In my opinion, the tablet-oriented direction that GUIs have gone to is what is messing up things. I don't see the reason for change just for changes sake. They're free to do so, go for it, but to then assert that anyone that doesn't jump on their fad-wagon is holding things back, is just silly. A friend of mine was afraid to upgrade from Gnome 2 on Ubuntu 10.04, because of Unity. She did not like Xfce, because it wasn't quite a complete desktop experience. I showed her MATE, and got her upgraded to 12.04, she couldn't be happier, because it is just like what she was using. I haven't used Windows 8, but if it alters the traditional desktop too much, I could definitely see more users hoping for an alternative, so they could use their computer like they used to do.. so maybe going to OS X or to a Linux distribution with a traditional desktop. I had the same experience when KDE 3.5 was taken away in favor of KDE 4. I love having a ton of configuration options, but if there were no Trinity, I'd probably be running MATE too. So, to me, projects like Trinity and MATE are what are keeping end-user Linux alive. They are both mature desktops that people have gotten used to. I am really glad they exist! And I hope neither changes much, except to support running programs written for other environments and to support new technologies as they come along (like bluetooth). Why fix what isn't broken? Jeff On Sat, Jul 21, 2012 at 2:58 PM, Lisi <lisi.reisz@...> wrote: > I was at a local LUG meeting today and was very distressed that the above view > should be expressed, and forcefully. I found it distressing because that is > quite some allegation - that we and Mate users and Cinnamon users etc., (all > splinter groups) are actually damaging Linux, doing it harm. > > The fact that we are free to digress and disagree is why I like open source so > much. Take away that freedom and we might as well all use Windows. It > seemed to me a quite extraordinary allegation. And as I say, I found it > personally upsetting. > > Since Linux without its freedom would not be Linux, nothing would seem to me > more terminally harmful to Linux than to destroy that freedom. > > I am a congenital maverick. I claim the right to remain a maverick and to > swim against the tide as much as I like! > > Lisi > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: trinity-users-unsubscribe@... > For additional commands, e-mail: trinity-users-help@... > Read list messages on the web archive: http://trinity-users.pearsoncomputing.net/ > Please remember not to top-post: http://trinity.pearsoncomputing.net/mailing_lists/#top-posting >