But how is it used? Being a major change from the usual, it’s going to need some serious adjustments on the part of the end users. So I thought I would do a bit of research (“gasp” some of you might be saying) and share a few tips on the basic usage of this new desktop.

It’s not all “that” different

When you really get down to it, GNOME 3 will not be all that different. Sure it will look quite different than what most are used to, and there will be features some may never have seen or used, but over all it is still a desktop that creates windows, minimizes windows, launches applications, has a panel, etc. But at first look you might wonder how does one configure GNOME now? Or how do you add applications to the favorites menu? What is the “hot corner”? And what are some of the important key combinations? Let’s take a look.

Configuring GNOME

At this moment you will not find an icon or menu entry as a means to configure GNOME Shell. For GNOME 2.x you go to the System > Preferences or System > Administration menus to configure various aspects of GNOME. It looks as if GNOME 3 is going to go the Windows and KDE route by using only the GNOME Control Center. To bring this up you can hit <Alt>F2 and then type gnome-control-center. In this window you can configure the following groups of tasks:

• Personal
• Look and Feel
• Internet and Network
• Hardware
• System
• Other

TIP: If you don’t like your window controls on the left, choose a different them and you can get the back to the right side.

Adding apps to the favorite menu

Figure 1

Take a look at Figure 1. In the upper portion of this you will see the APPLICATIONS entry and, below that, a few application icons. Those icons make up the Favorites Menu. These are the applications you use the most. You can easily add to this menu by doing the following:

1. Click on the APPLICATIONS entry (to open the full list of applications).

2. Right-click on the application you want to add.

3. From the resulting menu select “Add to favorites”.

The icon will then be added to your favorites menu.

Conversely, you can remove an icon from the Favorites menu by right clicking the icon (in the Favorites menu) and selecting “Remove from favorites”.

What is the “hot corner”?

At first you will think the only way to bring up the menu is by clicking the Activities button. Not so. If you take your cursor and place it all the way up in the upper left corner, the menu will open. This will mostly benefit laptop users, but it is still a nice touch.

What is the “overview”

The overview is when you have either clicked the Activities button or placed your cursor in the hot corner, at which point the menu will open and your windows will thumbnail. This is an “overview” of what is going on in your workspace.

Key combinations

Here are some of the more important key combinations you will want to know:

• Windows key: Switch between overview and desktop
• Alt+F1: Switch between overview and desktop
• Alt+F2: Run dialog
• Alt+Tab: Pop up window cycler
• Alt+Shift+Tab: Cycle in reverse direction in the window cycler
• Alt+`: Switch between windows of the same application in Alt+Tab
• Ctrl+Shift+Alt+R: Start/stop screencast recording
• Ctrl+Alt+D: Show desktop
• Ctrl+Alt+Right/Left arrow: Switch between workspaces
• Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Right/Left arrow: Move the current window to a different workspace

Those are all pretty basic. I’m sure as the full release comes more will rise to the surface.

Final thoughts

So now you have a good look at what GNOME 3 will be like as well as some tips on how to use the desktop. I know there are a lot of doubters and detractors out there. Many people do not like change. But in the case of he PC desktop – it’s about time for a change. And seeing as how stable GNOME Shell already is, I can only imagine what the full release of GNOME 3.0 will be like.

Aside from helping new users, KDE does have a lot to offer. And like the GNOME desktop, the KDE menu can be fine tuned to meet your needs. The KDE menu editor is a bit more powerful than GNOME’s Alacarte. With this editor you can quite literally move EVERYTHING around in your menu as well as add and remove items.

The KDE menu

It might be best to start off explaining a bit about the KDE menu. The menu I am speaking of is the “K” menu in the panel. In KDE 4.x this menu was changed (and renamed to the Kickoff Menu) to look and feel more like a “ribbon” menu. You can switch this back to the classic by right clicking the “K” and selecting “Switch to Classic Menu Style”. In all actuality I much prefer this style of menu anyway. This is also the only way to edit the Favorites menu in the Classic Menu – by:

1. Switching to the Kickoff Menu
2. Editing your favorites
3. Switching back to Classic Menu
4. Restarting Plasma

But I am getting ahead of myself. Let’s first start with opening up the menu editor.

Menu editor

Figure 1

No matter which menu style you are in, right click the “K” and select “Menu Editor”. When the Menu Editor opens (see Figure 1) you will see every sub menu that exists in your menu. From this point you can add a new item, sub menu, or separator by clicking their respective buttons.

If you were to add a new Item at this point that item would not be contained within a sub-menu. To keep your menu well organised you will want to contain all menu entries (items) within a sub-menu.

Figure 2

Let’s stick with the example that has found its way into all three articles – we will create a menu entry that will open Firefox automatically to the Ghacks page. The first step is to select the Internet sub menu in the left pane. Once that entry is selected click the New Item button which will open a small window asking you to give the item a Name. Let’s call this simply Ghacks. After you give the item a name click OK to open the editor to that item (see Figure 2). This is where you fill out all the necessary information for the menu entry. The information you need to enter is:

• Name: Ghacks
• Comment: Ghacks
• Command: firefox http://www.ghacks.net
• Icon: Click the icon button and select an icon you like.

Everything else is optional. There really is no reason to add this to the system tray. Having Launch Feedback enabled only gives you a bouncing indicator that the application is starting – you can keep that enabled.

The advanced tab allows you to configure a work path, indicate the command must be run in a terminal, run the command as a different user, and create a shortcut key for the menu entry. If this entry is something you do often, it might be a good time to add a shortcut key.

After you comeplete entering all of the details, click the Save button and you’re done. You will now see your Ghacks entry in the Internet sub-menu of the KDE Main menu.

Favorites

Figure 3

Adding items to the KDE Kickoff Favorites menu is simple. Click on the “K” menu to open it up. Navigate to the sub-menu that contains the item you want to add (We’ll add our new Ghacks item) and right click the item. When you do this a new menu will open (see Figure 3) where you can select Add to Favorites. Select that and your item will automatically be added to the Favorites menu. Simple!

Final thoughts

The KDE menu system is quite an elegant one. With the ability to completely personalize your KDE menus, it is one of the most user-friendly desktop menus available.