Talk:Unity (user interface)

/Archive 1

This huge article needs to be pruned. In particular, the reception section.
I think this article is too long. Unity is just one Linux shell, I don't think it is notable enough for such detailed coverage. In particular, the "Reception" section is bloated. We don't need a detailed timeline of Unity's reception. I am going to try to prune this section. I ask you to continue my work and prune the rest of the article. -- Jorge (talk) 11:48, 28 October 2013 (UTC)


 * The reason that there is such a large reception section is that this interface is very controversial, far more so than any other desktop user interface has been, hence the extensive coverage and criticism. - Ahunt (talk) 14:55, 28 October 2013 (UTC)


 * But 3.5 pages of text about reviewers' opinion on a Linux shell? I think it should be pruned a little.  The Reviews of early versions subsection alone is 2 pages, and deal with obsolete, unsupported Ubuntu versions (the 2010 subsubsection even reviews an alpha version!).  Can we prune (by removing some of the detail) at least this subsection?
 * On the specific subtopic of reviews of preview software, user User:Estevezj seems to agree with me. See Talk:Unity_(user_interface)/Archive_1 -- Jorge (talk) 20:31, 28 October 2013 (UTC)
 * I do agree with Jorge, both on the beta reviews and the relative balance placed on critical reviews. I think that summary style is a good compromise: the critical response can be placed into the proper perspective relative to the rest of the article by splitting the bulk of the critical reception section into its own article, as has been done with other controversial topics (cf. Criticism of Microsoft Windows, Criticism of Windows Vista, Criticism of the Bible, etc).— James Estevez (talk) 23:24, 2 November 2013 (UTC)
 * From my understanding of Criticism, controversy should rarely have a dedicated article. And Unity is clearly not notable enough for its own "Controversy about Unity" article.  I propose  that the reception of early versions of Unity be removed from here and integrated into the corresponding sections of List_of_Ubuntu_releases. -- Jorge (talk) 00:44, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Moving to List_of_Ubuntu_releases is a much better idea. I think that's probably the way to go.— James Estevez (talk) 03:23, 15 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Comments like the ones above are why I have just about given up on contributing to wp. In actual fact, the depth of this article was perfect (up to Ubuntu 12.04 LTS! :-(, and was just what I needed to read. Then along come the nitpickers who know stuff all about the topic ready to get it to conform to the rest of wp. Wanting secondary scholarly sources re open source software?!!! (Hint: secondary scholarly sources re open source software ARE RARER THAN HEN'S TEETH, nitwit. Figure out the economics. Which should not equate with notability.) Meanwhile, the contributors who could have continued this article to cover 13.04 & 14.04 have dropped out (arrgghh!!!) and the nitpickers have run away. Wikipedia - dying the death of a thousand pruning nitpickers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.171.52.40 (talk) 21:45, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Actually some of us do keep an eye out for new reviews of Unity, but since the last few releases of Ubuntu have all used versions of Unity 7 there have been few changes and hence few reviews. I suspect that when Unity 8 comes out in a regular release that there will be more third party sources covering it. - Ahunt (talk) 22:03, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

Reliability of sources
Some of the sources are bad. I am studying Wikipedia policy on source reliability and evaluating each source in the Reception section. One source that already stands out is http://desktoplinuxreviews.com. The writer does seem to have professional writing experience (see http://desktoplinuxreviews.com/about/) but it still is a one-person blog with no Wikipedia article about it, a very low Alexa rank (322,029), and no hits in Google Scholar. -- Jorge (talk) 16:05, 28 October 2013 (UTC)


 * LinuxDesktopReviews is a self-published blog by Jim Lynch. The reason it is a WP:RS is because his reviews are also widely published in other publications, making him an established expert in the field as outlined at WP:SPS. - Ahunt (talk) 16:47, 28 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Please see Reliable_sources/Noticeboard -- Jorge (talk) 01:38, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

Next steps
I think a To-do_list is good to focus efforts. If you agree on making one, I have some suggestions for the Reception section:


 * 1) Find a better source (Slashdot is low-quality) for the claim that images are anonymized before being sent to the user's computer.  See if reviewers have changed their minds.  If so, reorganize the section to list first the current reception, and later the past controversy.
 * 2) Consolidate information from List_of_Ubuntu_releases
 * 3) Possibly read  (which is notable because it was cited by ) and maybe report it, if it is still relevant (I think the shopping lens has switched to HTTPS since that analysis) and has anything notable that is not covered by . -- Jorge (talk) 23:09, 30 October 2013 (UTC)


 * In general I agree, except I don't think the section List_of_Ubuntu_releases needs to be cut down. The shopping lens was very controversial for both that release and Unity. - Ahunt (talk) 00:34, 2 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I think that for the reasons explained in Don't repeat yourself it is better to consolidate this information in one place, and add a quick summary and a reference in all other places. Like I did here -- Jorge (talk) 01:00, 2 November 2013 (UTC)


 * That can be done using the "Main" template, but right now I think there is enough lack of ref and quote overlap to leave it as is. - Ahunt (talk) 01:05, 2 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I will put only the first task (that one regarding anonymization of images) on the TO DO. It is clearly very important and it seems we agree on it. --Jorge (talk) 01:12, 2 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Sounds good! - Ahunt (talk)

NPOV
The article has acquired a distinct pro-Unity tone over the years. I don't think this is because of conscious COI editing, rather that Unity has indeed improved somewhat, and people who don't like it have switched to alternatives like LXDE so no longer pay attention. --Ef80 (talk) 12:15, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Unity (user interface) vs Unity (graphical shell)
Isn't unity rather a graphical shell then a user interface? User:ScotXW t@lk 16:46, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

Size of the "controversy" section
I think the "controversy" section could easily be pruned to a more manageable size, rather than consisting of a chronological account of every twist and turn of the issue, but others disagree. Per WP:WEIGHT, individual controversies shouldn't dominate the article. Opinions?  Sandstein  16:38, 28 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I can see cutting the quotes and going to summaries instead to reduce this, but the story of Unity is mostly the story of the controversies, especially the on-line search function. Furthermore the criticism has resulted in design changes and the elimination of the default internet search, so it has been notable to the development of the software. - Ahunt (talk) 22:35, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

Unity is described as "discontinued"?
Unity is described as "discontinued"? Isn't that slightly premature? According to the announcement announcing Cannonical's abandonment of Unity, it clearly states that Unity will remain Ubuntu's default desktop until the 18.04 release in April of 2018. That means that Unity will remain the default desktop on two forthcoming Ubuntu releases: 17.04 due out April 2017, and 17.10 due out the following October. Furthermore, 16.04 released in April 2016 was an LTS release, so my expectation is that some amount of latent Unity maintenance development should continue until April 2021, while active Unity development should continue (to some extent) until October 2017. While I don't expect any earthshattering advances in Unity in the next 6 months, it seems a bit soon to call it "discontinued". Am I way off base? Linux dr (talk) 03:53, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

I almost want to suggest the term "lame duck" but I've only seen that used to describe persons holding an office of some sort. Linux dr (talk) 03:56, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

Tagging recent editor, as this is relevant to their changes: Rezonansowy Linux dr (talk) 04:03, 7 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I agree, it is going to be discintinued, but it isn't yet. Presumably Unity 7 will be maintained until Ubuntu 16.04 LTS reached EOL in April 2021. - Ahunt (talk) 15:06, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

Spot of word salad in lead
In addition to Unity, there are Application Indicators and other projects such as MeMenu, the notification system and the application NotifyOSD gathered.

Gathered? I was not expecting that verb, there, hard stop. &mdash; MaxEnt 00:53, 11 February 2021 (UTC)


 * Yup, makes no sense, not relevant either and, even if it was, it would not belong in the lede. Removed and . -Ahunt (talk) 01:09, 11 February 2021 (UTC)