Latest Comments by Purple Library Guy
Save islands from sinking by spreading life across them in Regrowth
27 Apr 2021 at 6:08 pm UTC
27 Apr 2021 at 6:08 pm UTC
I only have one question in all this--why does growing plants on an island stop it from sinking?
Discord has reportedly ended talks with Microsoft to remain independent
25 Apr 2021 at 1:52 am UTC Likes: 3
25 Apr 2021 at 1:52 am UTC Likes: 3
Quoting: Cyba.CowboySomeday, I'd like to move to fully self-hosting everything, though I probably wouldn't have said server located in Australia, because we're basically China of the Western World (i.e. a "surveillance state").Ehhh, the whole Anglosphere is really. The Americans spy on everyone, the British helpfully spy on the Americans, and everyone swaps all their data so they get to effectively spy on themselves even if their laws say theoretically they can't. That's Five Eyes in a nutshell.
Humble Bundle replacing purchase sliders with less generous options
24 Apr 2021 at 6:58 pm UTC Likes: 11
24 Apr 2021 at 6:58 pm UTC Likes: 11
To be honest it has long been my opinion that the whole Humble thing was a great idea originally, when it was just some people doing a bundle now and then, but was kind of pumped up beyond what it could sustain. It was too slight a gimmick to base a whole game store on. Eventually, the ongoing Humble thing became like when you have the umpteenth sequel to a good movie. As we're seeing in the comments here, people lose interest.
Civilization VI has a final free update 'of the season' hinting at more
23 Apr 2021 at 11:35 pm UTC
23 Apr 2021 at 11:35 pm UTC
Hmmm . . . interesting, although I wonder if the new units are a bit fiddly. I mean, granular is nice I guess, there's flavour, but it adds extra tech steps and delays getting certain unique units on countries who already aren't that great.
System76 announce COSMIC, their own GNOME-based desktop environment for Pop!_OS
22 Apr 2021 at 6:34 pm UTC Likes: 1
22 Apr 2021 at 6:34 pm UTC Likes: 1
Quoting: NeverthelessI use Mate with panel on the bottom because that's what I've always been used to, but I add a side panel on the right to put launchers on. Plus I usually put a "quit" button at the top or almost-top of the side panel (dropped just far enough so I don't accidentally hit it when I'm closing windows). As slaapliedje points out, there's plenty space at the side of our wide screens, and launchers work fine on a vertical thing.Quoting: slaapliedjeI still go for the Mint desktop (with a few chamges). I think Cinnamon never had a top panel as per default. I also use XFCE in some cases (single bottom panel of course). I like KDE in principle, but in my experience it never has been as stable amd issue free as Cinnamon or XFCE. Mate could be nice, but the window decorations tend to have close buttons that can't be reached in the top right corner, which makes me mad..Quoting: NeverthelessI think the only issue with a panel on the left/right only is text doesn't display very well in a small column (at least with latin languages!) In my mind a top panel with clock and indicator and notifications popping down always made more sense to me in modern UIs than a bottom dock/panel. Here's why. Basically when you open an application, you have a title bar, with the Title of the app, maybe some information, and the Minimize / Maximize / Close (unless you're using standard Gnome, which for some dumb reason ditched minimize/maximize, I re-enable those, but also add the middle mouse click as minimize so I can click anywhere on the bar and have it go away temporarily). The title bar is generally up at the top, so having a panel up along the top with it leads to some readability, as you can get the info of the program name and maybe the tab name, depending on app, but also the clock is right up there, so you can check the time, etc. Throwing your eyes to the bottom right for a time check is extra work, really. It was fine on old 4:3 screens that were 14-21" in size, less so on larger screens).Quoting: slaapliedje1. A single panel on the left would make sense. Menu button on the left bottom, close button on the right top and workspace overview / activities would still be available. And the lost space is where you rarely need it.Quoting: Nevertheless1) Yeah, I don't maximize windows if I can help it. Ever. And especially on an ultra-wide screen, where (for example) web pages will never take advantage of them and you're left with huge amounts of white space on either side. Web pages don't scale well on wide screen displays, and irritate me that is what we all have moved to due to the movie industry...Quoting: slaapliedjeI like that you're talking detail. I think the classic Win95 style desktop has some big advantages!Quoting: riusmaNot that I like KDE. But this cracks me up.Quoting: KohlyKohlThey should just switch to KDE and provide their own theme...K-Pop!_OS ? :happy:
Curious... why do people like Docks? Personally I use the default Gnome setup because I like that it isn't constantly on my screen by default. I come from a long line of systems that didn't have task bars, and quit frankly like it that way. Windows 95-XP had a nice minimanlistic one that didn't take up extra vertical space. Gnome 2 was odd because they had the smaller panels, but were top/bottom. The gnome dock being off to the left and set to autohide makes so much more sense to me.
1) it is closer to the activities hot corner. So in one fluid movement I can fling the mouse to the upper left, then straight down to the dock to launch something without touching the keyboard. Or if I want to only use keyboard, meta key, then type, maybe some arrows, and enter. Boom launched application.
2) with the dock moved to the bottom of the screen (in both gnome 40 and Cosmic), you would have to go up, then down (assuming auto-hide is on, which for me it would be...)
3) now that screens are more commonly wide, ultrawide and super ultrawide... having a giant dock at the bottom with grey space around it looks REALLY hideous...
1. Closing maximized windows by clicking in the top right corner without having to look.
2. Opening the system menu by clicking in the bottom left corner without having to look.
3. Favourite apps in the bottom panel. Why bothering to add an extra dock, dash, panel or whatever?
4. Workspace switcher in the panel.
5. Window list in the panel (no clicking, or using the keyboard).
I don't get what a top panel is good for. And even when I move it down in Gnome, the window close button is in a position that can not be reached with a click in the top right corner.
I absolutely love Cinnamon because of it!
2) yeah that's why I like the top left hot corner as well, I don't even have to click on Gnome, I just throw the mouse up there and it creates the 'activities' screen. Ha, when I went to a Apple store to have them look at my work macbook, the 'genius' visibly cringed when he activated the hot corner for the 'expose' thing that macs have. Made me chuckle.
3) That's the same thing I feel about the current Gnome dock. You can add favorites, you can right click on them for specific menu entries, and it'll create icons there as you open various tasks. Works quite fine, and with it auto-hiding, it's out of the way. Bottom of the screen, especially with ultra and super ultrawide screen displays, is a HUGE waste of pixels. I currently run at 3840x1200 on a 44" display, and that means I have like 8 icons on the bottom panel in Windows, and the rest is just useless as windows can't overlap that bar...
4) The gnome workspace switcher is nice, but the odd thing is, even though I always touted that as a great feature, I've rarely used it in the past, though when I think about it and use it, I love it. Especially when I have a task that is running in the background and I can just fling that to another window while watching netflix or something, and then just switch the work space to check it... But then I find myself liking just hitting the 'meta' key to bring up the activities screen where the movie on Netflix will still run while I can glance at a terminal.
5) and the window list in Gnome is just a key, or a flip to the hot corner away. I don't need to constantly know what applications are running. Side note to this though, I really did like the feature in Gnome 2 where copying functions showed progress in the task panel. I find it funny that Microsoft definitely snagged that idea and put it in Windows (I think 7 was the first time I saw it in an MS OS).
2. I have the cinnamon workspace overview there.
3. I don't see any use of a panel on the top, and a panel / dock on the bottom. It's a waste of vertical space.
Older UIs (like the Amiga) are different, as there are UI elements / Information in the bottom of the window in certain cases, or will show there are more icons in workbench that you can scroll left / right. Then again, it also has a menu bar up top with the information. In fact, when I think about older operating systems.. Atari ST with GEM had the menu up top, Amiga, Mac... only major one that did not is Windows, and then KDE used it's paradigm, Gnome did the same thing in 1.x, then 2.x had the bottom / top panels (which became Cinammon and Mate's style) and then went to the top like the ST / Amiga / Mac. Mac later had added the Dock at the bottom as it was a thing in NeXT. And in my humble opinion is the wrong place for it. Whenever I use a mac, there is always something that irritates me about it, and that's one of them. I end up using the Spotlight function to launch programs, as that's more like what I'm used to with Gnome / Windows 10 / KDE. Ha, clicking on menus and trying to find an application in them seems like an ancient method to me. As does having to open a file manager to dig through folders for something. Though that's basically what I do on the ST / Amiga. But then in the case of those, I don't have software installs going all over the place and I can organize them any way I see fit :)
I'm also completely accustomed to look in the (bottom) panel for info (time, system messages, open windows/apps ...), and have my favourite apps clickable there. For rarely started apps I'm happy to use a menu, which NEVER changes the order or arrangement of apps, and/or which gives me a search option. There is no point in showing my favourite apps first in the menu too...
And I use the file manager all the time. I used to install KDE Dolphin for a long time, but imho Nemo is even better by now.
I guess what you prefer has a lot to do with what you're accustomed to... So have fun with your way! :)
Linux Kernel dev bans University of Minnesota for sending malicious patches
21 Apr 2021 at 10:57 pm UTC
(No, my mistake--they did that one deliberately)
21 Apr 2021 at 10:57 pm UTC
Quoting: Alm888I have a research proposition: let's get ourselves a pharmaceutical company and force this company to introduce poison in some of its medications and distribute those poisoned drugs trough common distribution network. In the name of research, of course! I think we must determine the pharmaceutical industry's ability to identify and block malicious drugs!Wasn't that Oxycontin?
HINT: That was a sarcasm.
(No, my mistake--they did that one deliberately)
Discord has reportedly ended talks with Microsoft to remain independent
21 Apr 2021 at 10:48 pm UTC Likes: 2
21 Apr 2021 at 10:48 pm UTC Likes: 2
Quoting: GuestSecondarily, what makes the data thing important is that it all gets combined to make a surprisingly comprehensive picture. The more your data is collected by separate silos rather than conglomerates that can aggregate it all, the better.Quoting: scaineI'm comfortable with the little data that I share by using Discord while they conduct their business an independent firm. (…) I won't support anything to do with Microsoft or Apple.I do not share your point of view, but I can understand it :wink:
Jackbox Games get their engine ported to Vulkan and SDL2, try it with Jackbox Party Pack 7
21 Apr 2021 at 4:51 pm UTC Likes: 2
21 Apr 2021 at 4:51 pm UTC Likes: 2
Quoting: EhvisI don't really see these games needing the performance that Vulkan could bring. Makes me wonder if their intent might be to go Stadia as well.I assume it's also about going forward; this is the proof of concept, but it's the engine that got the upgrade. Presumably from now on their games will have Linux almost for free, using up to date tech that won't be getting sidelined any time soon.
Metro Exodus for Linux to run better on AMD GPUs soon with a Mesa fix now merged
20 Apr 2021 at 6:59 pm UTC Likes: 3
20 Apr 2021 at 6:59 pm UTC Likes: 3
Quoting: EikeI don't know anything about the technology, but is my feeling right that the game shouldn't be calling with layout_size=0 in the first place?I guess it's a very minimalist game? :wink:
Zorin OS 16 gets a Beta with 'the largest library of apps' available on any Linux desktop
20 Apr 2021 at 7:51 am UTC
20 Apr 2021 at 7:51 am UTC
Quoting: denyasisI've always held the impression that Fedora was rather stable.That's not the impression I've had. Their server OS is stable. Far as I can tell, Fedora is Red Hat's cutting edge distro where they try all the new stuff. It tends to be quite up to date, but I wouldn't figure it for stable.
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