[LUG] A pretend rant

[Neil <barnaby@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

This has been a strange year. Nearly over now, thank goodness. So, as a 
bit of fun, I have come up with a list of some of the defaults in Linux 
which annoy me. (Agreed, I am easily annoyed.)

Desktop

I like to have the panel at the bottom. Some distros start with it at 
the top, or even on one side. So I have to move it.

The plank. Whose weird idea was that one? If it is there I remove it.

Konky. Another weird one. It takes up a lot of space on the screen, it 
is distracting, and if I need any of that information there are lots of 
other apps that I can use. (uname, htop, neofetch, inxi to name just a few.)

All those pretty (or not) pictures to show on the desk top. To me just a 
silly distraction. I always set up each desk top with a plain coloured 
background. Each one a different colour.

I always keep the panel hidden. When I need it I just move the mouse 
pointer to the bottom of the screen and the panel appears. The rest of 
the time it is out of  the way.

Browsers

Firefox is usually the default. There was a time when I could place the 
tab bar as the lowest bar. Then  that facility was removed. So I now use 
Waterfox Classic or Palemoon. Firefox is still installed but I just 
ignore it.

For some reason most browsers seem to be set up at the start so that 
closing the last, only, tab also closes the application. Why? I always 
switch that off via about:config. There are already several ways to 
close my browser down when I have finished, I don't need  another one.

Terminal screen.

Yes, I do use it a lot. But the default seems to be to open it up with a 
small screen. I like to have it full screen, so I change that in 
preferences. I usually change the font and background too.

Laptop

Very similar to the above, except that I never use a touchpad, I use a 
wifi mouse instead. So I switch off the touchpad as one of the first 
changes I make.

The above is by no means a full list, but enough for now.

I had better finish by saying that we are so lucky with Linux. Most 
changes that I want to make are so easy. Try that in Windows or Mac. 
That is one of my main reasons for using Linux. So please take this as 
just a bit of fun, not a rant.

Neil

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