Comment 718 for bug 532633

@Bob Pendleton - I've been at this since 1978, so I can relate with everything you've said, as I've had similar experiences.

I think Mark and company have enough data on what most users would like, for it to be min,max,close on the right-hand side, and clearly this is the majority of end-users. (End-users aren't on here. We're programmers, developers, IT geeks, etc) I'm not going to get into a debate, as I think everyone (including Mark) already knows my stance on this as well as my previous points made. I won't repeat them again here and now.

All that being said, I've done my own research and people agree with me for the most part. Some don't care either way, some like it on the left of the window, same goes for not only the button positions, but the order of them as well. It's all over the spectrum, but the vast majority of people I've shown Lucid to vs older versions of Ubuntu, liked it as min, max, close on the right-hand side.

Be all of that as it may...... I think the solution is to make it so people can use any theme (so that probably means making 2 different versions of the same theme, one for left-side buttons in close,min,max and one for right-hand side with min,max,close) so that people may easily choose which they would like. This change of the button order and position is not something within the Metacity window manager or within Gnome, but rather within Ubuntu itself. Perhaps these 2 different GTK themes will give other people who use Debian and other distros the option as well, which may be a bonus of this now-only-Ubuntu-specific deal. I think this is where the focus needs to be at right now. As for whatever unverified features that will be in Ubuntu 10.10, that too will need to be movable.

So to reiterate, I think the keep here is flexibility. This should fit right in-line with the core modular basis of Linux as a whole anyway.

Aside from all of the technical aspects of this, it is certainly a social experiment gone wild. Interesting, to say the least.

PS: To anyone who has gone 'round and 'round with me in the past on thus bug, please... just don't. Save it. Save everyone the hassle. This post isn't about any of that. It's about contributing positive data. Nothing else.