I do not want to beat around the bushes; instead I just kickstart the topic: Graphical Userinterfaces.
Today you just get eyecandy. OpenGL on the desktop, transparency, everything is shiny and blinks. But why? Do we really need that?
An average PC gets used for:
- Internet surfing
- Office-Applications
- Mailing
- Games
And that for we need a mousecursor to drop a shaddow or windows being transparent? Imho this is just a pure waste of RAM, CPU Power and disc space – or is it me beeing too old for such jazz?
Chris Harcourt says:
It’s not just you – I don’t see much point in all the eye candy either. If some people want to use it, that’s fine, but it’s not for me (at least not until it becomes a trivial drain on resources).
I find all the transparency etc to be distracting most of the time.
As an exception: when showing XGL to some people (a “heh look what Linux can do” kind of vibe) I found a practical use for the ‘desktop cube’ thing which happens when you switch virtual desktops. I’ve seen people in past get confused when switching VDs, since they might not know what happened so it appears that they’ve just lost all their applications. With the cube thingy it’s more obvious what’s happened.
LUGRadio did a segment about eye-candy a while back which had some good comments.