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I have a different theory: the Ubuntu "core" and "design" teams have their vision of what Ubuntu will be, and just don't listen for feedback from the community.

It's fine to just push changes, otherwise we would be stuck in the 80s and the 90s (everyone hates changes), but it's not fine to not listen to any kind of feedback from the community, even after years.

The unity sidebar is the biggest example. They refused to let users change the size of the icons for years. Even now, you're still limited by a small range they've decided on. They removed used, small features because it would make the codebase "harder to mantain".

The global menu is an usability nightmare on Ubuntu (the HUD instead is a pretty cool concept). I don't really like global menus, but Canonical managed to make it even worse - It's hidden by default, and get showed only on mouse hover. I've been using Linux with various DE for years, and the last time I tried Ubuntu it took me 5 minutes to remember where is the menu (I can only wonder what would my parents do). Obviously, they didn't change this at all.

I could go on and complain about Ubuntu all day (and not only about Unity - I'd like to talk about their tendency to patch everything downstream) but the message is "Canonical shot themself in the foot". I can only hope this is a "new beginning" and they'll start to listen their userbase.

You talk like "the community" all has one opinion.

In reality, whoever is unhappy screams and claims to speak for "the community" as a way of trying to get their way. And almost always someone is unhappy.

Most of the time, an equally large subset of the community is not screaming because they are happy with that decision.

You could chase one side of the community and then the other forever, without reaching a stable outcome.

Sure, I understand. But why not make everyone happy, and give a choice? At least, for the small "little" tweaks that make everyone scream?

There are plenty of examples: globalmenu on/off, globalmenu hidden/showed by default, buttons on the left/right side of the window, size of the icons in the launcher, side of the screen on which the launcher appear, show the launcher on every screen or only the main one...

Did you even bother to read the announcement? They HAVE provided this exact choice.

Yes I have. No, they haven't.

All you can do right now is to move the global menu from the "global" bar to the window bar. You can't still have it back to "default", like other operative systems, and you can't still have it being visible by default.

And, by the way, this was just one small point of my post. Everything else still applies.

This is the same lamenting and strife that one could also apply to Apple. OSX is their way or the highway.

If Ubuntu listens to the loudest community whiners the UI would be a terrible mess. If you don't like the default desktop: sudo apt-get install -y fluxbox, or whatever of the dozens of other WM's are out there that you like better. Problem solved.

Ok, so default like which operating system, mac? windows? They are doing things differently, what's wrong with that? I like it and I use it, those who don't have plenty more DEs to choose from. By the way they do provide a way to change the size of the icons, since 12.04 at least.

(Can't reply to yours comments res0nat0r and eklavya, hopefully this will do anyway).

By default like the operative system with 90%+ of the marketshare - Windows. I'm not saying that they're doing it good, but 90%+ of the people using a computer expect it to act that way. I'm also not saying that it should be the default, just have a tiny little option somewhere (instead of forcing me to remove the appmenu* packages, which I know how to do it, but my parents sure don't).

I'm also not sure why are you attacking me and telling me to install another DE - I have (In fact, I don't even use Ubuntu anymore, as I don't like apt-get and some other stuff). I'm just saying that they should add some options to make everyone happy. I have the same feeling towards Gnome shell, but at least this one has easy-to-install plugins.

Hey :) nobody is attacking you. They have given you that option for menus now but if it's not enough there is always KDE(which I also use and love by the way ;) ) It goes both ways, they can't force you to use their stuff and you can't force them to do it your way. Let evolution take it's course, only good UIs will remain.

For my parents I have installed Kubuntu, KDE always works and always has the features you need.

How can I move the menu bar under window title? I actually like to move windows by the title bar and not move my mouse over the whole screen to the global menu.

Even with the global menu, you can still move windows by the titlebar. Furthermore, you've always been able to move windows by dragging a window while holding the Alt key. You can also disable the global menu entirely by removing the appmenu-gtk, appmenu-gtk3, appmenu-qt, and indicator-appmenu packages. (This does break the HUD however)

why not make everyone happy, and give a choice

They've already given users several choices. They're called Kubuntu, Xubuntun and Lubuntu.

Parent is not debating DE options. Parent is talking about specific options for a specific DE.

It takes a great deal of effort to provide a configurable option and acceptable configuration UI for every single option in a DE. It also greatly increases the number of custom configuration combinations and the testing required. It's not a zero-cost option at all.

I think it's time for a Gubunto that uses GNOME instead of Unity. :-)

Ubuntu Gnome is that choice now http://ubuntugnome.org/

or, you know, use debian.

I actually use Arch although I do like Debian too.

Give people choice: People who like it old way are still happy and people who like new stuff will just switch.

Make a dialog at the start of the session when you release new features, asking if you'd like to enable new features or keep your old settings for existing users. Install new features on by default. Everyone happy, no complaints.

Then collect stats after some time and see what is actually getting used and if 95% is in favor of some option - remove the old feature.

This could also be a nice incentive to provide stats to developers - your opinion gets counted.

While this would be the ideal, having too many options is kind of a hassle for third party developers.

I mean, you test on the latest version of Ubuntu, then the LTS version, then with Gnome3, MATE and Xfce, then with Kubuntu and Xubuntu, better test all of those in 32 bit as well as 64 bit, and with free and nonfree drivers for Intel ATI and nVidia graphics cards, and you're sick of testing before you've even got off the major Ubuntu variants.

Or you don't test like that, and I find I can't get Google Earth to work, or I get VPN software that can't disconnect properly if I use the Gnome3 network manager, or any of a dozen other annoyances.

I have a third theory: The theory behind Unity was a theory and not based on empirical data collected from actual users. I am not comparing the design process to focus groups etc. but to the UX design methodology described in The Story of the Ribbon.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Tl9kD693ie4

Listening to your userbase is a good idea if you want to keep that userbase happy.

Ubuntu's goal has always been to vastly expand its userbase to, shall we say, non-traditional Linux users. Now Ubuntu wants to expand into entirely new devices. These new users are, by definition, not in Ubuntu's userbase, so if Ubuntu wants to get them, listening to existing users is likely a detriment.

If you've been using Linux with various DE for years, and Ubuntu frustrates you, then Ubuntu is not the product for you. Ubuntu is going for people who don't even know what a "DE" is.

The instant Ubuntu becomes beholden to listening to its userbase is the instant it stops doing anything interesting and it loses whatever slim chance it ever had of being anything beyond a top ranker on DistroWatch.

"If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses." Not sure he ever said it, but the point stands.

> The unity sidebar is the biggest example. They refused to let users change the size of the icons for years. Even now, you're still limited by a small range they've decided on.

That's an example of so-called bullshit. The setting was added to the standard config util in Ubuntu 12.04, the first LTS with Unity. It was a setting in compiz config since 11.04, the very first release.

> I could go on and complain about Ubuntu all day (and not only about Unity - I'd like to talk about their tendency to patch everything downstream) but the message is "Canonical shot themself in the foot".

Of course, you can, but next when you'll want to complain, try to use it for more than 5 minutes. Don't speak for the whole userbase -- I'm a part of Ubuntu userbase, and I love Unity. I consider vanishing menus a great idea, because in practice it adds exactly zero problems with menu interaction, but saves space (less important) and reduces clutter on desktop (more important).

They don't have a vision, they just copy random crap. Thankfully there are alternative options.

My conspiracy theory is that it was all a practical joke by Shuttleworth, bringing us so close to the ideal of a usable Linux desktop that everyone could get behind, and then randomly moving shit around and creating division within the Linux community. We went from Ubuntu clearly being the market leader and providing a consistent UI, to a clusterfuck of different distributions and DEs.

Yes. When I left Ubuntu 2 years ago, never to go back, even I thought it was merely a sadist joke. But I would say it had the desired effect.

Shuttleworth needs to make Canonical financially self-sustaining. The strategic focus moves to mobile. Hence Ubuntu phone &c.

What I can't get my head around is why Canonical and so it appears Microsoft think you need one common interface for all the devices so 3 inch screens to 30 inch screens. Apple seem to have worked that one out as have KDE with their various desktop styles.

The workspace switcher is another strange one.

In Gnome the workspace switcher icon showed a mini-preview of the window layouts. In Unity this is just a static icon made to look like a mini preview! This seems cargo-cultish, as though the Unity developers don't understand what they are trying to recreate.

I am honestly glad that they are trying to make the Linux desktop better. But I am regularly enraged that they make me their guinea pig so that they can discover that their shit doesn't work. Please, Ubuntu people, try this stuff out in a lab and then on small groups of volunteer testers before inflicting it upon the world.

And this goes double for the stuff they ship in the LTS releases. I keep my servers on LTS, and so my laptop stays on that as well. That means I've had two joyous years of wacky interactions and irritating UI bugs. I just have to log out and/or reboot every couple of days. On a Linux machine.

Really, I like what they're trying to do with Unity. But if your goal is to improve the user experience, you don't ship wacky, half finished stuff to a shit-ton of users.

Ubuntu is a Free Software project and there is a small group of volunteer testers before every release. In fact you can be one of them, right now, for the upcoming 14.04 release: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/daily-live/current/

> Really, I like what they're trying to do with Unity. But if your goal is to improve the user experience, you don't ship wacky, half finished stuff to a shit-ton of users.

Amen to this.

If they are still finding big UI bugs in production, then I suspect we're talking about different kinds of testing. I'm glad they've made a start, though.

Or the fact that the current global menu HIDES when not hovered. Will kill any new adoption, for sure. Discoverability: 0.

I actually prefer this behaviour. I need the active window/application title more than I need the menu. As for discoverability, I haven't seen much impact. Even my non-technical mother and father do not have issues with it. I'd chalk this up to personal preference.

> Also, changing windows (e.g., if you have two or three document processing files open), how do you quickly and efficiently switch to the right one? I don't know!

There are quite a few of them:

1. Mouse scroll on the icon in the dock.

2. Click twice on the icon in the dock and select the window from spread/expose.

3. Right click and select the windows from the list.

4. Alt+Tab. Select the application, wait a second, select the window.

5. Alt+Tab. Right-click on application, select the window.

6. etc.

It's probably like our dedicated UI team: cheap.

Our head UI designer sent SPAM for a living before working for us.

Also, it's open source and design related. I imagine that means that as the project grows, the bike shedding scales O(n^2).

FYI: you can hover over he app icon and scroll your mouse wheel to cycle through the open windows of that particular app.

However, I still find myself frustrated with many browser windows open...

I have been trying to train myself to take advantage of multiple desktops, which I have been historically poor at doing.

And since I run a win7 VM continuously, I like to have that desktop on another monitor, and then I have apps open in that VM as well... I have window/tab/app overload.

Since I never shut my machine down, I only sleep it, I find that sometimes I have to just close everything and start with a fresh desktop and zero tabs to reset my brains workflow.

I have also come up with the same theory, and was just explaining it to a friend last week, ending with, "I'm kidding of course, but it would certainly explain a lot."

Click the icon twice to pick which window you want to switch to.