Is GNOME really that bad?

After I stumbled upon solene’s blog post about GNOME and accessibility I also wanted to say what I personally think about GNOME as well.

A solid desktop

Yes, you might say extensions will break the desktop from time to time, but there are things that will keep you from having this issue and actually have a solid desktop experience. I use Fedora and they support the last two releases of GNOME which is enough time for developers to keep up with adjusting their extensions to the new version. Also everything is integrated into GNOME, it’s an outright solid user experience right from the beginning, especially on Fedora.

Everything you need

GNOME comes with a variety of applications to get stuff done. What I like especially is their e-mail client Evolution mail which not only snuggly integrates into the desktop, but also supports modern functions out of the box without having to hack them in along with full Exchange and PGP support.

What is the point in “removing features”?

This isn’t removing features really, they rather get moved into a seperate extension than clogging up the desktop. I think of GNOME more as a base system to build your specific user experience and user interface changes on top. If you want to extend your desktop just add extensions to match your workflow.