Linus’ motives for slapping GNOME
February 18th, 2007 by matt
This whole Linus vs GNOME debate is really strange. Can someone explain to me why Linus cares?
I can only think of two reasons:
- An exceptional amount of passionate and selfless concern for GNOME’s userbase;
- Because he himself uses GNOME.
If the latter, why doesn’t the tone of his messages show any respect for the development that has gone into GNOME? I mean, I personally use GNOME and also have a fair amount of gripes with it, but the fact that I’ve chosen it above other desktops means that I have sufficient respect for it that I would always seek to be respectful and constructive when filing bugs or posting to mailing lists. His complaints about the difficulty of contributing seem to be wholly gratuitous.
I don’t get it.
“Because he himself uses GNOME.”
He may do, but that’s not what he’s said in the past:
“I don’t use Gnome …”
http://mail.gnome.org/archives/usability/2005-December/msg00021.html
Who knows what his motives are–human beings are complex creatures, and there would certainly be more than two explanations–and why would anyone be interested in speculating, anyway? Maybe he’s just bored and looking for an outlet for his energies.
The interesting thing here is to think about what interfaces might better do. Linus’s manner is somewhat abrasive, but I think he’s probably right in saying that GNOME has gone to far in one direction.
“why would anyone be interested in speculating, anyway?”
Peoples’ motives always interest me, and they have a profound effect on the right way to interpret their comments.
Why not send him a mail and post the reply here (with his permission)?
I’m interested in the answer too.
The way that Linus complain with the Gnome guys “I don’t get it” too.
He can just submit his patches and say something to them but he demosntratre in the past that he don’t care about the feelings of the gnome-devs (say that your userbase are idiots aren’t the way to say a tip) and his users.
But after all i think that the way that he complain is the better since he submit patches unlike others [KDE] users complain.
The reason Linus cares is because GNOME is posed to be the face of Linux by default (Ubuntu, Suse Linux Enterprise Desktop, Redhat) and he wants to make sure we leave the right impression.
The tone is intense because this isn’t the first time this has been talked about.
And why should the README files not have mailing list information to send patches? Give me just 1 reason and I will concede this point.
Get off the bash linus train and think about it.
“And why should the README files not have mailing list information to send patches? Give me just 1 reason and I will concede this point.”
From the Metacity (SVN) README file:
> REPORTING BUGS AND SUBMITTING PATCHES
> ===
>
> Report new bugs on http://bugzilla.gnome.org. Please check for
> duplicates, *especially* if you are reporting a feature request.
>
> Please do *not* add “me too!” or “yes I really want this!” comments to
> feature requests in bugzilla. Please read
> http://pobox.com/~hp/features.html prior to adding any kind of flame
> about missing features or misfeatures.
>
> Feel free to send patches too; Metacity is relatively small and
> simple, so if you find a bug or want to add a feature it should be
> pretty easy. Send me mail, or put the patch in bugzilla.
>
> See the HACKING file for some notes on hacking Metacity.
Linus have admitted that he don’t want to use GNOME Bugzilla.
Regarding “Send me mail”, there’s no e-mail address in the README file.
Linus writes that he had to use Google in his attempt to find the e-mail addresses of the Metacity maintainers.
There’s a MAINTAINERS file in SVN, but it isn’t in the Metacity tarballs. However, there is an AUTHORS file containing Havoc Pennington’s e-mail address. There’s also the ChangeLog file.
“Regarding “Send me mail”, there’s no e-mail address in the README file.”
Actually, usability AT gnome.org is mentioned in the README file, but that doesn’t seem like the right place to send Metacity patches to.
i’ve never understood why gnome is the default for most distros, compared to KDE gnome is a joke.
“Can someone explain to me why Linus cares?”
Good question, and I too think that only he can answer it.
I would speculate that it has to do with the ‘drama’ he ended up in the middle of when he first mentioned (was it on lkml?) that he uses KDE for this and that reason (customiseability etc.) and doesn’t like / disapproves of GNOME’s approach (too simple, lack of options). I guess it would have been fine if people (on both sides I guess) hadn’t jumped on those statements, although knowing his harsh style no wonder that it stirred a lot of drama
— maybe he has been bugged by people since about that thing, and he just lost patience with it now.
But who knows, other than him…
Better ask him and tell us the reply, I guess
We’re curious!
@ sharms:
“And why should the README files not have mailing list information to send patches? Give me just 1 reason and I will concede this point.”
I think it should. However, the fuss made about it (from someone who clearly is well able to find his way around contributing even without the README file) is disproportionate and shows a resentment that
“Get off the bash linus train and think about it. ”
I’m not on that train. Please try and be less aggressive when posting to my blog.
Because GNOME is the ‘official’ `Enterprise Linux’ desktop? The only corporate Linux still shipping KDE as the default is Mandriva, but even SuSe has moved to GNOME. Look at how slow and unpolished Kubuntu is compared to Ubuntu.
Because just about all ISV work is for GNOME? Whether this is because of the more liberal-licensing or whatever, third party, proprietary software is almost all GTK plus some non-KDE-integrated QT stuff. See Nero, Acrobat, VMWare, Opera.
For the above reasons, if you care about ‘world domination’ like Linus, GNOME is where the action is.
Well, I agree with his rants. I really get irritated with Gnome’s constant focus on “grandparents.” If that’s the target audience, then fine, but really, Gnome shouldn’t be targeting that group to the exclusion of power users. Why can’t “save as” and “open” dialogs just show the modified time? Why can’t I see the file extension? Why is it essential that my folder of images be named “Photos?” Why do I first have to add a person to my Evolution address book before I can add them to my buddy list? I could go on and on (and I do file bug reports)…
The reason Torvalds whined about this is because Torvalds has a pathological dislike for not being deferred to. Which is fair enough; most all gnome-bashers have a severe dislike for not having their intellects pandered to with a plethora of useless widgets and preferences, with which to impress upon others their understanding of.
Gnome doesn’t focus on grandparents. It doesn’t focus on stupid people. It just doesn’t pretend that its users are all geniuses who feel better about themselves by telling each other how much they know about computers. Which is excellent.
The silent majority is pretty heavily in favour of gnome these days, which is part of the reason all the distros have adopted it. See also apt, firefox, and a dozen other things in free software that a very loud minority of community members have an intense dislike for.
– Chris
@ Matthew Nuzum:
1. What is a “power user” anyway? Is it someone who wants everything available in an obvious place all the time? Because that sounds like what everyone wants. If you need more, then get more, and just keep adding layers of software until you’re satisfied. If you don’t need more, then you’re set, and then everyone is happy.
2. Just turn off the Evolution integration in Gaim.
3. And I can see file extensions everywhere, so I’m not sure what you mean there.
4. I don’t have a “Photos” folder, so it can’t be that essential.
5. I’ll give you the modified time one though. Have you checked gnome bugzilla about that one? I can’t see that a config option wouldn’t be allowed, even though a GUI just to enable it probably wouldn’t be welcome.
Think sharms is right.
Gnome is the thing people see when they use gnu/linux. Most probably don’t see the distinction between gnome and the kernel, or more apropriate, how different software from different people are put into a distribution. If people feel gnome sucks (I’m not one of them), they think linux sucks. Linux is Linus’ life’s work, so perhaps he wants people to like it? Perhaps that’s why he cares?
Just my 2Cu