Wait, I thought they are recipient of Sovereign Tech Fund. Didn't that help them with their budget?
It's probably best to assume that since that funding was provided to be used with a specific focus, they didn't (and/or couldn't) use it for the Foundation's maintenance.
Likely earmarked for development.
And Gnome Foundation handles non-development stuff, like hackathons, Guadec, community outreach, liaising with other projects/governments/companies, etc. not to mention boring legal stuff like copyright of their name and icons and all that jazz.
It's basically the non-development part of the project.
For details follow the link. This is nothing more than the headlines.
Finances
The GNOME Foundation reserves policy says that the buffer is too low to run at a deficit any longer, which it has done for three years. This years budget is a break-even budget.
Strategy & Fundraising
A five year strategic plan has been prepared and a draft approved by the board. A variety of fundraising activies will be launched over the coming months.
Board Development
More directors are being added to reduce workload on individual board members. Non-voting officer seats will be added for the same reason.
Elections
Annual board elections is coming up, 6 seats are being elected.
"GNOME Foundation To Focus On Fundraising After Years Running A Deficit"
So... If I throw half a million at them I'll get native desktop icons back?
Desktop icons were removed because they're (at least in the devs' opinions), a poor solution. They're always covered as soon as you have a program open, add clutter, and on most machines, the desktop just becomes a dumping ground for rubbish that really shouldn't be there. I'm sure we've all seen systems with all kinds of crap strewn about the user's desktop.
Tbh, I can't say I disagree. I also think they're a bad solution and that Gnome shouldn't chase a feature just because people have it on Windows. Gnome makes zero attempt to be a traditional Windows-like desktop. It irks some people, but it's the devs' choice and you don't have to use their software.
Gnome foundation could have a billion in the bank, they still wouldn't add that, because it's not about not being able to afford to implement it, they just don't want it in their project.
If you want them, installing an extension will probably take under 10 seconds. Some distros that use Gnome already have it installed out of the box.
This is one of the reason I love GNOME's philosophy. They don't dogmatically follow convention and it shapes up the desktop to have a unique workflow that I really miss on other operating systems.
Desktop icons were removed because they’re (at least in the devs’ opinions), a poor solution.
They were removed because they were never able to make them working properly. It was always an hack and had multiple issues. ANY other OS and DE has desktop icons...
Nope. They had it and removed it, and there are plenty of extensions to add them back if you (for some ungodly reason) want them. They're not in vanilla Gnome because they don't want them. And they're right.
Practically all other DEs copy Windows, so yeah, of course they'll have Windows UX elements.
and there are plenty of extensions to add them back if you (for some ungodly reason) want them
All the extensions are plagued by the same issue they had before. Drag and drop from apps never working properly, the icon grid behaves incorrectly sometimes and other cosmetic glitches.
Nope. They work fine. Several distros even use them out of the box without issue.
You clearly never used those extensions.
Not for a long time, no. I prefer zero extensions. But back when I did... zero issues.
And right now millions of people do and I don't see widespread issues.
I think you're letting your irrational hatred cloud your judgement..
And right now millions of people do and I don’t see widespread issues.
It's not a widespread issue, it's something with the desktop icon extensions and the original implementation. In both cases the drag and drop from/to apps never worked fine.
You misunderstand. It was never a mistake. It was always an unfinished project because no one gave a flying....for anything that was of zero value.
Just because you want to use a tweak that carries too little organization and don't care for the much more efficient method they replaced it with doesn't mean you can't go use gorram any other desktop.
Bye!
It was always an unfinished project because no one gave a flying
No, I didn't misunderstood, I know it was yet another GNOME unfinished project. Both the native thing and the extensions always had/have the same problems - drag and drop from apps never working properly, the icon grid behaves incorrectly sometimes and other cosmetic glitches.
for anything that was of zero value.
Now this is the thing, desktop icons are basic DE functionality and even Apple - the guys that actually know how to design anything - agree they should be there... at least with an option to turn them ON/OFF. The removal of desktop icons was simply the "GNOME vision" being used as an excuse not the fix something that was hard to fix.
If you are wanting a traditional desktop you shouldn't use gnome. You can arrange your icons on the overview screen.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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