“Several weeks after the initial source-only release of GNOME
1.4, and almost a year after its first release of a repackaged
GNOME 1.2, Ximian released its own version of the desktop
environment: Ximian GNOME 1.4.”
“Ximian’s distribution of GNOME is built around the proposition
that in addition to the building blocks of the basic desktop
environment, some added polish in the form of easier installation
and more user-friendly tools are required to truly complete the
end-user experience. To that end, Ximian provides not only an
easy-to-use installer that’s simple to launch, but a few other
add-ons and enhancements designed to ease use and maintenance of a
Linux (or Unix) workstation.”
“To that end, Ximian has to be evaluated not only on the
strengths GNOME brings to the table, but how well it succeeds in
capitalizing on those strengths and making good on its promise to
take them to the next level.”
“Ximian’s former CEO Nat Friedman pointed out several times
during the gap between vanilla GNOME 1.4’s initial release and
Ximian’s release of its final product that his company’s purpose
isn’t simply to perform basic quality assurance and binary
packages. What end users finally ended up with provides evidence
that Ximian is on the right track, though we’ll see that in
addition to some excellent new features, promising tools, and good
usability touches, there’s still a little work to be done.”