Comment by pmontra
19 days ago
About the UI I become "they" but installing the GNOME extensions that I need to make my desktop look like 99% of what I would it to look and behave. It takes a few minutes to get to 80%, a few hours to get to 95% and days (a few minutes here and there) to 99%. Those huge menus and tabs on GNOME terminal eventually became skinny with a good deal of CSS and AI.
Do most people want to get through that research? Absolutely no, I don't expect many people to follow me into that rabbit hole. They can get the default or Windows or a Mac, no problem with that.
But with AI, "go through with that research" is tell Claude code how you want things to behave, and it'll make it happen for you.
You are correct but only in part.
Claude did tell me where to fiddle with CSS, but its suggestions where not always on spot. It cut the time I spent on it and maybe it made it possible, because I wouldn't have dissected the source code or inspected the UI in the right way (GTK inspector). All the process still cost me a few weeks of five minute attempts now and then.
I think that there is no way an agent (and I was using the chat UI) can take control of my desktop, patch CSS, restart it, take advice and give me what I want. Not yet.
By the way, I have an autohiding Windows 95 like app bar at the bottom. The text inside the app items is still a bit too small and some icons in the terminal top bar are still too narrow. I think I have more CSS to fix but I'm in no hurry.
> I think that there is no way an agent (and I was using the chat UI) can take control of my desktop, patch CSS, restart it, take advice and give me what I want. Not yet.
Claude Cowork can do such things if you set it all up.
[dead]