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Anyone whos starts a post with...

Bring on the Gnome folks! OPEN FIRE! Flamewar!, flamewar!! flamewar!!!

or...

Bring on the KDE folks! OPEN FIRE! Flamewar!, flamewar!! flamewar!!!

is a fool. So what if you like a different desktop. Its a desktop, thats all (a D E S K T O P). Use what you like but please keep the reasons why to yourself.

Bring on the Gnome folks! OPEN FIRE! Flamewar!, flamewar!! flamewar!!!

Thank you for the laugh..

I like both environments but I prefer KDE.

Loser

Double loser

If I remember right, Gnome wasn't dropped from Slackware due to a preference towards KDE, or thinking KDE was better, but because it was a pain to build and package all those Gnome dependencies.

> GNOME is quite incomplete and broken at the moment, but
> i think that GNOME has the better future because of its
> more advanced architecture and its greater flexibility.

Watch the keywords "incomplete", "broken" and then "more advanced", "greater flexibility" in one sentence. The first two quotes are a plain contradiction tot he second two ones.

If something is incomplete and broken, then it hardly can be advanced or offer greater flexibility.

"Watch the keywords "incomplete", "broken" and then "more advanced", "greater flexibility" in one sentence. The first two quotes are a plain contradiction tot he second two ones. "

in that case, i suggest you return(unless you are still there) to infants school to brush up on your english comprehension, because you obviously have great difficulties in understanding basic sentences. they are not contradictions by any means.

> > "Watch the keywords "incomplete", "broken" and then "more advanced", "greater flexibility" in
> > one sentence. The first two quotes are a plain contradiction tot he second two ones."

> in that case, i suggest you return (unless you are still there) to infants school to brush up on your
> english comprehension, because you obviously have great difficulties in understanding basic
> sentences. they are not contradictions by any means.

I understood these sentences pretty well. But I find it quite contradicting to say "GNOME is incomplete and broken" and then "but it's more advanced and offers greater flexibility" in the same sentence.

If something is broken or incomplete then it hardly offers greater flexibility. It offers more pain in the butt for a developer to get along with problems of the development framework. This can also not be called "advanced" by any means. Advanced is usually things that has been thought through, proved, works reliable, thought for future in mind - considered practially good. Now if GNOME offers incomplete and broken things then in what ways is that "advanced" ? It's a contradiction and irritation of the word "advanced".

Just my 0.5 cents.

"I understood these sentences pretty well. "

you obviously didn't because they have no relation to each other.


"But I find it quite contradicting to say "GNOME is incomplete and broken" and then "but it's more advanced and offers greater flexibility" in the same sentence."

compare that of the valve and the microchip when the mucrochip was almost complete. the valve is less advanced and less flexible than the microchip, but the valve was more complete.
thats why you need to return to school to brush up on your english comprehension.

> > "I understood these sentences pretty well. "

> you obviously didn't because they have no relation to each other.

It was just ONE single sentence that contained all this. So how can there be no relationship ? The sentence he wrote is exactly related to it because the sum of words exactly made that sentence which ends with a point.

easy, because one doesn't correlate positively with the other. its as simple as that.
something which is incomplete can either be advanced or basic.
something which is flexible can either be advanced or basic.

the architecture on GNOME is leaps and bounds ahead of KDE (eg gstreamer, dbus, cairo, etc)

Funny, none of the projects you cited are part of Gnome.
Hint: freedesktop.org.

"Funny, none of the projects you cited are part of Gnome. "

according to this, gstreamer, cairo, and dbus are all part of the GNOME architecture:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNOME
just because KDE are going to be using GNOME technology eventually doesn't mean they are not part of GNOME. read the part on architecture that states that gstreamer, dbus, and caira are part of the GNOME architecture.

according to this, gstreamer, cairo, and dbus are all part of the GNOME architecture:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNOME

It says that GNOME is built from a large number of "different projects" including ...

All of those projects are part of freedesktop.org, and are independent of gnome. They are just utilised by gnome to provide functionality.

You will see from the gstreamer entry on wikipedia that it is going to be the default audio framework for kde 4. You will also note that it is currently used by amarok and kaffeine.

> You will see from the gstreamer entry on wikipedia that it is going to be the default audio
> framework for kde 4. You will also note that it is currently used by amarok and kaffeine.

This is inaccurate.

KDE 4 will use KDEMM as audio framework that defaults to no special audio system such as GStreamer. It will offer the possibility for people to default to XINE, MAS, ALSA, GStreamer as OPTION. AmaroK also doesn't default to GStreamer, again it's an option they offer for people who want to use it.

Hm, I'd like to see some more authorative source on that before I belive in that. AFAIK it's one of the *proposed* replacements for artsd. And if they want to stay in that game they better get their shit together in a hurry, since it really sucks compared to lib-xine functionality wise.

according to this, gstreamer, cairo, and dbus are all part of the GNOME architecture:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNOME

Wikipedia isn't the Source of Truth, you know.
Give me a link on the {gstreamer, cairo, dbus} official website where they say they are a Gnome project.

Funny, none of the projects you cited are part of Gnome.

It's called collaboration and it's the open source community's greatest strength. Don't try to make it look like a bad thing just to serve your own zealotry agenda.

While I personally would not agree with "the architecture on GNOME is leaps and bounds ahead of KDE", both platforms have good things going for them.

DBus is an implementation of KDE's dcop that runs in C and does not require Qt. There is already a nice Qt library to help KDE developers use DBus, and this is used by the KDE media:/ ioslave since KDE 3.4. So not only does the entirety of the KDE desktop already make use of DBus-style features, but it also supports DBus itself. They'll probably switch to DBus for KDE 4, but they have no pressing need to switch right now.

Cairo has it's equivalent in Qt 4's Arthur rendering engine, which performed better than Cairo when Qt 4.0 was released (I don't know about now). KDE developers have an project set up (Plasma) to develop the best ways of using these new graphical features. Gnome has Cairo now, but there is no clear plan on how it will be used. KDE has an advantage in this in that Zack Rusin, a KDE contributor and Qt employee, was one of the main architects behind X11's EXA system that allows for such effects.

Gnome may have GStreamer, but KDE 4 is going to have an abstraction layer that will support GStreamer, Xine, MAS and any other multimedia framework. Thus KDE users can cherry-pick the best framework to suit their setup. There is no such global option in Gnome (most applicatoins use their own systems) and no plan, as yet, to come up with one.

The fact is, KDE has always had the better architecture; lets not forget that ioslaves came before the Gnome's VFS, and KParts were the first decent COM system in Linux (Gnome had Corba first, but it never took off). And they've always done a good job of documenting it. The problem is that they've spent too much time on the architecture, and not enough on the apps. Hopefully KDE 4 will see the application side of things improve.

>KDE is more or less limited to C++).

C++ isn't flexible? Limited? If anything C++ gives you too much flexibility, so much so that your likely shoot yourself in the foot before ever complaining "why can't my language do xyz"

the architecture on GNOME is leaps and bounds ahead of KDE (eg gstreamer, dbus, cairo, etc)

I'm afraid not. GStreamer is still far from being reliable enough to depend on (whether it will be good enough for KDE 4 is still an open question), DBus is not a Gnome technology, nor does it take much advantage of it, and Cairo is miles away from being able to give all the fancy desktop effects everyone thinks they're going to get.

What he means is that the infrastructure (programming framework and desktop) is there and available for programmers to just get in and produce great open source applications without getting bogged down in bullshit and debugging their own development tools.

Well dbus was taken straight away from kde and then reprogrammed, now the kde people basically put their automation interfaces on top of dbus, so much for history,
cairo is not GNOME its an X project and used by both gnome anmd kde in the future, gstreamer has its roots also in other technologies like xine and the windows media api, but I agree that is pretty much the only area where gnome was first.
It is usually like that, KDE has an interesting tech, gnome wants it reprograms it has often a worse solution, the kde people adjust their interfaces to the gnome solution to keep the peace ;-)

Gnome still lacks a decent compound document model essential for any office package. The OLE clone BONOBO was a dead end road, due to the same design mistakes and OLE had and due to the flakey CORBA foundation (the kde people ditched corba way before BONOBO due to its slowness and flakeyness)
Well there now is a project which unifies KPARTs and gnome to some extend, thank god! That should have been done 5 years ago.

Face it KDE is basically NextStep radically moved forward and basically really the only system besides OSX which is totally component oriented.

Well dbus was taken straight away from kde and then reprogrammed, now the kde people basically put their automation interfaces on top of dbus, so much for history,

DBus wasn't "reprogrammed". It was programmed from the ground up in C, with a design inspired, among other things, in the DCOP system. "taken straight away from KDE" is overdoing it a lot. Here for more info:

http://dbus.freedesktop.org/doc/dbus-faq.html#other-ipc
http://dbus.freedesktop.org/doc/dbus-faq.html#yet-more-ipc

cairo is not GNOME its an X project and used by both gnome anmd kde in the future,

Cairo is used right now in Gnome. GTK is using cairo since 2.8.0.

gstreamer has its roots also in other technologies like xine and the windows media api,

Xine is a player. There is no way in hell gstreamer shares similarities to xine beyond the use of third party media libraries (like ffmpeg).

Although GStreamer intends to offer the same features as APIs like DirectShow, their design is totally original. And when it comes to free software, there is no library that comes close to the level of features it provides for multimedia.

http://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/features/

It is usually like that, KDE has an interesting tech, gnome wants it reprograms it has often a worse solution, the kde people adjust their interfaces to the gnome solution to keep the peace ;-)

As is the case with Arts and GStreamer, mozilla and khtml, glib+Gtk and Qt (nice "interface adjustment there"), HAL, evolution-data-server, cairo and arthur (that was released later).

Yeah. "Usually". Hah.

Face it KDE is basically NextStep radically moved forward and basically really the only system besides OSX which is totally component oriented.

The day KDE is as usable as NextStep was in 1989 wake me up.

What a load of fanboyism.

Um...KDE is a collection of a bunch of small programs. So is Gnome. A lot of people like XFCE/FVWM and get by just fine with very few GUI applications. Some of us run systems that are older and don't have to resources to run KDE or Gnome. That or we just don't like the bloat (read "needless crap") sometimes.

>> KDE is a collection of a bunch
>> of small programs. So is Gnome.

Partially... yes, but also (with enthusiasm...) architecture! The concept of a "cohesive" desktop environment has been pursued for how long??? (win3.1, apple-2). Regardless of the number of apps... the whole debate reduces to architecture: do "modules/apps" use shared memory or filesystem or a subsystem such as corba to facilitate "services" or embedded components? How do pieces interact and share? What programming paradigm? What services are available to developers? What is the resource requirements? How well does the whole system behave as an economy? How does its implementation limit or extend it's capabilities and facilitate it's maintainance? Architecture!

"XFCE doesn't do anything!"

XFCE does a lot. At least for the original poster. A desktop environment, or a file manager, does not need to do "everything".

Actually this is the reason why I do not like KDE.

And I know that there are many other people who like "simple and efficient" interfaces, instead of the ones where "you're overwhelmed with options which you'll never ever need at all".

(For the record I'm not a XFCE user at the moment).

Have you used XFCE? XFCE is designed so you can still use and run many KDE/GNOME applications. It does exactly what the people who designed it want it do to: not get in the users way, or tell the user what to be.

As long as you've tried all the WMs or DEs that interest you, and you've all objectively as possible given them a solid chance then whatever you pick is right for you and no one should ever verbally beat the holy living death out of you for finding what works for you.

Software is highly subjective. If you can run windows and make it secure, and like it: good on you. Same with any $distro,($wm|$de) combo. Use what you like, not what everyone else thinks you should use. Just give them all a chance.

I'm just curious, which part of the word "personal" did you not comprehend? XFCE may not do "anything" for you, but it apparently does just about eveything for Ringheims Auto since (s)he still uses it.

KDE provides a file manager with ftp/http/ssh/imap etc. access, cd burning, audio/photo management, RSS reader, mail client, newsgroup client, calender software, download manager, network manager, office software, graphics software, media players, text editors and much more. To actually use your computer, you have to use XFCE with lots of other software to compare it to GNOME/KDE.

Yeah, but I get by by loading each of these apps seperately, I use KBear for FTP, and maybe konqueror from time to time.

But the point wasn't really that XFCE is better, it was rather that mostly all modern DE's are easy enough to use, atleast apart from geek-oriented ones like fluxbox. (I used to run fluxbox for myself and gnome for guests, but found that XFCE works great for both purposes).

http://developer.gnome.org/doc/API/gnome-vfs/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonobo_(computing)

What about KParts and IOSlaves?

KParts is hardly that great. It's a clunky alternative to proper single-function apps interacting through known interfaces. IOSlaves basically duplicates the idea of mounting filesystems, except it does it through a completely different interface meaning you have to actually compile your program with it in mind for it to work. If you just create filesystem drivers for the given interfaces (e.g. the gmail one) all programs can access it with no extra effort.

And did you know that KDE runs on operating systems which aren't Linux?

"What about KParts and IOSlaves?"

i thought i'd already exaplined that. GNOME are working on an equivelent that isn't tied to one language, but GNOME is quite incomplete. kparts is basically tied to C++ and is only for in process. Xparts is for out of process.

This whole ordeal is about personal preference. You use OS X, you are partial to that. I use Gnome, Windows and KDE occasionally. I think they all have good points. XP was a big step forward for Microsoft. I'm not saying their desktop environment is the be all and end all, nor is OS X, Gnome or KDE. Some people think that Fluxbox is the perfect desktop environment and for them it is, but not for you and that's okay.

By default yes it does, however you can in fact make it resemble just about anything you want, nothing is stopping you from changing the way it looks, no coding invovled either. Gnome is fairly flexible, but kde amazingly so.

He wasn't trying to say it's the most popular he's saying it's the best (try looking up the word editorial).

Is that a screenshot of KDE 3.0? A three year old version? With what appear to be dozens of user-added panel applets, icons, and menu entries? Hardly a fair comparison.

Yes, in recent version the colors are even brighter and it's even a bigger mess. You should be glad he didn't chose a recent screenshot.
Why KDE Rules - It looks like Toys"R"us is makeing desktops lately.

Actually it looks more like a 2.x series to me...

Wow, I'm amazed!
You chose a 10-years-old KDE screenshots with lots of user customization against a clean Ubuntu install. That's what I call a fair comparison!
Are all Gnome users like you?

KDE 3 is not 10 years old, and I can't edit my post, but here is a more recent screenshot.

http://shots.osdir.com/slideshows/472_or/33.png

Not to say that picture is any less fisher price than the first one.

thats so very true. KDE are not doing themselves any favours with the contiuation of their fisher-price icon sets (ie crystal and oxygen).

Oh seriously, it's usable and looks nice, how is that "fisher price"?

Your argument is a complete rip-off of the troll posts against Windows XP when it first came out, it's a dried up argument used by trolls to get attention, insite flame wars, and bolster support from fellow trolls. If you ask me the KDE interface doesn't look any less "fisher price" than the Gnome one in all the screenshots you linked to, and if you're complaining about the layout consider that not everyone is going to create a clone of Gnome consider that not everyone likes Gnome.

You don't care what KDE is like, you just want to raise Gnome higher up by using KDE as a footstool. Do you seriously think mature (as in over 12 yrs old) Gnome users are going to appreciate you spreading hostility between the two desktop environments. Here's a clue, they won't.

Oh seriously, it's usable and looks nice, how is that "fisher price"?

Fisher Price is know for using Primary Colors on their toys, and using a "cartoonish" design style. KDE and XP use that "cartoonish" look and primary colors in their look too.

I used to use KDE adamantly; I tried using GNOME in earlier versions, but it just didn't work for me.

Until I tried it again at 2.10. With a few minor tweaks, GNOME was a winner for me.

Why?

1) Simplicity-One product for one use. KDE has too many products loaded to determine which one to use. GNOME picks one (usually best of breed) and installs it.
There's nothing that prevents people from installing something else, but GNOME and or the distro (in my case Ubuntu) picks one and installs it.

Also, when making system changes, GNOME has one tool for one job. Digging in the KDE Control Center to find the right tool for something can take an effort.

2) Interface-Let's face it, OS X seems to have the best overall interface (more than several articles have been hosted on OSNews, Slashdot, and Newsforge about the UI of OS X). KDE's interface uses primary colors and a "cartoonish" look, which would work well as a newbie's PC, but not for a experienced PC user, where asthetics are a bit more important.

With a few small tweaks, GNOME give the desktop a smooth, polished look, using gradients of color and a down-to-basics look. With KDE, doing the same thing can take quite a bit of time, and it still has some remnant of primary colors and "cartoons" in it's features.

I've shown my Windows users both KDE and GNOME, and while KDE reminds them more of XP, they always go "OOOH" and "Wow" when I show them my GNOME desktop. They like the polished, smooth, instant feel of it all.

Now I will tell you what GNOME could work on that KDE does provide better:

1) Print Function-KDE's Print manager is much better than GNOME's. Fully Featured and integrated.

2) Bluetooth Support-KDE KIO slaves work a lot better when dealing with Bluetooth than GNOME does. GNOME's bluetooth support seems a bit of an afterthought.

3) Power Management- The Power Management tools in GNOME are also not as fully featured as KDE's, and on a laptop (Dell Inspiron 8600) that's important.

Have you tried Gnome Power Manager?
http://www.gnome.org/projects/gnome-power-manager/

"I've shown my Windows users both KDE and GNOME, and while KDE reminds them more of XP, they always go "OOOH" and "Wow" when I show them my GNOME desktop. They like the polished, smooth, instant feel of it all. "

Not to nitpick, but since you've been using Gnome instead of KDE for a while don't you think you're simply better at showing off Gnome's latest features than KDE's?

If you're blaming the developers for the behaviour of the trolls I would like to remind you that the developers of Gnome and KDE actually get along rather well.

It's funny how the developers get along, cooperate and colaborate on projects, and then you have kids from either side who compete over which desktop environment is the best like they would compete over who has the biggest penis, and when that fails, who can spit the farthest.

Well, I would like to remind you that it's just a joke. I neither use KDE or GNOME, I juste don't care ...

Sounds like you want the simple, yet powerful variant of a KDE media player: JuK.
It will be just the right thing for you - and even better: it's the official KDE audio player!

http://developer.kde.org/~wheeler/juk.html

Screenshots there, so you can make sure it doesn't spin and blink.

You are amazing!

The first person I encounter who actually likes CDE.
I had to work with CDE on HPUX for 3 years.

I always considered it a space-waster.
A panel which was almost not customizable, the only buttons I ever needed were the virtual desktop switcher buttons, and the "open console" button.

Additionally there was no way to make the panel be one-line with smaller Icons and span over the whole width of the dasktop. CDE's Panel always wasted 30 pixels vertical, but refused to use the spare 200 Pixels at the sides.

Additionally, the panel was not always on top, so the "maximize" button on the windows were never usable, unless I wanted to dig down to the panel every time I wanted to switch virtual desktops.

The file manager was slow as hell which made it unusable. It needed several minutes to open a folder with a few hundred files in it.

EVERY single dektop I had to use (KDE 1.1 - 3.4, GNOME 1.4, FVWM, Win95-ME, WinXP) was better than CDE in almost every way.

Then you didn't use the correct software under windows or gnome. Any good web editor would be able to sync with a remote site at the press of a key without you even needing to worry about what you changed. Both the big name Gnome/GTK editors, screem and bluefish, support direct editing on remote servers as well (with screem supporting the more sensible sync with remote site as well).

Does screem, bluefish, dreamweaver support scp? There are kio slaves for scp, dav, http..

yes. screem, bluefish and dw support scp. screem and bluefish use gnome-vfs so have scp, dav, http...

Are you using Konqueror, the threading doesn't work properly for me in Konqueror. It's a nice browser, but somehow when the webadmin made the site compatible with most browsers (s)he forgot about Konqueror.

IIUC it's not about browser compatibility but about invalid HTML code that just happens to work in some browsers.

To the osnews staff: Could you try to remove the <p> tag from the form code or to move it outside of the font tags?

<font>
[...]
<p><input type="hidden" name="ref" value="1234">
[...]
</font>

WE DON'T CARE! WE CHOOSE THE DESKTOP THAT BEST MEETS OUR NEEDS! YOUR COMMENT WON'T CHANGE THAT.

Now I agree with that. I don't agree with this:

That goes for this article too.

For one thing, "This is subjective" is written all over the place. Another thing is that whether you agree with the author's assesment (kde is the best) or not, you have to admit that writing such an overview requires considerable effort, and it is very well done. It offers a nice overview of the features many users find very attractive about KDE, and many users who are not familier with KDE would find attractive.

So far, most of the comments (including yours) turned this article into yet another GNOME vs KDE thing (yeah, yeah, this is osnews, so it is to be expected somewhat) but this doesn't do justice to its quality. Not that it is perfect - few are - but still, it is nicely done, and informative (for instance, every single QT related thread is hijacked by "license trolls" and this article, right at the beginning, clarifies a few things.)

Back to the "WE DON'T CARE! WE CHOOSE THE DESKTOP THAT BEST MEETS OUR NEEDS!" thing: this is not for you or me or those who already made a choice. I don't care for no amount of advocacy work will convince me to use GNOME, for been there, and didn't like what I saw, and I'm tired of explaining to my girlfriend how to save a file in GIMP (because of the braindead file dialogue). You don't care because you can (or a hardcore GNOME user probably could) say something like that concerning KDE, and I don't think I could (or should) convince him or her (or you) to use my desktop of choice. But I won't say that advocacy of either DE is bad, because "WE CHOOSE THE DESKTOP THAT BEST MEETS OUR NEEDS!" We do, because we tried both (presumably) and found out what fits our needs. This article is for those who didn't yet, and no amount of shouting will change the fact that you missed this point entirely. GNOME does a fairly good job (arguably better than KDE atm) at advocating their Desktop, so do many of their users... and that is perfectly fine.

This is article is perfectly fine. Is it subjective? It is, and it doesn't try to convince you otherwise. Is it advocacy? Yes, it is, and that is fine too, for I don't have a problem with that either, especially since it has some very useful information as well.

Oh, an UPDATE. I know that most of us engaged in a debate won't go back to reread the article (so it would be nice if osnews editors posted an update). This underlies my point:

Update: this page was submitted to osnews by a know anti-gnome troll (the guy who forked gnome because he didn't like the button ordering etc etc). I sent this page to the kde-promo list to get suggestions and make it "more correct" - but apparently some people can't wait when they just want to harm others. Just don't listen him and don't read anything with the name "oGalaxyo" on it no matter what desktop you're using. And in case you didn't noticed it - apparently, many osnews readers didn't noticed it - this is about "why KDE rules", not "why Gnome sucks" and if you think the latter you're wrong: I wrote this article just to give people a oportunity to see what they're missing if they're not using KDE, so they can change if they want. A "Why gnome rules" doc would be welcome.

This was from the article if that wasn't clear...

I don't read these things there.

Oh, an UPDATE. I know that most of us engaged in a debate won't go back to reread the article (so it would be nice if osnews editors posted an update). This underlies my point:

Update: this page was submitted to osnews by a know anti-gnome troll...but apparently some people can't wait when they just want to harm others. Just don't listen him and don't read anything with the name "oGalaxyo" on it no matter what desktop you're using.

That is not what is updated on the article at all. This is:

Update: In case you didn't noticed it - apparently, many osnews readers didn't noticed it - this is about "why KDE rules", not "why Gnome sucks" and if you think the latter you're wrong: I wrote this article just to give people a oportunity to see what they're missing if they're not using KDE, so they can change if they want. A "Why gnome rules" doc would be welcome.

........

Update: and now this article seems to have been updated again talking about oGALAXYo

Just leave it alone, OK? It's misleading. Who posted the article to OSNews is neither here nor there, and it's a lot of other people around here taking this the wrong way, for whatever reason, as they always do.

Edited 2005-12-30 00:41

oGalaxyo has a major axe to grind with the the GNOME developers and even attempted to fork GNOME to meet his standards. So it's not surprising that he wrote this article. He is welcome to his opinion but you need to know the context of his writing.

Guess what.. it wasn't written by oGALAXYo. He only submitted the link. It was written by diegocg.

Thanks for correcting that.

What's so great? If you have to ask that, you have probably not been using your environment to the full extent. KDE has lots and lots of functionality that isn't obvious to the eye, but very hard to let go of once you have started using it.

For instance
The fish:// integration, which works flawlessly.
The "network folder" thing, which works flawlessly and seamlessly with all KDE applications, as oposed to the gnome variant which:

A) is more than likely to crash nautilus, and b) doesn't integrate at all with a lot of the so called "Gnome applications", of which the majority really is a bunch of gtk applications hijacked in the name of propaganda.

Seamless spellchecking using the same spellchecker for all kde applications, from kopete to konqueror.

The "identities" functionality which enables me to have different language settings and so on for different applications depending on which identity I choose. For instance I mostly post messages in english from my gmail account and thus english spellchecking and makes more sense. On the other hand my normal email account mostly sees action in my native language, so there english doesn't make sense there. And it's all handled by which sender address I chose.

Another example where KDE works and Gome doesn't is opening a pdf file and then printing a single page. Works perfectly in KDE, the experience was quite different from the one I got in evince..

I could go on, and on, there are so many things that works in KDE that either doesn't exist in Gnome or that are totally FUBARed there, but I don't have all day, you'll have to find out for yourself.

how about KDE's (non existant as yet) version of the gnome volume manager?

You mean KMix which's there since years ?

"You mean KMix which's there since years ?"

you obviously don't have the first inkling of understanding about what the volume manager is. the volume manager is concerned with the automatic mounting and unmounting of all devices.

KDE has an automatic volume manager in KDE 3.5: http://www.jeugdvakantiewerk.nl/stuff/kde.png

Since 3.4 the media:/ ioslave has automatically detected devices.

Since 3.2 the system:/ ioslave has automatically listed all devices in /etc/fstab.

However KDE doesn't promise to automatically unmount things for you. Why? Because most devices don't actually send an eject notification (only CDs and ZIP drives). So you have to right-click on the icon in the system:/ or media:/ folder and select Eject or Unmount, depending on what kind of device it is.

Which is perfectly okay. It's what Mac OS has always made you do, and it works a whole lot better than the Windows method (right-clicking on a system tray icon).

What's more, KDE supported a form of volume management right from KDE 1.0, whereas Gnome limped along for years with various panel applets that weren't particularly attractive or easy to follow.

in that case, the equivelent KDE volume manager has either been buggy or doesn't work as it should. and certainly doesn't work as well as the gnome version.

you obviously don't have the first inkling of understanding about what the volume manager is. the volume manager is concerned with the automatic mounting and unmounting of all devices.

actually kde does that just fine.

hey, i compiled kde with hal support and now when i plug an usb key an icon appears in the panel... or on the desktop depending the moon fase

It is included in kde 3.5 - see bottom of this page: http://www.kde.org/announcements/visualguide-3.5.php
I'm not sure however if it acts 100% same as gnome volume manager as I don't use gnome

Browser is their real user environment? eeew.

My mail client, my irc client, my word processor, my spreadsheet, my IDE, my desktop file manager, my music player are my environment, not a web browser, not matter what OS / Desktop environment I am using.

this is not to denigrate kde. like gnome, its a useful desktop environment. beyond that, i didn't get a sense that my experience was being radically improved. i was still firing up firefox in full screen mode and going my merry way.

Okay, so you're entire desktop experience is the web browser. So why are you voicing your opinion on a forum about the achievements of KDE? You obviously don't care about anything a desktop can offer you other than starting your web browser.

Why do you even deal with all the extras that GNOME/KDE offer, why not run XFCE or Blackbox set to run Firefox fullscreen as soon as you login? Does GNOME have some magic Firefox icon that makes it run better there? I don't think so.

> This is where Gnome has done a good job by for example seperating the file manager and web browser into seperate apps.

In a word: NO!
I actually like to have Konqueror being a single browser for multiple source of documents, be it the web, the filesystem..
Browsing is browsing *many* functions are identical: zoom in, zoom out, bookmarks, go back, follow link (wether the link is an url, a directory..), etc.. independently of the type of data.

So I think that it is stupid to separate browsing to different applications depending of the type of data, the functions are very similar.

I do hope that KDE developers won't do what you're suggesting..

I actually like to have Konqueror being a single browser for multiple source of documents, be it the web, the filesystem..

You like it, but no one else. Konquerors marketshare is stagnating. Look at the statistical data of heise.de
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/66968

And don't tell me there is no movement towards KDE/Linux systems in Germany and even on this technical and linux friendly page Konqueror is still below 2%. Go figure.

Many Linux distros set firefox as their default browser, even if they install KDE by default. This is probably why konqueror gets so low figures. Another reason is of course that konqueror doesn't run on windows.

The reason for chosing firefox in Linux distros is probably that it will make it easier for their customers to access services like online banking.

It seam to take a while you can teach organizations like banks to do new tricks. It almost took forever to make them accept mozilla/firefox even though that was a perfectly safe or even a safer alternative to ie, and some still don't.

As of KDE 3.5 konqueror have improved a lot. Unlike firefox it now passes the acid2 test. This is very good, and will probably attract some people once it gets commonly known.

Apart from the sad figures for konquerer it was nice to see that more and more people find alternatives to IE. The figures are of course very specific to heisse online, but I have seen similar trends on many other German sites.

It is also worth noting that the figures in your cited statistics is only about web browsing. It tells us nothing about how konquerer is used as a file browser.

As of QT4, the licensing of QT will be available under GPL, so lets hope for a konqueror port to windows by then. That way the market share can increase enough to make banks take notice making further growth possible.

About the movement towards KDE/Linux, I don't speak german but in the page you gave, there are also figures for KDE, and both KDE and Konqueror figures are the same..

Anyway even if they were different, linking Konqueror success with people liking or not the one browser for all data type is difficult:
- if the web part of konqueror isn't as good as Firefox, then people will use FF whether they like the one browser concept or not.
- personnally at home I'm using Windows (for games) and at work I'm using KDE on RHE3, on both I'm using Mozilla at it is much simpler to use always the same web browser: the same reason could apply for dual booters.
So why do I say that I like the one browser for everything concept? PDF, it is always a chore to read PDF as the UIs are needlessly different from web browser..

3.4.x is actually good. I left kde on 3.2.0 because it was the worst release of it I've ever used.
3.5 is still a little buggy. They screwed up some things like sftp connections, but I imagine they'll fix it in dot-dot releases.

OK, so this fanboyish article will provoke yet another GNOME vs KDE flamewar full of venomous, angry comments posted by people incapable of comprehending a simple fact that when it comes to technology, people's preferences are about as rational as their preference of ice-cream.


I'm the guy who wrote the article. And I agree: it's a fanboish article, because I'm a KDE fan

It's not an anti-gnome article, though, even if some people are looking at it that way, but that's something I was expecting, some people just don't like looking things from other points of view...

I wrote this article just to give people a oportuniy to see what they're missing if they're not using KDE, so they can change it they want. A "Why gnome rules" doc would be welcomed.


(By the way, if some admin reads this....please change the link to http://www.terra.es/personal/diegocg/kde/index.html (add index.html). I added some "nice" words for the guy who submitted this before time and added some corrections and the link without index.html is cached - it'll be updated soon though, I hope

Edited 2005-12-29 19:32

"I'm the guy who wrote the article. And I agree: it's a fanboish article, because I'm a KDE fan "

I hear ya. I have aRts, kdelibs, kdebase and kdemultimedia installed here, using Fluxbox as my window manager. I didn't think your article was anti-GNOME at all. As a fellow KDE (sorta) user I liked it. Objectively, I thought it was a bit too much on the fanboy side, but that's understandable.

My main point was that it's impossible to fully rationalize desktop environment preference. I don't even remember properly why I have KDE installed rather than GNOME. I used to run GNOME a long time ago when I was using stuff like Red Hat, SuSE and Mandrake.

> For example: http://www.terra.es/personal/diegocg/kde/print-pdf.png . Also, I honestly think the
> icons in all those screenshots are terrible. I've always hated that "Crystal" look. I know you can
> change them, but I doubt there are themes out there to change all of them. They're just way too
> in your face.

That's not crystal and not even the default icon set. It's this 'children' icon set that exists in kde-artwork package if I am not mistaken. Personally I use the Nuvola icons and I pretty much love them. But then it's my personal taste.

http://img498.imageshack.us/my.php?image=snapshot39kg.png
http://img500.imageshack.us/my.php?image=snapshot16jn.png
http://img241.imageshack.us/my.php?image=snapshot42sc.jpg

You're right, some of the icons are the "children" icon set. However, the rest are still "Crystal" AFAIK.

"As someone who fancies trying Linux very soon

Explain the differences Between Gnome & KDE and which in your opinion I should use"

it depends what you want your desktop for and what your preference is.
you will never know which is best for you by reading about them. you can only decide by installing and using each one.

Gnome has less clutter, but also less features.

KDE has more features, but it's a bit more cluttered (however the Kubuntu distribution provides a less cluttered KDE desktop).

It's a harder job to get applications like Firefox and OpenOffice to look natural in KDE, as they're built on the same frameworks as Gnome. There is however a Crystal/Plastik theme for Firefox to make it blend in http://www.kde-look.org/content/show.php?content=11442.

OpenOffice can be blended in using various different methods http://www.kde-look.org/content/show.php?content=5065
http://www.kde-look.org/content/show.php?content=19116
http://www.kde-look.org/content/show.php?content=7131

KDE is easier to configure, and is more configurable, but it's so configurable that it's often hard to find the configuration option that you want.

KDE apps are more tightly integrated, which is generally advantageous. KDE has an easier system for dealing with devices like CDs, floppies and memory sticks.

Actually, a minor correction regarding openoffice: it is not built using the same framwork as GNOME. If GTK is available on your system, it will use that. On windows, it will use the native widgets. On KDE, it will use KDE widgets. I think the framework they use is a completely separate beast (from GNOME or GTK).

I think oo.o can be compiled to blend in either GNOME or KDE, depending on what you use, although I compiled it (from ports on FreeBSD) only to support KDE. Here is a screenshot:

ftp://hatvani.unideb.hu/pub/personal/screenshots/ooo-build.png

It is themed with the Lipstik theme, just like the rest of kde, and it uses crystal icons on its toolbars. Actually this is ooo-build, not the vanilla openoffice.org (but it works the same way in both).

> I think the framework they use is a completely separate beast (from GNOME or GTK).

OpenOffice makes use to the Staroffice Foundation Class iirc.

neither firefox, nor openoffice are built upon gnome frameworks. The bits of gtk they do use is very superficial to fake the look.

Explain the differences Between Gnome & KDE and which in your opinion I should use

I think it would be a mistake to commit yourself to GNOME or KDE on someones advice without trying both first. An easy way to do this would be to obtain live CD's that feature each desktop. You could then try both desktops out on your current system without installing anything on your hard drive. This also lets you test your systems compatability with these Linux distribution, but remember live CD's will run a lot slower than a full installation on the hard drive so don't be put off by that.

You could try the GNOME based Ubuntu distrubution, they will send you free copies of both the live CD and the installation CD from:

http://shipit.ubuntu.com

There may be a live version of Kubuntu the KDE based version of Ubuntu available. One good introduction to KDE is Knoppix the original Linux live CD distribution. These are all based on Debian, for an RPM based live CD which is KDE orientated you could try the live Mandrake CD, there are plenty of options out there.

I started out with Linux five years ago using KDE, I then moved to GNOME, on to XFce, then back again to GNOME. I am currently a happy GNOME user, but don't let any zealot persuade you to go with GNOME or KDE they are both excellent desktop environments and only you can decide which is best for you.

Please note that this article is about KDE not about GNOME. While it's your good right to express your opinion and even offer people the help by pointing them to the UBUNTU page, you on the otherhand ignore the fact that if we did the same in a GNOME related article then we all would be flamed to death and every comment we would have done would be moderated down regardless of the context.

I think you don't need to address Ubuntu to the user, if he was willing to read the article (link) then he would already know the difference between GNOME and KDE, just by simply reading it.

>GNOME are working on an equivalent...., but GNOME is quite incomplete.

It really explains it all, doesn't it. KDE has had working architecture for years, while they still are working on it.

Don't knock the Gnomers for that, they've taken an excellent lesson out of Microsoft's playbook: Detract from what your competitor can do today by overcomitting to what you'll do in the future... and hope you'll drive them out of the market before you have to actually deliver.

> The Qt license sucks and that's why all the big players went Gnome.

You mean big players like those who went Qt ?

http://partners.trolltech.com/partners/training.html
http://partners.trolltech.com/partners/training.html
http://partners.trolltech.com/partners/service.html
http://partners.trolltech.com/partners/tech.html
http://partners.trolltech.com/partners/resellers.html
http://www.trolltech.com/company/customers.html

Specially pay attention to the last link. So you say Boing, NASA, Deutsche Telekom, IBM, HP and many more bug players went to GNOME ?

> Eventually they'll have to move to something besides C++

Why? Please elaborate more on this. Bindings for more languages would be nice, I guess the Python bindings are the most complete ones. But I fail to see why the core desktop environment must be rewritten in another language.

I have done a lot of C++ programming, and with the Qt library it is possible to be just as productive as one would be in, say, java (which I also have lots of experience with).

Oh you mean like Windows has all those fancy 3d effects? Get real! First off a fancy 3d desktop environment would make most computers obsolete based on hardware requirements alone. Secondly who would use it besides the temporarily curious? It would complicate the graphical user interfaces even more and still serve no real purpose beyond what current 2D desktop environments provide today.

Linux on the desktop exists, just not for you as long as you keep raising your standard with every stride Linux takes, pretty soon there won't be any viable Desktop OS for you if you keep that up.

If this document aim at people who don't use KDE (like myself), maybe it would be a good idea to explain the difference between kontact and kaddressbook. Based on the quote above, it seems both are handling contacts.

Kontact is a mail suite, more like Outlook. KAddressbook just handles addresses. They access the same contacts through KParts.

Think of Kontact as a wrapper around various other programs. It gives you a consistent UI to access various different programs.

If you want, you can have a single, master window with an icon bar down the left side to switch between the included apps (KMail, KAddressBook, KNotes, Akkregator, KNode, and others). All the apps can pass data back and forth as needed.

Or, if you prefer, you can load each app separately, in their own windows. They'll still pass data back and forth as needed, they'll just be in separate Windows.

Kontact is really just a meta-app that puts all the different apps into one windows for ease-of-use. Giving you a UI that looks similar to Evolution or Outlook, but without writing a new app (it builds on all the existing apps).

Actually, I did understand what it does. However, I always use editplus for editing anything that is not on my system, which has ftp functionality. Anything else I only need to download and not resave.

> Why are KDE themes so hard to install. It's like there's all these different parts to them.
> There should be more one-click themes like Gnome.

If you are just worried about theme installation then you seriously don't understand KDE as a whole. But then, I only use 'one click' to install themes.

because its not as usable as GNOME is. Komplexity(oops, i meant complexity) is the name of the game on KDE.

That is a rather tired and old argument, not to mention subjective. In a hope that your post wasn't just flame-bait, I'll embellish a little. What you're saying is that you consider the GPL less free because you can't restrict the freedom of the software users?

You need to realize that freedom isn't some imperial or metric measurement that is measured on some one-dimensional scale on which one end signifies complete freedom and the other signifies complete lack of freedom. What is complete freedom for you may very well be unacceptably restricted to me.

To draw a parallel to the article at hand, I realize that while I find KDE to be the best desktop out there, in many ways much better than my OS X desktop, it certainly doesn't mean that there aren't any other equally valid points of view. If you love GNOME or XFCE, I'm pretty sure that you'd disagree severely with me arguing that your preference is misplaced since it doesn't coincide with my preference.

> I am linux n00b incarnate.

For a n00b you write a lot of stuff that requires excessive througly deep Linux knowledge:

http://www.osnews.com/usercomments.php?uid=3737

I write about what I know - windows and web design. Just because I can use windows, that doesn't mean I'm not a n00b on a new system. If you had never used RISC OS or Amiga OS before and I handed it to you, you wouldn't have a starting clue how to use it. Although that's harsh on RISC OS and Amiga because they're actually easy to use.

Trying to install a friggin app on Linux, or worse - a driver, was so hard to guess work, I couldn't do it; not even common sense and wild guessing would work :/

Amarok has two interfaces. There is a simple player interface that simply has the usual stuff, showing control buttons, track time, track name and a couple of other things. The interface you were looking at is primarily used for managing music collections. It does this very well. Once you're organised, you use the simplified interface to play stuff.

I see this as good usability. Providing you with two interfaces, which are optimised for the particular task at hand.

But feel free to criticise an application after looking at one screenshot. Analysis from a position of complete ignorance is so helpful, don't you think?

What's the main thing you do with a music player? Play music, obviously.

Except Amarok is a audio jukebox, not a music player. It encompasses a wider set of functionality than does a mere music player. Thus it has an interface which is primarily oriented toward organizing and managing large collections of music files rather than simply playing them.

Where's the play button in Amarok? At the bottom of the screen, squeezed in betweeen the visualizer and the "other albums by this artist" box.

A full height right navigation panel paired with a left content/view panel is one the most widely used and familiar UI conventions currently in use today. Numerous file managers, email clients, admin consoles, and even a good number of popular websites all use this exact same UI paradigm to reasonably good effect. Amarok's implementation is hardly a perfect example of the form, but it should be quite familiar to anyone who's used a computer before.

all the controls that actually matter (play/pause, seek, skip track, volume, visualizer, playing song title) are crammed into the bottom 2cm of the window. Brilliant!

Makes perfect sense to me. The control buttons act upon the playlist and are located exactly where I would expect them: below the playlist (above the playlist would be an equally obvious location).

Also, what the heck to those 3 buttons with different cube icons and the 2 with green arrow icons do?

The boxes: random mode, repeat playlist, and dynamic mode. The arrows: undo and redo.

The boxes aren't exactly obvious, but then that's what tooltips are for. Hover and learn! You'll pick it up in relatively short order. And once you do, it'll seem perfectly natural. Learning things is neat that way.

Side tabs were a bad idea when they first appeared in Konqueror, and they haven't improved with age.

Hmmm... the side tabs in Konqueror have always seemed to me as a perfectly acceptable solution for extending the functional range of that left navigation panel doohickey we talked about above. The other option would be to add more top-most elements directly into the tree structure, which is an approach that has plenty of merit as well. Neither way of doing things seems obviously superior to the other. Although, adding more top-level elements into the tree should scale up better to include a larger number of distinct navigation modes. Not sure that's really an issue with either Amarok or Konqueror.

Tiny, sideways text is always going to be hard to read.

True, but it works well enough that its never been an issue for me. And remember: you only need to learn the tab placements and their respective functions once.

Options are nice, but really, I don't care whether Amarok uses MySQL or sqlite or MS Access 95 on a 486 in Siberia to store it's database, as long as it knows where my music is. The same goes for audio backends.

I don't particularly care about the database backend either, but I can easily imagine situations where having the choice would be very nice. So while having the choice of multiple db backends has never benefited me, it's nice that it is useful for those who do need it. The audio backend issue is another matter altogether. Audio on Linux isn't exactly at the "it just works" phase, and until it is, such flexibility is absolutely necessary. For instance, I've got a lot of hopes for the long term prospects of Gstreamer, but as things stand right now it's barely usable for many tasks.

And in any case, implementing apps such that they relatively independent of such things as database backends and audio engines is generally considered good programming practice.

The article brags about tranparent windows and stuff, yet I see no such options on a vanilla Kubuntu install. What's missing to enable drop shadows, window transparency etc.?


Use my guide if you can:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=75527

Again, I know what it does, and I think it's great. All I was trying to say is that I've been able to download remote files (http/ftp) through Explorer/Common Open Dialog on Windows for a while, and it's great seeing other places doing it as well. I NEVER said KIOslaves was limited to that.

But myself, the only files I need to open and save remotely are files I use editplus to edit. And that does FTP and let's me hit Ctrl+S to save a remotely opened file.

I don't know why you or the other guy are so defensive when I give KDE kudos for having a feature I like.

Again, I know what it does, and I think it's great. All I was trying to say is that I've been able to download remote files (http/ftp) through Explorer/Common Open Dialog on Windows for a while, and it's great seeing other places doing it as well. I NEVER said KIOslaves was limited to that.

I believe that his gripes were more related to the way how you stated, comparing to Explorer and such. Actually, KFM (the old KDE 1.x file manager) was also capable of displaying websites back in 1997 or so. See: http://www.linux-user.de/ausgabe/2000/01/HomeNet2/kfm.gif

Though, it didn´t relied on on a powerful underlying system such as KIOSlaves as far as I know. KIOSlaves is a different beast from either the method mentioned above or the Windows Explorer way, as another poster already pointed out.

But myself, the only files I need to open and save remotely are files I use editplus to edit. And that does FTP and let's me hit Ctrl+S to save a remotely opened file.

That´s fine but it is hardly the same thing, don´t you agree? fish:// alone makes any security conscious person drool over his/her keyboard.

I don't know why you or the other guy are so defensive when I give KDE kudos for having a feature I like.

Again, I believe that it was a reaction (not warranted, though) to the way how you put it, comparing to Windows Explorer et al. I agree that there wasn´t any need to get defensive at all, even being a diehard KDE user and advocate as I am. But then, I have a thick skin.... :-)

Cheers,

DeadFish Man

I believe that his gripes were more related to the way how you stated, comparing to Explorer and such. Actually, KFM (the old KDE 1.x file manager) was also capable of displaying websites back in 1997 or so. See: http://www.linux-user.de/ausgabe/2000/01/HomeNet2/kfm.gif

Great. That's not what I was talking about.

That´s fine but it is hardly the same thing, don´t you agree? fish:// alone makes any security conscious person drool over his/her keyboard.

I never said it was the same thing. I was simply saying it was nice the KDE has that one feature I've been using in Windows for years. But KIOslaves do much more than that. However, that is the main feature that is useful to me. KDE is certainly ahead of Windows in that area. I've always wanted to be able to mount random shit as volumes.

funny. I have been able to do that for years in screem, which is a gnome application.

> In reply to sappyvcv (1.12) on 2005-12-29 18:43:16
> (damn it osnews, get your systems right).

Hint to the osnews staff:
http://www.osnews.com/permalink.php?news_id=13118&comment_id=79723

on one hand, i hope KDE 4 will be cleaner than 3.5 - but on the other hand, i hope they don't split up Konqi TOO MUCH - i love a webpage combined with filebrowsing in one tab (split-screen) and stuff like that.

That's why KDE has great code and infrastructure reuse. You'll probably see a more dedicated Konqueror web browser and file manager application (I certainly hope so, anyway), but all the components can be reused completely between it and the filebrowser - so if you want to browse files and web pages together go right ahead!

Thats the biggest bullshit I've read so far from 132 comments written. Go and get some brainz.

LOL!
I have to agree.
The comment is so stupid that even a troll should be ashamed of it.

This says more about you than KDE.

Who is they? What power do "they" hold over you that they can force you to use a certain browser/music app/"everything else"? Since when has koffice been part of a default kde installation?

An extraordinary outburst of utter drivel.

I can do the same with WindowBlinds in XP. I use the iFlex theme.

Nice readability you got going there on the clock and text up there. The glass isn't blurred underneath either.

I assume that you can do the same in GNOME. Regardless, it's a million times more complicated to customize KDE. You have to get the theme, compile it, install it, then apply it. In WindowBlinds, I download the .wba file and double click on it. That is it.

"Adding themes in KDE is dead simple, and if you'd ever used it you'd know."

you have to admit though. theming KDE isnt anywhere near as straightforward as theming gnome. neither is it as effective. and ive used linux for years.

Seriously, I can't see how clicking "Control Center" -> "Apperance & Themes" and then proceeding to "Theme Manager" or straight to "Icons" is much harder than the gnome procedure. If you want to add specific styles or window decorations that aren't part of a theme I see your point, but not otherwise.

And I have actually no clue what you mean with "more effective". All I know is that with gnome I have to try to find a theme with a color setting that matches my needs everytime I testrun it because the defaults suck, and I can't figure out how to easily change it.

Very few metacity/gtk themers write their own engines. Most KDE themers do write, or modify, their own engines.

I'm not sure why it is. It doesn't matter really though. Some systems make it nearly impossible for a user to theme his desktop without paying someone for doing the dirty work. At least both of these systems are open about the look.

> For me it has been difficult to choose between the two
> because there are positive things in both of them:
>
> GNOME
> + OpenOffice, Firefox, GIMP, Synaptic, Gaim

Timosa sorry, but neither OpenOffice, Firefox, Gimp, Synampic or Gaim are GNOME apps.

OpenOffice = Staroffice Foundation Class with a subset of GTK+ or QT widgets for appearance.

Firefox = XUL with a subset of GTK or QT widgets for better appearance.

The rest is plain GTK+ only.

Maybe I was little bit inaccurate. My point was that in GNOME OpenOffice, Firefox, and friends inherit look & feel of the GNOME environment and in KDE Skype and friends inherit look & feel of KDE environment. In other words OpenOffice is more GNOME than KDE and Skype more KDE than GNOME.

You are correct that from technical side those applications are not pure GNOME or KDE but GTK or QT applications. However because GNOME is founded on GTK, not QT, the GTK based applications are more at home in GNOME than in KDE. Same applies to QT applications too in KDE. Of course you can use OpenOffice in KDE and Skype in GNOME and thanks to freedesktop.org they are not aliens in the foreign environment.

Edited 2005-12-29 21:50

Timosa, thanks for clarification of your point but you are still wrong. OpenOffice is still not 'more GNOME' since it doesn't use anything GNOME related.

OpenOffice is based upon Staroffice Foundation Class widget set (tool set).

Both camps, GNOME and KDE have written native wrappers for Dialogs and Toolbars to cover a few aesthetical aspects of the app. So you can't say that OpenOffice is more a GNOME app since it's not true. It's not true due that it uses a totally different widget set but offer the same equal amount of KDE and GNOME integration due to wrappers for the dialogs, which on KDE's side is the same good as the side of GNOME. It's a desktop neutral application.

kubuntu != kde

Just thought I'd chime in here:
Amarok only downloads album covers when you ask it to.
It only looks up lyrics when you ask it to.
It only downloads off wikipedia when you ask it to.

It really doesn't sit there and do stuff behind your back.

I don't agree that KDE mainly appeals to geeks. I have lots of friends and relatives who are non geeks and don't struggle to use KDE on my computers because its quite similar to Windows in some aspects. GNOME on the other hand is a bit confusing to a lot of them due to the unfamiliar look and feel. One of my aunts even requested that I install Mandriva with KDE in a dual boot scenario because she had been impressed with KDE and some of the office applications available on Linux.

As for Linux not having a large desktop market share, you have to remember that Linux on the desktop is still in its infancy. Previously many people who use Linux and Unix concentrated on the server side, but with the vast improvements in KDE, GNOME, Openoffice, firefox and popularity of distros like Ubuntu, Suse et al more people are beginning to see Linux as a viable alternative.

I think the learning curve puts some people off, but for those that have hands on support, its not much of an issue. It would also help if more computers were sold with Linux preinstalled and people didn't have to pay the MS tax. Many people will use whatever is installed on the PC they buy so Linux will never be as popular as windows if its not given the same exposure as Windows.

I don't agree that KDE mainly appeals to geeks. I have lots of friends and relatives who are non geeks and don't struggle to use KDE on my computers because its quite similar to Windows in some aspects. GNOME on the other hand is a bit confusing to a lot of them due to the unfamiliar look and feel.


Yes, you are right in that KDE is very similar to windows, in fact I would describe KDE as windows on steroids. This is good and bad. The bad thing is that there are far too many people that have problems handling windows out there, and they are not likely to be any more lucky with KDE. Actually, you give a good example of this yourself, as you tell me that your aunt asked you to install KDE. If it had been easy enough she would have done it herself.

I take it that your aunt is a non geek user, but still the install process is too complicated. I don't know about your ant, but many users hadn't been more successful installing their favorite app on windows. This only tells us that being simple enough is not the same as being as simple as windows.

The good thing is that windows power users will have no problem handling it, and I expect that this group of users will be very happy using KDE. The problem is that today almost all people need to use a computer, even the guys on the factory floor that skipped a lot of classes in school and barely can read. Then we have the people that really doesn't care much about computers. They see the computer as an office item much like the telephone. As we get more and more of these kinds of users user interfaces need to adapt, that goes for windows as well as KDE.

To persuade people to switch from windows you need to offer something that is significantly different or it will be hard to motivate the cost of switching in most organizations. After all windows comes preinstalled on most new computers why spend extra money on installing a system that is very similar that quite possibly will be more expensive to support (more possibilities in the GUI -> more user questions, more possibilities in the GUI -> users will spend more time configuring than working)

To be successful, we need to offer something new and easier to use system. This is the niche that Apple with MacOS-X currently are trying to make theirs. It would be nice if there was some free alternative though, and KDE is not it. Gnome is closer, but have a long way to go, as it still looks like an attempt to make a GUI for Unix not an interface to get work done. So, lets hope for KDE4.

"So, lets hope for KDE4."

yes, we can only hope.

Actually, you give a good example of this yourself, as you tell me that your aunt asked you to install KDE. If it had been easy enough she would have done it herself.
The problem for her would be installing Linux as a whole and not KDE. I agree that the Linux installation process would be complicated for many non geeks, but the same applies for Windows. Many people out there cannot install Windows on their own, so its not just a Linux problem.

For years reviewers of new Linux distros in various magazines always complained that Linux was hard to install. All this nagging finally seam to have worked. Linux is now as simple as it can be (even though this may be to hard for some), and now reviewers seldom have anything bad to say about the Linux OS install process.

The new favorite issue for reviewers to nag about now days seam to be software installation. As a Linux user I think it is extremely simple and much better than in windows, but evidently reviewers doesn't seam to agree.

These people probably have windows background, and as windows background is quite common among new users to Linux, the install process probably needs to be even simpler if we want to attract new users.

This is an area where KDE, Gnome, XFCE,... could help.
One solution would be to introduce some virtual Application folder. To install new software the user should just have to drag the new package into that folder. In case of dependency problems needed packages should be downloaded from the net if possible. To uninstall he should just have to drag the package he doesn't want into the trash.

I would also suggest hiding folders like /bin, /lib, /boot, /dev, /root, /usr, /etc, /sbin, /boot and just leave business related folders visible by default to non andmin users. That way, the user won't be confused by seeing his application packages displayed in his virtual Application folder as well as the real installed program files in their standard unix places.

Another solution would of course be to actually install the software in the Application folder, but that would probably not work very well for backward compatibility reasons.

It would also be extremely important that KDE, Gnome,.. cooperated on this so the install process looked the same regardless what desktop environment used as a newbie will probably not know what DE he is running.

> I use Konqueror and it works perfectly fine with osnews.com.

Then why doesn't your post have a link to the parent post? ;-)

Edited 2005-12-30 01:39

As long as Redhat (RHEL 4) and Novell (NLD9) choosed GNOME, then I think as them that GNOME is better than KDE.

Their choises have nothing to do with better or worse, it only means that they think that their potential customers is more likely to buy if Gnome is the default.

At least Red Hat admits that, they are not trying to sell general purpose Linux desktops but desktops for special purpososes e.g. call centers and similar applications where the user only uses a few applications, and perhaps have very little training.

Besides, you can install KDE on both Red Hat and SuSE.

As long as Redhat (RHEL 4) and Novell (NLD9) choosed GNOME, then I think as them that GNOME is better than KDE.

RHEL hardly qualifies as a desktop OS. And Red Hat created Gnome because KDE's original licensing was incompatible with Red Hat's licensing. And Red Hat provides and supports KDE.

NLD9 defaults to KDE if a desktop isn't explicitly chosen. NLD10 will default to Gnome if KDE (which will be provided and fully supported) isn't explicitly chosen. Novell's choice had nothing to do with which desktop was better. It has to do with projects like mono and evolution that weighed more heavily in terms of scarce development resources post-restructuring than KDE development. How fast did Novell turn around and clarify the fact that KDE will continue to be provided and supported after word spread they were becoming a Gnome shop?

You don't like KDE's look, and prefer Gnome's, that's fine and that's your choice. I don't like either DE's default look myself, and consider the two-minutes I spend customizing my KDE desktop after a clean install a small price to pay for the integration and functionality I get in return. I guess it's all about priorities.

> I'll upgrade to kde 3.5 and Konqueror 3.5 and test it

You don't need to, it doesn't work there either.

There's a preliminary Konq patch to work around the problem but IMHO osnews should fix the code in any case.

I'll contact osnews staff.

> I'm using Konqueror 3.4.3 at the moment, as k3b hasn't
> been updated yet in Debian Scud (and will be removed if
> you move to 3.5)

I had done the upgrade anyway and IIRC I was able to reinstall k3b afterwards. In any case I have it around:

$ k3b -v
Qt: 3.3.5
KDE: 3.5.0
K3b: 0.12.10

$ dpkg -l k3b | grep k3b
ii k3b 0.12.10-1 A sophisticated KDE CD burning application

This is on a Debian unstable system with the packages from alioth (deb http://pkg-kde.alioth.debian.org/kde-3.5.0 ./).

Edited 2005-12-30 03:42

> Gnome con algunas mejoras supera de largo a KDE !!!

I think you should clearly investigate into GNOME then. To have GNOME surpass KDE will be harder than freezing the sun.

dcop = dbus. Granted, dcop was there first, and has been there for a long time, but look at the present and (most importantly) the future.


Which is why I said that KDE is moving to dbus. By the way: The infrastructure is less important, what matters is how many apps are using such infraetructure. And KDE really rocks on that field - all KDE apps used dcop to some degree, but sadly not all gnome apps are using it extensively.


kparts = uh... really, why? Isn't it just an inflexible way of embedding controls?

Not at all: Take a look at the amarok + wikipedia screenshot. The "<-" "->" buttons are there but in a different size, they could have even been removed. I don't see why it's "inflexible" or why it has not sense..



"Isn't it a big advantage over using Qt link solutions that can only be used by the KDE project?


This is FUD. QT is licensed under the GPL license and you can build whatever you want as long as you don't break the GPL license. You've to pay extra fees if you want a commercial license, right. I'm *shocked* that people sees this as a problem. Aren't we supposed to build free software? What's the point of having created the GNU project if you only seem to care about comercial apps being developed....?

Edited 2005-12-30 14:56

I don't need 100 checkboxes in a control panel to control my mouse.

By fabricating facts, and then drawing a conclusion from your own fabrication, you make yourself look like an idiot. It is your loss.

This is a screenshot of kdevelop, an ide. Hardly an everyday application that an average user would be using.

you forgot to post the screenshot. kdevelop designer is one of kde's least cluttered applications (just to give an indication of the level of clutter)

Companies supporting Windows build new drivers every 5 years, not every other week like they must when attempting to support Linux.

Obviously you are a complete fool as well, companies have to constantly chase kernel changes for example look at the fglrx code. If it's this kernel, do this if it's that one, do that.

It's stupid, and only a complete idiot would accept it and think that's the way it should be done.

I'm not blasting it because I want to. Unfortunately, these are real problems for people I'm using myself as an example further in this comment. I've used Linux since the mid-90s and I started with KDE 0.9x. The reason I defected to GNOME was because of KDE's look and feel. The reason I've been forced off of Linux all together is because of driver issues. Can't use Linux if you can't get drivers that work and companies can't make drivers that work if the kernel constantly forces the drivers to change.

I want Linux back on my desktop *but* Linux is going to have to suck less. Linus really needs to forget about commenting on which desktop is better and focus on a Linux that sucks less.

I'm not alone, take the comment I made on tainting the kernel. I've seen literally hundreds of messages from innocent users thinking they had done something wrong because that appears on their screens.

So what if a driver taints the kernel, the kernel allows for it so don't present it to the users in a way that makes them believe something is wrong when it's just one man's opinion.

"if the kernel constantly forces the drivers to change. "
Well, I recommend you to buy Redhat Enterprise linux Desktop or Workstation because their OS lives for at least 1.5 years without breaking any drivers and kernel minorly change without breaking anything not drivers not applications.
"I want Linux back on my desktop *but* Linux is going to have to suck less."
Well, my best comment for this is to try to buy a linux desktop or workstation (IBM, HP, Sun are the best who could sell you a preconfigured, highly stable, very powerful, fully supported linux machines).
If you have a windows box and you want to convert it to linux then my advice is to let a professional do it for you because he will be able to tell you which distro is compatible with your hardware (not all hardware accepts a certain distro).

RHEL 4 is pretty good, I haven't tried it on this system though. FC4 gets much closer towards being functional than any other Linux that I've used recently, maybe I'll give RHEL a shot.

What's up with "let a professional do it"?

I hear this all the time, *I AM A PROFESSIONAL*!

LOL

My complaints are based on what I have learned about Linux in the last 10 years that I've used it professionally and at home.

I only buy hardware that's said to be compatible (which I did in this case, however it only worked on a single kernel rev + 5 or so patches to fix more kernel bugs with the timer and AMD64 chips).

"he wants all drivers to be IN THE KERNEL itself, not seperate from it, released by some independend company"

In my opinion that is why Linux will always be second best. I know it's not a popular opinion, but companies are not going to release their proprietary data to a bunch of developers and no one should expect them to. Sure, maybe at the end of a products lifecycle the drivers could be released to be implemented by OSS developers, but it's wrong to expect a company to hand over it's bread and butter just so one OS out of 3 (Windows, Linux, Mac) can work a little better.

Another sore spot, ACPI. How long before that works properly? Take this machine (and my last one) for example. Boot Linux and it rambles on about how ACPI is broken on this system because of a bad BIOS.

WTF? Windows supports ACPI on this same computer just fine, and no special drivers were loaded for it! It uses the standard ACPI.sys driver so how is it broken?

It's not, just more excuses for bad code.

Linux in my opinion is in the worst state it's ever been in, and this stuff needs to be fixed if it is to ever be used by non-geeks unlike ourselves or even some geeks that are tired of forcing it to half work and then trying to get work done.

Granted, there are a lot of areas where Linux shines unfortunately if you can't get a GUI to display you can't really take advantage of 50% of them.

"Which drivers have stopped working after changing kernels?"

It's in one of my comments, try reading them. The only one spreading FUD is you.

"Minimum System Requirements

Before attempting to install the ATI Proprietary Linux driver, the following software must be installed:

* POSIX Shared Memory (/dev/shm) support is required for 3D apps
* glibc version 2.2 or 2.3
* Linux kernel 2.4 or higher
* XFree86 version 4.1, 4.2, or 4.3"

- http://www2.ati.com/drivers/linux/linux_8.12.10.html

"Linux 2.6.12 Kernel Support

This release of the ATI Proprietary Linux driver introduces driver compatibly with Linux 2.6.12 kernel."

- http://www2.ati.com/drivers/linux/linux_8.16.20.html#177818

"Note: If a Linux 2.6.11 or newer kernel was built with CONFIG_AGP enabled, the kernel AGP frontend is required to load the fglrx kernel module. To identify whether your kernel was built with CONFIG_AGP enabled, look for CONFIG_AGP=y in the kernel config file, or if the 'agpgart' module loaded."

- http://www2.ati.com/drivers/linux/linux_8.19.10.html

Chew on this, glad you aren't having problems that doesn't mean the rest of the world isn't.

"ACPI works fine as well. Suspend, Hibernate, Resume...I know it doesn't work for everyone, but things are improving, despite your nay-saying. "

How long did it take? How many hacks and patches did it take to get there?

Do you think Microsoft implemented ifs for every different vendor out there? Do you think they saw into the future to 2005 and realized that HP or Dell would release a broken BIOS?

No, they followed the spec and implemented good code in the first place.

OMFG I can't believe I just wrote that, unfortunately it's true.

Keep your blinders on, you are no better than the pro-MS crowd claiming their OS is perfect.

How long did it take? How many hacks and patches did it take to get there?

Do you think Microsoft implemented ifs for every different vendor out there? Do you think they saw into the future to 2005 and realized that HP or Dell would release a broken BIOS?

*sigh* You really see the world through rose colored glasses, don't you?

No, they followed the spec and implemented good code in the first place.

The spec was created by Intel. Intel created a compiler utility to create apci code to spec, if your code was out of spec or contained errors, it would not compile.

MS decided to create their own compiler, one that was much more forgiving and allowed vendors to create buggy DSDT's and acpi code that wouldn't have been able to compile under Intel's compiler (you know, Intel who created the spec).

So once again, MS has taken a spec, applied their own interpretation of it, and thrust it upon the masses. Vendors wind up creating flaky ACPI implementations that don't adhere to spec but work on Windows. This is hardly the first time it's happened, just ask Sun how they felt about Microsoft's original "interpretation" of Java.

Linux holds to the spec as written by Intel. If you take a couple of minutes with google, you'll find resources to correct your vendors "buggy" ACPI implementation and correct it so that it meets the spec and works with linux. Since linux adheres to the spec. Or you can ask your system builder to fix their spec and implement it properly.

So linux expects vendors that state they support ACPI to properly support ACPI. Many of those vendors don't. Linux is to blame for that? The vendors shouldn't be claiming ACPI compliance if they can't compile their DSDT's to Intel's spec instead of Microsoft's.

OMFG I can't believe I just wrote that, unfortunately it's true.

Neither can I. Did you really believe it was that simple a problem and that the linux engineers were just too dense to figure it out? This is a debate that has been brought up time and time again.

"t takes 1 minute reading at gstreamer.org to proove you dead wrong."

i'm right. i was referring to the original shorthand.

Yes, you could use an old kernel version. The problem is that new kernel versions are released for a reason.

Perhaps you can live without new features in later kernel versions, but security updates may be harder to do without.

> > XFCE doesn't do anything!
>
> Excellent! That's the job of applications.

But it's the job of the desktop libs to provide infrastructure, something KDE libs excel at.