"Today, the GNOME Project celebrates the release of GNOME 2.18, the latest version of the popular, multi-platform Free desktop environment." The GNOME 2.18 start page has all the details, such as release notes, download locations, and screenshots.
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Member since:2005-06-28
Member since:2005-09-27
Member since:2005-07-08
I think some users are just so conditioned to the idea that CD burning is provided by a third party application that they don't even notice the integrated solution if it stares them right at their face.
Right, that maybe the problem - which may befixable which just adding a "CD Burner" icon in the apps menu that opens the cd burning folder. But. "Usability" is about people being able to use software, so if they can't find what they want despite of being there...there's a usability problem IMO.
For example, you may argue that the "places -> cd burner" menu is "usable". But why should users think of the cd burner as a "place"? And what happens when you've a CD inserted?: You've the cd menu entry, AND the burner entry. IOW, there're *two* menu entries for the same physical thing. And that apparently confuses users.
And then, there's the nautilus burning interface: A "virtual" directory. Sure, you and me know that you should copy & paste the files there. There's only a not-clickable "burn" button. Nothing informs users that they're inside of a "burning app". It shouldn't be to hard to put a small text there: "Drop here the files that you want to burn" or something.
And then, when they move around the directories and they want to return to the CD burning app...how to do it? You can do it, but it's not easy for novice users.
IOW, I think that the nautilus burning interface is just not intuitive. It's very brave to try unify the cd burning app with the file manager, but unless you make things easier, users are not going to use it.
Member since:2005-11-12
Member since:2005-07-07
And then, there's the nautilus burning interface: A "virtual" directory. Sure, you and me know that you should copy & paste the files there. There's only a not-clickable "burn" button. Nothing informs users that they're inside of a "burning app". It shouldn't be to hard to put a small text there: "Drop here the files that you want to burn" or something.
The nautilus burning interface is very similar to the XP interface. So if people are having problems with Gnome then they most certainly have problems with XP. I don't think it is too confusing considering there is a big "write to disk" button in the window. That being said I prefer using Brasero. I am used to having another program to burn CD/DVDs with.
Member since:2007-03-05
I'm pretty much an idiot when it comes to working my Ubuntu/Linux drive...
so I asked on the LinuxForums.org site about a suitable burner for Ubu,
and installed whatever it was they recommended (couldn't even call its name now!)
Took one look at its decidedly UN-intuitive interface,
couldn't figure out what the hell to do,
and forgot about it, and haven't returned!
Nowadays, when I want to burn something, I fire up the XP drive, and use NERO, which I know and understand.
WHEN will the Linux ppl come around to the reality that 90% of us idiot computer users are NOT geek-types?
We want/demand INTUITIVE, not dorky!
Member since:2006-10-08
"I think some users are just so conditioned to the idea that CD burning is provided by a third party application that they don't even notice the integrated solution if it stares them right at their face."
These basic tools belong to Linux and BSD distributions for some years now. The users should get aware of the fact that a modern OS contains such tools by default.
"That cannot necessarily be fixed by the software, so why not tell them about it when they ask?"
Maybe it's too complicated for them to understand? "But I have to install something if I want to [insert desired action here]!" seems to be a common principle.
"Of course K3B is always a safe bet, but there is no reason to tell them to install K3B if all they want is to burn an image file."
For FreeBSD, burncd would be the first choice, connected to a drop icon in Gnome, or simply called via a xterm session.
The Verge pointed me to a blog post by Leap Motion - which reveals how their Kinect-like motion control works with Windows 8. "From the second you plug in your Leap Motion Controller, you'll be able to browse the web and interact with your computer just by moving your hands and fingers in the air. With Leap Motion technology and Windows, you can do everything that's possible with multi-touch inputs - without actually touching anything. This also means that existing applications in Windows 7 and 8 will respond to your natural hand and finger movements. Soon, we'll show you how Leap Motion will work with Mac OS X." Quite cool.
PocketNow interviews Marc Dillon, and there's an interesting note about why Jolla is keeping the display properties under wraps: "We're leaving some of those details out because we do understand that there are a lot of really big players in the market and they tend to take certain components in the market and dominate them. We created the ability to actually be able to run Sailfish on multiple hardware displays and be able to swap components, so this is part of the demand and supply planning phase. We are committed to this industrial design which is a 4.5-inch display, an 8 megapixel camera on the back and a front-facing camera at the front, and the exact specs of the display we'll provide when we're close to delivery." Something you rarely hear anything about.
"This is my NeXTstation Turbo Color booting the Mac System 7.1 Operating System using a hardware add-on called 'Daydream'. The Daydream has a Mac ROM and a few custom ICs in it and hooked up to the NeXTs DSP port. Turns your NeXT into a full fledged 68k powered Mac." So cool.
"The NetBSD Project is pleased to announce NetBSD 6.1, the first feature update of the NetBSD 6 release branch. It represents a selected subset of fixes deemed important for security or stability reasons, as well as new features and enhancements. Please note that all fixes in the prior security/bugfix updates (NetBSD 6.0.1 and 6.0.2) are also in 6.1."
"At the end of a week in which Electronic Arts confirmed it wasn't developing a thing for the Wii U, one of the software engineers in EA Sports' Canada studio, in a series of since-deleted tweets, disparaged the console as 'crap' and suggested Nintendo should give up on hardware altogether. 'The Wii U is crap. Less powerful than an Xbox 360. Poor online/store. Weird tablet', tweeted Bob Summerwill, listed as a senior software engineer at EA Canada, in a reply to a tweet posting a link about EA's no-Wii U news. 'Nintendo are walking dead at this point'." The Wii U is turning into the 21st century's Virtual Boy.
"In NixOS, the entire operating system - the kernel, applications, system packages, configuration files, and so on - is built by the Nix package manager from a description in a purely functional build language. The fact that it's purely functional essentially means that building a new configuration cannot overwrite previous configurations. Most of the other features follow from this." Interesting approach. A Linux distribution, sure, but with some very refreshing ideas about system configuration.
Appfour added, among other features, C/C++ support to its new version of AIDE. From Android-IDE, "Now you can write parts of your app or your whole app in C/C++ on your device. AIDE supports the Standard Android NDK toolchain (GCC 4.6 + Bionic, STL, ...). No changes are necessary if you want to build an app developed on a PC with Eclipse. C/C++ development is fully integrated: Build errors appear in the error list and files can easily be navigated to with Go to file. The editor supports C/C++ syntax highlighting."
Ars nails it: "The answer is that Google did announce what amounts to a fairly substantial Android update yesterday. They simply did it without adding to the update fragmentation problems that continue to plague the platform. By focusing on these changes and not the apparently-waiting-in-the-wings update to the core software, Google is showing us one of the ways in which it's trying to fix the update problem."
"It is good for programmers to understand what goes on inside a processor. The CPU is at the heart of our career. What goes on inside the CPU? How long does it take for one instruction to run? What does it mean when a new CPU has a 12-stage pipeline, or 18-stage pipeline, or even a 'deep' 31-stage pipeline? Programs generally treat the CPU as a black box. Instructions go into the box in order, instructions come out of the box in order, and some processing magic happens inside. As a programmer, it is useful to learn what happens inside the box. This is especially true if you will be working on tasks like program optimization. If you don't know what is going on inside the CPU, how can you optimize for it? This article is about what goes on inside the x86 processor's deep pipeline."
"It was the only moment I heard regret slip into Otellini's voice during the several hours of conversations I had with him. 'The lesson I took away from that was, while we like to speak with data around here, so many times in my career I've ended up making decisions with my gut, and I should have followed my gut,' he said. 'My gut told me to say yes.'" The world would've been a much different place - Apple would have been less dependant on Samsung for its chips, which probably would've meant less money for Samsung to develop its Galaxy business.
Member since:
2005-07-08
It's right there in the places menu (one to the right of Applications on the desktop) and it has a very clear name. What would you suggest? I think some users are just so conditioned to the idea that CD burning is provided by a third party application that they don't even notice the integrated solution if it stares them right at their face. That cannot necessarily be fixed by the software, so why not tell them about it when they ask? Of course K3B is always a safe bet, but there is no reason to tell them to install K3B if all they want is to burn an image file.