Ubuntu 11.04 has been released, and I’m very happy about it. I gave the news to many (Italian) media, I wrote the (Italian) press releases, I did several talks (Ubuntu parties, Universities, simple events) about the Unity allure. I said it’s new and fantastic. What else should a good promoter do?
Probably use it. But I’m sorry i will not use Unity. For many reason.
I’ll try to tell you some of them.
1 – I find Unity colours really uncomfortable to my sight.
Since from the very first time I’ve known Ubuntu and the GNOME desktop, I’ve been really excited by the opportunity to fine tuning my desktop, my theme, my spaces, a large part of my life, since I pass about 10 hours a day in front of my PC, for work and pleasure.
I’ve chosen a pink ambient, with glass window decorator, a large use of transparencies everywhere.
I hate brown tonalities, but I hate more black environments, so male ones, too much testosterone for my tastes.
Besides, I found the appearance of Launcher buttons (and Laucher itself really) so 70’s old fashioned…
Ok someone could tell me that I can use old gnome-panel but why should I use old stuff when the new could be so much finer? Why someone shouldn’t let me change my DE tones, only because I find pink/purple more comfortable then dark/brown?
2 – I find some difficulties in using an applications based dock.
I’m asking how people normally use PC: I have many windows (at least 15) and 3 or 4 applications open. When I’m looking for a specific minimized window in the taskbar, I find it immediately among many similar others, and I can call it with a single click. Otherwise I find an extreme waste of time find the application on the launcher and chose among windows. I click a Firefox/Libreoffice/Thunderbid icons once in a day, an then I have dozen of widows on my desktop.
I had a dock. I removed it. Please let me have a taksbar again, if I need. 🙂
3 – I found a lateral launcher a bit claustrophobic.
I have a normal panoramic screen, but the presence the a launcher in the exactly areas my eyes naturally goes (ask to Gestalt psychology or simply to art critic) give me a sense of occlusion and closure.
There are many other considerations, but these are probably enough. I know some some ideas (as Launcher based approach) will be kept and I accept it and really appreciate the effort to give users something new, but I ask: in a user experience desktop guided by designers where is the freedom of users? How can I call again Unity’s desktop mine?
Code is Poetry 