Today the GNOME project has released version 3.4 of its longstanding desktop environment. Available at http://library.gnome.org/misc/release-notes/3.4/, the release notes for GNOME 3.4 paint a picture of polish and improvement across the board.

I initially was quite impressed with GNOME 3.0, and the 3.2 version which followed provided even more evidence of polish, though there were warning signs I chose to ignore, hoping that in time the project would listen to its users and reverse course. Unfortunately this hasn’t happened.

GNOME 3 places emphasis on touch as a new input method for the desktop – as such it features gesture based window management and touch oriented application launching facilities as well as an on-screen keyboard. This was fine with me as to date the GNOME desktop had not disadvantaged users of keyboards and mice, as Microsoft has made the mistake of doing with Windows 8.

Unfortunately, with the 3.4 release, the GNOME project has joined Microsoft in this error – from now on, key applications will run in fullscreen mode by default, even on high-resolution 1920×1080 (or higher) screens, with no discoverable way to revert to windowed mode other than possibly a ‘fullscreen’ menu option newly placed, not within the application’s menu bar (this is now non-existent for the apps in question), but in the bar at the very top of the screen, hidden under the application’s name.

Thus one can:

1. Drag the window downward from the top of the screen
2. Hit alt-space and choose ‘unmaximize’
3. Choose ‘fullscreen’ from the application’s ‘main menu’
4. Deal with the app in fullscreen mode and sacrifice the benefits of 30 years of multi-window multitasking in the desktop metaphor

Solutions 1 and 2 give no visual cues to the user and thus will not be discovered by the GNOME project’s target audience (the inexperienced). Solution 3 has no basis in any previous desktop environment in either the open source or proprietary landscapes, meaning inexperienced and experienced users alike may not find this right away if at all. This leaves the user with option #4, to put up with an increasing number of applications which now launch in full-screen mode even on the largest displays, and that’s just how it’s gonna be.

Even more worrisome to me is the GNOME roadmap, which touts the eventual elimination of scrollbars and menubars in favor of an iconified tool menu similar to that found in Google Chrome, and other alarming trends. This can be seen here: https://live.gnome.org/RoadMap.

It’s important to note that the Linux desktop has a marginal position in the marketplace as it is. Due to the inability of open source user interface designers to actually listen to their target audience, or their lack of skill in designing fluent user interfaces, the Linux desktop has never gained traction – due to the upsurge in consumer interest in appliance-computing (in the form of smartphones and tablets) over desktop computing, the Linux desktop is not likely to make any headway at all.

What better way to ensure its irrelevance, than to alienate new and experienced users alike, condemning their dissatisfaction as grousing, and to tell them they’ll just have to get used to it? I can’t think of one.

The article, on Stuxnet and its escape into the wild:

But you now have it, and if you’re a computer whiz you can take it apart and you can say, ‘Oh, let’s change this over here, let’s change that over there.’ Now I’ve got a really sophisticated weapon. So thousands of people around the world have it and are playing with it. And if I’m right, the best cyberweapon the United States has ever developed, it then gave the world for free.

Also impressive is that this article points out Clarke’s interest in backdoored hardware – almost all our hardware is manufactured in China, which is an enemy nation. It is likely there are vast numbers of backdoors and illicit entrypoints placed in the processors and other “chips” that make up the various computer systems that we entrust our businesses, finance systems and governments to every day. This should be the concern of every western company and government interested in protecting itself.

On corporate espionage:

My greatest fear,” Clarke says, “is that, rather than having a cyber-Pearl Harbor event, we will instead have this death of a thousand cuts. Where we lose our competitiveness by having all of our research and development stolen by the Chinese. And we never really see the single event that makes us do something about it. That it’s always just below our pain threshold. That company after company in the United States spends millions, hundreds of millions, in some cases billions of dollars on R&D and that information goes free to China….After a while you can’t compete.

Really good read. Link below.

www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/Richard-Clarke-on-Who-Was-Behind-the-Stuxnet-Attack.html

I don’t think this is going to do well among fans of the original, but then again there’s no accounting for bad taste.

The trailer left me with the strong impression Quaid doesn’t even get his ass to Mars.

And, Colin Farrel? Jessica Biel? I remember when attractive people used to be cast for movies…

And another thing. How much fake plastic hype is too much? A teaser for a teaser trailer that’s not even on TV? SERIOUSLY?

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/total-recall-teaser-len-wiseman-colin-farrell-kate-beckinsale-jessica-biel-304714

I don’t support racism but I wholeheartedly support everyone’s right to make offensive comments. It is tyranny to imprison anyone over a remark, no matter how offensive it may be.

From the article: “A second year biology student at Swansea, Stacey was arrested after his comments on the social networking site were reported by other users.”

The world has gone mad.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-17515992

In a rare show of respect for its users, Facebook is directing prospective employers to consider the legality of soliciting a user’s network password or face possible legal action by the social networking giant itself.

This is a most welcome position for them to take, as inspection and demands by interviewers to see the contents of a prospective employee are becoming rampant.

This is a start – for Facebook to show true respect for its users they must refuse to collaborate with regimes around the world in acts of tyrrany, including handing the information of its users over to repressive governments so that they can be imprisoned, tortured and murdered.

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/facebook/facebook-legal-action-against-employers-asking-for-your-password/10768

Back in my day, things ran on only one server and they had five nines guaranteed.

And that’s how we liked it.

Now get off my lawn!

Continuous heuristic analysis of phone calls means the entire call, not just the background noise, will be run through remote computers.

Given the desire of various agencies to scour all communications in real time for key words and elements, how can this be good for anyone?

http://thenextweb.com/google/2012/03/21/google-wants-to-serve-you-ads-based-on-the-background-noise-of-your-phone-calls/

A good overview of what seems to be a new trend in Linux desktop development – “we know better, you’ll get used to it.”

I’ve tried to like GNOME 3 but I’ve ultimately reverted to using WindowMaker (which, fortunately, has resumed development) and some supporting apps. Too many aspects of the desktop metaphor were thrown away by the GNOME project in a blind effort to emulate a union between the Mac and the iPad.

It strikes me as ironic that a free desktop should take it upon itself to make these kinds of big decisions without user feedback – a practice reminiscent of proprietary software companies, most notably Apple, with whom I and others believe the GNOME core developers have become enthralled. Indeed, I’m sure most GNOME users were content to continue to refine the GNOME 2.x desktop rather than rip its guts out. In the world of open source, it should be the users who decide.

From the article: ” What makes all of this worse is the way GNOME dismisses the complaints, chalking it up to the fact that people don’t like change and that its users will acclimate. Fair enough. Except they won’t get used to it. GNOME isn’t the only free desktop on the block. The users will just leave. Even staunch supporters of the GTK (along with Linus himself) have left GNOME for the lower-end XFCE user interface.”

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/fedora-16-gnome-3-review,3155-27.html

Reasoning like the below is why Ubuntu is ultimately doomed.

“Sometimes we must make sacrifices in order to keep our product looking good, and we really don’t care that you, the user, object to the notion of sacrificing usefulness for looks.”

This is the gist of what’s explained below to the dissatisfied majority who are quickly switching to other distributions.

http://www.jonobacon.org/2011/09/06/menu-discoverability-in-ubuntu-11-10/

Forget that the vast majority of app developers make pennies for their sweat and almost never make an equitable amount of money in the brave new Apple world of job creation.

Sounds a lot like they want to pay Americans beans the same as they do for the Chinese slaves they have thugs hire to build their phones.

From the page: “The app revolution has added more than 210,000 iOS jobs to the U.S. economy since the introduction of iPhone in 2007.”

http://www.apple.com/about/job-creation/