[sampo]

> There's also the nuttiness known as gnome-shell and unity.

I wish more people knew about Xfce (Xubuntu). It offers a better Gnome 2 -like experience than Gnome 2 ever did.

Although, the ouf-of-the-box theme, and look and feel, of Xfce/Xubuntu looks very dated. Changing the theme, desktop background picture, adding some transparency, is easy for a geek, and gives you a nice modern-looking desktop. But the default theme with gray and blue colors gives a somewhat Windows XP -like feeling.

[pan69]

I have become a big fan of XUbuntu as well. When Ubuntu phased out Gnome 2 I looked for alternatives and I found XUbuntu. Like you said, it's a better Gnome 2 than Gnome 2 ever was.

This is what my XUbuntu desktop looked like a few years ago: http://imgur.com/BK2leWF