Android is a huge success... it overtook Windows NT in number of users in
2014, and now it has even overtaken Windows NT in number of world wide web
page views even though Android devices lack proper keyboards and big screens.
This success was so much self-evident that six years ago everybody wanted to
do things more Android-like. And of course, GNU/Linux developers thought
they were the ones more ready to do it, because they already shared the Linux
kernel. So there was this trend to design desktops for GNU/Linux as if they
were for Android. GNOME 3 succumbed to it. Unity (Ubuntu's customized
GNOME) went even further - here is the short review I wrote about it:
http://www.grafotema.com/agullo/articulos/ubuntu/ubuntu.html#5
I remember being at an GNOME 3 presentation asking "So you cannot have two
applications at the same time onscreen so you can copy things from one to
another?". It was unbelivable to me. So we computer users with GNU/Linux
had to withstand desktops that were obviously worse to use, because desktop
developers happened to have the expectation that convergency with mobile
devices would lead GNU/Linux to massive success.
Moves intended to multiply the user base at the cost of disappointing the old
users show how little the developers cared for their users community. And
guess what, sucess never came - I suppose new users never come when they see
the old ones are unsatisfied. So, the move only succeded at betraying their
old users' trust.
So I am happy to read that Unity is to disappear, and wish this lesson would
be learnt once and for all.
