Aston2 vs Aston1, I'm confused and dissapointed.

[Liath]

Okay, after a long time of using Aston 1, I decided that since Aston 1 doesn't seem to be going any further, the features that were listed in Aston 2 would be a really nice addition. I like some of the new eye-candy and all, but so far, unless there are some plugins and themes make, I'm sticking with Aston 1, at least on my Windows XP system.

My first impression when I loaded Aston 2 for the first time was, 'd**n everything is HUGE -- oh wait I probably just need to set the theme to match resolution.' (1024x768 - It's a laptop). Then my next main complaint is that it looks... like the normal shell with eye-candy. Nothing like my first load of Aston 1, where I was like, "hey, what's that? NEAT!". Aston 1 blew me away.

If the themes were made to support smaller resolutions, or Aston2 supported dynamic resizing of the stuff, I think that would rock. But as it stands, none of the themes I've downloaded compare to Aston1's themes. There aren't any panels, icons everywhere, everything takes horrendous amounts of screen real-estate... exactly what I did *not* expect from an upgrade to Aston 1.

So my real question, before I remove Aston2: *Can* it be made to look nice and neat like many Aston1 themes do? For an example of what I like (theme I've used for years), check Techno Dream... No Escape Does it support anything like the panel plugins on the left/topright of the theme? Can it do what some of the more 'unique' themes in aston1 did where your desktop is a picture, and various parts of the picture were the 'icons'?

If Aston2 is goign to be anything at all as good as Aston1 in my mind, someone really needs to spruce up the default themes, make 'em simple, but elegant, with some plugin-pizzaz to show it off.

[krstatzar]

Agree with you on many issues but A1 didn't become what is it now over night. A2 will show itself in full beauty in some 3-6 months. In few days you can expect new version with floating widgets. After that top panel/Panel/Toolbar very soon. A2 is taking its shape that is for sure

[Liath]

Ahh, okay. Hadn't noticed a whole lot of activity lately, and was kinda grr (hadn't had 2nd cup o joe yet) when I made the o.p. Came across more b**chy than I'd thought.

Aston 2 has been around for a while, and is the successor to A1, so I'd thought there would be more... 'oomph' even in release candidates and such. So, soon we'll have more plugins for A2? Floating widgets sound much better to me than the sliding bar thing.

So that I can stick with Aston, is there an easy way to reclaim some of my desktop? Icons are absolutely too large on my screen. Also, the panels are just... big. I understand that most of the world has huge monitors by now, but there are still plenty of systems stuck with 1024x768 flatpanels out here.

I really would like to have some way to control UI elements as a user. In A2, I haven't really found the dialogues to set sizes and such. Most infuriating is trying to resize just the desktop icons. The theme I'm using right now, AgeofAero, isn't too bad visually, and it is the smallest theme I have in the bunch right now. But, elements are still way too large for my screen, compared to Exploder and the Aston1 theme I use.

I tend to go for a display that 'looks' simple and really clean, but mouse-over a panel and you have hidden menus and such. With the TechnoDream theme in A1, I pretty much used nothing but the quicklaunch, taskbar, clock, and the panel (vertpanel) on the left side.

I'm not even a big fan of the 'start menu'... I use it here and there, but generally I have a few apps that I launch regularly, so the quicklaunch works in most cases, and the start menu I used for stuff that I used occasionally but not often.

[krstatzar]

Icons can be resized by holding ctrl+mouse wheel (scroll) like in many browsers. More and more users are using larger resolutions so larger icons are applied for that reason. More user control and easer skinning are the next steps that is for sure.


BTW A2 advantages over A1:
- Desktop that has all the explorer options and features and offer more.
- PNG transparency and alpha transparency on all elements
- 64 bit support
- sound support
- hardware acceleration (feature is yet to be fully implemented)
- no limitation on desktop animation

cons:
- still missing some plugins - widgets
- hard skinning and lack of skins for that reason

but that will all be fixed soon

[Liath]

Ahh okay. I know that in the world of programming that this is generally a stupid question... but is there any guesstimate of when the new plugins will be coming? Have they come along a good bit?

[Helenistic]

Every version released offers a number of new features and widgets. 1.6 is going to implement 'RSS reader' and "floating" widgets for example. Next will come Top panel and toolbars.

[Dany0]

yay k mail me when Aston2's ready 2 use and I come back.