It works well on my laptop. Most people don't hate it. Those who tried earlier versions of it and hated it then (myself included) are pleasantly surprised when they give it another look.
> One important function of the Start menu is discoverability of apps. If I want to see what junk I have installed, I can look through the menus to see what I have. With Unity you have to bring up the whatever and try typing search terms. If you don't know what you're searching for, it can be difficult -- and lots of times, you don't know the name of the application, because they have clever branded marketing names (Evolution, Firefox, GIMP, Inkscape, Shotwell, Chromium, etc.) which don't have their primary function ("image," "photo," "web," "email") as a substring.
This is hideously out of date. If I hit the windows key and type "image", then "gimp" and "inkscape" are in the list of choices. If I type "photo" I get "shotwell", "gimp" and "cheese". If I type "web", I get "firefox", "opera" and "chrome. "email" gives me "thunderbird".
> Also, there are switching costs. The Unity interface is so foreign, I'd need several days -- possibly weeks -- to get as proficient with Unity as I am with Windows, Gnome 2 or Cinnamon. That's definitely a cost in time and frustration, and the benefits aren't clear.
This is an argument against "change", not an argument against "unity".
> Some features -- like the Mac-like "there's only one instance of each application" -- seem designed to cater to n00bs who need hand-holding because they don't understand the concept of multiple application instances, or the difference between launching an application and switching to an instance of that application. I want multiple instances of certain applications -- terminals particularly -- and it's a major pain point with Unity. So not only do I have reduced productivity during the transition period, it seems like Unity is actually going to decrease my productivity once I do learn it, due to lack or hiding of core features.
It takes hardly any time to get used to this change. Personally, my web browser, email client, terminal and text editor all support tabs, so I us ually only have one window per app anyway.
> Add to that the fact that Unity would crash regularly within the first hour of use when 11.10, the first Unity-only version of Ubuntu, was released.
I'm not interested in older versions of Unity. I already said they were crap.
> I gave it a fair shot on two or three different occasions -- I think once when it was still called Ubuntu Netbook Remix, again when the beta was released, and finally with the official release of 11.10. (And a few incidental times when I've booted the Ubuntu CD for various reasons.)
> In each case, within an hour of use I've concluded that Unity is a nightmare.
So you're qualified to state that Unity was a nightmare. Not that Unity is a nightmare.
