I wanted to like GNOME 2.6.1. I wanted to appreciate the eye candy, the better performance, and the more consistent interface. I was looking forward to playing with some of the applications and applets, to seeing how the old ones had changed and what the new ones could do. In the end, I just wanted it to run, but it didn't.

I haven't recounted everything I tried, during a 10-day period, to get GNOME to run. The point being, though, that I shouldn't have to sacrifice goats and wave chicken feet to get something like this to work. I'm prepared to spend three hours downloading a metric buttload of tarballs. I'm willing to spend as much time as necessary building complex software from source code. If the end result works, it's worth it. As it is, I'm not willing to go another step with GNOME 2.6 until I get it as part of my next Slackware release.

Should you run it? Sure, if you're willing to put up with the aggravation and to play the detective game required to make it work. My recommendation, though, is that you should wait until your Linux distribution maker has gone through the pain for you and presents you with a known good product. Until then, GNOME 2.4 is good enough for you and for me.

Kurt Wall is an all-around Linux geek. He has written all or parts of eight books about Linux and UNIX programming and system administration and is the technical editor for over a dozen other Linux- and UNIX-related titles. Currently, Kurt works for TimeSys Corporation in Pittsburgh and lives in South Park, Pennsylvania. He receives entirely too much email at kwall@kurtwerks.com.

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