Justin Foell

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This post was originally supposed to be titled “My commitment to Ubuntu.” But I couldn’t take it. After 2 years of using Unity and watching it evolve one step forward and then dwindle two steps back, I decided it was time to give GNOME another chance.

Don’t get me wrong… I’m still committed to Ubuntu, and moreover Linux and Open Source in general. I’ve tried quite a few Linux distributions: Slackware, RedHat, Fedora, Gentoo, Debian, and Ubuntu. I don’t mean I installed and tried them for a week, I’ve used each of those distributions for over a year on a day-to-day basis.
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I have stuck with Ubuntu since 2008 because it seemed to have the most momentum, the most desktop distribution market share (which equates to better support), and the most polished overall package.

As such, I’ve always tried to stick with whatever Canonical recommends for mainline Ubuntu Desktop. That meant using atrocious iTunes wanna-be softwares like Rhythmbox and Banshee (to this day I’m unclear as to the difference between these two). However, I’d stick it out just so I knew what the normal user experience was – feeling the average users’ pain, and reporting bugs along the way.

Why Ubuntu decided to drop GNOME in favor of Unity has always puzzled me. As per my rule, I went along for the ride into the Unity experience. I like the simplicity of Unity, having used it as part of the Ubuntu Netbook Remix / Edition or whatever it is/was called. But I feel it was moved into prime-time a little too early.

No Man’s Land

All of my complaints with Unity are in regards to hardware support (or lack there-of). For my office, I prefer to use my laptop (a huge desktop replacement) with an external monitor in “portrait” mode:

In the beginning (Ubuntu 11.04), multi-monitor support was abysmal. My monitor setup would get rendered as one large canvas. The laptop & monitor are like a backwards “L” and the rest of the area (above the laptop and to the left of the monitor) becomes what I call “No Man’s Land.”

System tray icons that were written for “legacy” GNOME support, like Skype, would be rendered up in No Man’s Land, where no one can see them. The only reason I knew is because you could see a tiny green icon up there when using Unity’s “Expo” feature. The mouse cursor could go up into No Man’s Land (confusing), and application windows could also be moved there accidentally.

Then on a later release all of the system tray icons needed to instead use a different “indicator” API. So every system tray app that was previously working in GNOME and hadn’t kept up with the Unity trend, now had to have an indicator wrapper to make it useful (or even visible).

The Last Straw

So after two years of Unity advancements, you’d think it would be awesome now, right? Nope – 12.10 is the slowest Unity ever. I tried it for a month and decided it was the final straw. I don’t know exactly what happened. Maybe I was previously using Unity 2D or had shut off all of the effects. Frankly I’m glad I don’t have to remember all the stupid minutia anymore. But in Ubuntu 12.10 there is no “giant off switch” for all Unity effects, and my computer feels like everything is “Powered by Java.” ™ Slow menus, slow window switching, slow window moving, slow desktop switching! I thought I had fixed the slowness by turning off vblank_mode for my Intel GM45 graphics card, but when I attached my external monitor, slowness resumed.

Maybe the Unity slowness is caused by the sheer size of my desktop, since it is effectively rendering a 3000×1920 pixel area. Maybe my graphics card is just a wimp. What ever it is, I give up. I found that GNOME is still alive and well in the Ubuntu repositories. I suggest to anyone that is stuck in the muck with Unity, exorcise your demons! Execute the `apt-get install` command from that page. Don’t bother with activating GDM over LightDM – GNOME really only recommends it because GDM is themed to look like GNOME “Remix” (see below). You can also skip the `apt-get remove` in case you want to go back to Unity – especially if you’re a masochist. If your user account was set to automatically log in, turn it off so you can choose between GNOME/Unity when you restart.

I tried the GNOME “Remix” and it was cute, but seemed to be plagued with similar issues that Unity had in the beginning: in-configurable virtual desktop switching, poor multi-monitor support, limited flexibility with system-tray apps/indicators.

Classic

GNOME Classic. Like Coke Classic, this is it. Why did we ever abandon this? It felt so comforting to be using GNOME again. Everything works just as I remember, plus it’s a little more polished. The ironic thing is, GNOME also uses the Compiz 3D compositing system, but it performs far better on my hardware/monitor configuration than Unity. Like I said, I don’t care what magic makes it work, as long as I can get back to work.

Update: Unity in Ubuntu 13.014

I’m happy to report that Unity in Ubuntu 13.04 is much better regarding performance specifically with my Intel graphics chipset. After 2 months of solid use I can report that it’s definitely back in a usable state (for me at least).

Unity, Ubuntu, and all Linux distros (including the Linux kernel itself), have always suffered from 1000 paper cuts. It’s always been useful for me as a tech geek, but I see and can understand how the minor annoyances add up to someone not being able to make the switch to Linux full-time.

My current issue with Unity is a strange bug where if I have a browser maximized on my 2nd display and I try to open a new tab from a different workspace (via Instant Messenger usually), when I switch back to the workspace containing my browser, it has magically moved to the primary display.

It’s not enough to make me abandon Unity again, but combined with something else it might be.

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Once the BNSF railroad passes over the south side of I-694 and expands into the vast Northtown Yard, you have but one option to cross it in Fridley City limits: the 44th Ave. Bridge.

I always had assumed that this bridge is in Columbia Heights, but it lies in Fridley proper. The notion sunk in when I saw a Fridley Police car staking out the bridge – presumably looking for speeders.

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And speed they will. This bridge has a 2-lane road with extra wide lanes and extra wide shoulders. The speed limit is 30 MPH. Who are we kidding? No one is going to go 30 on it because it is engineered like a 45 MPH road:

44th-wide-lanes — Impatient driver, wanting to go faster than 30 MPH

The view from the top of the bridge is actually quite fascinating. You can see the “hump” at the Northtown Yard in action. A train backs up slowly to a hill (the hump) and one-by-one cars are uncoupled and roll down the other side, switching to various tracks so the non-unit train cars get rearranged to move on to their next destination:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/family_man_system/28129427798/

Photo courtesy of Man of Family

Getting up to the top of this bridge is the laughable part. There’s no real entrance to the bridge walkway from the road on the east side. There’s just a narrow, weedy, sandy, decaying section of asphalt that says “trouble” more than “walk this way:”

The path is perilously narrow, squeezed down by the guard rail. Once you get to the bridge it turns to concrete and doesn’t get any wider. In fact it feels narrower since you’re now encased between a fence and a jersey barrier:

I think it would be impossible for two pedestrians to pass without brushing shoulders. Yet automobiles on this bridge are given a extra-wide berth for their whopping 30 MPH:

This bridge is technically a county road (Anoka County Road 2). I understand that the county (and state) sometimes operate with heavy hands. But regardless of who assumes ownership, someone should be ashamed of themselves.

The next time this bridge is resurfaced, the lanes should be narrowed to 10 or 11 feet, to fully reflect it’s 30 MPH speed limit, and the shoulders should be even narrower yet. Then the pedestrian area could be widened to provide actual space for non-motorized traffic to travel in both directions simultaneously without the certainty of a head-on collision which is guaranteed today.

Skip to the ride racap

Date: Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Time: 5:45-7:30PM (leave at 6PM promptly)
Start/End: Fridley Northstar Station west side – East River Rd. & 61st Ave.
Route options: 5 miles (or less), 10 miles (route map)

As part of Bike/Walk Week Twin Cities, I’m organizing an evening ride on the Mississippi River Trail in Fridley. This trail advertises “10 states, 1 river” as it goes from the Mississippi headwaters at Lake Itasca near Bemidji, Minnesota all the way down to the Mississippi delta and the Gulf of Mexico in Louisiana.

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Let’s say for a moment you’re a passenger on MetroTransit’s 10N northbound. You meant to get off at 52nd & Central because you work at one of the retailers near 53rd and Central, but you missed your stop. The next stop is just north of 694, at Central & Hackmann, by the Holiday Station. The fastest way to get back would be to walk south on Central.

However MnDOT (as much as they love the automobile) have forbidden pedestrians on Central Ave. between 53rd and Medtronic Pkwy. (where the 694 interchange resides). There are posted “no pedestrian” signs as well as no sidewalks anywhere in the area. So legally the shortest route for pedestrians is to cross 694 using the Matterhorn bridge, adding a full mile to the trip:
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I like to think that I’m not sexist, but my reputation may precede me.

At some point during my college years, I started using a reverse-psychology approach with women I knew (usually girlfriends) – telling them they couldn’t do something – in hopes that they’d be motivated to prove me wrong.

Ask my wife – this is the wrong approach. Reverse psychology only works on a certain type of person, usually enemies, and (hopefully) they’re not the majority. People want to be built up, not torn down. The other bad part of this reverse-psychology habit was that as I told women that they couldn’t do something, I was slowly and subconsciously telling myself that they couldn’t.

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I had to stop doing it. Then, a wake-up call came. I learned I’d be having a daughter. Was this my punishment for my transgressions? Would this mean all of the secrets of the female psyche would be revealed to me? Probably not. But I want to make sure both my son and daughter, if they choose to follow my footsteps into a technology field, are both given the same opportunities and the same treatment.

As soon as I learned I was having a daughter, the articles about sexism in tech became immediately more personal and relevant. A lot of attention had recently been paid to conferences, female speakers (or lack there-of), and conference behavior. I took this all to heart as I was planning a conference that was held right before my daughter was born – WordCamp. I made a conscious effort to have a good representation of women speakers.

In the WordPress community, it’s not difficult to find and meet amazing women doing amazing things. Look at Lisa Sabin-Wilson, my neighbor to the east – she wrote a book. I’ve thought about writing a book – but she actually did it! However, you don’t have to be a superstar or “internet famous” to add to the conversation. Maybe that’s why I enjoy working with the WordPress community. It’s easy to meet all types of people doing great things.

Even though WordPress is written in PHP, I found that there’s a big difference between these two communities. I’ve only been to two PHP conferences: php|tek in the mid-aughts and most recently MidwestPHP 2012. At both conferences, the only female speaker was Sara Golemon. Maybe it was just coincidence. Sara is a highly respected contributor to the PHP community and she’s also a published author. But my feelings concluded that she had become the token female spokesperson for PHP conferences.

So what can we (especially men) do? First you need to change your mind. If you don’t have a daughter, imagine one of the few women in your technology field as if she were. Is she being treated fairly? Are you treating her fairly?

Then start leveraging your power for good. Be your own superhero. If you’re organizing a conference, go out of your way to include women. Pay it forward: my business partner teaches a class called Black Girls Code. For those who don’t know him, he is neither black, nor a girl. If you’re involved with the interview process at work, bring some women in. I guarantee they’ll bring new perspective to your old boys club. It may only take a couple of GI Jane’s in a male-dominated field to turn the tide and welcome a new wave of female geeks.

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Technology, Bicycling, Hobbies, Kids, Life.

GNOME sweet GNOME

Skip to Ubuntu 13.04 Update

No Man’s Land

The Last Straw

Classic

Update: Unity in Ubuntu 13.014

Fridley Hates Pedestrians (Part 4) – 44th Ave. Bridge

Discover the Mississippi River Trail north of Minneapolis

Skip to the ride racap

Update

Landmarks

Alternate Route

Fridley Hates Pedestrians (Part 3) – MN-65 & I-694

MnDOT’s solution, still part of the problem

Women in Tech: My bout with Sexism