It might satisfy hipster designers but not users.
I must say, I am not impressed by the UX of the whole setup... which is a shame, since they iirc slaughtered the perfectly good GNOME 2.x UI to cater to those devices specifically around a decade ago - and for what? If this is all that's there to reap, it's been a bad trade-off.
Looking forward to trying Plasma Mobile; maybe it can improve on the status quo.
It was the fad of that time, when Microsoft also introduced Windows 8 and the "Modern UI" Metro.
But at least they came to their senses, also because no devs bothered to adopt it :) and they still didn't manage to sell any Windows tablets.
That was such a branding problem for Microsoft. Microsoft supplied so many Surface tablets to the NFL and the commentators kept calling them iPads.
There was a recent article on here that explained GNOME 2.x was windows-like enough that there was fear Microsoft would come after Linux distributions with patent lawsuits, hence the departure from that style of UI in the next version. KDE on the other hand was made with a patent sharing agreement in place.
Edit: The point made in that article seems to be disproven though: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39493246 . Even Miguel de Icaza said it's nonsense. Can't get more authoritative on Gnome than that.
But it was just too weird with the workspaces on the fly, the huge window decorations (despite touch I would mainly use the pen anyway) and the lack of a real launcher. I used it for about 3 months and got rid of it. It just rubbed me the wrong way constantly and I really couldn't stand the designers' attitude, every time I wanted to change something I ended up googling it and finding some excuse from the devs on why they wouldn't account for it (usually along the lines of "you shouldn't want/need that").
What didn't help was that Linux on the Surface Pro 3 was a huge PITA also. Often the keyboard wouldn't work after having been disconnected, or the pen would stop working, or it would turn on in my bag for some weird reason and be boiling hot, or it would fail to pick up the ethernet of the dock etc. Most of these issues were solved by a reboot but I ended up rebooting a lot to solve all these stupid random problems and I really got sick of that.
But the "Weirdness" of Gnome 3 didn't help. I have a lot of opinions on how stuff must work and tried modifying gnome with plugins to make it work that way, and that led to a lot of issues when updates came out and the plugins weren't updated. Opinionated software just isn't for me. I want options. Lots and lots of options :)
Eventually I moved back to a desktop and gave KDE another try (the last time was in the KDE 4 period and I didn't like it) and it felt like a breath of fresh air. Everything I wanted to change about the default UI had an option in there somewhere to do it. It felt like the developers were reading my mind and pre-empted every wish :3 I've always cherished software packages like that.
And it only kept getting better and better with things like accent colours in the anniversary update. I use a lot of my own theming as well for both my DE and web apps and KDE is really great for that. I was actually planning to make a real theme myself but it's so configurable now that I can really make it pretty much like I want with just some configuration clicks.
I donate monthly to KDE now just because I want them to continue this great work and philosophy.
Might not be "professional" but it sure is more productive.
https://i.imgur.com/XcZvanv.png
(Burnt yellow is my current system accent color, the borders adapt to the setting)
I do think that on a laptop, GNOME is probably the best environment to use, out of any OS.
And I don't use laptops, only desktops. Good point also as I have much more screen real estate available. For example I use a 3x3 grid of 9 virtual desktops (with the numpad as a quick-switching pad), something that on Gnome isn't possible without a whole bunch of addons that break with every update :) Because it doesn't allow for virtual desktops in a grid matrix by default and I don't think it's got direct access hotkeys to them either. I really love that I can just configure all that in KDE without having any kind of addon or modification (and many other things I change too).
I'm just not one of those "just use it like it's intended" people. I have my own ideas on how my computer should work. But yes not everyone is me.
Not really. According to Fitts's Law, it would be easier to point your mouse cursor to a larger target.
It’s not “facts on the ground” when you’re literally courting diverse opinions. That law just covers the average. ;P