They are too busy with delusional "design choices" and "specs", if we keep letting them be the face of Linux desktop, they are gonna end up killing Linux. Developers should stop using GTK, or at least not locking it down to LibAdwaita, they need to stop giving GNOME clout.
Actually, GNOME isn't that bad at all. I've tried many DEs, but I always end up returning to GNOME. In my opinion, its design language is the clearest, most beautiful, and intuitive. However, we need to keep pushing them to implement the features we've been requesting for years. Look, they finally added accent color support; the next checkpoint is the system tray.
@@yaroslav7328 GNOME is pretty, the prettiest I'd say, but they have a bunch of issues (more noticeable when gaming) that will never get fixed on Wayland because of their design choices. I love minimising my game just to be greeted by a timed out later on, stop hanging my games when I minimise them! It has been an issue since FOREVER but for them it's not an issue, things like this will kill Linux. And yes, you are not supposed to minimise in GNOME, but fullscreen apps (like games) minimise on their own when you switch to another app!!! Their own decisions are clashing with how computers have worked for ages, congratulations! KDE cares about their users and usability, doing anything on KDE just works, thanks KDE devs.
YESSS !!!! About a year I follow the development of Cosmic and it feels GREAT !! There is a possibility that Cosmic becomes my Main Operating System and I leave Windows .... Thanks for your great explanation !!
Tried cosmic on my old laptop (full install). I was optimistic to begin with but considering it is an alfa, I was expecting less. It is almost good enough to run as daily. This is the first top panel I really enjoy using. Made it so it auto hides with maxed windows, and I use if for less important stuff - BT, notifications, shutdown button, workspaces and so on. It is really cool that you can move things freely between panel and the dock and can change their behavior quite liberally.
From the video, I like the look of the spotlight-esque search in cosmic. I work on a Mac, but I run Linux mint with cinnamon as my non-work main computer, so there's things I like about Windows and MacOS that I'm happy have made it into a linux desktop environment (which I use for my own programming projects and gaming)
I'm glad they do this, because I wish more people would have a chance to try tiling window managers and have their own opinion instead of just sticking to what they now (which probably is windows or mac style)
As a Pop!_OS 22.04 user, I'm certainly excited for Cosmic to be released, but I'd be glad, if I had the option to stay with my current set-up until the software I use for my current desktop (i.e. variety and GSConnect) or feature-equivalent alternatives are available on Cosmic as well.
Since i like to distro hop a lot. I installed it on my thinkpad. I wasn't expecting it to be stable but it is. There are a lot of features missing but it is in alpha stage. And they already updated it couple of times.
Wow. Finally, a tiling window manager that supports tabs and looks easy enough to use that it won't scare most people away immediately. This is long, long overdue. I know there was a KWin tiling extension I used a number of years ago. Not sure if it's still around. It was almost good, but you couldn't tab windows, which was a dealbreaker. I learned my way around i3, and have finally got a setup I'm happy with. But I really wish I could have skipped a lot of the learning curve and troubleshooting.
@@jayarmstrong I personally consider it a critical feature. The juggling I would need to do using virtual desktops and sticky windows to replicate even my most basic layouts is just a nightmare. When I open a new window, I have it set to open up tabbed with the current window(s.) I then relocate it as I see fit, if I believe relocation is needed. This means when I create a new window, I don't need to consider what it's going to do to the rest of my layout, or if I have enough space for it. Of course I do. It doesn't take up anymore space, and doesn't change the layout. If I have a text file I'm working on using the left third of the screen, I can have a pdf viewer and web browser on the right 2/3rds, tabbed, and swap between them without losing sight of the text editor. Virtual desktops without tabs would require making the text editor a sticky window, the browser and pdf viewer would need to be non-sticky and on separate workspaces. And even then, this makes it so I can't create a workspace without the text editor. Back when I used regular floating window managers, I found window management such a pain that I would almost always just maximize everything and jump back and forth through keyboard shortcuts. My current method starts that way, but neatly and cleanly transitions to viewing multiple windows when I want to. I'm really annoyed that tiling window managers aren't really designed with this setup in mind. I use i3, which I think drastically over complicates things with multiple containers and different container layouts. When I move a window left, that means I want to tile it to the left. But that often just rearranges tabs until I'm the furthest tab to the left. I don't care about tab order, and can't figure out a way to get i3 to cleanly move window to adjacent container.
@@plentyofpaper very interesting. Appreciate the detail. I'm realizing I've layered on a few tools to make things work faster. I don't know if they'd help your workflow, esp in i3. I use window snapping, exquisite for tiling (dialed in for 3 columns on a 4k screen), ALT+mousewheel to quickly move current window between virtual desktops, and two of the built in 'app overview' extensions to quickly switch apps from the background. With 4k, I keep 3-4 windows tiled, often browsers with tabs related to current activity. I use a couple keyboard shortcuts, ALT+rightclick to resize windows, and the tiling extension keeps everything tidy. Full tiling managers like Hyperlander/sway look pretty but I wouldn't want most apps to open full screen. I also just started using CTRL SHIFT A in the browser and the equivalent shortcut in Krunner to quickly switch to an existing tab/window. Overall, I'm happy though I wouldn't mind more horizontal pixels to keep task list, music apps always visible.
I installed Cosmic the other day on my EndeavourOS, and it feels like a great midpoint between Hyprland and Gnome, with the kind of pros from both that I find use for. Problems include absence of hotkeys or hotkey customisation for a lot of things; having to use mouse every time I need to change keyboard layout; PgUp/PgDown, Home/End not working in file manager; tiling setting not saving between sessions/autotiling not being a thing, etc. Stuff like this is making it difficult to switch full-time - I hope they enable these things soon.
@@MichaelNROH Yeah I discovered that custom hotkey setting from your video, but am completely clueless how to create one for e.g. layout switching. Hopefully something more streamlined comes along soon. Thank you for the reply.
@@mmstick I'm sure those reports have existed for weeks, if not months, already, given how anticipated this DE is and how many people are trying it out. I did open a thread on the subreddit the other day to ask about the keyboard layout switching hotkey thing, and I think it was one of the devs who responded by telling me the hotkey is not yet included.
You can already turn a folder into a wallpaper slideshow pretty easily on kde plasma. Dont know how long that setting has been around for, but its been at least a year since thats when i started using it. So nope, cosmic isnt the first DE to do that.
Cosmic probably has great timing. It will take a couple more years to be ready but given the development of Linux, so will it by then too. I’m looking forward to the state of Linux when cosmic is ready for daily use on a grand scale
You’re the first person I’ve seen try to combine the panels into one. I’m glad that’s a feature. A top bar without a global menu just seems like wasted space to me. Although one of the devs said they would also try to add that at some point. So that’s cool.
That's actually one difference that I didn't mention yes. The steps in size also seem to be bigger with the panel, but that's just some fine tuning on System76' side
The part that most interesting for all the stuff this desctop experience has is the window stalking. I don't know how good the implemention is but personally think it's very good to have this option for every app. And yes it's true that able to use multiple software and use alt tab however I think this great idea for proactivity.
My favorite DE & WM have been Plasma and Hyprland for a while now. I installed Pop_OS with Cosmic on a spare thinkpad I had laying around to see what all the hype was about and I was genuinely impressed with they have so far. I think this going to be a very happy medium for people who want to leave something like Plasma or Gnome, but too scared to jump to something like Hyprland or Q-Tile. Cosmic definitely has a place in the Linux world, I have a feeling it's going to be an important one.
the panel and the dock function the same way, in fact there are only two "panels" in the settings.. you can have 30 panels if you like by editing the config files directly. From what they said the settings app provide sensible configurations for the average user, but you can do so much more
I already use Pop so it’s fairly familiar to me - but I do love the entire look and feel so far and I really enjoy Sys76 approach to Linux (and giving us something new!). Well done! 😊
cosmic seems super cool, I love i3 but I miss the simplicity of having a full desktop environment that just works... if cosmic's tiling system is improved upon more im 100% swapping over
I was looking for a dynamic tiling Wayland compositor that doesn't sacrifice on its looks. Living large in Hyprland. Now, Budgie DE does the floating WM best, but I will give Cosmic a try after beta is done.
I need to try the actual alpha now that its out. Tried to daily it on my gaming rig during pre-alpha and it was a mixed bag. Some things worked great, others not so much. One thing worth mentioning is that Cosmic supports mirroring to displays with different refresh rates (ahve one image displayed at 60 hz on one and 240 hz on another for example) which is something desktop environments on Linux really struggle with (especially Gnome). Really excited for that HDR support in maybe the beta or whenever System76 cooks it up.
KDE has had wallpaper slideshows forever. What I don't understand is that it looks like Cosmic could have been achieved with a KDE tiling plugin and a 'background task' plasma widget. And those might already exist. What am I missing?
As soon as they manage to get tiling as good as hyprland with modern protocol support (which would require them to re-think their as of right now moronic release model), I'll consider daily driving it.
Cinnamon has had the slide show background setting since at least cinnamon 5 with an adjustable time and folder selection! I think its currently the best DE if you dont want wayland or tiling, both gnome and kde while being better in different areas but they give me massive headaches every time i use them, they're so buggy its like living in a bugs nest! but i will give Cosmic a try on arch when it comes out, i dont wanna try a distro just for a de
Running CachyOS August 2024 release and I installed and played around with it. It still has the Gnome feeling but with more customization to it, along with a tiling desktop feel. However, for me, my workflow doesn't really work well with tiling desktops, nor the Gnome-type workflow, so I doubt it's something I will look at in the future. But still, I love trying out new things, and with Linux, it's so easy to be able to test out things like this, unlike a certain OS from that Redmond place. 😉
4:10 to 4:19..well that's cool, but CAN you put separate Documents, Pictures, Downloads, folder launchers RIGHT on the dock/panel combo ..thing? If not...no thanks.
I really hoped to see a more gentle review highlighting more the encouraging side to try popos cosmic desktop while just mentioning the bugs, because this is a new venture in linux, so its still new and not mature, so more encouragement what is really needed here. I'm saying this because I know you're a nice guy and do encouraging review as well as subjective unbiased reviews. sorry for the long comment, and thank you for the review. and I use xfce btw ( in other words, I'm not linked to system76 in anyway, just a linux enthusiast, begginer).
Hey Michael, I did try cosmic on hardware, I did not like it. It is still to buggy. I could not get the clock to tell the right time. I am not going to go into a lot of things, I hope they fix these problems soon.
It's quite a nice Gnome clone and it's great to have another DE option, but the GUI makes no sense to me. Too much space used in the panel/dock combo and then they don't even seem to do a lot. The menu brings up this large menu that only seems to load apps and choose categories. To be fair if I tried it I might think otherwise. I do love the pop-up launcher though. K-runner on KDE plasma is too tiny whereas the Pop one is nice and big. And Gnome doesn't have one at all OOTB.
Question how are the resources usages. RAM & Memory usage IS it a light environnement or a heavy one ? is it Fast or slow as hell on old computer ? Do you need a good video card accelerator to use Cosmic Desktop ?
I have a 55" TV screen as my monitor, sitting on top. With KDE Plasma I have a task bar on top and on the laptop screen a panel at the bottom. Same type of panel. Cosmic at this point seems to be too much like "Gnome" with panels.
They don't venture too far from the current experience it seems. They used Gnome for a reason previously and they seem to keep its vision, just with more options
@@MichaelNROH Yeah I never liked Gnome. Was always more comfortable with KDE. Gnome sometimes too much like "Mac" by dumbing down the interface to the point where it is irritating. We are creatures of habit I guess. I like a specific way of working - classical Start button with very configurable taskbars. Especially with dual screens.
@@franklin_johnson01 I don't care about "pretty". I need to get to stuff, make stuff, have the power available. One of the reasons I hate Mac interface. Dumbed down to the point of irritation. Interface perspective from where I stand: KDE > Windows > (Gnome, Mac) But as of late Windows is sliding o the point of irritation as well.
I Like Gnome and kde and tiling Window Managers; they all lack Something, i really think cosmic could be it, unite all good things under one hat? Awesome!
While i admire what they try to do, as a long term Pop OS user i got tired of waiting. 2204 feels old right now (to me). 2 years is a long time, and this still is a bit rudimentary. I experimented with ubuntu minus snap, which is fine, but you need replace the snap packages. So i installed gnome on Mint22 , no snap, no flatpak needed, and all ubuntu modifications are there. Presently this will be my way to go. Hope Pop OS will be great again🤞👍
Coming from a newbie, configuring a tiling window manager like awesome or i3 with .files is a pain in the as$holes. I might switch to it if its available for ubuntu later on. Sys76 is one of the biggest contributors to FOSS and Linux, so im sure they will figure it out. Nice vidya btw
i completely understand the advantage of having multiple choices for users, but when the product looks like something that already has been around for years, offering almost nothing new and solving nearly zero problems then whats the point?! i feel like their team could be better off just working on something like KDE to make it more robust and all together better. but again here is ANOTHER low effort de called cosmic!
I tried the alpha for like a week, it wasn't awful but I'll give it another year before trying it again. I noticed that system processes and cosmic-comp consistently used a lot of my CPU and RAM. It also just felt way more sluggish, and videos sometimes had popping sounds, though this is probably due to Wayland sucking. Also I'm not really the biggest fan of the design for cosmic programs. It just feels kinda minimal and bland.
It sounds like you did not install Vulkan drivers for your hardware. Make sure that you have Mesa's Vulkan drivers installed. There are people running COSMIC on very low power ARM boards like the Banana Pi Zero with nearly no CPU usage.
cool havent seen new de in a while its cool to see i like it but i am a hyprland person but if i buy a sys 76 laptop i wloud defenetly use its its uniqe
I know this is an alpha but i wonder if libcosmic and pop are built to be responsive for other screens like a mobile or a digital billboard? Linux phones aren’t going to take over the world but they could be a decent alternative for people who want to “digital detox”
The toolkit and applications are being built to be responsive in an auto-tiling environment where windows can be very tall and narrow, or very wide. So yes, widgets and apps will be responsive to a mobile form factor.
@@mmstick awesome. Just one more question though. Is libcosmic similar to libadwaita that provides primitives that follow the HIG or is it closer to GTK?
@@Danzek. I think Mint(especially Cinnamon) will struggle with only 2gb, for a smoother and still functional machine I would suggest Lubuntu or Linux Lite
The lack of a desktop background randomizer / slideshow feature is the only thing I added an extension for in Gnome. Seems like such a basic thing to be missing.
The Slideshow has been a thing on Plasma for a VERY VERY long time. add a folder and go... but ngl cosmic kinda looks uuuuuuugly to me and I think its cause its using a custom rust ui toolkit that needs A TON of work. tbh they should have gone gtk or qt
We already were using GTK, and it was untenable to retrofit a modern theming system on top of it, or to develop custom widgets in Rust. The state of Qt on Rust is even worse than that. Iced is loved by many developers in the Rust ecosystem. It's going to make app development on Linux significantly easier. Elm's MVU design pattern is just a much better approach to app development. Use of Rust is also improving the experience of cross compiling to other platforms, and supporting older platforms thanks to static linking. Starting with a lean and modular toolkit also makes supporting modern Wayland protocols like layer-shell simple, which is needed to create interfaces for Wayland compositors.
@@MAUROdns exactly, why do I need extensions to change some basic design things like dash to dock or even to enable Desktop Icons! or to change the appearance of my date/time/calendar settings(Top Bar settings in Gnome Tweaks). I get that not every edge case can't be baked into the DE but if a certain % of people use some tweaks or extensions then it's probably a sign to bake them in.
@@MAUROdns True. I understand wanting to keep a clean and polished experience, but hiding a common function that I believe most people would find very useful under an extension is not smart. I guess that's the nice thing about Linux though, you aren't stuck with one way to do things. You can choose a desktop environment or distribution that better fits your needs.
It looks awful...redundancy all over in UI elements/navigation features, and it's too cluttered, it looks like mash of Mac OS and Gnome with a bunch of stuff that gets in the way.
Cosmic is the only reason why Linux should survive for consumers. It's build with rust and is fast. Kde or gnome are to slow and inconsistent. Hope cosmic will be good enough...
Okay cool but no more new desktop environments. How about the Linux community focused on creating a better GIMP, Inkscape, Kdenlive, LibreCAD, FreeCAD and other productivity apps?
Feel free to donate to those projects. There is no developer pool that can freely work on anything, and not every project needs or wants new contributors. Start by supporting them so that they can sustain their existing developers, or pay someone to contribute to them.
If only the gnome team wasn't so stubborn about petty things
They are too busy with delusional "design choices" and "specs", if we keep letting them be the face of Linux desktop, they are gonna end up killing Linux.
Developers should stop using GTK, or at least not locking it down to LibAdwaita, they need to stop giving GNOME clout.
Now i have to either find GNOME extensions to replicate this behavior or sacrifice all my extensions that I have come to love
Actually, GNOME isn't that bad at all. I've tried many DEs, but I always end up returning to GNOME. In my opinion, its design language is the clearest, most beautiful, and intuitive. However, we need to keep pushing them to implement the features we've been requesting for years. Look, they finally added accent color support; the next checkpoint is the system tray.
@@yaroslav7328 GNOME is pretty, the prettiest I'd say, but they have a bunch of issues (more noticeable when gaming) that will never get fixed on Wayland because of their design choices.
I love minimising my game just to be greeted by a timed out later on, stop hanging my games when I minimise them!
It has been an issue since FOREVER but for them it's not an issue, things like this will kill Linux.
And yes, you are not supposed to minimise in GNOME, but fullscreen apps (like games) minimise on their own when you switch to another app!!! Their own decisions are clashing with how computers have worked for ages, congratulations!
KDE cares about their users and usability, doing anything on KDE just works, thanks KDE devs.
@@yaroslav7328They implemented the system tray as an extension 🤷♂️
Cosmic has the potential to be everything gnome should've been. I'm very excited for the future.
It's gonna be a while though. I wonder how fast they can catch-up or eventually surpass it
"should've" lmao
It seems pretty polished for an alpha release. It definitely has potential!
It's rock solid in Window Management, so the core is pretty great yeah
How to switch language?What is the key combination?Pop os 24 cosmic alpha
Running COSMIC right now, on this computer
Are the animations bad?
@@renegade5942 I would say their basically non existent. Granted it makes everything feel snappy
Cosmic is looking amazing, I cannot wait for the final product.
I am a popOS user and I am excited to see this. You had me at slideshow desktop wallpaper
There's also a system service that enables theming to be dynamically generated and applied based on the active wallpaper.
can't wait Cosmic have all the features later. Maybe I could consider to use it then.
YESSS !!!!
About a year I follow the development of Cosmic and it feels GREAT !!
There is a possibility that Cosmic becomes my Main Operating System and I leave Windows ....
Thanks for your great explanation !!
Which distro do you use? Pop!_OS or another one?
@@andrabtedja I tried different Linux OS-es. My main system is a tuned Windows 11 24H2
Tried cosmic on my old laptop (full install). I was optimistic to begin with but considering it is an alfa, I was expecting less. It is almost good enough to run as daily.
This is the first top panel I really enjoy using. Made it so it auto hides with maxed windows, and I use if for less important stuff - BT, notifications, shutdown button, workspaces and so on. It is really cool that you can move things freely between panel and the dock and can change their behavior quite liberally.
"I love your videos! You are exploring new distros, which really helps me see if a distro is good or not. Thanks, bro!
From the video, I like the look of the spotlight-esque search in cosmic. I work on a Mac, but I run Linux mint with cinnamon as my non-work main computer, so there's things I like about Windows and MacOS that I'm happy have made it into a linux desktop environment (which I use for my own programming projects and gaming)
The tiling looks great too!
Apple 🤢🤢🤢🤮🤮
3:21 KDE : "Are you sure about that?"
I'm glad they do this, because I wish more people would have a chance to try tiling window managers and have their own opinion instead of just sticking to what they now (which probably is windows or mac style)
As a Pop!_OS 22.04 user, I'm certainly excited for Cosmic to be released, but I'd be glad, if I had the option to stay with my current set-up until the software I use for my current desktop (i.e. variety and GSConnect) or feature-equivalent alternatives are available on Cosmic as well.
22.04 will be supported until 2027, but you should create GitHub issues for the things you care about to ensure that it's being tracked.
I installed it on a laptop I have to help them test. I just wish they had a section in the settings to report bugs/broken features.
there are the github issues, but i am not sure if it is ready to contribute
Great! But I’ll wait for the full version
Since i like to distro hop a lot. I installed it on my thinkpad. I wasn't expecting it to be stable but it is. There are a lot of features missing but it is in alpha stage. And they already updated it couple of times.
I like where they are heading. Hopefully Cosmic will replace Gnome for me.
Wow.
Finally, a tiling window manager that supports tabs and looks easy enough to use that it won't scare most people away immediately.
This is long, long overdue.
I know there was a KWin tiling extension I used a number of years ago. Not sure if it's still around. It was almost good, but you couldn't tab windows, which was a dealbreaker.
I learned my way around i3, and have finally got a setup I'm happy with. But I really wish I could have skipped a lot of the learning curve and troubleshooting.
There are at least two excellent tiling extensions. I hadn't thought of tabbing windows as I just use multiple virtual desktops. How helpful is it?
@@jayarmstrong I personally consider it a critical feature. The juggling I would need to do using virtual desktops and sticky windows to replicate even my most basic layouts is just a nightmare.
When I open a new window, I have it set to open up tabbed with the current window(s.) I then relocate it as I see fit, if I believe relocation is needed.
This means when I create a new window, I don't need to consider what it's going to do to the rest of my layout, or if I have enough space for it. Of course I do. It doesn't take up anymore space, and doesn't change the layout.
If I have a text file I'm working on using the left third of the screen, I can have a pdf viewer and web browser on the right 2/3rds, tabbed, and swap between them without losing sight of the text editor. Virtual desktops without tabs would require making the text editor a sticky window, the browser and pdf viewer would need to be non-sticky and on separate workspaces. And even then, this makes it so I can't create a workspace without the text editor.
Back when I used regular floating window managers, I found window management such a pain that I would almost always just maximize everything and jump back and forth through keyboard shortcuts. My current method starts that way, but neatly and cleanly transitions to viewing multiple windows when I want to.
I'm really annoyed that tiling window managers aren't really designed with this setup in mind. I use i3, which I think drastically over complicates things with multiple containers and different container layouts. When I move a window left, that means I want to tile it to the left. But that often just rearranges tabs until I'm the furthest tab to the left. I don't care about tab order, and can't figure out a way to get i3 to cleanly move window to adjacent container.
@@plentyofpaper very interesting. Appreciate the detail. I'm realizing I've layered on a few tools to make things work faster. I don't know if they'd help your workflow, esp in i3.
I use window snapping, exquisite for tiling (dialed in for 3 columns on a 4k screen), ALT+mousewheel to quickly move current window between virtual desktops, and two of the built in 'app overview' extensions to quickly switch apps from the background. With 4k, I keep 3-4 windows tiled, often browsers with tabs related to current activity. I use a couple keyboard shortcuts, ALT+rightclick to resize windows, and the tiling extension keeps everything tidy. Full tiling managers like Hyperlander/sway look pretty but I wouldn't want most apps to open full screen.
I also just started using CTRL SHIFT A in the browser and the equivalent shortcut in Krunner to quickly switch to an existing tab/window. Overall, I'm happy though I wouldn't mind more horizontal pixels to keep task list, music apps always visible.
I installed Cosmic the other day on my EndeavourOS, and it feels like a great midpoint between Hyprland and Gnome, with the kind of pros from both that I find use for. Problems include absence of hotkeys or hotkey customisation for a lot of things; having to use mouse every time I need to change keyboard layout; PgUp/PgDown, Home/End not working in file manager; tiling setting not saving between sessions/autotiling not being a thing, etc. Stuff like this is making it difficult to switch full-time - I hope they enable these things soon.
I think you can implement all hotkeys if you find the window management configs, but it's a lot of work.
They will surely improve this for the Beta
@@MichaelNROH Yeah I discovered that custom hotkey setting from your video, but am completely clueless how to create one for e.g. layout switching. Hopefully something more streamlined comes along soon. Thank you for the reply.
It would be helpful to report issues for the specific things you find lacking. Which will make it easier to push PRs to fix those specific issues.
@@mmstick I'm sure those reports have existed for weeks, if not months, already, given how anticipated this DE is and how many people are trying it out. I did open a thread on the subreddit the other day to ask about the keyboard layout switching hotkey thing, and I think it was one of the devs who responded by telling me the hotkey is not yet included.
@@SvalbardSleeperDistrict You might be surprised. People aren't often reporting issues they encounter.
I tried the alpha and really like what I saw but I'll be waiting for the full release before switching.
My hope is that they do NOT pass up on accessibility. To date, KDE is the only desktop with a fullscreen magnifier with the options I want.
I just hope Cosmic will push Gnome to be innovative and future proof.
But we have enough DEs with customisation. I don't need that in Gnome.
You can already turn a folder into a wallpaper slideshow pretty easily on kde plasma. Dont know how long that setting has been around for, but its been at least a year since thats when i started using it. So nope, cosmic isnt the first DE to do that.
It's set up just like I have KDE set up! I might switch once they get the kinks ironed out.
More customization is not better... That's why GNOME is the most reliable desktop environment out there.
Bro got that corn dog plant growing behind 🌽 🐕 🔥
I think Cosmic is a new step for linux
It is
Ohhhh...ok, cosmic is looking awesome
Cosmic probably has great timing. It will take a couple more years to be ready but given the development of Linux, so will it by then too. I’m looking forward to the state of Linux when cosmic is ready for daily use on a grand scale
All I want is a text suggestions option. Like on Windows, Android, and IOS
You’re the first person I’ve seen try to combine the panels into one. I’m glad that’s a feature.
A top bar without a global menu just seems like wasted space to me. Although one of the devs said they would also try to add that at some point. So that’s cool.
How would you combine them? I can't seem to disable the top bar and just enable the dock.
That's actually one difference that I didn't mention yes. The steps in size also seem to be bigger with the panel, but that's just some fine tuning on System76' side
@@NiffirgkcaJ disable the Dock. Then move the top panel to the bottom and configure size/applets.
@@ProtonBadger146 when I use the panel, the applets for the menu and the like is in words instead of an icon.
The part that most interesting for all the stuff this desctop experience has is the window stalking.
I don't know how good the implemention is but personally think it's very good to have this option for every app.
And yes it's true that able to use multiple software and use alt tab however I think this great idea for proactivity.
My favorite DE & WM have been Plasma and Hyprland for a while now. I installed Pop_OS with Cosmic on a spare thinkpad I had laying around to see what all the hype was about and I was genuinely impressed with they have so far. I think this going to be a very happy medium for people who want to leave something like Plasma or Gnome, but too scared to jump to something like Hyprland or Q-Tile. Cosmic definitely has a place in the Linux world, I have a feeling it's going to be an important one.
the panel and the dock function the same way, in fact there are only two "panels" in the settings.. you can have 30 panels if you like by editing the config files directly. From what they said the settings app provide sensible configurations for the average user, but you can do so much more
I installed the alpha on my desktop (want to see if I can come with some feedback to aid the developers). Works pretty well for an alpha.
This looks great, but I think I'll look it up again in another year or so.
I already use Pop so it’s fairly familiar to me - but I do love the entire look and feel so far and I really enjoy Sys76 approach to Linux (and giving us something new!). Well done! 😊
I love watching people review Alpha software and complain about missing or breaking features. Like cmon man... Great video never the less :D
cosmic seems super cool, I love i3 but I miss the simplicity of having a full desktop environment that just works... if cosmic's tiling system is improved upon more im 100% swapping over
I hope other distros will use Cosmic as well!
It is using too like fedora and arch btw
I was looking for a dynamic tiling Wayland compositor that doesn't sacrifice on its looks. Living large in Hyprland. Now, Budgie DE does the floating WM best, but I will give Cosmic a try after beta is done.
I'm interested in trying Cosmic if it comes to Fedora.
As far as i know, it is on Fedora already.
It is available, but not officially
I need to try the actual alpha now that its out. Tried to daily it on my gaming rig during pre-alpha and it was a mixed bag. Some things worked great, others not so much. One thing worth mentioning is that Cosmic supports mirroring to displays with different refresh rates (ahve one image displayed at 60 hz on one and 240 hz on another for example) which is something desktop environments on Linux really struggle with (especially Gnome). Really excited for that HDR support in maybe the beta or whenever System76 cooks it up.
KDE has had wallpaper slideshows forever. What I don't understand is that it looks like Cosmic could have been achieved with a KDE tiling plugin and a 'background task' plasma widget. And those might already exist. What am I missing?
As soon as they manage to get tiling as good as hyprland with modern protocol support (which would require them to re-think their as of right now moronic release model), I'll consider daily driving it.
Cinnamon has had the slide show background setting since at least cinnamon 5 with an adjustable time and folder selection! I think its currently the best DE if you dont want wayland or tiling, both gnome and kde while being better in different areas but they give me massive headaches every time i use them, they're so buggy its like living in a bugs nest! but i will give Cosmic a try on arch when it comes out, i dont wanna try a distro just for a de
Running CachyOS August 2024 release and I installed and played around with it. It still has the Gnome feeling but with more customization to it, along with a tiling desktop feel. However, for me, my workflow doesn't really work well with tiling desktops, nor the Gnome-type workflow, so I doubt it's something I will look at in the future. But still, I love trying out new things, and with Linux, it's so easy to be able to test out things like this, unlike a certain OS from that Redmond place. 😉
😃😦😩😮😲😳🫨😬😱
Cosmic DE has potential, but I would wait a couple of years till it becomes mainstream to use it
Wallpaper slideshow has been available on Linux Mint for years.
It's fantastic.
I love GNOME but I'm definitely gonna give Pop_OS a shot when Cosmic is in the production release.
Cosmic might do it 👏
4:10 to 4:19..well that's cool, but CAN you put separate Documents, Pictures, Downloads, folder launchers RIGHT on the dock/panel combo ..thing? If not...no thanks.
I really hoped to see a more gentle review highlighting more the encouraging side to try popos cosmic desktop while just mentioning the bugs, because this is a new venture in linux, so its still new and not mature, so more encouragement what is really needed here. I'm saying this because I know you're a nice guy and do encouraging review as well as subjective unbiased reviews.
sorry for the long comment, and thank you for the review. and I use xfce btw ( in other words, I'm not linked to system76 in anyway, just a linux enthusiast, begginer).
It's already the best desktop environment I've ever used, and it's an alpha!
Hey Michael, I did try cosmic on hardware, I did not like it. It is still to buggy. I could not get the clock to tell the right time. I am not going to go into a lot of things, I hope they fix these problems soon.
You have an old version, active windows get highlighted
9:20 w reference
It's quite a nice Gnome clone and it's great to have another DE option, but the GUI makes no sense to me. Too much space used in the panel/dock combo and then they don't even seem to do a lot. The menu brings up this large menu that only seems to load apps and choose categories. To be fair if I tried it I might think otherwise. I do love the pop-up launcher though. K-runner on KDE plasma is too tiny whereas the Pop one is nice and big. And Gnome doesn't have one at all OOTB.
Question how are the resources usages. RAM & Memory usage IS it a light environnement or a heavy one ? is it Fast or slow as hell on old computer ? Do you need a good video card accelerator to use Cosmic Desktop ?
Cosmic doesn't really have anything fancy yet, so it's pretty lightweight. It definitely will get a lot heavier though
Most programs are designed to work well on full screen. So tilling is not for me. At least you can take that panel away from the top.
you can make an app in full screen fyi
It is still really easy to move apps between displays and workspaces using super+shift+arrows
I have a 55" TV screen as my monitor, sitting on top.
With KDE Plasma I have a task bar on top and on the laptop screen a panel at the bottom. Same type of panel. Cosmic at this point seems to be too much like "Gnome" with panels.
They don't venture too far from the current experience it seems. They used Gnome for a reason previously and they seem to keep its vision, just with more options
@@MichaelNROH Yeah I never liked Gnome. Was always more comfortable with KDE. Gnome sometimes too much like "Mac" by dumbing down the interface to the point where it is irritating.
We are creatures of habit I guess. I like a specific way of working - classical Start button with very configurable taskbars. Especially with dual screens.
@@isrbillmeyer gnome is prettier than kde
@@franklin_johnson01 I don't care about "pretty".
I need to get to stuff, make stuff, have the power available. One of the reasons I hate Mac interface. Dumbed down to the point of irritation.
Interface perspective from where I stand:
KDE > Windows > (Gnome, Mac)
But as of late Windows is sliding o the point of irritation as well.
I Like Gnome and kde and tiling Window Managers; they all lack Something, i really think cosmic could be it, unite all good things under one hat? Awesome!
When Mint has a wayland beta Ima try it
While i admire what they try to do, as a long term Pop OS user i got tired of waiting. 2204 feels old right now (to me). 2 years is a long time, and this still is a bit rudimentary. I experimented with ubuntu minus snap, which is fine, but you need replace the snap packages. So i installed gnome on Mint22 , no snap, no flatpak needed, and all ubuntu modifications are there. Presently this will be my way to go. Hope Pop OS will be great again🤞👍
Und here we go lads.
Coming from a newbie, configuring a tiling window manager like awesome or i3 with .files is a pain in the as$holes. I might switch to it if its available for ubuntu later on. Sys76 is one of the biggest contributors to FOSS and Linux, so im sure they will figure it out.
Nice vidya btw
i completely understand the advantage of having multiple choices for users, but when the product looks like something that already has been around for years, offering almost nothing new and solving nearly zero problems then whats the point?! i feel like their team could be better off just working on something like KDE to make it more robust and all together better. but again here is ANOTHER low effort de called cosmic!
How many different front ends does linux need?
yes.
next question
I REALLY hope system 76 see this
The fact that gnome has no changing keyboard button in the top right bar is a lie. I used Ubuntu 24.04 and it had it
Ubuntu doesn't use native Gnome
@@MichaelNROH ok didn't know that
@@MichaelNROH by the way I don't take time to check what I am using as long as it is working for me and doing what I want
How much memory does it use?
Is it possible to combine the top panel and the dock at the bottom to save space?
Yes. You can use just one panel with all the options
Can't you use a custom GTK themer app to add a custom theme?
I tried the alpha for like a week, it wasn't awful but I'll give it another year before trying it again. I noticed that system processes and cosmic-comp consistently used a lot of my CPU and RAM. It also just felt way more sluggish, and videos sometimes had popping sounds, though this is probably due to Wayland sucking.
Also I'm not really the biggest fan of the design for cosmic programs. It just feels kinda minimal and bland.
It sounds like you did not install Vulkan drivers for your hardware. Make sure that you have Mesa's Vulkan drivers installed. There are people running COSMIC on very low power ARM boards like the Banana Pi Zero with nearly no CPU usage.
Does it having something like the activities feature in KDE? (Not virtual desktops)
Kind of?
I think Plasma is the only DE that seperates this from the Overview tbh
For an alpha I am really impressed I can see this one is going to be my favorite
cool havent seen new de in a while its cool to see i like it but i am a hyprland person but if i buy a sys 76 laptop i wloud defenetly use its its uniqe
the tonation in your voice is pure torture
I know this is an alpha but i wonder if libcosmic and pop are built to be responsive for other screens like a mobile or a digital billboard?
Linux phones aren’t going to take over the world but they could be a decent alternative for people who want to “digital detox”
The toolkit and applications are being built to be responsive in an auto-tiling environment where windows can be very tall and narrow, or very wide. So yes, widgets and apps will be responsive to a mobile form factor.
@@mmstick awesome. Just one more question though. Is libcosmic similar to libadwaita that provides primitives that follow the HIG or is it closer to GTK?
@@mma93067 Comparatively, it's both. It provides a custom theme engine and all the widgets used by our design system.
This is like beta quality but it's an alpha
A Beta is basically testing a release version, while an Alpha is more like proof of concept really. It's still miles from a Beta release
It's an alpha because it's not feature-complete. But the quality is surprisingly good indeed!
@@MichaelNROH Let's call it incomplete, not proof of concept. A POC is something to learn from and then throw away in my understanding.
The ruling is reminds me yabai or aerospace wm
I was thinking about switching to mint,i have 2gb ram and 60gb hard drive space,do i am asking if im gonna have problems
@@Danzek.
I think Mint(especially Cinnamon) will struggle with only 2gb, for a smoother and still functional machine I would suggest Lubuntu or Linux Lite
We went from TWO MORE WEEKS before release to TWO MORE WEEKS till FIX.....
I hope comic is better then kde
do sudo apt full-upgrade
The lack of a desktop background randomizer / slideshow feature is the only thing I added an extension for in Gnome. Seems like such a basic thing to be missing.
but it hasn't desktop icon
The desktop icons applet is being implemented at the moment.
Check out deepin os
I didn't know that Toni Kroos uses Pop OS! Guys resembles Toni Kroos
The Slideshow has been a thing on Plasma for a VERY VERY long time. add a folder and go... but ngl cosmic kinda looks uuuuuuugly to me and I think its cause its using a custom rust ui toolkit that needs A TON of work. tbh they should have gone gtk or qt
since it's still an Alpha I think that the toolkit will look a lot better after another year or 2 of development.
I've never quite liked the Pop Shell look altogether. It's not my style I guess, though objectively it's not all bad
We already were using GTK, and it was untenable to retrofit a modern theming system on top of it, or to develop custom widgets in Rust. The state of Qt on Rust is even worse than that. Iced is loved by many developers in the Rust ecosystem. It's going to make app development on Linux significantly easier. Elm's MVU design pattern is just a much better approach to app development. Use of Rust is also improving the experience of cross compiling to other platforms, and supporting older platforms thanks to static linking. Starting with a lean and modular toolkit also makes supporting modern Wayland protocols like layer-shell simple, which is needed to create interfaces for Wayland compositors.
kde is there why we need more ...
There is a system extension that allows you to view background apps on gnome
It's insane that we need extensions just to cover basic use cases
@@MAUROdns exactly, why do I need extensions to change some basic design things like dash to dock or even to enable Desktop Icons! or to change the appearance of my date/time/calendar settings(Top Bar settings in Gnome Tweaks).
I get that not every edge case can't be baked into the DE but if a certain % of people use some tweaks or extensions then it's probably a sign to bake them in.
Yes, I use it on most of my systems, but they should re-integrate it
@@MAUROdns True. I understand wanting to keep a clean and polished experience, but hiding a common function that I believe most people would find very useful under an extension is not smart. I guess that's the nice thing about Linux though, you aren't stuck with one way to do things. You can choose a desktop environment or distribution that better fits your needs.
KDE is still way ahead
It looks awful...redundancy all over in UI elements/navigation features, and it's too cluttered, it looks like mash of Mac OS and Gnome with a bunch of stuff that gets in the way.
Cosmic is the only reason why Linux should survive for consumers. It's build with rust and is fast. Kde or gnome are to slow and inconsistent. Hope cosmic will be good enough...
Okay cool but no more new desktop environments.
How about the Linux community focused on creating a better GIMP, Inkscape, Kdenlive, LibreCAD, FreeCAD and other productivity apps?
Feel free to donate to those projects. There is no developer pool that can freely work on anything, and not every project needs or wants new contributors. Start by supporting them so that they can sustain their existing developers, or pay someone to contribute to them.
I downloaded and played with it. It’s more of a pre-alpha release. It’s YEARS away from being ready for the mainstream.
Alpha is always barebones. It's about core features that doesn't really resebmble actual new features yet
Yes another DE was severly missing from Linux!I mean the Linux world has a bad case of NIH syndrome!