nightwriter

Where I agree that your points have merit. You are starting to run into the problem that WinCE had. (BTW WinCE is probably the best OS out of Redmond. Stable as heck, lightweight etc.) But the problem it had was that it looked tooooooooo much like Windows the full version. So people expected it to do exactly what windows did. Unfortunately in 32 megs of space you can't do what a 1Gig OS can do. Since Linux (thankfully) isn't windows you need to be careful... Besides Windows really is ugly. Linux isn't Windows in the way the user and the OS interact. Besides ... if we are always following M$ doesn't that doom us to the #2 spot? We won't win over windows user by being like windows. If I tell a Windows bigot that Linux is "Just like Windows" ... I've lost them immediately. But if I tell them "Linux can allow you to be more productive than Windows" I get their attention. So for the group let me ask. What does the windows UI do wrong, and how can we do it better?

hmm.. especially the kontact icon can be improved imho. One of many. agreed, but what kind of wallpapers should be there then? it will be hard to create a coherent look with different wallpapers, because, if they look to similar, users won't note the difference. if they are too different, the galaxy-look/feel will be destroyed... <{POST_SNAPBACK}> How about an embossed "Desktop2" in the upper right hand corner? (for the terminally inept.) But seriously they only need 2 wallpapers. The two I suggested from KDE look would do (and there are a number of them there that do fit.)

Oh man .... where to start. How about with a funny comment. The star. Yes the one in KDE/Gnome that "starts" the menu. You see I live in California, and the yellow star is a registered logo of a chain of fast food resteraunts called Carls Jr. You wouldn't believe the number of times I've been asked if I was running Carls Jr. Linux. (I've since found out the name MDK gave it and no longer have the star. ) The weaknesses of the MDK desktop as I see it. ( and suggestions) 1. There are more colors in the world than Blue Grey and Yellow. 2. The Mandrake specific Icons where ugly when I first saw them on 7.0 and they really haven't improved. They really have a TWM look to them and having Crystal SVG as the default icon set only makes it worse. 3. The desktop is too flat. It makes Linux look an IBM PCjr in a room full of Amiga's. It needs desperately a feeling of depth. There are a number of beautiful, simple and very Mandrake wallpapers on kde-look.org. My suggestion of one that fits beautifully with Galaxy is this one. Wallpaper 1 or to get rid of the blue and grey Wallpaper 2 4. Follow the theme ... Like making the default in xmms this one Galaxy Xmms Skin 5. Following whatever Red Hat does. STOP Please. Red Hat proved that an ugly desktop would chase away users. 6. Don't look to XP for answers either. (A-La Plastik) Move beyond them and go to the master of beautiful desktops. Mac. Open their "style" requirements and implement them. 7. Different wallpapers on the Virtual Desktops. Many new users don't know what the pager does. If the wallpaper is identical they don't realize they change desktops. Changing wallpapers is a visual clue to the potential here. 8. Go back to the layout of MCC circa 9.2 One of the things that is earning SuSE raves is that they dropped the layout MDK went to and picked up the old MDK layout. 9. The Mandrake specific Icons don't scale well at all. The designs are not "clean" so when you look at them they look "fuzzy" this is really apparent comparing the golden star to icon sets like H3O, or Crystal SVG etc. 10. Make sure that the icons on the default desktop... freshly opened. Never used before, actually Line up. 11. Give the default wallper from release to release the same name. So when a user upgrades they don't have the last versions wallpaper. (please no arguments on upgrade vs fresh install if they keep their /home the problem exists either way.) 12. Code to the UI .... don't make the UI try to fit the code. A business like desktop doesn't have to be flat and dull. Flat and dull doesn't mean it's a business desktop. What makes a desktop (or anything else.) business quality is crispness and cleaness. The fine grained attention to detail that says, "I care". M$ has proved that looking good is often more important than being good. (it sold 95 98 and XP for them. ) Apple proved that you can sell old hardware just by make the desktop sing. The theory is proven. Next step is to make it a part of Mandrakes method.

I've an Armada M700 and this was first noticed by compaq with win2000 and XP... it was a BIOS problem See this advisory http://search.hp.com/gwuseng/redirect.html...mada+M700&hit=1 Just upgrade BIOS and it's fixed.