Are you upset that GNOME is broken in the labs?

Linux does not by default come with a desktop environment. Third parties create the interfaces used by many people - by default, Ubuntu comes by default with a version of GNOME. The key difference between Ubuntu and Kubuntu is that Kubuntu comes with KDE instead of GNOME. Xubuntu comes with an environment known as XFCE. There are many reasons why multiple environments exist, but one of the most straightforward ones is that they cater to different crowds.

GNOME is generally pretty simple, doesn't really need to be configured at all to be used, and is actually not very configurable at all (by comparison to other environments). It also doesn't use up a ton of system resources.
KDE uses (usually) a hefty amount of your system, but can be very pretty. It is highly configurable and a bit unfriendly to common users - but very powerful.
XFCE is generally the very low system resources option. It has some configurability, some user friendliness, but its key selling point is that it doesn't eat much CPU or RAM.

Because GNOME is very easy for people to walk up and use with little foreknowledge, and KDE isn't, it has been an issue of some contention recently that all of the Linux computer labs switched with no student input from GNOME to KDE. GNOME is still around, but its installation does not work correctly. This poll is intended to take opinion from a large group to see if people are generally annoyed or indifferent about the inability to use GNOME.

Good question; sometimes we just assume.

---
Wyatt Carss
President, SOCIS
Senator, Bachelor of Computing
http://wammmr.ath.cx http://wcarss.blogspot.com

Actually, I have a fairly easy fix, which I've tested, and would take about ten minutes to implement. (I've got it working on my account, but it would be easier to apply globally.)

The main issue for me now is that GNOME is locked down to a silly degree: e.g., security settings prevent setting common keyboard shortcuts!