Unity has got the looks down. It just needs customization options and fine-tuning

[linuxuser12345]

The Ubuntu users and the Ubuntu community have lost so much potential and user power in these latest releases, and we need to go back to what the open-source movement was founded on: Allowing, securing, and maintaining user freedom.

Unity has gotten to be a pretty dazzling desktop UI, and new kinks are getting fixed every day. We (the Ubuntu community) now need to work on allowing full customization of the new UI before the upcoming release, letting users at least move the launcher around to any position and hopefully the top bar, too. The Unity interface needs new theme options and the Appearance section of the new an improved System Settings app included with 11.10 needs major "jailbreaking" to let us take full control of our desktop again, much like how things were back in the Gnome 2.x on Ubuntu 10.10 days. The users want to change icons easily, the users want to change themes completely and easily, the users want to manage their entire computer themeing quickly and easily with all features available from installation. The users can't even enable/disable/edit desktop effects easily without installing more programs!
It's little things like this that create a big problem over time.


Is anyone willing to add on to this?

[moldaviax]

moving the launcher around would be nice but we need a menu driven interface too, I fear there is not enough time for 12.04 to hit the ground running and please everyone

M.

[PaulInBHC]

The majority of people with computers and other devices want an operating system to be an operating system. That's all. Turn it on, have it work, easy to understand buttons or icons to get online, check email, play videos, music and games.

That should be the priority. Then if it is customizable that is a bonus for some people. It doesn't matter what it use to be. The world and the devices keep changing. The OS has to keep up.

[gsmanners]

The world and the devices keep changing. The OS has to keep up.

That's what the kernel is for. Why involve the desktop?

[PaulInBHC]

We would still have Win 3.1

I'm not saying to make it not accessible, just that most people don't need more choices. Just one, that works.

[linuxuser12345]

moving the launcher around would be nice but we need a menu driven interface too, I fear there is not enough time for 12.04 to hit the ground running and please everyone

M.

Well then we need a service pack after the initial release if we can't get these features off the floor by April. The users want customization to fit their workspace and their needs.

[linuxuser12345]

The majority of people with computers and other devices want an operating system to be an operating system. That's all. Turn it on, have it work, easy to understand buttons or icons to get online, check email, play videos, music and games.

That should be the priority. Then if it is customizable that is a bonus for some people. It doesn't matter what it use to be. The world and the devices keep changing. The OS has to keep up.

We are straying away from the foundations of the open source movement: User freedom. Why don't we just close the source and make the whole OS proprietary, then?! The "average user" wouldn't mind, as long as it "works."

[chubbtech]

getting back the screensaver wud be nice 2

[kyleabaker]

More customization options would be great, but I'd rather see more fine-tuning in both a visual aspect as well as a performance/resource aspect.

Unity performance improved a great deal between 11.04 and 11.10, and I think we'll see a similar improvement between 11.10 and 12.04. I just want to see compiz become more efficient as far as resources and performance since the unity interface is directly affected by this.

The dash still feels slow to me, the "Available for Download" section seems useless since that's the whole point of the Software Center and the "Run a command" (Alt+F2) dash wastes a huge amount of space.

It would be great if they created a universal Unity settings tool that ties into System settings like the Ubuntu One settings, rather than a tool for Unity 2D and a tool for Unity 3D (in Compiz).

[rg4w]

I would say it almost has the look down. Coloring the background of launcher icons just makes it hard to distinguish the icon's shape, giving a muddy appearance to every icon no matter how much time the icon designer put into make it clear.

I hope going forward they reserve the background color for an indication of some state, such as when the app is open, so the native state of the icon is simple and clean.

Admittedly, that's a minor point. The rest of it seems to be coming along pretty well.