On Thu, 2003-01-09 at 08:58, Emilio wrote: > I had RH7.2 on my laptop and had to wait nearly 2 months (to get the disks > right) to be able to install 8.0, or rather do an upgrade to 8.0. I have > been a Red Hat user since version 3.0. > Unfortunately this upgrade came to me as a GREAT disappointment: > > 1) The "new" desktop, that BlueSomething thing is the worst thing I ever > used, I > was so disenchanted with how the system has "degraded" that I am now using > Windows again after many years...
Bluecurve is merely a theme. You can change it in both KDE and GNOME. What makes it unusual is that there is a common theme for both KDE and GNOME so that GTK and Qt apps look the same no matter which environment you run them in. I happen to like it, but it's clearly a matter of preference. When I first encountered it, I admit I wasn't too fond, but I found myself switching back after a short while. It seems an especially clean and simple design that's easy on the eyes. Anyway, you can change the theme by selecting Preferences->Control Center->Theme > > 2) As usual from all the upgrades, the upgrade method completely breaks > down/destroys all the desktop URL shortcuts. After the upgrade you see > urlABXCY86xErer or something like that and the shortcut is useless. Same > thing happened in previous upgrades, every time I had to remove them and > recreate them if I new where they pointed to. I never upgrade. I keep my /home directory on it's own partition and do a fresh install everytime. This may be the source of many of the problems you mention. > 3) The "new" menu system of that blue thing is disappointing too. Can't find > anything as I used to in my previous Gnome/Sawfish thing. There is no > possibility > to select other window managers even though the RPMs for those are > installed? Yes, you can change your window manager (Metacity is the default under RH 8.0). A 2 second search of Google turned this up: """ from a terminal, run killall metacity; sleep 3; sawfish after that, run gnome-session-save """ > 4) It seems impossible to configure ANY of the SawFish window management > parameters. Using the "explorer" thing, when you reach the "SawFish" folder > and click on any of the parameter groups (Focus, Sounds, etc.) simply does > nothing. I noticed that if I did it on the command line > (sawfish-ui -group=focus) I get an error saying that it cannot connect to > the socket /tmp/.sawfish-myusername and that is strange because (a) > /tmp/.sawfish-myusername does not exist, but /tmp/.sawfish-root does, and > (b) I am logged in (X) as myself (myusername) and NOT as root. As an > experiment I executed the same command as root thinking but it still > complained that it could not connect to the socket. Sawfish is probably not running. As I mentioned above, Metacity is the default WM for 8.0 > 5) Mozilla 1.0 STILL complains that it could not initialize the security > component, when are they (Mozilla) going to fix that??? has been appearing > for AGES. I don't get that error. Have you tried Mozilla 1.0.1? Or maybe it's the result of upgrading versus doing a fresh install. Then again, if you've been getting it for "ages", perhaps it's something with your configuration. > 6) The "terminal" windows that now pop up are super huge, almost an > abomination! what happened to the good old, decent sized, fully configurable > terminal windows of RH7.3 ? Again, just change your preferences. You can change these preferences in the terminal itself under Edit->Preferences <wink>. Try font size for starters. > 7) APM is still broken. If I simulate closing the lid by pressing down the > button that detects that, the screen goes black, I hear a couple of beeps > but the system seems "alive". The problem is it doesn't respond anymore to > anything, only way out is the Windows solution (REBOOT!).. I understand APM > isn't a redhat specific thing :) but I can definitely name it as one of the > most > unsuccessful pieces of Linux software, one would expect that after so many > years it would have improved (APM) so much that it would work for most > systems out of the box (as it did on my system when I had RH6.x). Can't answer this as I don't use a laptop. Sorry. > 8) Previously I was able to configure GDM to use "faces" that no longer > seems possible Make sure that GDM is setup to use the "Standard Greeter" and that "Show choosable user images" is enabled (System Settings->Login Screen). You can also set a "Login Photo" under Preferences->Login Photo. > 9) What happened to the menu that appeared when clicking on the desktop > background area? now it brings up a useless menu. I want to be able to > change the window manager and theme to something more useful and more > tasteful than that BlueCurve abomination. While many, if not most, of the configuration options have moved, most are still available if you search through the menus a bit (and Google is your friend). > 10) Evolution seemed to hang endlessly during the import, in the end it did > not import anything, not even my Balsa/ELM mailbox.... I'd report this on the Evolution list. Undoubtedly someone there could help you work through this. > So I guess that is it, after 10 years of being a fervent Linux user I have > grown terribly disappointed :( and RH8.0 seems to have given the final blow > to that. Anyway, if anybody knows solutions to the above mentioned issues > I would appreciate it. The real solution is to realize that RedHat made great efforts with 8.0 to make the desktop more usable for the average user but that this meant widespread changes in the interface. Take the time to explore it a bit before complaining about "serious" problems (of which you don't seem to really have many, just annoyances). It doesn't seem to me that you've really tried very hard as many of the things you complain about are just a few mouse clicks away. While having a familiar system change underneath of you can be frustrating, it certainly isn't unique to RedHat or even Linux (consider WinXP). If everything stayed the same, we'd still be using FVWM or TWM. If you've used Linux for 10 years I'd expect you'd show a little more tenacity than that <wink>. Hang in there, -- Cliff Wells, Software Engineer Logiplex Corporation (www.logiplex.net) (503) 978-6726 x308 (800) 735-0555 x308
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