Happy poopy holidays. It seems to me that more often than not, computer related things are not actually constructed from electrons or gallium arsenide, rather they are made out of pure excrement. Go read The Futurological Congress: at some point I wish the scales/drugs would fall from peoples' eyes so they could admit just how bad things really are. Not that it would cause anything to be fixed.

For example, gThumb is confused because the directory it used to be looking at is no more, and so it crashes when I try to start it, and I can't get it running long enough for me to point it at another directory.

Dave Bowman: "My God! It's full of [excrement]!"

So then I go wonder if I can start it from the command line with an argument that is a path to a real directory. The help from gThumb is like an ouroboros of usability vomit.

x@superlap4300:~/Media/20161124$ gthumb --help
 Usage:
  gthumb [OPTION...] - Image browser and viewer

Help Options:
  -h, --help                        Show help options
  --help-all                        Show all help options
  --help-gtk                        Show GTK+ Options
  --help-gst                        Show GStreamer Options

Application Options:
  -n, --new-window                  Open a new window
  -f, --fullscreen                  Start in fullscreen mode
  -s, --slideshow                   Automatically start a slideshow
  -i, --import-photos               Automatically import digital camera photos
  -v, --version                     Show version
  --display=DISPLAY                 X display to use

x@superlap4300:~/Media/20161124$ gthumb -help-all
Usage:
  gthumb [OPTION...] - Image browser and viewer

Help Options:
  -h, --help                        Show help options
  --help-all                        Show all help options
  --help-gtk                        Show GTK+ Options
  --help-gst                        Show GStreamer Options

Application Options:
  -n, --new-window                  Open a new window
  -f, --fullscreen                  Start in fullscreen mode
  -s, --slideshow                   Automatically start a slideshow
  -i, --import-photos               Automatically import digital camera photos
  -v, --version                     Show version
  --display=DISPLAY                 X display to use

x@superlap4300:~/Media/20161124$ gthumb -help-gtk
Usage:
  gthumb [OPTION...] - Image browser and viewer

Help Options:
  -h, --help                        Show help options
  --help-all                        Show all help options
  --help-gtk                        Show GTK+ Options
  --help-gst                        Show GStreamer Options

Application Options:
  -n, --new-window                  Open a new window
  -f, --fullscreen                  Start in fullscreen mode
  -s, --slideshow                   Automatically start a slideshow
  -i, --import-photos               Automatically import digital camera photos
  -v, --version                     Show version
  --display=DISPLAY                 X display to use



Even though the app purports to have different, extensive, help it turns out that in fact it only has one answer it can give. And it doesn't include the ability to be given a starting path.

Utter excrement.