what’s in the file itself. For an example, take a screenshot and save the file with a .doc extension instead of .png, then open it. Gnome will launch OpenOffice instead of the image viewer.
James: I haven’t tried too hard to fix Seahorse, but I have the same experience on multiple systems. It’s not too serious, but I wish that “Allow Always” and “Deny” meant what they said.
Item 3 is supposed to be fixed in the Ubuntu paper cuts exercise that is going on at the moment .
I hope it is because it is very irritating!
KDE4 is no longer unstable, but that’s beside the point.
For the Network Manager, try removing it and using Wicd, which is just great in my experience.
KDE uses file name extensions as well, which is a shame. I’ve filed a bug about that here http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=191847
If I had a list of five things to change in GNOME, they would be:
1. Allow filepicker to honor single-click-to-open if the rest of GNOME is configured that way, http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=561969
2. Support and incorporate the KDE KIO slaves (smb:// and sftp:// etc) for better use of networks and files
3. Lump all of the configuration ‘applications’ into a single panel rather than a ton of separate menu launchers
OK I dislike GNOME and don’t use enough of its apps even to make a complete list of five improvements, I just know that when I use it i get frustrated by its lack of options to get real work done. Just my experience and opinion of course.
“KDE is too unstable”
I consider such an statement either an uniformed one or a rant. Sorry, I don’t pretent to ignite a KDE vs GNOME flame war but I had to say it. I consider *both* desktops prime time ready.
And about the article, I agree completely with poit 2.
I only have a persistent keyring problem with UbuntuOne
KDE is *not* unstable. Infact I get more crashes and errors with GNOME 2.24/2/26 on Mandriva and/or Opensuse. By contrast, KDE 4.3 on Mandriva and Opensuse has been rock solid. I believe when you deem KDE as unstable, you’ve been playing with Kubuntu, right?
Kubuntu is nothing short of a disgrace to KDE. Many newcomers get introduced to Linux through Ubuntu and they happen to look at its sibling Kubuntu…and want to try it. They do, and bam! they experience the worst KDE distro around which is half-baked, highly unstable and severely crash prone. Use a Mandriva or Opensuse to get the right KDE experience.
@Christopher Tozzi
3) See https://bugs.launchpad.net/hundredpapercuts/+bug/44082 , has been fixed for 100 papercuts project
5) Are you automatically logging in? If so, this is a known issue, see here: https://bugs.launchpad.net/hundredpapercuts/+bug/137247
@Anshul: Absolutely right. I recently switched my Kubuntu machine to Arch, and the difference is immediate and amazing. There is nothing unstable about KDE. Kubuntu, OTOH… well, at least when they were basing off KDE 3.5.x it was usable. Now it’s just not, and it hasn’t been since the 4.0 changeover (which has been what, a year and half?!).
Seriously. This isn’t a distro war, nor a desktop environment pissing contest. But for real, if you are basing your opinion of KDE off the Kubuntu experience, you need to broaden your horizons.
I like Fluxbox too, but it’s not for everyone.
About point 2. GNOME does not use utility called ‘file’. It would be like saying Nautilus uses utility called ‘ls’ for listing files. Rubbish. Both GNOME and utility ‘file’ use library called ‘libmagic’ that does mime type recognition! Use common logic for a bit, please. Don’t you think that calling ‘file’ for each and every file in directory listing would be a spawn bomb?
@Bro: What’s the big deal if GNOME would have used `file’? Big deal…
The problem is that the fscking libmagic is dumb. I *HAVE* to save a file with an extension (e.g. “.txt”), otherwise I CAN’T ASSOCIATE it with an application (e.g. gedit).
As for a missing thing, #6: Window List: you *never* know how wide a window is going to be in the task bar. Never. It’s worse than in WinXP!
Beranger:
I think everyone in this discussion is talking beyond what they know. I’m pretty confident this is not a problem with libmagic but with another mimetype association layer ..maybe in the gnomevfs or gvfs layer depending on how new of a stack you are talking about.
The image preview thumbnailer in Nautilus still works even if I rename screenshot.png to screenshot.doc. It’s more likely that the file extension column and the associated application hooks are related to mime type layer in gnomevfs.
If you repeat the test that Chris mentions and save a screenshot with the wrong file extention… file will return the correct “magic” but xdg-mime query filetype “filename” will not.
On my linux system file ../Download/Screenshot.doc tells me its a png… libmagic is doing its job.
gnomevfs-info ../Download/Screenshot.doc tells me its a Doc file…gnomevfs is doing additional work which related extentions to mime types probably involving information taken from the globs file in systemwide mime directory that update-mime-database uses…but i could be wrong about that.
-jef
1. Sounds like it’s not greedy enough. If I plug in a wired Internet connection, it should automatically shut down my wireless radio to save power. The wired connection will be faster and more reliable.
2. As far as I know, this point is entirely untrue. Remove the file extension from a jpeg and Gnome will still know it’s a jpeg. Rename it to .txt and Gnome will still know it’s a jpeg.
Like you Christopher, I much prefer Gnome to KDE, XFCE, and Fluxbox. However, Gnome fails dismally against KDE and XFCE on one particular point that irritates me intensely: with the Gnome/Metacity combination new windows always open in the top-left of the screen, forcing me to drag them into the middle of the screen with the mouse.
Before Compiz I used Ubuntu 6.06 with devilspie to attempt to correct this. Unfortunately devilspie wouldn’t always work and I would still have to drag new windows into the middle of the screen. Now, with any Gnome distro, I suffer the extra load of Compiz mainly to force new windows to open centre-screen.
KDE and XFCE both have the option to open windows in the centre of the screen, and even the very lightweight LXDE/Openbox combination can do this, so why the hell can’t the otherwise excellent Gnome remove this intense irritation?
Totally agree with point 3 and 5…
But there´s still another nobody has actually mention. Is the Desktop, sometimes i get two files(folders, … on top of each other showing in the desktop, I hate the way Gnome arrenges the files around the desktop and sometimes it doesn´t even let me put the icon where i want to even if the space is actually empty of other icons.
Windows doesn´t do a but job on organizing icons around you desktop but i love the new KDE 4 features.
Another small point is the screensaver, it never seems to do what i tell him. I have it turn off and when i´m watching a movie i have to be moving the mouse every ten minutes, tried to switch the screensaver back on and give it an hour of timing before it switches off but it continues with the fucking tweenty minutes…
@Uh: “Remove the file extension from a jpeg and Gnome will still know it’s a jpeg. Rename it to .txt and Gnome will still know it’s a jpeg.”
Tried just that. Double-clicked Blind_Skier3.png in Nautilus, and it displayed in Eye of Gnome. So far so good.
I changed the filename to Blind_Skier3.txt in Nautilus. Nautilus still showed the image as the icon, but when I double-clicked it, Nautilus launched it in gedit (“cannot detect character coding”).
Changed the name to Blind_Skier3.jpg and double-clicked – Eye of Gnome launched but complained “file is not a JPEG”.
Looks pretty broken to me.
Carles:
The screensaver issue has recently been understood and fixed.
Turns out its an xserver bug.
http://blogs.gnome.org/hughsie/2009/08/17/gnome-power-manager-and-blanking-removal-of-bodges/
-jef
I have similar issues with seahorse after changing my password, i have to change my keyring pass to the same value of the login pass, after that it never asked for my keyring pass anymore.
I agree with point (1). This gets even weirder in my case where I use my laptop on the train to work and whenever it finds a “stronger” wireless network, it tries to connect to it — effectively disconnecting the mobile broadband connection via the USB key plugged into the laptop!!
Suffice to say here that I can never use it to connect to the office VPN.
OpenFred:
Try the nautilus extension nautilus-gksu, its probably not exactly what you are after but at least there is no need to drop to the terminal, you just open a nautilus window as admin.
Other useful nautilus extensions are nautilus-open-terminal (in case you need to do more than create a folder ;p) and nautilus-image-convert (or converter not sure) which allows you to rotate and re-size images easily.
Gnome using extensions is disapointing and last time I tried XDMCP it was broken not just unencrypted, but the other bugs don’t bother me too much as i have my panel hidden (no minimizing anything ever) and /etc/networks/interfaces handles all my wired/wireless needs.
If you want a good kde experience, try out mepis or pclinuxos. Mandriva also does kde right as well as opensuse. Kubuntu use to be good, but no longer. It suffers from a childs neglect.
You are brave. A while back I posted a list of my annoyances with Xfce, my preferred environment. All it did was attract flames from intolerant geeks who couldn’t tolerate the fact that someone said it wasn’t perfect.
I agree with number 3.
Whenever I play Diablo 2 (through WINE), after I exit, all the items are pushed together… but the next time I log into Gnome after that, all the items in the panels aren’t just pushed together, but shuffled too! It’s very annoying.
Other than that, I can’t really relate to the others.
About #2:
I think this was originally done to avoid performance problems when opening directories with lots of files in them (having to run 2000 files through libmagic could certainly slow down displaying them in nautilus).
About #4:
I think the new GDM doesn’t even support XDMCP…
@KenP
Right click on the icon, disable wireless, continue using USB broadband.
Same goes for Point 1, right click disable …. lt;- use the one you want.
Guys, learn how to drive the tool, not let the tool drive you.
“Even with the ‘lock to panel’ option set, my applets occasionally end up moving around for no discernible reason when I log out and back into Gnome. This isn’t a show stopper, but it is annoying.”
It isn’t a showstopper but it should be. It’s true, things like this doesn’t crash your system or wahetever, so in a strict sense these aren’t showstoppers.
But, on the other hand, why cannot we raise the bar a little on software quality?
Small issues like this are all over the place in Gnome (see 101 papercuts), some of them for ages.
I LOLed at title: “gnome-panel musical chairs” is true tho, they need to fix this switching around stuff there. But in general, I would say Gnome is the best desktop environment for linux distros.