Unity Mega Discussion Thread

[AgentZ86]

I tried to make Unity work

It just doesn't do what Gnome classic can do unfortunately

Top bar windows lists are not there, bottom bar windows lists are not there.

It looks nice but the logistics of the interface are just terrible.

Who wants to memorize shortcuts too ?

The logistics of moving the mouse and browsing through menus has a reason behind it.

The logic of even webpages that do that.

Are we going to now see Ebay with some sort of memorized shortcut scheme just to figure out how to use the pages NO

It's a universal language logistics that needs NO changing.
The visual logistics of simply browsing your menu system is the key to a user friendly OS

Unity is NOT user friendly and limits the user from doing what they would do naturally which is click a mouse button, not reach up to the keyboard for shortcuts.

I was determined to make Unity work in spite of the interface but I learned some about it, I use the computer for my business to and you just can't use it with ease.
It's clunky, it's awkward and illogical for PC computings

Might be good for touch screens but not for PC's

Example:
I want to open gthumbs, ok hit the special windows key, type gthumbs, or click the icon that I put in the dash

You want to right click and move images to a folder on the network but you can't because the network is not mounted yet.

So you have go to the panel, click the folders because while the gthumbs window is open you can't access the top panel windows to browse to your places and mount the network
So you have to go to the side panel and click the folders, and then you have to open the nautalus browser finally and then select your network bookmark from you side bar
Then the and only then finally you can move your images to the networked folder

But everything is like this, all these extra step for something that you normally just click on places and select your bookmark too simply really. How much change can you want if it makes every single task harder and more time consuming.

Anyhow just ranting on, but I learned Unity and concluded that I can't stand it.
Thats my opinion, change for the worst is still change not worth changing.

[HDave]

The logistics of moving the mouse and browsing through menus has a reason behind it.

Like you I tried hard to stick with Unity. Very hard...for many months.

Having recently switched to Xubuntu, I have to say that I find the (customary) cascading hierarchy of menu items to be amazingly fast and intuitive. It's refreshing. People think about things in hierarchies...org charts, biological classification, governmental structures, directories, functional breakdowns. It's an old-fashioned user interface paradigm for a reason -- IT JUST WORKS. I can run any of 200+ programs with two clicks and no typing. Beat that Dash!

As I've said previous in this thread, I can take almost anything about Unity except Dash. Dash...just...doesn't...work.

[Garthhh]

Unity is NOT user friendly and limits the user from doing what they would do naturally which is click a mouse button, not reach up to the keyboard for shortcuts.

I was determined to make Unity work in spite of the interface but I learned some about it, I use the computer for my business to and you just can't use it with ease.
It's clunky, it's awkward and illogical for PC computings

Might be good for touch screens but not for PC's

I've seen it written quite often that Unity would be fine on a touchscreen

every Touchscreen I've used, operated more like a mouse than a keyboard...

[AgentZ86]

I've seen it written quite often that Unity would be fine on a touchscreen

every Touchscreen I've used, operated more like a mouse than a keyboard...

Well, I guess on second thought Unity would probably stink on a touchscreen too. It just seems touch screens sort of go with huge icons and kiosk looking interface like Unity seems to look like.

[leth]

I just wanted to throw my two cents in here; I like Unity. It has a handful of weird little quirks/bugs that don't make the experience as smooth as it should be (which will get worked out over time,) but I like the actual concept of the dash and the bar along the top and how they've packaged everything together.

Everyone is complaining about the lack of customization in Unity. I can see how that would bother someone after becoming so used to the things that the old interface offered. I'm coming back to the Linux desktop world after being in the Windows world for many years (it's been about 9 years since I ran Linux on my desktop), so I guess I'm just not as hung up on the way things were prior to Unity.

When I was trying to pick a distribution to use for coming back to a Linux Desktop, I tried Ubuntu/Unity along with Debian-Gnome and Kubuntu and Mint. Ubuntu/Unity appealed to me the most.

Ubuntu/Canonical seems focused on making Linux easy to install and use and I applaud them for that. It's finally getting to the point that I could see Ubuntu getting used on my mother's PC. I hope Canoncial doesn't abandon Unity due to all the negative feedback. There are other options (gnome-classic mode or whatever it's called, kubuntu, lubuntu, etc) so why not just use those options instead of expecting Unity to disappear and Ubuntu to go back to the way it was?

[devosc]

I just wanted to throw my two cents in here; I like Unity.?

I was resistent at first. But in trying to work out the little customizations that I may like to have, and having read negative comments, I'm compelled to write in admiration of Unity.

I do think/hope that customizations will become easier overtime. But overall I must say, it is a decent desktop.

My only initial would like, is that wether it is possible to between to choose to have a "menu" similar to 11.04 or if different themes will improve the application selector window. Or if it is possible to integrate a combination of the synaptic package manager and the Software Center. The overlay doesn't match the Synaptic Package Manager. It might be nice/easier to launch the application if it is installed.

One late thought, maybe a single shortcut help key, that lists all the other shortcut keys... I saw an image/desktop background that listed all of them, and it might be handy to have all that info with one single shortcut key.

Given some of the negative comments I've come across, I hope that Unity still continues its momentum. There are other previous quirks that niggled me in other versions but have been resolved in Unity/Ubuntu 11.10. Specifically, we/I were limited to only evolution support in the indicator section. Which suggests to me that it is only a matter of time.

Unity is really decent.

Regards,

Greg

[hzFVOW00pw]

There are new developments:

http://www.webupd8.org/2012/01/hud-u...announced.html

Seems to work like a kind of search engine. It'd better be mature before it becomes the default or else there's going to be even more bad publicity from disgruntled users...

[HDave]

There are new developments:

http://www.webupd8.org/2012/01/hud-u...announced.html

Seems to work like a kind of search engine. It'd better be mature before it becomes the default or else there's going to be even more bad publicity from disgruntled users...

Wow -- I am blown away. This is a bold step...very dangerous...very courageous ... crazy... genius... stupid... scary... awesome... klunky... cool. I need some time to process...

[vasa1]

Wow -- I am blown away. This is a bold step...very dangerous...very courageous ... crazy... genius... stupid... scary... awesome... klunky... cool. I need some time to process...

I will definitely try it out. After all, I managed to tune out all the negativity about Unity. Actually, the outrage attracted me

[Hylas de Niall]

I have been using 11.10 on an old netbook since the beta 2 release with only one (passing) issue to speak of.

On that device I found it to be stable, perfect for the small screen - barring certain of the save dialogs being too big - and an ideal interface. In fact, i found it to be such a great experience that i installed it on my desktop machine where i had a whole different experience:

Constant random freezes with no recourse but to repeatedly cold-boot the machine, stupidly slow start-up and shut-down times, and programs loaded slowly too. I tried reinstalls from different source iso's, different DE's, posted my issues on here, but nobody could find anything amiss with my system.

After such a good experience on my tiny netbook I was gutted.

Unity - though i got used to the layout on my 19" screen - was awkward and counter-intuitive after using panel based interfaces for so long. I would have trained myself to master it in the long run had it not been for the constant crashing. This particular installation had me convinced there was an issue with my hardware, despite it running Win7 with all the bells and whistles without any problems.

So, off the desktop it came, and back on went 10.10 which, by comparison, runs like a thoroughbred racehorse, is brilliantly responsive, and starts up and shuts down like lightening. And no crashes at all.

My conclusions? 11.10 is STILL buggy, and Unity is slooooow. It seems more like a down-grade than an upgrade in all honesty.

It'll stay on my 'travelling companion' and be very welcome there, but no way will it go back on my desktop machine.

Nor am i at all confident about PP any more, and will not try it unless it is a lot more polished and stable than OO.

Come April I will be replacing 10.10 with 10.04, just so i can keep support for something that 'works' for a bit longer.