Gnome 2.26 (review)
GNOME 2.26 is set for release for March 18th and if you’re wondering exactly what the developers have cooked up for their latest bi-annual release, well you’ve come to the right place. Techpark6 has been running the Release Candidate for the last two weeks to figure out what changes are in store for GNOME 2.26. The actual changes are mostly minor and not likely to cause huge reactions. You’ll likely hear a lot said about the GNOME desktop, but adjectives like “exciting,” “cutting edge,” and “revolutionary” will not be one of them . Rather, GNOME takes pride in their desktop’s stability, ease of use, & its ability to get out of the user’s way so the user can get to work. GNOME 2.26 continues this trend faithfully, enough so that this release’s mantra could be called “steady as she goes.” Gnome Desktop Like the entire GNOME 2.2x series, the basic GNOME desktop layout has stayed the same. Of course this doesn’t stop you from customizing the desktop and the screenshots below give you an idea on various styles you can go for by changing options in the GNOME panels. screenshotscreenshot-1screenshot-2
Control Center is an application you may never see depending on how your distro implements GNOME, but if you do use it the application hasn’t changed much since 2.24. A new “Startup Applications” applet is found under the Personal section. The applet looks like an easy way to keep track of start-up programs, but it also seems redundant with the “Services” applet found under the System section. There’s also a new “Computer Janitor,” which is a no frills app to remove unneeded/unused applications from your system. Finally, the “Keyboard Shortcuts” applet has received a makeover and now offers useful “Add” and “Remove” buttons along with its “Help” and “Close” buttons.
gnome-control-center
GNOME 2.26 now includes Brasero as its default CD/DVD burning program. Like GNOME itself, Brasero is a no non-sense disc burning program that does its job well. The program opens with five options: “Audio project,” “Data project,” “Video project,” “Disc copy,” and “Burn Image.” These five options should cover just about all your disc burning needs. Brasero also has more advanced options like the ability to rip discs to your hard drive if you have “libdvdcss” installed, automatic filtering of unwanted files, ability to place silence between audio tracks, a plugin system and ability to support drag and drop from nautilus among other apps. I did come away impressed with Brasero.
brasero
Although most Linux distributions ship with Firefox as its default web browser, GNOME does offer its own official browser known as “Epiphany.” There was talk of Epiphany moving from the Gecko engine to the Webkit engine by version 2.26, but Epiphany 2.26 ships with Gecko by default. Most likely this transition will happen at a later date, but in the meantime Epiphany 2.26 works like a champ. Although I am a frequent user of Firefox, I do find the Linux implementation of Firefox to be inferior to its OSX and Windows versions. Firefox on Linux loads slowly and runs like a sloth with 4 or 5 tabs opened. Epiphany feels noticeably lighter (even though they share the same Gecko engine) and worked fine with multiple tabs opened. The newest feature found in Epiphany 2.26 is their new & improved “Location Bar” which is similar to the “Awesome Bar” found in Firefox 3.0. Furthermore, a package of Epiphany extensions can easily be installed which includes popular functions like Ad Blocker, Gestures, Greasemonkey, Sidebar, Smart Booksmarks and more.
epiphanyscreenshot-3
Evolution is GNOME’s venerable e-mail and groupware suite and it’s still evolving with nifty features new features in GNOME 2.26. The two main features are aimed for better Windows & Linux integration & will make Linux users who work in a Microsoft environment very a happy. First feature is Evolution’s ability to directly import Microsoft Outlook Personal Folders (PST files) into its own program. Rather than using convoluted third party steps to import PST files like in the past, Evolution now imports PST files directly and updates appropriate email, contacts, appointments, tasks and journal entries. The second new feature is Evolution’s support of Microsoft Exchange’s MAPI protocol. Because of this, Evolution clients can now communicate directly with Exchange servers with minimum fuss (in the past Evolution only worked with Exchange’s SOAP protocol). Furthermore, setting up IMAP email accounts took minimal effort. evolution
GNOME’s sound system has implemented the latest version of Pulse Audio and also made it easier to access Pulse via their new volume control and Sound Preferences tool. When Pulse Audio works correctly (and you don’t have to kill the Pulse process to regain sound), then it’s a thing of beauty.
volumecontrol
Empathy was first introduced in GNOME 2.24, replacing Pidgin, as their default instant messenger. Empathy is also growing fast and offers a world of potential though the software framework known as telepathy. An absolute positive with the shipping version of Empathy is that the program supports voice and video in its current iteration, something Pidgin has been promising for an extended period of time but yet to deliver. Screenshot provided below is from Empathy’s website . empathy-call
And with these additions, you have GNOME 2.26. Examined on its own merits, GNOME 2.26 is a rock solid desktop manager that offers ease of use which should translate into more productivity for the end user. Also, with its new Exchange features found in Evolution, GNOME 2.26 should appeal heavily to businesses wanting to integrate Linux clients into their Microsoft Exchange networks. On the flipside, if you have been following GNOME closely, you’ll likely notice a diminishing amount of return from GNOME 2.22 to 2.24 to 2.26. This likely indicates that the 2.2x series has fully matured and is as good as its going to get in its current form. Hopefully the GNOME project will take this as an incentive to step up work on their (next generation) 3.x series and bring excitement back into the GNOME camp. GNOME 2.26 is a solid release that feels a little long in the tooth when it’s all said and done. |
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