Gnome 3.0 To Be Delayed Until September 2010?

By , Published November 4, 2009
Gnome 3.0, which is due to bring the love/hate Gnome-Shell to users desktops, was originally slated in for a March 2010 release. This may now be pushed back to September 2010 due to the “beta quality” of Gnome-Shell; there is just too much work to be done on it and just not enough time.

As such it seems the March 2010 release of Gnome 2.30 (which was to be renaged and replaced by Gnome 3.0) will be just that – Gnome 2.30.

“Beta quality…”

Red Hat’s Owen Taylor posted a message on the Gnome Shell mailing list describing Gnome-Shell as ‘usable’ in it’s currentl state but goes on to liken it to “beta quality” software. Time, it seems, is not on their side.

We’d have to either lock it down and freeze it without finishing everything, or we’d be changing stuff up to the last minute. … It makes more sense to take our time anddo a really good job.

~ Owen Taylor to the Gnome-Shell mailing list.

He highlights two key areas that need big improvement before he feels a quality release should be made. These are: -

Messaging - how GNOME Shell interacts with nofitications and messaging.

App Browsing - The current way of finding applications is just a “regurita[ting] the gnome menu’s in a slightly different form.”

He also notes another area of the Shell that needs a re-think: Document Browsing:-

There’s no big picture story about how you access and find your documents in GNOME 3. The default here is to just say that GNOME Shell replaces “Recent Documents” in the panel, and the rest stays the same. But all the interest in Tracker, Zeitgeist, etc, shows that people aren’t that satisfied with the current ways this work.

User Testing

Worryingly still he goes on to note that no formal user testing has been done on GNOME Shell!

We have not (in general) set down users in front of GNOME Shell and watch how they succeed and fail with it and how they like it.

That just borders on insane! If GNOME Shell is to succeed, be useful and user-friendly (GNOME ethos here, no?) then not getting feedback along the way is a crazy idea, and judging by the feedback so far on forums, comments and the like there isn’t a wide pool of love as is for GNOME Shell! Devs blindly trotting down a path they think users will like just isn’t good enough. All the “user interface guidelines” in the world won’t tell you if something works in the real world or not.

I am a GNOME boy at heart, but even i fear for GNOME Shell. I do hope that it is delayed and September 2010 becomes the release date.

Excited for GNOME-Shell? Think it’s great enough already? Hate it? Share your thoughts below!

Don’t forget you can easily install a developer preview of Gnome-Shell in Karmic Koala via Synaptic.

Article originally appeared on omgubuntu.co.uk

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  • Edward

    I really dont like where gnome 3.0 is heading. I absolutely love the current gnome (was a huge factor in winning me over from windows) but this gnome shell looks like something that would be useful on small notebooks; not for a desktop.

    I fear the gnome devs think they are doing what KDE did, design something different which wasn’t too popular at first, but in the end came out really well. Just because it worked out well for KDE, doesnt necessarily mean its will work for gnome.

    Furthermore if your right that the gnome devs are just making what they think is good rather than what the public want, then I feel Gnome 3.0 is going to be linux’s equivalent of Vista :P

  • Anonymous

    As long as I can shut it down its fine by me, If it becomes mandatory I’ll switch to xfce.

    That’s the reason I didn’t switch to KDE 4.0 as was planning to, they made plasma mandatory, as in “you can set up your desktop anyway you want as long as it is constrained in crippled stupid plasmoids.”

  • Anonymous

    I’m all for Gnome Shell. I personally feel that the Desktop paradigm is getting old and I think every OS will start looking on how to re-invent itself.
    I actually like how Gnome Shell works, and I’m excited for for Gnome 3. There are a few bugs in the version I was playing with, but the system was stable for me. I even had it replace Metacity as the default windowing system.

    I like seeing groups in the Linux camp trying to create new ideas instead of just copying Apple/Microsoft. Now trying to change the Desktop paradigm without talking to users is risky though. So I hope the Gnome groups finds a happy medium.

  • James

    I have found it to be very useful, of course there are a few bugs and what not, but it’s simple, elegant and useful. Compiz is… eye catching… but not as intuitive to use. I have been using it back and forth with my Linux Mint 7/ubuntu 9.04 installation with few problems. I find that Gnome-shell is something you have to actually experience before you judge it, when I first saw it I thought… what the hell is that? It actually repulsed me. But I grudgingly decided to try it and found it to be extrememly efficient.

  • Lucas

    I like the ideas that they have for Gnome-shell. It does not feel too different from what we already have but certainly offers some room for improvement. It unfortunately is still in a very rough form at the moment. Not certain if it is really in the beta stage yet.

  • http://twitter.com/SeifSallam Seif Sallam

    its good to take their time but at the end the final product is done good.

  • Mel

    I don’t like Gnome-Shell. It’s plain weird. I like Gnome how it is, it just needs more eye candy, because it feels static and old compared to KDE, Windows and Mac. It works it’s usable but eye candy is eye candy and everyone loves it.

  • Mohan

    I don’t mind that it is pushed back as I rather have product that is late and be more stable and usable then a rushed one. :)

  • kersurk

    Usually, there are 3 different modes of using computer (for me)

    1) With mouse
    2) With keyboard
    3) With keyboard and mouse

    I tend to be lazy a lot, so just drifting around with mouse – which means searching for an application by typing its first letters would uncomfortable, except if I’m in mode 2 or 3.

    That’s it. I hope there will be best methods for keyboard and mouse navigation at the same time.

    The delay is definitely good decision, as there’s no real rush, so it can be afforded.

    However, I’m testing latest Linux stuff all the times, so whether Gnome 3 is official or not doesn’t change much.

  • Anonymous

    does anyone other than me think we need to be optimizing code and reducing and reusing code in linux?i mean for what gnome/kde/xfce actually do seams extremity bloated to me what i think we need is to skip a couple of release cycles and have a cleanup release of Debian kde gnome Ubuntu and any and all code across the boardthe endless release cycles always add more code and bloat and projects seam to always get scraped or completely rewritten once they get a feeling of completeness instead of cleaned up and optimization it never ends :(

  • Anonymous

    does anyone other than me think we need to be optimizing code and reducing and reusing code in linux?i mean for what gnome/kde/xfce actually do seams extremity bloated to me what i think we need is to skip a couple of release cycles and have a cleanup release of Debian kde gnome Ubuntu and any and all code across the boardthe endless release cycles always add more code and bloat and projects seam to always get scraped or completely rewritten once they get a feeling of completeness instead of cleaned up and optimization it never ends :(

  • GiveMeAGnome

    I can’t wait !

  • GiveMeAGnome

    I can’t wait !

  • http://www.moreau-island.com/blog mike moreau

    I agree with others, if I’m forced to used Gnome-Shell I’ll switch to XFCE or WindowMaker. I recently tried it, and it’s horendous. It makes my normal tasks five times more difficult and for what? It doesn’t even look cool, it looks stupid.

    I hate KDE and it’s chintzy plastic feeling. The current state of Gnome is marvelous, in fact I think it’s the best desktop environment out there besides the BeOS/Haiku tracker. If they’d integrate a dock (I personally wouldn’t use it, but I know many who would) I think it’d be perfect.

    In fact we should start a freakin’ petition to make sure the Gnome team keeps working on regular Gnome as well as the Gnome-Shell.

  • http://www.moreau-island.com/blog mike moreau

    I agree with others, if I’m forced to used Gnome-Shell I’ll switch to XFCE or WindowMaker. I recently tried it, and it’s horendous. It makes my normal tasks five times more difficult and for what? It doesn’t even look cool, it looks stupid.

    I hate KDE and it’s chintzy plastic feeling. The current state of Gnome is marvelous, in fact I think it’s the best desktop environment out there besides the BeOS/Haiku tracker. If they’d integrate a dock (I personally wouldn’t use it, but I know many who would) I think it’d be perfect.

    In fact we should start a freakin’ petition to make sure the Gnome team keeps working on regular Gnome as well as the Gnome-Shell.

  • http://courira.ca/en/blog/normand Normand C.

    I’m with michaelwholley. I like Gnome’s simplicity a lot, it reminds me of MacOS 9 of old (I’m a former Mac user, but switched before the advent of OS X) along with Windows’ task bar.

    But I’ve been using UNR 9.10 on my portable for a few weeks now, and my brother showed me Moblin 2.0… And that made me realize that the desktop could be so much more than an Applications menu, a background image and a boatload of icons. :-P I think it is great that the GNOME team tries to reinvent the desktop instead of copying what’s already been done. I just hope the end result is more polished than the screenshots I saw in the “Designing A Desktop For Today” March 28th article.

    And if GNOME-Shell means I can get rid of the PITA that is Compiz, that’s a bonus! (I like Compiz effects a lot, it’s just exasperating that it creates so many conflicts)

  • http://courira.ca/en/blog/normand Normand C.

    I’m with michaelwholley. I like Gnome’s simplicity a lot, it reminds me of MacOS 9 of old (I’m a former Mac user, but switched before the advent of OS X) along with Windows’ task bar.

    But I’ve been using UNR 9.10 on my portable for a few weeks now, and my brother showed me Moblin 2.0… And that made me realize that the desktop could be so much more than an Applications menu, a background image and a boatload of icons. :-P I think it is great that the GNOME team tries to reinvent the desktop instead of copying what’s already been done. I just hope the end result is more polished than the screenshots I saw in the “Designing A Desktop For Today” March 28th article.

    And if GNOME-Shell means I can get rid of the PITA that is Compiz, that’s a bonus! (I like Compiz effects a lot, it’s just exasperating that it creates so many conflicts)

  • Anonymous

    why can’t they leave this stuff the hell alone?? kde4 looks pretty and all, but it killed my productivity. the desktop paradigm has lasted this long for a reason – it friggin works.