Hot take: good riddance.
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@vkc@linuxmom.net @volpeon@icy.wyvern.rip definitely. i like GNOME, but i wish they'd allow for slightly more customization out of the box (although i get why they don't)
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Anyway, if you like GNOME and their design concepts, you're awesome and totally a valid user of Linux.
Sick of the absurd nonsense that says otherwise.
@vkc I'll leave this also here
https://mstdn.social/@fabiscafe/115848147812611839 -
@vkc I love the middle click, I've been using it for about 26 years, and I think its one of my favourite features. I'll be annoyed if it goes away.
I'm totally ok with making it optional...
@DiogoConstantino @vkc it is optional as much it is now. Just the default changes.
And ye I totally agree. One of reasons why i cannot use Windows, though surprised there is no third party thingee.
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@DiogoConstantino @vkc it is optional as much it is now. Just the default changes.
And ye I totally agree. One of reasons why i cannot use Windows, though surprised there is no third party thingee.
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In this period, in this timeline, at this moment, maybe, just maybe, we shouldn't talk about *desktop environment design disagreements* like they're causing deep emotional harm?
@vkc they are causing deep emotional harm, but we’re not dealing with mature, well-adjusted adults here. We’re dealing with Linux zealots.
I like the highlight and middle-click paste. It gives me a second, and faster, clipboard.
I can see how it would be frustrating for new users and those without a suitably firm actuator on their rodent.
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Hot take: good riddance. I dislike the middle click thing. Trips me up all the time as someone who accidentally clicks it when scrolling.
I think the right move is to make this (undoubtedly useful to some) behavior opt-in, not opt-out.
A lot of the gripes I see are just people being mad because GNOME makes choices they don't like. I don't understand why people write like this about GNOME, if you don't like it don't use it, your emotions make you look petty, etc etc.
https://www.theregister.com/2026/01/07/gnome_middle_click_paste/
@vkc I’m glad middle click is getting turned off by default too.
My first experience with Linux was installing it on a Mac, connecting my Magic Mouse, then trying to work out why it was randomly pasting my clipboard all over the place instead of clicking normally.
I eventually worked out that Linux thought magic mice should have a third, mystery button in the middle which pastes. Not a good first user experience - wasn’t familiar or comfortable behaviour.
Hopefully this helps new users.
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Hot take: good riddance. I dislike the middle click thing. Trips me up all the time as someone who accidentally clicks it when scrolling.
I think the right move is to make this (undoubtedly useful to some) behavior opt-in, not opt-out.
A lot of the gripes I see are just people being mad because GNOME makes choices they don't like. I don't understand why people write like this about GNOME, if you don't like it don't use it, your emotions make you look petty, etc etc.
https://www.theregister.com/2026/01/07/gnome_middle_click_paste/
@vkc to turn this comment over, have you ever questioned the mouse design? What is the purpose of the middle button now? It's a waste of a switch ? p.s. I've been using middle paste since I moved to Linux (~1999) it's way faster than alternatives as long as your mouse isn't physical difficult. I chose my mouse carefully for that reason. Now, the feature is not really gone, it's just disabled. There is a thing called gnome tweaks, you could disable it for a while, now you can enable it instead.
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Hot take: good riddance. I dislike the middle click thing. Trips me up all the time as someone who accidentally clicks it when scrolling.
I think the right move is to make this (undoubtedly useful to some) behavior opt-in, not opt-out.
A lot of the gripes I see are just people being mad because GNOME makes choices they don't like. I don't understand why people write like this about GNOME, if you don't like it don't use it, your emotions make you look petty, etc etc.
https://www.theregister.com/2026/01/07/gnome_middle_click_paste/
@vkc see I don't like almost all choices GNOME made over the decades that's why I don#t use it and that's why I get annoyed when they hold up stuff like wayland protocols just because they don't like it on there upshot smartphone UI but I will not argue over the default of a config option as long is it is easy to change and well documented.
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Anyway, if you like GNOME and their design concepts, you're awesome and totally a valid user of Linux.
Sick of the absurd nonsense that says otherwise.
@vkc I don't believe anyone is arguing otherwise, especially not the people who disagree with that decision. It's just that the GNOME maintainers have a habit of not implementing features they have decided that users don't need, ranging from little things like this to maximize and minimize buttons, and I believe it's understandable to not like this mindset and think those things should at least be configurable.
"Some people like the GNOME way of doing things and those people are okay" and "One of the main draws of Linux is escaping the one-size-fits-all paradigm that Windows and MacOS are leaning into more and more lately, and the GNOME maintainers' attitude of "if you don't like your desktop how we like ours, don't use GNOME" is disappointing" are not mutually exclusive ideas.
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@vkc Oh…my…gosh. I've never liked GNOME (or KDE). But so 🤬 what? My spouse, who is not a programmer, has enjoyed every version of GNOME since 1999 & a Linux-based system has been her primary desktop for decades.
I'm vaguely aware that *yet again*; like some kind of clockwork, the world wants to
-post about #GNOME for the 2ⁿ-th time.I gave this #GUADEC keynote 10 years ago directed at these haters; I'm sad it's still relevant,though.
https://sfconservancy.org/videos/2016-08-12_Bradley-Kuhn_GUADEC-2016_Keynote.webm
@bkuhn @vkc Yeah, I haven’t used Gnome personally in a long time but when I did I remember seeing criticisms of it that seemed completely detached from reality, that in no way reflected the actual experience of using it.
20 years later, they’re still making the same criticisms. I admit I don’t know first-had, but I’m willing to bet that the criticisms didn’t magically become valid in the intervening time.
It’s always the same people, anyway, who never do anything but moan about systemd and/or wayland. (Wayland, especially, they’ll insist simply does not work at all, despite the evidence of thousands — millions? — of people using it regularly without issues.) These people can’t be taken seriously.
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@emi @vkc No, Wayland neeeds to care too, not just DEs. Right now, global keyboard access and other things which assistive technology would require is all over the place and DEs are allowed to do their own thing. Those kinds of features should be a part of the core Wayland specification. Accessibility should never be a third-class citizen. And the accessibility landscape is already fragmented enough. We don't need Wayland adding to it
@draeand@the-gdn.net @emi@social.comfy.city @vkc@linuxmom.net accessibility is first-class citizen. But you know what? Its fucking difficult and companies do not bother to fund this effort. The only reason we have any accessibility at all is because Sun funded it for their Solaris.
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@vkc I also hate middle click. It's only useful on a three-button mouse.