cshalle wrote:
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Improving touch screen support is a goal for both GNOME and Fedora, simply because laptops are heading that way and if we offer something
that doesn't even try to use the touchscreen where it makes sense, users will go elsewhere.
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Linux based solutions oriented towards tablets, hybrids and touch-screen-laptops already exist: Chrome OS and Android.  Realistically nobody in the Linux community has the resources that Google does or the mainstream market-share. Everyone knows the obvious, Google will dominate that space.  In the technology press everyone is saying the "Year of the Linux Desktop" will be because of Google and Chrome OS as well as Android.  Please, don't waste your time and resources, leave this use-case alone.

Red Hat and Fedora as well as similar platforms thrive in the more traditional desktop space and specifically workstations. If you walk into Pixar, NASA or CERN you'll find Fedora/RHEL on workstations and servers.  Look at Ubuntu at Google or Facebook.  If I call up any major OEM I can get workstations with two different operating systems: Windows 7 and RHEL.  Not surprisingly the product is called Fedora Workstation.  

There's a theme at play here that if you focus 100% on traditional workstations you can having a winning product that will even compete on equal footing against Mac OS and Windows.  

Linux distributions and desktop projects have been chasing the hybrid and tablet and it's had the effect of throwing their workstation users off of the bus. When Ubuntu and Fedora abandoned Gnome 2 and focused on Unity and Gnome 3 this caused major disruption and chaos.  Around the same time many developers and engineers ended up going with Mac OS because Apple provided a conservative traditional desktop experience that was highly polished and professional.

Last night I was looking at Gnome Shell extensions and I realized that most of them had the effect of turning Gnome 3 back into Gnome 2.  The fact is that the community and specifically the workstation use-case is desperately seeking a Gnome 2 replacement that's why we have XFCE, LXDE and Cinnamon.  This is why MATE exists and is rising in popularity.  The Linux community still loves Gnome 2 and wants it back.

This is why I propose a compromise that will work for both Gnome and Fedora Workstation: 

Have both Gnome 2 (MATE) and Gnome 3 (Gnome Shell) be parallel but related branches of the same Gnome product.

1. Have the Gnome Foundation adopt MATE as a Gnome 2 legacy project.  Provide development and support resources to accelerate MATE's efforts to transition to GTK3, systemd and Wayland.  Make sure that both Gnome 2 and Gnome 3 are based on the same modern infrastructure.

2. Modify Mutter so that it can become the official compositor of MATE and replace the practice of bundling Gnome 2 with Compiz which is now an Ubuntu product.  This would ensure that Gnome 2 and Gnome 3 have similar look, behavior and feel.  Another option is to use Compton but that could be seen as a short-term fix until Mutter was fully integrated into Gnome 2.

3. Keep Gnome 3 as is in the present and don't interfere with that project or dictate design to them.  Gnome 3 will exist as a development project focused on innovation, experimentation and creativity.  Their focus would continue to be on pushing desktop boundaries and exploring alternative paradigms.  If appropriate, innovations developed in the Gnome Shell would be occasionally fed back into Gnome 2.  This will create a healthy Gnome innovation cycle.

4. Make Gnome 2 the default desktop for Fedora Workstation with Fedora branding and themes as well as the current Gnome default applications.  Have Gnome 3 be an optional extra at installation.  Also offer KDE as well for diversity.

5.  Promote Gnome 3 to Gnome 2 users.  When the user runs Gnome 2 for the first time have a prompt that says "Would you like to see the future?  Try out Gnome 3".   And it would be installed side-by-side with Gnome 2.

That way the traditional desktop can be addressed by Gnome 2 (MATE) and Fedora Workstation doesn't have to interfere and disrupt the activities happening over at Gnome with Gnome 3 (Gnome Shell).  Both projects can happily cooperate and coexist.  This sort of collaboration is what Linux is famous for and Fedora Workstation should epitomize.