The quick answer about interface behaviour is that there is no one Linux UI guideline. Instead, there were historical things like MOTIF guidelines vs OpenLook, and then GNOME vs KDE, and now…I dunno what. I’m sure they’re not even consistent with the text of the “do it” button: Yes? OK? Ok? Done? Create/Edit/Delete? Then things gets worse because Linux UIs are usually programmed by nerds that love double-negatives…what exactly is that Yes button gonna do?
(I thought KDE was a copy of Win95 guidelines, but that could be old FUD.)
Just a couple of screenshots from Mint Cinnamon, with some small info on useability and desktop usage.
This is the main desktop, pretty much default. I have added a few shortcut links in the bottom left taskbar (a few browsers, calculator etc), called the ‘panel’ when you right-click on an application you want to include here.
This second shot shows what the ‘Menu’ (lower left) looks like when opened up. I’ve also highlighted (badly, i was using the included drawing program, which i’m not used too) what is a really nice feature that comes included, the Update Manager, which is that shield with a tick in it (the tick is when everything you have installed is upto date, that becomes an exclamtion mark when there are updates). I was using a seperate tool in windows for that kind of thing, so it is nice to see this included as is with the mint install (on Cinnamon atleast).
I use Mint with Cinnamon on my work system. I love it. If you want to run Cinnamon I have found it to be a lot less of a headache than switching to Cinnamon on a stock Ubuntu system. Mint builds on top of Ubuntu releases and I’d rather tag along with some very devoted people focused on integrating Cinnamon on top of Ubuntu instead of trying to do it myself.
I am still using Ubuntu. I change as much as neccesary to force him to use a Gnome 3 desktop, and then customize this Gnome 3 to behave like how I think a “perfect desktop” would work.
I look at Linux Mint and think “eek… some KDE designer as touch this”. Theres nothing bad with KDE, but I just dislike the design phylosophy of about everything-kde-ish.
Anyway, I can’t recomend installing Ubuntu to change it to Gnome3, It need to much thinkering with the distro defaults and is somewhat a losing war. Is probably better to start with a distro that have Gnome has default.
Well there is a KDE edition of Mint, but i really don’t know what that actually means :) What i do know is if you like w98 to XP in terms of mouse and desktop menu usage, and even vista (although things had started to get a bit strange here in terms of where stuff was stored on the PC, and this carried on in later Windows) to a lesser extent, and maybe didn’t like Windows 7 wannabe-like-apple ‘dock’ thing (i didn’t, used guides to make the taskbar work and look like the earlier windows), but were ok with the general way the desktop worked, well in that case i’m finding Mint Cinnamon very comparable.
If not for the reversing of prompt commands (yes on right, no on left etc) it pretty much feels like my using XP or Vista, or un-docked Windows 7. It feels like a functional classic desktop. And it has a great system for software updates (not just OS, but all installed software), it’s early days yet but i’ve been surprised as how good an impression it has made, much more so than Ubuntu Feisty Fawn did (which wasn’t bad, just not great driver support then). Pretty impressive. I mean i still need windows for certain software (and games), but overall i might actually be able to sit it out with Windows 7 as my last MS OS, unless Mint does something crazy.
I find KDE to be gaudy and inelegant in a windows XP kind of way. It’s fine, though, it isn’t an abomination like Unity. I run XFCE on my HTPC and and cinnamon on my work PC (with a task switcher addon making it work like windows 7, pinning programs and such), personally.
If you swap out your window manager to cinnamon or something else on a stock Ubuntu install, there is a decent chance that when you go to upgrade to the next Ubuntu release you will run into issues unless you jump through some hoops. It’s generally nothing super horrible, but for the newer or more casual user I think there is a lot of sense in suggesting they start with something based on the package they want to run.
yeah I just wanted ‘something that works’ but wasn’t an MS OS. And the Linux Mint i’m running seems to be that.
One of the biggest issues around Linux in general I can see is that most (it seems that way) users are very technical in their Linux usage, can compile there own custom distro’s (or at least know how to)etc.
The forums for new Linux Mint users is actually a pretty scary place with not a lot laid on for new ‘stupid ex-MS OS users’ (my own characterization!). They are helpful, as my thread i linked up above shows, but yeah you are sort of expected to know how to use the terminal, and that is just something that you need to get a handle on as a Linux user, eventually.
I’m finding the whole ‘reversal’ of the pop-up confirmation dialogues quite funny. It has very specifically been made that way across the whole distro, I wonder if it is across Linux/Unix as a whole (like on Mac?). Is it just ‘windows’ that puts ‘yes’ on the left? To my left to right writing brain that does make sense, the way it is in Mint sort of feels ‘backwards’ (maybe if I was Japanese it would not?).
Spell-check in the browser is not working it seems (so i apologise for stuff that slips through! keep in mind i type uk english mostly), and i’ve not been able to work out why.
Also I occasionally get a non shut down issue, where after selecting ‘shut-down’ it will nearly do it but not completely, so the only option is to depress the on/off button until it fully switches off.
Other than that so far it has been a much more painless transition than I was fearing. No issues with heat/fans, that all seems to be working as well as it did under Windows. Good job Linux Mint team :)
The hardest part was setting up the partitions, and you really need a good guide for that (like the ones i ended up using in the thread i posted for help on that).
Vent/rant: a USB mouse, Linux??? You can’t run a USB mouse? Ok the pointer moves fine, but clicks are 1/30, which is actually much worse than not working at all. Editing configuration files in text, sudo this and that, error messages in terminal, searching and using forums on a new install with only a keyboard? Ok then. Maybe I’ll try again in 2018.
I run through an almost identical cycle. At this point, it’s almost a game to see what laughably basic feature or functionality is still fundamentally broken on the most consumer-“friendly” distros, since I have no intention of subjecting myself to it full-time.
aarendek: Exactly right. Linux works smoothly, except when it doesn’t, and then you need to be a sysadmin to fix it. People want their desktops to just work.
