I really like gnome and how it looks. However every time I try it I find myself in need of more functionality and so I install a bunch of extensions. For example I can’t live without a dock and some sort of system tray that shows which apps are running in background.
Sometimes the extensions have small UI inconsistencies or use more memory than usual. That’s why I totally ditched gnome and switch to KDE.
Also I tend to think it’s been designed for people who are more comfortable using a keyboard. I’m mostly a mouse person.
Do any of you run pure gnome with no extensions? How do you cope with the lack of a dock and system tray?
What do you mean a lack of dock? Gnome indeed has a dock by default where has you need an extension on kde to have a dock.
I don’t think I installed any extensions to get a dock on kde, unless debian came with the extension preinstalled
Are you talking about a panel or a dock?
It was a panel that mimics a dock. I can’t remember if it was the existing task bar with modified settings or another panel that can be chosen. However, it’s so customizable that I got it to mimic the macOS dock almost perfectly without downloading anything else IIRC.
The dock is hidden by default, only visible in the overview mode.