Goodbye Global Menu

I've tried, I really do, it was really good to find you once again, and on XFCE it was -sort of- really nice to use you, but... It is not you, it's me.
Maybe I'm old now, maybe is something I left -or lost- behind, I don't know, the thing is, I got used to the "traditional" desktop setup, with a Taskbar/ Panel on the bottom of the screen, etc. etc.
Over the years I've used and tried many different Global Menu incarnations, and I was always pretty happy with them, but it is time to change.

Welcome Back, Global Menu

Giving my old friend the Global Menu a new opportunity.
Installed yesterday, seems to be working just fine.

Not So Global Menu for VLC on Xenial

There is a glitch with the Global Menu and VLC on Xenial.
When you stop a movie (it only happens on video files), all the menu options are reproduced on the VLC window as well.

The Unity Desktop

Well, here is a little screen shot I took a couple of days ago while testing Ubuntu 16.04 on the Thinkpad T60.
The Unity Launcher can now be placed on the bottom, and of course, the Global Menu can be set to "Always visible".

The most important settings used on the screen shot, that is, those that make the Unity desktop truly, truly useful are these two gsettings strings:


gsettings set com.canonical.Unity.Launcher launcher-position Bottom
gsettings set org.compiz.unityshell:/org/compiz/profiles/unity/plugins/unityshell/ launcher-minimize-window true

Just Like Yesterday

Yesterday afternoon played a bit with Ubuntu MATE (16.04 of course) on my really, really old yet somehow trusty T43.
It comes with a built-in Global Menu implementation (go figure and yet, gloria aleluya for the initiative!!!) which works with most of the programs (Open Office doesn't, for instance).
This particular distro seems like a nice enough option for my ageing hulking beast, the PowerMac Dual Proc, the infamous QuickSilver.
Or perhaps, this is the answer to the eternal question: Reasons to get (or not) a PowerBook Nowadays

To Linux Mint, Unity and Beyond (or Back!)

Well, after getting my lovely T60p back from the dead, I've used a bit the Unity install I did on the T60.
Things went obviously well, no hardware problems at all, that is....
But, I guess I can finally say that Unity is not my thing (maybe this time for good).
Not even with the new and improved all shown Global Menu.
So, I got the newest Linux Mint, the XFCE variant, and slapped it onto the T60p.
Everything seems to go A Ok so far...

Unity: (Maybe?) Once Again...

Some notes from my return to Unity....
Testing it a little bit on my T60.
Now that (finally!!!!!) offers the possibility to have always shown menus on the Global Menu, it suddenly makes a lot of sense (maybe).

• Kill Caps Lock

Edit the file /etc/default/keyboard
Add this:

XKBOPTIONS="ctrl:nocaps"

• Extra software

Nothing new here... The usual suspects... sudo apt-get install openvpn openssh-server rar unrar emacs23-nox gip

• Themes

I can't effing believe there is no builtin GUI on Unity to set the theme you like... You need to install extra software for this???
  

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface gtk-theme "Yosembiance-Atomic"
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface icon-theme "Humanity-Dark"

Ubuntu 14.04 on the Thinkpad T60p

Still not my cup of tea

Installed Ubuntu 14.04 LTS (32 bits) on the T60p today, using a SSD drive (I can't even believe there is a new LTS available... Time fucking flies...)

As expected, everything went peachy, no problems at all (Screen resolution, WiFi, Suspend/ Resume, etc, etc, etc...).
Unity feels quite snappy, the border-less windows (on top of the anti-aliased round cornered windows) look truly amazing, but the damn Global Menu implementation still sucks ass big time...

Also, with this current minimalist trend going on that strips everything of every possible configuration option, this Ubuntu release, following GNOME's "directive", doesn't offer any way to edit the keyboard layout (you know, for stuff like remapping the totally useless CapsLock key to a completely more useful additional Ctrl...)
You'll need to install GNOME Tweak Tool in order to do that, the program had a transparent window on the T60p, but I'm pretty sure that's because of the now crappy laptop video card.

Anyways, the thing is not for me, if I can't have the perfect Global Menu, then I don't want any... In the mean time, I'm patiently waiting for Linux Mint's next release, specially with all the annoyances I'm having with my current install.

Next distro hop: the newer Lubuntu.

(Next) Distro Hopping, maybe

These last couple of days I've been watching a bit what's out there, and what are things looking ahead for the next Ubuntu LTS release, that will hit the streets towards the middle of April.
So far, sad to say, I think I'll stay with what I already have (Linux Munt 13 running Cinnamon & MATE).
Unity not only doesn't fixes its own implementation of Global Menu, but also it is doing everything it can to kill it for good.
On MATE, the Global Menu hack that surfaced about a year ago broke when MATE devels released a new version (besides, it was only for 64 bits, so that left many of my out of the game).
So far, if I have to pick a new distro to test, I have to go with Arch Linux, and that is only to be able to get the newest of the new GNOME 3 release running.

The Global Menu Is Dead

And the LIM did it.
That is, the Local Integrated Menu... And, that is of course, on Ubuntu's Unity.

Anyway, I hated Unity's implementation of the Global Menu (with the vanishing menu entries) and I now hate this LIM thing, which is basically a menu on every window -on un-maxified windows- but the menu item appear on the window title bar itself, and only when you do a mouse over on the given un-maxified window, once the mouse leaves, the item disappears, leaving you with a plain vanilla title bar once again.

Reading the users comments on every Linux/ Ubuntu site out there, it seems that the idea is pretty well received... But that is nothing unusual, ever since Unity raised its here, the popularity of Global Menu sunk.
Call me old fashion, but I miss a lot all that GNOME2, circa January 2010 had to offer...

Unity is not my thing

After close to a month of testing on my T60 I have to go back to Linux Mint MATE. Unity was good, rather snappy actually (that was surprise), but the Global Menu implementation drives me completely crazy, I really can't understand how on Earth they did such a thing. 

I love the Global Menu approach, the idea, to me it makes total sense, no matter how big the screen or its resolution; but why, why, why they had to make it only visible on mouse over?

It seems like a really moronic idea.

Other than that, I had a couple of serious glitches, that is lockups, doing stupid and trivial things like dragging a couple of video files onto GNOME Player... The kind of lockpus  that requires an X Window restart.

So, yeah MATE might look ancient and there no Global Menu -at least with an easy setup- on Linux Mint, but it delivers.

Give Unity a chance

Installed Precise, a plain vanilla one this time, on the Thinkpad T60 a couple of days ago.

Wanted to give it a spin and use a real Global menu once again.
It seems quite snappy, even on the T60.
Guess its a keeper.

Global Menu on MATE: Fail!

Tried to make the Ubuntu's own Global Menu solution to get going on MATE, to no avail...
Used the instructions given here: HOW TO GET A GLOBAL MENU IN MATE DESKTOP.
(Specifically, the last post as of today...)
Which says to do this on a MATE 32 bits:

sudo apt-get install indicator-sound-gtk2\
indicator-application-gtk2 indicator-datetime-gtk2\
indicator-session-gtk2 indicator-messages-gtk2\
firefox-globalmenu indicator-appmenu appmenu-gtk\
appmenu-gtk3 appmenu-qt

Followed by a reboot.
The desktop never got back :)
After login, it belched an error, it couldn't start GNOME, and died.
So, commands over the internet... Caveat Emptor ;)
Luckily that was on a box that was planned to reboot.

Stuff I miss on Cinnamon/ MATE

Simply things, no big deal, but nevertheless...

• Global Menu solution
• Google Calendar integration

The Global Menu one seems to be a little hope that some day I'll be able to get one up & running (easily) on MATE; on Cinnamon there are no news so far.

As for the Google Calendar integration (with the Panel's calendar), I have no news  whatsoever.

The rise and fall of the Global Menu

There is no news that I love GNOME Global Menu, it simply makes sense to me; one of the things, along with drop shadows, that I got stuck from the Os X days.

While searching over and over on Google and Duck Duck Go for info on how to get it (or something very similar) up and running on Cinnamon and/or MATE I found a pattern regarding the adoption of the program.

There seems to be a clear cut that divides everybody's wishes to have something like GNOME Global Menu installed, and then, getting it out of your box no matter what.

The event is no other than Unity; it seems like Ubuntu's Global Menu implementation was a bit hard to swallow for a lot of folks.