GNOME Shell 3.0 Nears Release
A couple of days ago GNOME Shell 2.91.92 (release candidate) was released for some last bit of bug hunting before the big day. The announcement stated that the code is frozen, but important bugs could still be fixed. It also confirmed that GNOME 3.0 would emerge the week of April 4.
It's only been a little over two weeks since the last developmental release, but a substantial list of bug reports have been closed. Several changes have occurred as well. Some of these include:
* New network indicator for NetworkManager 0.9.
* Multi monitor improvements
-- Enable workspaces_only_on_primary so that workspace switching only affects the primary monitor
-- In the overview, show windows for each monitor on that particular monitor
-- Use new "pointer barriers" to trap the mouse cursor at hot screen corners
-- Don't use a slideout for the workspace selector if it's at a monitor boundary
* Greatly sped up search
* Improvements in Message Tray
-- Combine multiple notifications from the same source into a "stack"
-- Don't show resident (permanent) notifications from active applications
-- Improve styling of items to ease clicking
-- Fix scrolling to the bottom when new messages arrive
* Performance enhancements
* Add Restart button to shutdown dialog
* Improve appearance of PolicyKit dialogs
* Obey global GNOME text size setting
* Lots and lots of bug fixes
Screenshot above was scarfed from dedoimedo.com. Dedoimedo published an interesting and fair review of the upcoming GNOME 3.0 desktop today. He said, among other things, "Overall, the interface is a curious blend of cool effects, pretty looks and hybrid, non-linear actions that fall in between netbook and smartphone usage. This could appeal to modern users, who envision the computer as a Web portal, if not quite as ready to store their data in the cloud."
He further states, "When it comes to using your desktop seriously, Gnome 3 becomes problematic. For power users, the simplified interface and the extra cosmetics are actually detrimental to their productivity. Gnome 3 is not intuitive when it comes to working with files and programs and having more than one application in focus.
It is called multitasking - and it may be too difficult for the inbred majority of consumers out there, but then, they already have their iPhone and Android, leave the desktop alone to people who actually want to get things done."
Read his full article here.