http://www.osnews.com/story/5410/KDE_3_2-beta2_Towards_a_Better_KDE Exploring the Future of Computing en-us Copyright 2001-2013, David Adams adam+nospam@osnews.com Wed, 19 Jun 2013 07:08:35 GMT http://www.osnews.com/images/osnews.gif http://www.osnews.com http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? main menu itself it just has way too many options

As the old saying: Every coin has two sides Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:26:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? It's interesting how a few years ago KDE and Gnome were like night and day, but now they seem to be moving toward each other on a lot of issues, particularly pertaining to usability and general look & feel. I am not sure whether this is a good or bad thing, but we'll surely find out soon.

You make some good points about KDE in general. I think the points you raised about things being "cluttered" is what turned me off to KDE a long time ago. It seems the KDE philosophy is lots of icons, lots of toolbars, lots of menus, lots and lots of GUI. Gnome, on the other hand, was sort of minimalistic, especially in 1.x. I liked Gnome better for that.

Now Gnome has more menus and more icons and more toolbars, but still not quite as many as KDE. I think both DEs could take some hints from Apple's sense of usability here. Oftentimes in UI design, less is more, way more. A toolbar (like the ones in MS' Office XP and Kspread both) with hundreds of buttons loses its purpose because it is too difficult to find any one icon when you need it. A toolbar with few icons (think Apple Keynote) with the truly most-accessed features gets much more use and increases productivity. More specific features should just be within file menus as at least there categorization breaks down the search for a function.

But I do like the progress being made... that's for sure. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:28:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Konqueror always has allowed you to use tabs in file or web mode since shortly after 3.0 Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? No. The menu is just wrong. The "Most Used Applications" should come after "Actions", and then "All Applications" (and the number of menu items under "All Applications" should not exceed seven, imho). I'm sure that this could be done by which ever distribution, but it would be so much better if KDE shipped with usable defaults.

IMHO, GUI usability is simply THE most important and most overlooked aspect in GUI software today.

--ralpht Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? 1. Konq. has an ugly button (Return key) to the RHS of the URL bar. IMO it should't look like that. It looks out-of-place to me.

2. This is definitely the best looking KDE I have seen. Great job!

3. Menu clutter.....why not have a global option somewhere that gives the user "basic user" or "power user" settings. This could be chosen as part of the first start-up wizard. The basic version could be like Mac OS X while the detailed gives the power user all the extra options. Presently KDE looks just too messy although I like having access to all the options. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:41:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Despite the nit picking it sounds like a 9 out of 10 to me. I've always looked forward to new Linux related releases and I think the next one with KDE 3.2 on Linux 2.6 is going to open some eyes if not be a break through. I bet Qt deserves some of the credit. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:43:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Gorgeous looking, for sure. However seeing the KDE Control Center reminded me why I stoppped using KDE in the first place - having to search through too many options to find the one I was looking for.

Here's an idea. Instead of KConf (ala GConf), how about levels. Level 1 hides most options except for the absolute neccessities, and that is how KDE comes by default. Level 2 shows more and Level 3 shows them all, so tweaker aren't left out in the cold. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > Level 1 hides most options except for the absolute neccessities, and that is how KDE comes by default. Level 2 shows more and Level 3 shows them all, so tweaker aren't left out in the cold.

This has being discussed in the past on gnome I think, and they did tests and they decided against it. Read here more about something related: http://ometer.com/free-software-ui.html Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:52:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? For example, the "configure toolbars" should be accessible by right-clicking the toolbars themselves for example, a-la OSX or Epiphany.

Wrong. It is bad design to make only one (not obvious) way of doing something. Many users never figure out what context menus are. It's wrong to consign the toolbar options to just a small menu. No decently designed app does only that.

Also, you really ought to have mentioned Konqueror's wonderful Clear Location button which should be mimiced by default by any other X-based browsers. Not having it is an embarrassment of usability because of clipboard autocopy (a good feature).

You are also missing what the KDE project is attempting to do, Eugenia. The KDE Project seeks not to cater to the beginning user so much as provide the best fundamental technology so that those who would prefer a simplified solution can purchase wares from integrators like Lindows, Xandros, or Lycoris. When you graduate from the bottle, it makes no sense to make you have to muck around in a registry.

Your attitude of shove every power-user setting into the registry is rejected by all the millions of Windows users who have downloaded TweakUI and its clones.

Regarding your remark about Plastik, you should have realized that changing the default theme in 3.2 would have been bad since Keramik has only been the default for ~1 year. Changing the default theme so rapidly goes against your professed belief in keeping things consistent and simple for beginners, which is why KDE will switch to Plastik in the next revision after 3.2 Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The main problem with menu and configuration clutter in Konqueror is that its menus and dialogs are not different when in KFM or KHTML. This is bad and ought to be changed before release.

Your remark that no one would ever want to zip or burn an HTML document is right on the money. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > It is bad design to make only one (not obvious) way of doing something.



Most users know about the context menu. The rest, won't be attempting to change the toolbar behavor anyway.



>you really ought to have mentioned Konqueror's wonderful Clear Location button



That's there for years, nothing new to report. Everyone knows about this.



>Your attitude of shove every power-user setting into the registry is rejected by all the millions



It is the only way to get rid of the clutter. Advanced users will know where to find these extra options and newbies won't have to deal with all that clutter.



>the default theme in 3.2 would have been bad since Keramik has only been the default for ~1 year.



Keramik as default was a bad decision from Day 1 IMHO. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 07:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I agree about Keramik but it's somewhat understandable considering the environment shortly after the release of Windows XP and its absolutely horrid Luna interface (ridiculously large title bars, excessive use of bright colours, inconsistent application to older programs).

It is the only way to get rid of the clutter. Advanced users will know where to find these extra options and newbies won't have to deal with all that clutter.

Beginning users will never use stock KDE or stock GNOME. Nor should they. Total noobs will always stick to the defaults provided to them by their beginner-friendly Unix distro. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 08:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? KDE is extremely customizable, yes. Way more than gnome.
If finding an option is hard, then thats a problem of layout out the configuration or interface.
In any case, though, KDE has a good Interface philosophy, because after not too long, you get used to where is everything.

In KDE, I most of the times find the option I'm looking for..
compared to gnome, where the option I'm looking for rarely exists and I have to stick to the default. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 08:20:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? and the geometry app are not new in 3.2 they exist in my 3.1 menu. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 08:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Like many of Eugina's numerous nitpicks in this review, I
likewise could find quite a bit to nitpick about the review
itself - however, I was quickly able to forget my misgivings
once I read the first two paragraphs of the final part.

Those two paragraphs summed things up extremely - KDE's got
everything necessary to be a real winner, all that's needed
is a little more polish, and a little less clutter. While I
don't personaly think that KDE should go nearly as far as
Gnome has gone in this direction; I do agree that a few
more focused cleanups to the UI, would make huge impact on
the usability, and very much increase those all important
first impressions for new users.

And I also believe that it becomes _very_ clear with this
release, that honestly - KDE's foundational technologies
far outclass Gnome's current architecture. It will be
_significantly_ easier and timely for KDE to add polish and
to focus further on usability/HIG, than it is for Gnome to
bolt/hack a comparable underlying architecture to that of
KDE's. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 08:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The panel applets do look cleaner with their lefthand menu widgets now revealed only by mouseover.

Some questions for Eugenia
1) When you use the mouse to customize the panel height by dragging its top edge, do the panel icons now scale smoothly as in Gnome ? as I would expect by the brief mention of SVG support.
2) When the panel height is at 36 pixels, does the desktop switcher applet draw its previews to have a wierd aspect ratio with only half their expected width ?.
3) Is there an option to separate out how some of the various panel elements resize because I usually cfg just 2 or 3 desktops but they become to tiny and look silly when being stacked into 2 rows as the panel ht exceeds 35 pixels.

Thanks
Brian N Mon, 15 Dec 2003 08:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Keramik as default was a bad decision from Day 1 IMHO.

I agree! Again, I do agree with you about that the Plastik theme should be default because it looks more professional than Keramik. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 08:44:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? If you look at screenshots, there are plenty of gnome-apps in menues. And if you install all packages it's not suprising that menues are full of apps. Installing what you need (e.g. libs,base,network, multimedia and pim), menues are much cleaner. At least when you build from source (RH-packages has been more or less br0ken a long time). Mon, 15 Dec 2003 08:44:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? 1. Yes
2. Yes
3. I don't understand the question, possibly not. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 08:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Honestly, it's the packager who should bother about it, not the developer. KDE is distributed in sources. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:03:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Also, I would advocate for some Qt UI changes, e.g., expanding a few pixels the space between words on the application menus. Currently, they read like a sentence instead of being wisely spaced out.

Actually the spacing is larger that those on Windows. The problem is that the font used in Menu is larger than the default in Windows. If they shrink the font size, the rendering quality will suffer, just look at the ugly text in Konqueror's address bar in this picture

http://img.osnews.com/img/5410/kde2.png

the "www" part is significantly thicker than the rest in the sentence and even in one word - news - the w looks more like a bold font. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > Actually the spacing is larger that those on Windows. The problem is that the font used in Menu is larger than the default in Windows.

No, this is not the case. Check on this shot how much better the GTK+ app's menu text looks compared to the Qt's: the words are well spaced-out. On Windows the spacing is bigger than in KDE too, but their font is much smaller at the same time indeed.
http://img.osnews.com/img/5410/kde1.png Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:10:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? KDE menu should ignore all non-KDE applications by default which would reduce the menu bloat. You user should be force to manually add non-KDE applications to the menu.

Btw, gnome does this, which is the reason why gnome menu looks better or less bloated.

PS, more spacing who be easier on the eyes. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The three things that bother me the most about KDE at the moment are.

-Preformance. Kde 3.1 is noticeably slower than gnome2.4 on a k6-2 450Mhz.
If 3.2's faster then good and it's about time.

-Memory it eats the main mem (256) just loading and starts on the swap file as soon as I run an app. Gnome 2.4 usually leaves me with 30-40MB once loaded.
Hopefully 3.2 being faster uses less Memory

- Arts. It's slow resource hungry and a pain in the neck. Why does arts require 12% to play an MP3 when XMMS is already using 10%. In Gnome with esd esd uses 1% Xmms 11% on average. Taking twice the CPU time to do the same thing is Stupid! Also when apps like mplayer aren't set to use esd they still work alright in gnome just overridding esd. In KDE when not set to use Arts they either don't play sound or Arts grabs the sound and stuffs it up!

Combine those problems with all the Apps I use the most being Gtk based or similar to gtk. MozillaFirebird, OO.org, xmms etc...
I see no reason to use KDE. Hopefully 3.2 will fix many of these problems if so I'll be interested but other wise I'm sticking to gnome! Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:16:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? As a user of both DEs (first KDE then Gnome) I agree with your points, KDE is too bloat while gnome has poor menus but they are clear, both filemanager sucks IMHO, they are too slow (myabe is not their fault) and confusing, maybe konqueror is a little better but has too many option (and that puzzling location menu, why they didn't called it file like the rest of the world fms)
But one of the most annoying issue IMHO is the size of QT widgets, most of time windows are opened with wrong sizes, for example the open with dialog or the file selector, and its bad to have to resize them manually in order to read all the content of the window, those windows should have a fixed size.
Thumb Up for Plastik, it should be made default (and also a gtk port would be good :-) its light years away from keramik Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Is it possible to "stack" the buttons next to the K in current versions of KDE as shown in these screen shots or is this something new?

Ive been fiddling around for a while trying to figure this out, I have them stacked up in the system tray area, but this makes the other icons huge and butt ugly. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? This is just the quick launch applet I use there, right click on the kicker and add that applet if you want it. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? No, this is not the case. Check on this shot how much better the GTK+ app's menu text looks compared to the Qt's: the words are well spaced-out. On Windows the spacing is bigger than in KDE too, but their font is much smaller at the same time indeed.
http://img.osnews.com/img/5410/kde1.png

Yeah, you are right. I aligned the menu in the image with the one in my IE window. In my previous post, I must have used the Gnome one to get my conclusion.

I think Windows' default menu font is Tahoma in 8 point,
it looks taller and as such more compact horizontally than Arial. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? great review! (got nothing else to add) Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? That would be contrary to the freedesktop.org specifications which are trying to have the same config file/format for both gnome and kde menu.

I think Eugenia makes good points but...
On the first page I see many "new" features that are not new at all. Just to name a few:
-The kicker detail for example has been available since 3.1 I beleive. (with a GUI checkbox to set it in 3.1.2 I think). KDE 3.2 just made it a default.
-Someone allready mentioned the tabs in KFM
-Service menus have been here for ever, they might have added a GUI to customize it (haven't installed it yet). If that is the case it would seem ironic that Eugenia appreciated the new "bloat".

As was said above. KDE is nicely bloated: you get used to it really quickly. The only part where their is an emergency is the konqueror service menus. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? My guess is that they need to look inside (open, read then close) the file to determine file types - text or binary, etc. This kill speed.

On Windows, file types, for the most part, are determined by their extensions, so Windows explorer is pretty snappy. There are exceptions, though. If FrontPage is installed, explorer will look inside a html file to determine if it is generated by M$ front page and in this case, browsing a folder with hundreds of html files will slow down explorer dramatically. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? You are _so_ right about KDE having the best technology and just needs polish of the default GUI settings.
Using the GNOME HIG is a good idea, since the current problem with yes/no-buttons is really, really stupid. A polish of KDE and a standard format for widget themes (maybe developed by freedesktop.org) that all toolkits can use would really be the best thing to happen to the Linux desktop.
Good article! Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Tabs available for file management" and service menus were already available in KDE 3.1. Also KStars and kdialog were already part of KDE 3.1 (btw, the geometry app is really new, it's another one than in KDE 3.1).

"KDE 3.2b2 had a copy of the latest beta of KOffice as well" is plain wrong. KOffice has it's own development and release schedule.

The screenshots show that there changes/tweaks by your distribution (Fedora RPMs), e.g. the "Open Terminal" in the desktop background context menu is not original KDE.

Next, there is no "Kontrol Center": It's descriptive name is "Control Center" and the KDE name is kcontrol.

Last, "the "configure toolbars" should be accessible by right-clicking the toolbars". How about trying and discovering that the case since at least KDE 2.0? Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:40:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > "KDE 3.2b2 had a copy of the latest beta of KOffice as well" is plain wrong. KOffice has it's own development and release schedule.

It does not matter. My copy of KDE came with it, and it is one of the official betas.

> It's descriptive name is "Control Center" and the KDE name is kcontrol.

Big deal. We all know what we are reffering to. Let's be practical around here.

> How about trying and discovering that the case since at least KDE 2.0?

I know that there is a context menu there, but it is not doing the same as the "configure toolbars", we are not reffering to the same thing. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:44:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Great review, but a couple of errors : tabs are available in Konqueror as a file manager, ever since tabs entered KDE, and you already can hide the lefthand menu widgets of applets in kicker as of 3.1.x Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? That would be contrary to the freedesktop.org specifications which are trying to have the same config file/format for both gnome and kde menu.

The last thing *nix heads want is to seek common ground with their rivalry, as they always think theirs own peppy is the best and there should be no compromise. They probably hardly ever give thoughts on what is good for end-users, as they think users should be no different than themselves. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 09:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hi

Stupid remark. The ground reality is both kde and gnome along with xfce considers freedesktop.org to be a unified front and actively seeks to interoperate.

Dont talk about stuff you dont have an idea of.

Regards
Rahul Sundaram Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Why should KDE "fix" its nature? Why should GNOME become more like KDE?

KDE is a geek toy. GNOME is the DE for Linux's cooperate/home-user future. You can't satisfy both "markets" at the same time. A middle-ground between KDE and GNOME would be too "dumbed down" for the geeks and to "toyish/overloaded" for the serious users.

The technical issues of GNOME can be fixed. And more important the GNOME people have the will todo so. Improving the preformance of GTK, writing a good IDE/RAD tool etc. can be done.

I come straight from the "developerworks" section of IBMs website. It contains articles which praise the wonders of GLIB or get you started on developing for GNOME. All the big cooperate Linux players (IBM, Sun, Novell) are on the GNOME bandwagon and for a reason.

Serious users don't want to have to worry about two different DEs and they won't have to. GNOME will be the standard, believe me. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:26:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The ground reality is both kde and gnome along with xfce considers freedesktop.org to be a unified front and actively seeks to interoperate.

Dont talk about stuff you dont have an idea of.

Regards
Rahul Sundaram

The reality is that they are **considering** it, and **seeking** to interoperate. Don't equal hype with "knock on the wood" results.

One might not know all the details, but that doesn't prevent one from inductive reasoning and reach certain conjectures. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? >KDE is a geek toy.

Apparently not:
http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=5409 Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:28:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The reason might have more to do with the licsening issue. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I like u review, Eugenia, I allways thought KDE is too much bloated, and need a clean up. What also bother me is that u cannot have separate application, if u want kopete, u have to download kdenetwork .... bah !
Mandrake did it the good way, they splitted all packages, but in other distribution, where is nothing like that (I've got gentoo, and I allways must compile kdegraphics only to get kghostview ! ) Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? >Apparently not:
>http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=5409

Debian and KDE developers.. Both projects aim to produce geek toys. Debian even more than KDE. Call me again if a cooperation that is a little less laughable than Lindows.com jumps on the KDE bandwagon.

The whole fact that the Debian devs have chosen KDE proofs my point. These are the same guys who refuse to add a GUI installer to their distro because it wouldn't work on their MIPS Toaster from 1974. Bah. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hi

Apparently you arent aware of the interoperability improvements

Let me list them for you

Fontconfig is used by all gtk2 and qt3 apps.

pkgconfig is used by both gnome and kde apps

Apps can dock on the panel regardless of the toolkit like gaim in kde and kopete in gnome.This is called system tray specification.

Book mark specification - XBEL

Desktop file formats - .desktop and .icon files

DBUS is already used by some gnome apps and it is very close to the similar kde technology which is about to be adopted by kde in its next release

Cairo

Shared mime support will be adopted with the release of gnome 2.6

Check here for a complete list of stuff

http://freedesktop.org/Standards/Home


While there is still a good amount of work to do this isnt vaporware or hype. If you are in either the kde or gnome lists you can find developers actively participating in the freedesktop.org effort

Rahul Sundaram Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:40:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? First of all, you do NOT need to download a complete package for most applications. Kopete can be downloaded from it's website without problems, for example.

If you're skilled enough to use the sources directly, I think it's time you learned how to download applications selectively. For the default packaging: that's the work for the distribution. KDE does not make these, it only makes sources. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? You may know more about user interfaces than me, but I think I know more about marketing than you. KDE shouldn't diss its current market just because they could gain another. If they must gain the new one, they should at least accomodate their current userbase instead of alienating them.

When I download KDE, say in the form of RPMs or DEBs, or make it myself, I don't want to have all the tweak options hidden from me. I want them right at my face, because if I could install KDE by myself, and I even bothered to install KDE by myself and even more I know what KDE is - I don't want default. I may not like the default colour and theme, for example (which I don't, I loathe Keramik, and I don't quite like the blue used in the default colour scheme. Some people may like animation, but I don't, and would love a way to switch them off.

Without changing some XML document or something (ala GConf).

Now, what about the home users? As you say, KDE has a lot of flexiblity, and even more so, it is easy to develop for. If you want a clean control panel - get a distribution that does it well for you (like Xandros, which had a great product with 1.0). But leave us geeks alone.

With KDE, it isn't even near imposible to change contextual menus (Oh BTW, I do zip up the web sites I save, normally of news sites like New York Times which after a few days it goes cold and I need a subscription to read it again. But I save it in Opera first than zip it up to save space). The sky's the limit with changing KDE in and out. And still maintain compatiblity with the rest of the KDE world (well, in theory at least).

As a distributor, you don't have to bundle 3-4 text editors. Even if you have to keep the backend to run certain applications (IIRC, KDevelop needs Kate), on the menu you could put one text editor. And you can shed some applications here and there, and because of KDE's architecture, you can further integrate certain applications to fit your target market.

But, as for me, I don't want KDE to change into a GNOME. If Xandros or Lindows.com or any other company wants to simplify it to the point of OS X or Windows XP, be my guest. But for pure KDE from kde.org - please, leave it as it is. Sure, rearrange things if you like, but to kick out certain features. It is after all targeted towards geeks. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:51:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? From the article...
Kontrol center's modules and move them to a KConfig panel (a-la GConf or a-la Registry) so both worlds are happy (advanced and newbie users).

I think you are correct here, but I think it should still be kept as a GUI based config. But it should be offered a-la Windows Powertoys, not Registry.

But make sure it is kept away from those users who don't kare about configuring all those options. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I too agree with this article about KDE's clutterness. It's definitely one of the main reasons I don't use it. The second main reason is that their graphical interface just "feels" weird to me. I guess it's the difference between QT and GTK.

But the main thing is that Gnome is so much cleaner, more classy and more elegant than KDE ... IN MY OPINION. (Opinion ... look it up if you don't know what it means.)

Take Konqueror's file manager for example and compare it to Nautilus. Nautilus gives you back, forward, up, stop, reload, and home. Konqueror gives you everything including the kitchen sink. My God. I just want to browse the file system hierarchy, not launch a nuclear missle. And what is the deal with the Kontrol Panel. Could it be any more convoluted?

The KDE developers need to learn that some times less is more. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 10:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? After using Kde for a while, it becomes hard to take the "kde should do this, be like that" arguments seriously.

If used on a daily basis - all the menus and configuration options become second nature. It's quite easy to customise everything to suit your individual needs/preferences! Mon, 15 Dec 2003 11:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? You really don't need to zip the pages. Konqueror is capable of saving Web archive files directly from the Location menu. Plus, you can just print to PDF to preserve the images if you want full compatibility.

Zip HTML isn't necessary IMHO. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 11:11:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? If used on a daily basis - all the menus and configuration options become second nature. It's quite easy to customise everything to suit your individual needs/preferences!

Is that like learning to smoke? You hate it first. It tastes terrible, you cough and gag and get a headache. But if you keep with it, eventually you'll like it?

Personally I don't think it says much for a Desktop Environment if I have to "learn" to like it. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 11:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? If such options intimidate you, you can always buy a distro that will dumb it down for you. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 11:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hi

Some stuff just get time to understand. The beauty of kde is in stuff like io slaves and kparts which is hidden.

Its not a bad quality at all.

Rahul Sundaram Mon, 15 Dec 2003 11:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > How about trying and discovering that the case since at least KDE 2.0?

> I know that there is a context menu there, but it is not doing the same as the "configure toolbars", we are not reffering to the same thing.

I'd suggest you look again in KDE 3.2 before you do anymore comments... if it isn't there then it has been removed by your distribution. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 11:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Is that like learning to smoke? You hate it first. It tastes terrible, you cough and gag and get a headache. But if you keep with it, eventually you'll like it?

Personally I don't think it says much for a Desktop Environment if I have to "learn" to like it.

Thats really twisted and shallow .........

You have to learn to use it - if you don't like it you have the choice of modifying it or using something else.

Majority of linux people like to tweak, tinker, modify and learn. If you want a desktop for dummies it will only be for people who don't care what the underlying OS is. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 11:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Majority of linux people like to tweak, tinker, modify and learn. If you want a desktop for dummies it will only be for people who don't care what the underlying OS is.

That may have been a valid argument up until now; Linux has so far been a geek's OS. However, if we want Linux on the desktops of ordinary users, thus posing a real threat to M$, its user interface will have to be so simple that neither the dummies (How arrogant!) nor anyone else will have to care about the underlying OS. It agree with those who say that there is the time now for the KDE team to clean up and sort out, not necessarily omit anything, but to find some better ways of making the KDE interface simpler to navigate within. For ordinary users you can hardly over-simplify anything. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 11:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Have they taken care of the bug in Konqueror that causes index.htm to be displayed automatically in file-management mode as well as in web-browser mode? Mon, 15 Dec 2003 12:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > If you're skilled enough to use the sources directly, I think it's time you learned how to download applications selectively. For the default packaging: that's the work for the distribution. KDE does not make these, it only makes sources.

Ok, U can download kopete and compile it as a standalone app. but what about Kghostview? I found it nowhere.
Or better Konqueror Would be nice to have it as a standalone app (I think, it should be possible to do that).

So I could use fluxbox + konqueror + Control center ... I need nothing else.

I also don't want download so big files - Download and compile time is too
.
they certainly have less peoples who wants to test the beta's && release candidate. - 1 Day to compile kde is to much.

I don't see the add-value they get than delevering so big sources. Or do u can find a reason for doing that ? Mon, 15 Dec 2003 12:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Most of the KDE apps in the base packages can be "compiled out" with compile-time flags.

If you search around in the source-based-distro-that-shall-not-be-named's forums, you'll see more then a handful of people discussing it. And even a script or two to automate it for their packaging system.

But that said, this should be the job of a distro's packager. The fact that no one does it is not a fault of KDE, but rather the distributions. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 12:36:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? For me it was exactly the other way around with Gnome, within minutes I was getting frustrated because I couldn't find any of the more detailed options, everything was hidden. I switched to KDE and was immediately relieved to see that almost everything I could ever wish for was right there.

I _do_ agree that certain things are not always origanized ina logical way and the Kontrol Center is a good example of that. I like the way it works but there are quite a number of options in places that wouldn't expect. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 12:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? First of all, linux is a kernel, not an OS. Second of all, KDE is more like an OS than a simple environment. If you don't like the size of it, then you haven't understood that something that is more than a simple environment (more than a windowmanager and a panel) is bound to be bigger than say a web browser.

We have started getting people who argument for KDE or Gnome because of the "feel". That is on the same turf as the arguments between AmigaOS, Windows and MacOS's "feel". We have a new situation: windows vs. KDE or KDE vs. Gnome. These environments have become operating system like, or more technically correct, platforms.

I love the KDE platform -> it gives me a highly customizable environment in which I feel totally at home. I can modify the various window gadgets to my liking (AmigsOS style), and I can set a theme I like, with no problems. The panel is wonderful to modify. Actually, when using "easy to use" windows, I get claustrophobic, I can't modify the environment because I have no real choice.

KDE lets me be creative, and I am sure MacOS users and Gnome users can achieve creativity and productivity just like me. The versus fights must stop. They are irrational.

Rationally, KDE has some steps to go. More polish, yes, like finding crystal icons where there are none right now (you also see a mix of icons some places on the screenshots of Eugenia). We also need more system configuration utilities, and better control over fstab so that we are sure we can mount/umount cdroms without hassle (and we're 96% there). I'm really looking forward to 3.2, and I have been for a long time now. It's the best environment I have used! And it has a reason. A rational one. Why I use it exclusively is on the other hand less rational. But that choice is hardly open to rational discussion. I just love it Mon, 15 Dec 2003 12:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Congratulations, Eugenia. This is an excellent review. If you don't mind, I will fill some usability bugs citing your review.

I specialy agree that cervisia is a bit too invasive. How many times do you use it inside Konqueror? Why not start it as a separate program?

Also, you get the main KDE point: it should be easier to make kde usabl than GNOME, since KDE has a unified framework. KDE has all it takes to bee an excellent corporate/user desktop. The project and the distributors could use better this flexibility. I think the KDE community already noticed that. And they are acting to make it happen, see the KDE, Debian and UserLinux iniciative.

Many people talk about desktops like they talk about religion. They talk about fate. No explaining, just fate. This leads to nowhere. One example is:

Desktop XXXX is going to be the next default desktop.

Why? Is it better? It is more used today? It has the right technologies? It has the right defaults? These are the right questions, because they provide the answers for going forward. And your article does that. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 12:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I don't know why gnome fans must be so agressive. Must be some kind of inferiority complex. KDE is most definitely not a geek toy. It is the standard desktop environment in europe, just like gnome is the standard desktop environment in the US. Oh and by the way: debian stable is the most stable and reliable linux distribution in existence. If you think it is a geek toy just because it does not have enterprise written in bold letters all over it, you are just plain stupid. I use debian stable on a server for years, and apart from the occasional apt-get it has not required any maintenance.

About the features: I use KDE on a daily basis, and I use almost every feature you see in the konqueror menus. If you can't handle it, it is easy enough to remove the options you do not like. And if even that is too hard for you, there are numerous distros that offer a dumbed down KDE, such as Lindows.

The whole KControl issue is really ridiculous. I often install and use KDE productively without ever touching KControl. So a normal user could use KDE just fine without even knowing what KControl is or does. But when I have to use KControl it is much cleaner than the mess of windows XP configuration. Everything is in one place, and third party stuff like SuSEs Yast integrate just fine into the KControl.

I think the most important thing for KDE is to become even more stable. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:13:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? What bug? To "Use index.html" is an option and not enabled by default I think. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:20:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? ...don't use Linux. Seriously, save everyone the time it takes to read your rants about how having options is so terrible and confusing for you and go back to using MacOSX or WindowsXP/Longhorn or whatever and leave Linux to those that enjoy options.

If it really isn't confusing to you to have so many options, but you feel it is likely going to be confusing to newbie users, then mention a potential solution.

Here's an example...

On the first start of KDE, a 'configuration' dialog could startup to determine the level of skill the user has as well as the tasks the user will be performing with the desktop. This could be limited to a handful of questions and could even have an 'expert' setting allowing the user to have complete customizing control. Then, once the dialog is done, the Kmenu could be customized for that particular user, thus cutting down the number of options that are so completely dizzying, in your opinion.

That way, everyone could be happy. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hi

Go to view menu in konqueror and check out use index.html. That should work for you. If not file a bug report on bugs.kde.org

Regards
Rahul Sundaram Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I agree about konqueror. It's really the only thing I hate about KDE (it's my primary environment).

Konqueror Web Browser and Konqueror File Manager aren't separated enough... They need completely different right click menu's for start. Also, the normal menu's and toolbars should change. I have tried for ages to get rid of the "up" button from Konq. Web Browser, but _keep_ it in KFM. "up" has NO MEANING when browsing the web. KHTML and KFM should NOT share the same toolbar!

Please for the love of all things holy, clean konqueror up (pretty pretty please with sugar on top? Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Oh and btw, I am a technically proficient user and yes, a "geek" who likes to tweak things. The need to clean things up is more to do with speed than anything else.

With the right click menu's; it takes longer to mentally filter through all the options to get what you want. A lot of the options are pointless (e.g View Document Source (should be provided in a normal menu), Encoding (ditto), Open with... (in KHTML), etc).

Less options means I'd find what I want faster. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:31:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? For a change: an OS X user reviews KDE: http://e-scribe.com/osx/freebsd-kde-and-me/

On features: I agree with tutte. Nothing compells anyone to even touch kcontrol if the distro u use ships KDE with sane defaults. On the other hand, should you need to configure something, you would find everything in the same place - for newbies, knowing that, is a lot of help.

Out of curiousity, I always try gnome, but come back to KDE exactly because GNOME configuration is confusing. For a newbie, the default config tools offer too little, and if a want more, I have to use that hideaous gconf. I guess it boils down to what we are used to at the end, however.

As to memory and kde: here is my output of top. As you can see, swap isn't even touched, and I have lots of free ram as well. It is easy to blame everything on KDE, whereas it might be possible that the distro u use is to blame for it (bad compilation/packaging or patches choice ???) Note that I have every eyecandy turned on + lots of applets (kgpg, juk, kget) running.

last pid: 860; load averages: 0.30, 0.16, 0.10 up 0+01:30:52 14:35:30
49 processes: 2 running, 47 sleeping
CPU states: 5.4% user, 0.0% nice, 4.7% system, 0.4% interrupt, 89.5% idle
Mem: 119M Active, 53M Inact, 47M Wired, 8600K Cache, 35M Buf, 15M Free
Swap: 491M Total, 491M Free

PID USERNAME PRI NICE SIZE RES STATE TIME WCPU CPU COMMAND
854 mcsaba 96 0 30304K 16588K select 0:02 3.65% 3.08% kdeinit
521 root 96 0 99M 34168K select 2:30 2.83% 2.83% XFree86
603 mcsaba 96 0 32600K 18692K select 0:50 0.93% 0.93% kdeinit
362 root 96 0 1188K 568K select 0:07 0.15% 0.15% moused
566 mcsaba 96 0 27820K 13124K select 1:19 0.05% 0.05% kdeinit
601 mcsaba 96 0 29768K 16232K select 0:11 0.05% 0.05% kdeinit
772 mcsaba 96 0 37376K 31552K RUN 1:27 0.00% 0.00% opera
630 mcsaba 96 0 37232K 25448K select 0:22 0.00% 0.00% juk
608 mcsaba 96 0 28168K 14524K select 0:10 0.00% 0.00% kdeinit
588 mcsaba 96 0 11584K 7040K select 0:10 0.00% 0.00% artsd
596 mcsaba 96 0 29640K 15912K select 0:08 0.00% 0.00% kdeinit
618 mcsaba 96 0 28244K 15876K select 0:05 0.00% 0.00% kget
223 root 96 0 672K 180K select 0:02 0.00% 0.00% natd
625 mcsaba 96 0 27228K 15800K select 0:01 0.00% 0.00% kalarmd
613 mcsaba 96 0 27712K 13728K select 0:01 0.00% 0.00% kgpg Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I find it funny that one of the replies stated kde being for geeks, while gnome is more for corporations/offices. I'm a geek. I'd call myself a fairly advanced user. Why then do I use gnome and OSX?

As a geek, I value productivity and time. If I want to make text bold in an application, I can quite easily find the bold button among 5 icons. It's not so quick and easy with 10 to glance at. The simple problem I find with kde, just like eugenia, is it's bloat. I know it seems a very cliched term, but I hold it with proper meaning. If I don't use a button/option regularly, why is it in the bar cluttering my oftenly used actions? This slows down my regular work. It isn't a burden opening up the registry if it's something I do every six months. If I do it so uncommonly, it shouldn't be in my menu among day to day actions.

The option doesn't need to be taken out, it just needs to be out of my day-to-day viewing. Hence why windows has a registry.

kde having three text editors is just stupid. Sure, as someone has stated, a distro doesn't have to package all three, but if this is the case, then why doesn't my distro just use dillo instead of konqueror? After all, the consistancy has already been lost among the DE.

It should have one default and stick to it for each major application. This is one of the major points of having a DE in the first place.

I also don't like the fact that if I'm browsing the web with konqueror, I have options in front of me that I'd only use if I was browsing my own hdd. Same for the reverse. Konqueror has a beautiful web rendering engine, the ui has just always annoyed me with it doing two things at once and not specialising at either. That's never been the unix way! A geek's ui?

Keep up the great work eugenia.

I learnt a long while back the power simplicity gives you in almost every art. I would love to see kde take up such a challenge.

- Jeremy H. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hi

I use the up button in konqueror web browsing very frequently. We check broken websites as part of our work. If some particular link is not working I try going one level above using the up button.

You may find it useless but that doesnt mean it doesnt serve a purpose. This is precisely why kde doesnt remove options

Regards
Rahul Sundaram Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? no libranet review in the last 2 weeks.. the world has ended.

KDE still needs polishing, matter of fact someone need to make KDE and GNOME work togeter and be polished. while KDE has advanced further and further up the interface chain. Hopefully in a year, no more KDE crashes, before some smart ass chirps in and says "my kde never crashes" its probably cause they do not use it extensively.

KDE is nice, but MacOS X is nicer KDE should emulate the Mac instead of Windows. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:42:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I agree. Konq gets hailed by KDE fans as the greatest thing since sliced bread, yet in reality, it's a cluttered mess.

In fact, most of KDE is like that in my experience. Yes, I can customize it to be friendly, but why am I supposed to waste my time doing that?

Interesting how few people here know anything about proper usability heuristics, though...

-Erwos Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:43:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "I agree. Konq gets hailed by KDE fans as the greatest thing since sliced bread, yet in reality, it's a cluttered mess."

This was one of the funnies comments I ever read. So KDE fans (that outnumber GNOME fans by a large margin) love Konqueror, but 'reality' (whose reality?) overrides that judgement. It is good to know that we have someone with the authority to decide what Konqueror is in reality )) Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The point really was, with the "up" button, was that I couldn't remove it from KHTML without it being removed from KFM, because they share the same main toolbar... if KHTML and KFM had a totally different main toolbar, I could get rid of up, and I'd be happy. (I'd also get rid of cut/copy/paste, and whatever else).

Also, let me totally configure the right click menu for KHTML and KFM (separately), and I'll be happy too. If you don't want to get rid of options, at least let me do it. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:51:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Also, let me totally configure the right click menu for KHTML and KFM (separately)"

pssst ... Eugenia will have your head for that suggestion (what? another configuration option?!!!) Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:55:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hi

You got a point there with the up button. The subject heading is your answer if you want to be involved

Regards
Rahul Sundaram Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:57:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Just stick the config file somewhere and let me edit it with a text editor. It'll be the geeks little secret. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 13:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? ... and be happy. But shut up your mouth if you come to KDE! Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Nice too see that the clock uses a normal font instead of the old one with those stupid digital clock numbers, but still, why leave the clock in that beveled box? (especially when the date is not on it) Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:10:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? My guess is that they need to look inside (open, read then close) the file to determine file types - text or binary, etc. This kill speed.

I wonder if it's possible to have an ext3 extension for saving type information as seperate metadata? Sounds like a good idea to me.

I do like though how Konqueror lets me open text files and such straight away regardless of extension, but in Windows I have to deal with the 'Open With' dialog. But you could detect type when the file is created/copied (like BeOS did) instead of doing it every time you open a folder... Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? With leaner environments, you always find that designers have made choices that you can't always agree with. I find that everyday with my Apple Powerbook..

KDE is at the other end of the spectrum. When u thought that something was not possible or not catered for, then you find the option somewhere.

It'd be nice if a 3d window manager was adopted for those of us who have recent hardware. I've found it clarifies the desktop perception in a lot of cases. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? If you don't like it, it is possible to take it out. Right click the clock and configure it.
(The configuration dialog is _very_ nice. It is an example of power and ease of use.)

I believe the default should be a simple clean clock, and not the binary clock, and without the frame.

But you are probably just nitpicking, and probably didn't try it out, it is available since KDE 3.1. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? With not the binary clock , I mean not the _digital_ clock. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:40:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I too, think that there are too many similar apps installed by default. Why do I need 4 different editors? I say pick one to install by default and add a "install others..." option immediately below it. Then if you want you can install everything on the CD. Ditto woth OOo and Koffice, etc... Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:52:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I rely on kaddressbook and wish that I could get my hands on the handbook. But it is never loaded and it is not available on the website. Kaddressbook should include an easy way to backup your data so you can open the data in another computer using kaddressbook. Also the phone numbers dont stay put, they always default to the home category although you already have them removed. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 15:01:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Most of a 'desktop environment' important details are underneath, not the pretty GUI. ( though the importance of having a CONSISTANT GUI shouldn't be dismissed. )

GNOME should have had mechanisms in place from DAY ONE for shared information and intercommunications.. not something that was seemingly tacked-on later.. Integration of the desktop must be done on the fonctionnality level, not on the software level.

KDE is much closer to this, as they PLANNED ahead, and didn't just wing-it since it was 'pretty'. See http://www.kdedevelopers.org/node/view/232 for example.

On the other hand, the problem with GNOME is that they use GTK+ object-oriented style, but don't borrow the most important aspect of (early, anyhow) GTK... cleanliness and simplicity! Without that, the GTK-inspired GNOME macro, er object, system is COMPLETELY INCOHERENT and to put it completely blunt: SHIT.

Not to mention the fact that the numerous API libraries do not work well together and stability will _never_ be achieved since one package will _always_ depend on something that is considered beta or unstable.

Don't even get me started on the various ad-hoc configuration mechanisms and the nightmare that is CORBA and Bonobo.

Sorry to sound harsh, but it was a complaint of mine from day one of GNOME, it just wasn't professional.. They worried more about a smelly foot in the menu then making it solid and consistent.. Now they are finding out the price to be paid if they want to stick around and be more then a cute plaything...

But I'm not really sure what to think of it, honestly. That they'd have to involve money to have things that SHOULD be simple get done. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 15:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Well, almost. I've got a few tiny complaints:

1) The different editors aren't really similar. KWrite is simple like notepad. Kate is advanced like BBEdit. I think there is a decent reason for those two to be there, especially since a lot of programmers do not want to use an IDE like KDevelop. It might be worth moving Kate to a developer package. KEdit is there because it supports BiDi and the others don't, but I don't think its in kdebase anymore. Kommander is not a text editor, but rather, a GUI editor that comes with Quanta. If it got installed in the base distribution, its the packager's fault. On Debian, installing Quanta just gets me Quanta --- you have to install Kommander seperately.

2)I mostly agree about KControl, but disagree with the solution. I personally use almost every single on of those options. I wouldn't mind moving them to a seperate app ala PowerToys, but I definately would not want them to be GConf'ed, or (shudder) taken out entirely.

I agree about everything else though, even (especially), as a KDE user myself. Toolbars and context menus are definately too cluttered.

I've got a few KDE complaints of my own to add:
- There needs to be fewer menu icons. They just make menus look cluttered. OS X doesn't use them at all, and even WinXP uses them sparingly.
- The visual layout of some dialogs need to be better. Many of them need to undergo the polishing the clock dialog did awhile ago.
- Toolbar arrangements aren't great. Not just because they're cluttered, but because they're not in a good order. This is more of a problem with some apps like KOffice.
- KOffice stability needs work overall.
- There are still many missing icons in CrystalSVG. KOffice still needs to adopt Crystal-style icons.

PS> TO whomever was complaining about the packaging --- the packaging is entirely up to the distro maker. The source layout is organized in large packages for developer reasons. That doesn't mean they have to be organized that way in the distro packages. Debian, for example, does ship each application seperately. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 15:09:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? - To people complaining about Eugenia complaining about too many options. Its not the options, really, but how they're presented. Lots of new users don't get the whole "hierarchical" thing, and they shouldn't have to deal with it. Anyway, its not just about choices, either, but efficiency. Having tons of stuff in the toolbars and context menus hurt efficiency, because those things are supposed to be easily scanable.

- As for the "Settings" menu, you're completely wrong First, a proper "Settings" item is the greatest thing since sliced bread. The fact that "Settings" keeps moving between the File, Edit, and Tools menus in other OSs indicates that it doesn't belong in either! Its like putting page margin setup into the File menu in Word! And "Configure Shortcuts" and "Configure Toolbars" needs to be in the menu. Its pretty standard HIG policy that the menu should offer access to all the functionality of the app --- functionality should never only be accessible through the context menu. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 15:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Just out of curiosity, what makes u an expert on gui-issues. This is really not meant as a flame, just interrested, just find that u bring across your opinions very strongly and convinced, when sometimes i would think it is just a matter of taste ... Mon, 15 Dec 2003 15:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I filled 2 usability bugs and one wish based on this review:

Bugs
Cervisia add-ons to konqueror are a bit too invasive
http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=70495

Show text shadow is a usability feature, should be on by default
http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=70496

Wish
KControl should have a simple and an advanced general layout
http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=70505

I added another bug that was discussed in this list:
In web-browsing mode, the up button should be removed
http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=70506 Mon, 15 Dec 2003 15:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Translation: This is my opinion. This is only my opinion, any resemblance to other opinions is a concidence.

Sorry to be harsh, but that's basically what your posts amounts to. One programmers clean API, is anothers "pile of clothes in the corner".

That's part of the reason there's more than one Linux windowing environment.

Just look at the vi verses emacs war.

I say let the results speak for themselves. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I am curious - I just came here and read the Conclusion *only* and wonder in what areas KDE is NOT HIGified ... I think the overall experience is that KDE itself is more HIGified than other known Desktop Environments. There are still large parts inside GNOME where dialogs look like they are made in a hurry. E.g. no pixel exact layout of buttons, wrong padding, different statusbars, still different Toolbars and things like this. You can't find any of these issues in KDE.

There is a big difference saying that an app has too many Menu/Toolbar entries or that KDE itself is a bit unclean (the way it installs, no subcategories for include/library dirs as in GNOME or things like having 3 Editors.

But all this is in no way related to HIG. I mean, when I click through many KDE applications Then the dialogs are always looking equal from layout and padding, the Toolbars are all equal, have the same look and the same way to be changed, The statusbar is always the same size in height and things like that. It's more accurate in it's whole.

I made an UI review for GNOME 2.2 (or so) a couple of months ago. You can download the Tarball and read the things offline (sorry it's not online readable anymore). Skip the part with the Toolbar inside it and read the rest. It's still 100% valid.

http://www.gnome.org/~chrisime/random/ui.tar.bz2 Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:20:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Generally unpolished", did you mean?

Also, "KDevelop should do the rest of the job for the programmers."

No. There should be an "Editor" menu, and then "More Programs" submenu....You can have just kwrite in the main Editors menu. I doubt even YOU could argue with that. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? People who say things like this: "You make some good points about KDE in general. I think the points you raised about things being "cluttered" is what turned me off to KDE a long time ago. It seems the KDE philosophy is lots of icons, lots of toolbars, lots of menus, lots and lots of GUI. Gnome, on the other hand, was sort of minimalistic, especially in 1.x. I liked Gnome better for that.
"

Are just a tad pathetic. If you're a power user enough to have an opinion about clutter, SPEND 5 MINUTES DELETING THINGS. Jesus, stop bitching!

The ones who say things are "too cluttered" need to go back to using a typewriter. Each program has an entry. Move them to the top if you want, but don't bitch about too much when "not enough" is far worse. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? When said like this: "IMHO, GUI usability is simply THE most important and most overlooked aspect in GUI software today."

Has no worth. What does that MEAN? You certainly don't know.

Also, someone who says this wants their computer to "look pretty" rather than "do work", so NO, usability is not THE number #1 consideration...It's important, but not as important as it being stable and useFUL. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I just thought of something that bugged me, I would like a seperate 'home' for browsing and file manager mode. In fact it should always be your home directory in the file manager. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:28:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? " Only keep visible on panels the most important, basic options, the ones that guarantee a polished experience."

"Polished experience"????
What the hell does that mean?

Give us a list of what should be deleted, and what should be kept...HELP, instead of just giving vague, useless phrases like "Oh, some stuff should be deleted..." Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "The panel applets do look cleaner with their lefthand menu widgets now revealed only by mouseover."

Was available in 3.1.4, but was hard to find. Yes, KDE does need some help with configuration options being in the right places. Sadly, I don't think I could fix it any better than it is right now. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? To me, usability means I can make the environment into whatever *I* find most usable. Any other kind of usability is just someone else's usability. KDE has enough options that *I* actually have a usable desktop, not just Eugenia. I'm running KDE 3.1.4 right now, and it is still lacking options I consider to be highly important. If somebody doesn't like all the options, I wish they would switch to Gnome and let KDE keep advancing, rather than trying to slow KDE down. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:36:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "I agree with your points, KDE is too bloat while gnome has poor menus but they are clear,"

I just stop reading comments like this...WORK ON THE ENGLISH. If presentation is SO important to you, work on your own! Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Interesting how few people here know anything about proper usability heuristics, though..."

No, someone was just saying that you were full of it. That's all. Move on.

Who cares about "usability heuristics" if a large group uses the DE and loves it? Your page of numbers should trump my love of something?

No. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:57:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "I just stop reading comments like this...WORK ON THE ENGLISH. If presentation is SO important to you, work on your own!"

Well, rest assured your kind words are truly an incentive to those poor fellows who, like me, are putting an effort on trying to learn a foreign language to be able to communicate with narrow minded imbeciles such as yourself.

Be seated, as this may be too much of a shock for you: there are thousands of languages on the world. Yes, really. And guess what: people actually speak them (holy cow!). Learning a language is a huge undertaking. I can somehow excuse your ignorance, since obviously you have never gone through the experience yourself. But please, next time you feel like opening your mouth, keep it shut. Thanks.

It is comments like yours that I won't be reading anymore; this has turned into yeat another moronic flame war. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 16:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? You cannot view moderated comments anymore. I assume this is because of the anger raised by people who realized the censorship in the XAML discussion.

On topic people discussing XAML vs. XUL (with valid links) were censored. Posters complained, and now the ability to view moderated comments is gone.

I for one, am disgusted at the editors/maintainers of the site. Clearly, the site has an agenda (pro-MS based on the comments censored in the XAML discussion) they are pushing and cannot accept open, valid discussion.

Boo censorship and hidden agendas!

I know this is off topic, but now I question what other posts have been censored in every discussion. All OSNews credibility is gone. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 17:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? i disagree kde has bloated menus and bloated with software itself (i.e. "four text editors", etc), it's all because of installing ALL KDE packages which (IMO) is simply stupid desigion. Look at my laptop:

[(20:05):~ ] pkg_info|grep kde
kdebase-3.1.4 This package provides the basic applications for the KDE sy
kdelibs-3.1.4_1 This is the base set of libraries needed by KDE programs
kdenetwork-3.1.4 Network-related programs and modules for KDE
[(20:05):~ ] pkg_info|grep qt
qt-3.2.1 A C++ X GUI toolkit


So your need only FOUR packages to have a full-featured WM WITHOUT unnessesary software. Clean nad fast, with all I need.

And what is about menu usability (i.e. control center is awful) this is depend on how long you use KDE. My everyday KDE using begun with first 2.x releases (I know it then it was 1.x but it was not "everyday using"), and I'm accostomed to it Mon, 15 Dec 2003 17:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Personally, I prefer KDE abundance of options to Gnome's "cleaner" interface. I do think "levels" of options would be a nice touch (i.e. a simplified set for newbies, an extended set for power users) and perhaps this is something they should look at for KDE 4.

As far as Kcontrol is concerned, there is a user-friendly alternative. It's called "kde mission control" and it's really nice for novices.

As far as K Menu "clutter" is concerned, I have to say that I don't really know about it because I use Mandrake's version of KDE 3.2 and it has its own menu structure. There are still lots of apps to choose from, but the menus are better laid out and there is a simple task-based menu available for newbies.

Personally, I really like this new KDE (although it is still a bit unstable...and the font size in HTML messages in Kmail is too small for my 1600x1200 resolution). Mon, 15 Dec 2003 17:20:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Also note that, with the new packaging scheme used by KDE, you don't have to install everything, as the main programs are divided into separate packages. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 17:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "I added another bug that was discussed in this list:
In web-browsing mode, the up button should be removed
http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=70506 "

I use this up-button while browsing very often to get to the main page after following some links to other sites.
And this is exactly why this feature is there: people actually use it! Mon, 15 Dec 2003 17:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? This is a pretty decent review Eugenia.

I think the new theme is angelic. It fits KDE very well. It's one of the best themes I have ever seen for any platform.

However, seeing those updated khtml renders of osnews, I have to say I have never been, and definitly am not impressed with the khtml rendering engine. This peave of mine carries over to other areas in the KDE/Qt environment. For example in the comparison shot between gnumeric and Kspread, I just find the Kspread icon widgets and all the menubar items to be too close and awfully busy. It's probably because I use OS X a lot at work, but I don't like that cramped feeling on my toolbars.

Just a little something about the file selector. I really wish they didn't abandon file permission flags in the file selector. I would rather see a column view, with things like name, date modified, and permissions (drwxrwxrwx) to be present and optionable. I suppose the nature of multi-user Os's makes this a negligable feature, but I personally would like it.

Also, that little green button and "lock" in the status bar of konq. just have to go, or be clarified. I don't use KDE, and I still don't have any idea exactly what they do, but I could make some guesses. They're not very intuitive IMO, and haven't changed in any releases.

If ANY GTK/GNOME DEVS are reading this, I would really like to see some "comment" items to be in the main gnome-foot-icon that's like a win32 "start", as you see in the kde4.png. Gnome needs this to make the system more friendly. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 18:04:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Eugenia is so right.
"If the KDE Project realizes that polish and simplicity is more important than all these almost-never-used and hard-to-find-in-a-chaos-of-panels options ... we would have a winner."

Examples are:
1) Korganizer still has a time offset problem when importing a cal.ics. This happens when using the add feature for multiply loaded calendars. The korganizer is way too complicated anyway. What good is calendar that cannot tell time?

2) Klipper still locks the desktop on ocassion but the bug report is closed.

3) The Kmail mime tree does not seem to serve any useful purpose. I can't drag and drop the attachments from it.

4) There is no "undo" if you insert the wrong file association in the Konqueror file manager. The next time Kde is started it spawns many warnings. Try it youself; add *.xld instead of *.xls and then try and get rid of the misstyped *.xld. AFAIK there is no way to do it easily.

5) Too many pop ups that are annoying. EXAMPLE: put the word "attachment" in Kmail's subject line and try and send the letter with out an attachment. Kmail will display a popup. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 18:11:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Thanks for the info about Konqueror. I did look in the Konqueror settings and could see no way of turning this off (it's set on as standard in SuSE Linux). I'll be sending SUSE a few words about this. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 18:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Who cares about "usability heuristics" if a large group uses the DE and loves it? Your page of numbers should trump my love of something?"

People who are interested in making an application BETTER know about usability heuristics. Your obvious disdain for principles of proper GUI design indicates to me that you don't know jack about them. If you'd like to disprove your ignorance to me, go ahead. I'm waiting. But I can guarantee you that following them with a bit of common sense will lead to better applications.

Try reading Ben Shneiderman's "Designing the User Interface". You may find it enlightening. Hint: there are _reasons_ people find some interfaces good and efficient.

So, if anyone's full of it, it's you.

-Erwos Mon, 15 Dec 2003 18:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? There will be no war between K and G for the main reason that Gnome Desktop is already out... the reasons become history...(kde run too fast for them)
Now looking for, the future at my opinion Gnome has two options:
First going more to the kde field...and make a Gkde?
Second Beeing as inovative or a real alternative in this case to look more to people like XFCE by excemple...
For me the choice is betw. these two as my favorite ...
Gnome is only a piece of ham in the middle with fantastics tools but not as a real desktop in comparaison of course. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 18:36:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I wonder if someone from the KDE team is reading this page (hopefully able to see through off topic squabble and flaming). It would be very interesting to have a comment or two from that side of the table. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 18:43:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? >> "I just stop reading comments like this...WORK ON THE ENGLISH. If presentation is SO important to you, work on your own!"

Loser.

Just because you're speaking English perfectly doesn't mean the whole world does that.

Many other people around the world have to learn 2, 3 or even 4 languages (often all in the same time frame), and like said above, learning these languages isn't always that easy.


Ontopic: I fully agree with Eugenia, KDE needs some polish (not polish as in great artwork). Mon, 15 Dec 2003 18:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Some aspects of the layout in KDE apps need some work, but it shouldn't be a big deal. KDE's GUI is entirely based on a layout engine. So adding padding here or there is really trivial, and in fact, can often be done at the framework layer without ever touching the application itself. Stuff like toolbars and context menus are similarly easy to fix. They're all specified as XML or RC files referencing PNG icons. In fact, this is one of the easiest ways for non-programmers to contribute to KDE. Edit the files to get the toolbar looking the way you want, or replace the icons, and submit it as a patch to bugs.kde.org and see what they think.

Also, KOffice is still in a transitory phase --- 1.3 is a big "stabilizing the infrastructure" release. 1.4 should see a lot more UI work, and they've already started doing stuff like replacing the dated icons with nice Crystal-style ones.

As for the little green button: to tell the truth, I don't know what it does either, and I'm a KDE user! I think it has something to do with the multi-pane view feature. I don't use Konqueror as a file manager (I'm a CLI addict), so maybe that's why Mon, 15 Dec 2003 18:52:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? For someone newer to Linux, it's hard to choose between KDE or Gnome because there's not a big degree of consistency between the two.
For example, using Libranet 2.8, after I get the fonts in Gnome set up kind of the way I want them and Firebird is looking pretty decent (as decent as I could manage), and the boot back into KDE, everything looks like ass again.
Plus, I click on each DE's application launch menu and everything is in a different place. I don't know if this is a DE issue or a distro/packaging issue, but I eventually just get frustrated with all the BS and give up.
Another thing is that both file managers are absolutely horrendous. They're bloated as all hell (anyone ever tried Explorer in Win2k classic mode), and as far as configurability goes, compared to Directory Opus, both are child's play. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 18:53:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Another thing is that both file managers are absolutely horrendous. They're bloated as all hell (anyone ever tried Explorer in Win2k classic mode), and as far as configurability goes, compared to Directory Opus, both are child's play.

obviously you haven't had the opportunity to try the new nautilus (from gnome 2.5 devel).
While konqueror keeps getting more stuff, nautilus is getting simpler Mon, 15 Dec 2003 19:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? That green "button" in konqueror that people are confused over:

It's not really a button, but rather an indicator - it shows
you at a glance which pane currently has focus.

Split your konqueror view into two. Then click into each of
the two panes, and watch the green indicator. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 19:09:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Personally I prefer the combination of Knifty (for the Window decorations) and ThinKeramik (for the Style). ThinKeramik solves most of the problems people have with Keramik. It's got eye candy, but not too much, and it's got plenty of cool features and customizations (shadowed text, etc.). Mon, 15 Dec 2003 19:09:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? A very important topic is (I think) that KDE should not be simplified too much, because now it appeals to power users who want to be able to configure all the details. So I am against leaving out the many configurations settings.

What is a good suggestion though, is to try and split the settings, into an "easy" configuration panel with few, but important options, for beginners or people that don't care.
And providing an "advanced" configuration panel for the people who love to personalise their work environment.

Maybe the panel should have two modes, an "Easy Mode" and an "Advanced Mode". KDE could be standard in the "Easy Mode", good for a lot of users, but with a simple click in the menu, the "Advanced Mode" (with all panels, options, configuration possibilities) should become available.

Anyways, a great open source project it is !!
Thanks to the KDE-people !!!
Erik. (BE) Mon, 15 Dec 2003 19:11:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hey I'm sorry, but english is not my native language, so it's possible for me to make mistakes Mon, 15 Dec 2003 19:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? This thread is getting old, so here's something new:

Read this:
http://www.adequacy.org/public/stories/2001.12.2.42056.2147.html

Then read all the comments from people that believed
it was for real!!!

I mean, if there people THAT DUMB in the Open Source community, so that

a) they think the article is real,

b) fail to catch 16-ton-heavy hints of irony

c) try to correct the "misinformed" parent

then we are all doomed.

Now, go enjoy... Mon, 15 Dec 2003 19:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I have been mounting my clients (Windows) My Documents folder on a tool bar in the task bar since Win95. This allows for browsing their documents from cascading menus. Right clicking on any folder or file, gives them the abillity to execute or manipulate them without ever opening Explorer.
I have tried to emulate this funtioning in a Linux (KDE) GUI, but when you add a documents quick browser folder to the Task bar (kicker),there are no right click context menus available from these cascading menus, so you must open Konqueror to do anything but, left click the file. This is sorely missed, because they are blazingly fast when the context menus are used.
They also make changing (editing) the start menus a breeze, instead of opening some separate application to edit the menus, you simply right click, cut, copy or paste them.
In windows 9x I use the Programs menu as a catch all, then build a well sorted application launcher menu on the first start menu. KDE should consider this catch all folder idea, that way all new applications would just add shortcuts to this one folder (they end up sorted alphabeticaly), then let the end user or integrater, build a nice clean application launcher menu that features only their prefered apps. The other apps are still available if you need them,just not cluttering your day to day menus.
Moving these folk over to a Linux distro is going to be a tough sell, because everyone loves these cascading menus, especially the elderly, and the very young. I had an elderly woman that was afraid to open explorer because her desktop "went away", the cascading menus open on top of whatever she was doing, and she felt a lot more comfortable looking for her documents.
KDE really needs to explore this, its clean and neat and fast. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 19:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? ..rpms? Mon, 15 Dec 2003 19:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Its not so much a matter of people being dumb, but the fact that nerds have no sense of humor Mon, 15 Dec 2003 19:53:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "up" has NO MEANING when browsing the web.

It has. Many pages out there use a hierarchical structure. I often miss the up button in Opera (my browser when I use Windows)

Konqueror is the Frankenstein of file managers, made of so many Kparts that the end result is just not good.
I don't need four text editors in the same submenu (Kate, KWrite, Kedit and Kommander-something), I need one.

Huh? Isn't that a bit contradictionary on the one hand you don't want a one-for-everything solution on the other hand you want one solution for everything. AFAIK, Kedit still exists because Kate/Kwrite (same engine) don't have bidirectional text support yet, comparing kate to the rest is like comparing vi to nano or emacs to zile, different goals and I never encountered that Kommander-something thing.

KControl is a big mess but I prefer it to the lack of features that plagues Gnome. You can reduce the complexity of everything in KDE but that's the responsibility of the distribution and Xandros and Lindows show that it's possible. It's trivial to reduce the number of buttons in the Konqueror toolbar to the layout Nautilus uses but it's impossible to make Nautilus as powerful as Konqueror.

I actually like the settings menu because it's a central location for all menu items that enable you to customize the application. In Gnome settings are sometimes in edit, sometimes in file, sometimes in settings, sometimes called settings, sometimes preferences, sometimes options and sometimes configure. The worst thing had to be one application (I don't know which one, sorry) which had configure..., options..., and preferences... all next to each other in the edit menu

That said I can't understand how KDE can still have the toggle-menubar button as the first item in the settings menu (at least it was that way in a more or less recent CVS-build) That's plain stupid Mon, 15 Dec 2003 19:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Yes, Mandrake (in Cooker).

Check it out at your closest Mandrake FTP site.

Here's my favorite:

http://carroll.cac.psu.edu/pub/linux/distributions/mandrake-devel/c...

Download the RPMs and install them manually (be careful to install them in the right order) or add the Cooker repository to your URPMI database by typing this in a console:

# urpmi.addmedia cooker ftp://carroll.cac.psu.edu/pub/linux/distributions/mandrake-devel/c... with synthesis.hdlist.cz

You can also use the very nifty EasyUrpmi page to set up your URPMI repositories:

http://urpmi.org/easyurpmi/index.php Mon, 15 Dec 2003 20:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I've heard quite a lot of people complain/mention/begrudge
the notion that konqueror is unable to better differentiate
between file browsing mode and web browsing mode - for
instance the recent posts about the "up" button.

This is _easily_ configured, people. I just went and
reconfigured my web konqueror without the up button, in
fact my web-konqueror toolbar now contains only the following:

left, right, home, reload, stop, print, security

My file-konqueror, on the other hand, *does* have the up
button. But I got rid of the home button, along with the
cervisia button, and a few others, while adding a couple
new ones.

It took me about 2 minutes to do this.

Settings -> Configure Toolbars ... apply your changes.
then:
Settings -> Configure View Profiles ...

Do this once, for each profile: "webbrowsing" and "File
Management".

Done deal.

This is the power of KDE - it behaves the way *you* want
it to behave, in 95% of the cases.

LEARN it.
USE it.
LOVE it.

To wrinkle your face because it's not as dumbed down as
what you're used to in gnome - is sheer lameness. The
defaults *could* use some work, IMHO; but regardless, the
power is there for you to make it work _exactly_ how YOU
want it to.... now.

If you don't like the clutter in the stinking menu... simply
go to the menu editor and DELETE THAT EXTRA EDITOR, if
having three of them is just too much for you to handle.

Etc, etc, so on and so forth - you have an EXCELLENT
desktop environment just sitting there waiting for you to
use it to it's full potential.

If you'd rather drive an automatic economy car, then I
guess Gnome is for you. If you're willing to spend some
extra effort in the beginning to use a manual in order to
drive something high-performance and super versatile, then
KDE is your ticket.

To install KDE, use/dabble with it for an hour or two,
then run back wimpering to Gnome, for all its "simplicity"
and so-called "HIG conformance"... is simply ridiculous.

Further, anything you don't like - get INVOLVED... contribute,
help out, join a mailing list, write bug reports, provide
feedback, CODE - there is *so* much you could do to actualy
FIX or change the stuff you're all nitpicking on.

The rewards are huge. Gnome's gonna be looking mighty
pathetic next to KDE in the comming year, the gap is going
to be growing exponentialy.

Those corporate entities people seem so proud of to have
on "their side" - IBM, Sun, and whoever else; to hell with
them; their interest lies _solely_ in the ultimate prospect
of market share and profit. This is where your beloved
Gnome is going to get pigeon holed and swept right into.
Gnome will become a tool for a few corps. KDE is, was, and
will remain, a desktop env strictly developed for and by
US, without outside commercial interests involved. KDE
will stay pure to it's origins, Gnome's just gonna get
abused by the enterprise and the very same business that
are "supporting" it today. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 20:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? ...the (long) URLs got cut off in the previous message. Just make sure you use the complete URL if you want to add the repository to your URPMI database. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 20:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Those corporate entities people seem so proud of to have
on "their side" - IBM, Sun, and whoever else; to hell with
them; their interest lies _solely_ in the ultimate prospect
of market share and profit. This is where your beloved
Gnome is going to get pigeon holed and swept right into.
Gnome will become a tool for a few corps. KDE is, was, and
will remain, a desktop env strictly developed for and by
US, without outside commercial interests involved. KDE
will stay pure to it's origins, Gnome's just gonna get
abused by the enterprise and the very same business that
are "supporting" it today.

What a troll, isolate your self in your litle KDE world then. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 20:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > What a troll, isolate your self in your litle KDE world then.


The difference between KDE and Gnome is going to look
more and more like the difference between Redhat and
Debian. If you think that's a troll, well, maybe you
should think a little deeper. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 20:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? >Just out of curiosity, what makes u an expert on gui-issues

I am a professional UI/usability designer, I worked 2 years on such issues in UK. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 20:53:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The difference between KDE and Gnome is going to look
more and more like the difference between Redhat and
Debian. If you think that's a troll, well, maybe you
should think a little deeper.

In case you don't know RedHat is using Debian package installation and Debina is Using RedHat's Anaconda installer, Can't you read what he wrote, he is a troll here and China I can read you are one too, thing clear please, Don't you atart writing flames just because you are not happy in your life. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I hate the floating text bubbles. I forget what version introduced it, but it has been a baine to my existance for years.

you move the mouse over the clock, a tool tip. you move it left, another tool tip. you move it over a task bar icon, another tool tip. If you run the mouse quickly enough over all 3 you may end up with an orphan tooltip that wont close until you reboot the computer. very very annoying. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:06:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? >I hate the floating text bubbles. I forget what version
introduced it, but it has been a baine to my existance for
years.

Configure -> Desktop -> Behavior -> "Show Tooltips" ...
uncheck.

No more floating text bubbles. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? If you run the mouse quickly enough over all 3 you may end up with an orphan tooltip that wont close until you reboot the computer.¨

The fact that you can turn off tooltips notwithstanding (as already revealed by the other anonymous poster), you certainly don't have to reboot the computer to get rid of those (annoying, to be sure) orphan tooltips. You can just log out then log back in. Unless you're installing a new kernel or adding hardware (or have to turn off your machine for whatever cause), there's scarcely a reason to reboot a Linux computer. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? It might sound simple, but before you can really make a difference in terms of usability and simplicity in a community orientied project like KDE (or GNOME), you have to go through one hellride of a flamewar. Everyone who followed the discussions around GNOME 2.x and Galeon should know what I mean.
I don't think that KDE really wants to go through this anytime soon and maybe it's a good thing, that we have a solution for both sides of the fences. Some people prefer to adjust the desktop to what they are used to so they can be productive right away (KDE is good for that), others rather adjust themself to the desktop, hoping that it will improve their productivity or enjoyment (GNOME is good for that).

It is not enough to just implement several levels of configurability or similar solutions which were proposed, because features and options have other costs besides complex UI. To quote HP:

"I find that if you're hard-core disciplined about having good defaults that Just Work instead of lazily adding preferences, that naturally leads the overall UI in the right direction. Issues come up via bugzilla or mailing lists or user testing, and you fix them in some way other than adding a preference, and this means you have to think about the right UI and the right way to fix problems.

Basically, using preferences as a band-aid is the root of much UI evil. It's a big deal and a big change in direction for free software that GNOME has figured this out."

You can agree with this or not, but this is the way many people (including me) think. Flaming us for our opinion won't change a thing. That doesn't mean that we don't respect other opinions or the technical qualities of KDE.

Another problem of configurability is, that it becomes gradually harder to find the source of bugs, also adding features becomes more tricky because you have to doublecheck that it will work with every possible combination of settings. Of course this particular issue wouldn't be an issue in a world of unlimited ressources, which we unfortunately don't live in.
Sometimes people look at GNOME apps and say something to the extend of "it works incredibly well, but it isn't very configurable", without realizing, that part of why the application works so well is, that it isn't very configurable. You can try to find a good middleground, but it's always a tradeoff. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I would like a seperate 'home' for browsing and file manager mode

I believe that 3.2 has this feature. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Newbies and other people that are overwhelmed by KDE's numerous configuration options can easily dumb down the interface with only a few lines of code. Put the following in a file and save it as ~/.kde/share/applnk/knewbiecontrol.desktop:

[Desktop Entry]
Exec=/bin/sh -c "kcmshell -caption KNewbieControl LookNFeel/{background,kwindecoration,style,colors,fonts,screensaver}"
Icon=kcontrol
Type=Application
Name=Newbie Control Center

Nobody is a newbie for his whole life. It's just for the first few weeks/months, after which come years/decades as (power)user. GNOME concentrates on the short newbie stage, KDE concentrates on the rest of the life. :-) Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? No, the topic has nothing to with newbies and experts. Even experts want a telephone that "just works", so they can spend more time talking than dialing. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:53:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Excellent post, Spark - well said.

When it comes down to it, really, Gnome and KDE simply
offer different solutions. Common sense would tell us
that we should see this immediately, and there would be
no arguments/flames/etc.

I think that what causes the flames, are when people try
to compare the two as if they were in the same class, when
they clearly are not: when someone says "KDE is ok, but it
would be better if it acted more like ", or "Gnome is too restrictive, KDE is better
because it's more configurable, and gives more power to
the user."

So, these comparisons really simply end up just amounting
to subjective speculation - because they often do not
take into account the perspective/realisation of the subject or concept or feature being compared.

"User interface guidlines and studies show that round
objects are more aero dynamic and thus can be thrown
longer distances - therefore, such fruits as oranges and
apples are much better than strawberies or bananas. Thus,
my orange is better than your banana. You should make
round bananas, or you should just start using oranges."

Whereupon the banana user replies:

"Everyone knows that fruits were made to be eaten, and
so a fruit should be made to be easily consumed - bananas
are easily peeled, they're not too messy, and they're easy
to bite into. Oranges are stupid, they would be better if they were more like bananas."

Vim vs Emacs
Python vs Perl
.NET vs J2EE
Windows vs Linux
...
Gnome vs KDE


Although I still think KDE has a much more extensible and
powerfull and rich backend architecture than gnome does,
regardless of GUI arguments.

And that foundational architecture is much more difficult
to change/improve/polish than it is too polish default
high-level ui, and to make simple usability tweaks. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 22:03:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > No, the topic has nothing to with newbies and experts.
Even experts want a telephone that "just works", so they
can spend more time talking than dialing.

I like to have redial and *69 and memory, speaker phone,
three way converstions, and two lines on my phone.

This might be much different than your phone - perhaps
your phone doesn't have any of those features: "cool!",
you say, "I don't need to hassle with learning or configuring
anything!".

But should you ever want any of those features, you're
gonna have to buy a new phone.

My phone, on the other hand - I can simply ignore those
features that I'm not yet willing to learn or use; but
they'll be there when I'm ready. All that's required is
for me to not get too bothered with those buttons that
I'm not currently using.

If kde was a phone, it'd be like my own hypothetical phone
described above -- only with the kde phone, you'd be able
to hide or rearrange the buttons and features you weren't
currently interested in using. Of course, in order to hide
those options, you just might need to pick up the manual
or dork around a little bit. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 22:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? you don't even need to log out or reboot.. just click on it. sometimes just hovering on it is enough, and often they disappear by themselves after a while.

yeah they happen on windows too, so it's not a KDE-only problem. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 22:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I tried KDE 3.2 beta 1 and beta 2 but I actually found them a lot slower than my Gnome 2.4 (opposite Eugenia for whatever reason) and I also found that Gnome is a lot cleaner and more intuitive for me. I tried playing with 3.2 beta1 /2 for awhile but it didn't last too long. I was really put off by the various themes and by the file manager that seemed far more complicated than necessary. KDE may be the most trumpeted desktop but for those of us who spend all our time in applications working, what's the point of all the customization? Mon, 15 Dec 2003 22:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Well, I find some real problems in the review when it's about Quanta & Kommander.

1. Kommander is not a text editor. Qt Designer is mentioned so by simply starting Kommander it would be easy to find out that Kommander has more common things with Qt Designer than with any other text editor. Right, the menu name is wrong, and "Script builder" would be more accurate. Will try to find a good name.

2. "There are a few more nice UI touches on 3.2, like a new vertical widget showing on the left bar of Konqueror, Quanta or KDevelop which auto-expands."
Unfortunately Quanta doesn't and won't have those in KDE 3.2, due to lack of time. Sure, the framework is there, it's already used in some applications like Konqueror, Kate, KDevelop (maybe also Kexi), but the above statement raises a question in me: did you really started Quanta??

3. KOffice is not part of the KDE Beta 2 release, even if the Fedora packages containing the latest Beta or CVS version of it. As stated many times, KDE releases sources and whatever is mentioned in the release document is inside that version and not more.

Andras Mon, 15 Dec 2003 22:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? >did you really started Quanta??

Yes, I did. Check my screenshots. And I also have a way of consistently crashing it when loading it via Konqueror's context menu. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 22:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Some people will endlessly complain about what they call "bloat". But for many people it is exactly what they call "bloat" that they like about an application or program. If you like it small, lean and clean, why not simply use one of the countless alternatives? You have the choice. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 22:51:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? ... is worth overdoing ;-) Mon, 15 Dec 2003 23:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Just recently I started using 3.1.4 KDE along with beta Kdevelop. I think it rocks. I had never used anything from the 3.x series until I started using 3.1.4.

Usability issues: As some people have said let the distros decide how to do the menu "clutter" or have an expert, intermediate, novice option somewhere easily accessible. I, for one, don't mind the "clutter", even though there are some things that could be cleaned up. A "HIG" is as the name suggests - a "guideline". This isn't boolean logic here. The re is no absolute truth here no matter how many so-called experts tell you there is.

Technology and Development issues: There is no doubt that the technology behind KDE is more advanced than Gnome's desktop technology. DCOP, KParts and other things makes plugin/component reuse fairly easy for the developer(along with the new KDevelop).I've heard the Gnome developers complain about bonobo which is based on Corba. KDevelop 3.0beta is pretty awesome. KDevelop has been around since around '98 or so and they finally got it right with the rewrite(KParts galore). IDEAI mode kicks ass and is a good example of HIG. Anjuta is stalled and has lots of work ahead of it to be even close to KDevelop 3.0. The Anjuta developers should probably rip out at least the c/c++ parser so you can get code completion.

And finally, what's up with the dip.t-dialiners and the .de's? KDE is like some kind of national pride for them and any kind of criticism is taken as a personal affront on the german nation. Calm down, it's just a desktop.

Anyway, I like the way KDE integrates apps and the desktop. Until Gnome comes up with some new/better technology I'll be using it as my desktop. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 23:09:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? If such options intimidate you, you can always buy a distro that will dumb it down for you.

Typical response from a narrow minded elitist. There's no possible chance that something could be improved. No. If you offer up an *OPINION* stating that something could be done a different way, it's just because you are too dumb to understand it. Yeah. You're so l33t, yo. Tell me Mr. l33t, h4x0r d00d, why do you use Linux? Are you too stupid to write your own kernel? Mon, 15 Dec 2003 23:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? These are the kind fo articles I like to see, thoguh I don't agree with some of your KDE criticisims. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 23:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? These are the kind of articles I love readinga t OSNEWS.COM. Criticisms with constructive suggestions, and many of the things mentioned would probably not be ramarked by anyone but Eugenia. Such as teh menu and toolbar separation, msot would just say it's cluttered and leave it at that. I agree with just about al of Eugenia's points, but I do wishs he went intoa lot more details regarding teh new features in this release, there are hundreds of new important features.

Also, I don't think Kcontrol is that bad, it does have too many options ins ome areas, but waht is more problematic is that they are not as well organized as they should be. Lots should be combined, sucha s Keyboards and Mice. But overall I think it is a very good ocntrol center and just needs a bit more polishing. If you don't wan to change the defaults you don't need to go in it.

ALSO remember that unliek GNOME it ahs a very easy to sue search tool. THere is a find tab in which you can type what you're looking for and quickly find it. It works great even for obscure options. I often use it because it is faster that way.

Good job and thanks! Mon, 15 Dec 2003 23:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > I don't think that KDE really wants to go through this anytime soon and maybe it's a good thing, that we have a solution for both sides of the fences.

I dunno.. KDE as a whole with the changes in 3.2, does sure seem headed that way. Just a review of history:

KDE in 2.x/3.x, tries to best and go above GNOME 1.x, which is known for features and eyecandy. It pretty much succeeds.

GNOME in 2.x, tries to best and go above KDE 1.x/2.x, which is known for it's ease of use and usability. It pretty much succeeds.

In late 3.x, KDE is gradually shifting back towards KDE 1.x/GNOME 2.x and makes a larger focus on usability. In late GNOME 2.x, GNOME is shifting back towards GNOME 1.x and KDE 2.x/3.x and focusing on adding features (with new apps) Mon, 15 Dec 2003 23:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? After hearing on and on and on about Gnome I thought nobody liked KDE anymore. While your article is good, I'd point out that it's always better to have more options/preferences available than too little like Gnome. Gnome may be simplistic, but it's WAY too simplistic for me, if it wasn't for KDE I think i'd be using Linux for a small fraction of the time I use it for now.

Though I would agree with some things you said. KDE preferences could be simplified a bit. The only thing I noticed is that some preferences are located in many different areas giving people this impression.

I love the new theme for KDE. Every theme for KDE or Gnome that i've used seems a bit off without a consistent look and feel to everything.

This looks like the best DE made outside of Mac OS X's. Mon, 15 Dec 2003 23:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Interesting choice of example.

Read Donald A. Norman's book: The Design of Everyday things.
Page 18-22. Even the lowly telephone gets flubbed. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 00:26:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > Your obvious disdain for principles of proper GUI design
> indicates to me that you don't know jack about them. Try
> reading Ben Shneiderman's "Designing the User Interface".

You are a theoretician:

a) Who says that Ben Shneiderman is right? He is just one person with own opinion.
b) If you belive that Ben Shneiderman is right and ignore the masses who complain about ugly looking Windows, Toolbars, Menu's and things like that. Then there is only one word for it 'ignorance'.
c) I am over 23 years into computer business now. You can belive it or not I made a lot of mistakes myself in my former times when developing stuff on the Amiga. I for my own learned the lesson. Sadly to see other people making the same mistakes over and over again. To get these things solved you can't simply go and provide patches, you need to convince the maintainers, developers and people first.

Aesthetics of software is indeed important. But solving aesthetics doesn't mean 'go into GLADE or the XML file or the code (people still hardcode things)) and tweak 10 lines with paddings and fonts stuff. Often aesthetical abnormality occours due to problems in the framework. Simply fixing the aesthetics doesn't solve the real issue which is the framework.

KDE (coming back to the HIG problem again) has the benefits of not having such huge problems in the aesthetics. The Toolbars are all similar, the Menus are all similar and the Windows are all similar as well. They interoperate correctly and it's hardly possible to make mistakes in misplacing things, or have things behave strangely because the framework is better.

I give you a good example: open 10 different apps, say yelp, devhelp, abiword, evolution ... and to fill up the remaining ones choose as you like.

Open the 'Mouse & Toolbars' preferences program and change the Toolbar behaviour and look what happens with the apps.

I do understand the needs of a HIG but it doesn't make much sense using the GNOME HIG as argumentation in such conversations when we all know that it's not used the way it should. It doesn't give any advantages if 1/2 of the apps follow it and the other 1/2 not. To solve this problem you need to convince the developers/maintainers and people (maybe those who read OSNews). Then we can continue arguing the big benefits of HIG. Maybe KDE doesn't have a HIG (maybe it does, well it does) but it's not necessary for them to ride on it since their apps will automatically follow these rules due to it's framework. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 01:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Sorry, but I have used KDE on a dayly basis since before KDE 2 and I agree with Eugenia all the way.

Both on the fact that KDE is beats Gnome on technical matters and that KDE usability sucks compared to Gnome. I use KDE only because Gnome so far doesn't provide the functionality I need.

Just look at the crowded context meny in konqueror, look at the menu that pops up when you do drag & drop files, not to mention single click as default mouse behavior and the ugly, hard to read window titles in keramik.

All of this is enough to prevent new users from ever becoming long tinme users of KDE. If I had not started to use KDE back when Gnome was a bad joke I would probably not given KDE a second thought. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 01:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > Just look at the crowded context meny in konqueror

Have you tried konqueror 3.2? It's context menus are actually less busy than Nautilus 2.4 (but perhaps not 2.5) now.

> look at the menu that pops up when you do drag & drop files,

That's a nice feature.

>not to mention single click as default mouse behavior

single click as default is done for usability reasons.

> or and the ugly, hard to read window titles in keramik.

I agree that Keramik is a bad default theme. plastik all the way! Tue, 16 Dec 2003 01:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? With regards to kfm/konqueror seperation - I use the two together often spliting the screen into tabs and paynes and having some browsing local disks - some browsing the local network - some ftp and some on web pages.... I also use the inbuilt terminal (Window->Show Terminal Emulator)

With regards to the number of buttons in konqueror I can say that I use most of them expecially the find and Text Zoom Buttons....

With regards to kcontrol.... There are too many options but there are people out there who depend on just about all of those options... Only options that can be factored out because there is a way to have KDE behave properly for everyone without the options. Fortuneatly kcontrol has a very modular nature so reworking options shouldn't be a huge hassle. For me Gnome just does not have the options I need. I actually find Kcontrol easier to navigate than the windows control panels... Since everything is available from the one place. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 02:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "a) Who says that Ben Shneiderman is right? He is just one person with own opinion."

The more important thing is not "is one person right?". But is it several saying similiar things. Assuming of course your "he's one person" implies that you'll be swayed by numbers.

"b) If you belive that Ben Shneiderman is right and ignore the masses who complain about ugly looking Windows, Toolbars, Menu's and things like that. Then there is only one word for it 'ignorance'."

The "masses" believe in a great many things. Ghosts, UFOs, The man on the grassy knoll. That doesn't mean that they've always got their "reasons" straight.[1]

"c) I am over 23 years into computer business now. You can belive it or not I made a lot of mistakes myself in my former times when developing stuff on the Amiga. I for my own learned the lesson. Sadly to see other people making the same mistakes over and over again. To get these things solved you can't simply go and provide patches, you need to convince the maintainers, developers and people first. "

This is however the "OSS development model", not the closed source.

[1] In short people have been studying each other for centuries. From time and mothion studies, to "how does the mind work?", to Freuds "A cigar is just a cigar". We've been picking each other apart, and as time has passed, so we've gotten better. While the process of building a good GUI isn't perfect it is however built on more than just smoke an mirrors. "Sight unseen" doesn't mean "doesn't exists" as it applies to the human mind. Psychology, sociology, anthropology, economics, those and more all come into play when designing something for the "masses". Try designing a GUI for the Asian market, that takes into account cultural differences. How about for the handicapped? Or those who work in a steel mill? Tue, 16 Dec 2003 03:16:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? whats wrong with keramik? lol Tue, 16 Dec 2003 04:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? KDialog sounds really intresting, any chance we could get a URL? Tue, 16 Dec 2003 04:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Excellent article Eugenia. --: ) Tue, 16 Dec 2003 05:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I'm BASIC USER and I want simple options for my BASIC little brain. Seriously, how many people think of themselves as BASIC?


Quote:

"3. Menu clutter.....why not have a global option somewhere that gives the user "basic user" or "power user" settings. This could be chosen as part of the first start-up wizard. The basic version could be like Mac OS X while the detailed gives the power user all the extra options. Presently KDE looks just too messy although I like having access to all the options." Tue, 16 Dec 2003 06:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I just wanted to say that I tried out SuSE 8.2, and they have an improved control center. They added "back" icons which make the control center much more usable. It would be cool to integrate these ideas into the mainstream KDE. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 06:57:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? My pet peeve about reviews is: Screen shots should be smaller than your target audience's screen resolution becase ... they'll be looking at them in a browser, or a viewer, and nobody (I mean _nobody_) wants to spend their time scrolling around trying to get a sense of what they're looking at. So if you think everyone in the world has 1280x1024, then screenshots should be 1024x768. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 07:08:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Someone has wondered if KDE Devels are taking a look at this. I'm not sure about the core devels, but some have. There has also been a kind user who created bug tickets at bugs.kde.org.

Before I start, a bit of background: I am a KDE developer, I have used KDE since before release 1.0; I have never used GNOME, I suck at UI and usability (thankfully for you I don't design UI either). Also note this is all IMHO: my humble opinion; I don't judge myself to know better than anyone else here.

Setting aside the general flames ("KDE doesn't have HIG", "KDE should be more like ", "Konqueror is a mess") without explanation or base, the article and the comments do raise some interesting questions. I have read through all comments, and this is I think people have most often complained:

1) KDE needs polishing; Keramic looks ugly
2) Too much configuration, creating clutter and bloat
3) Context menus and KDE Control Center hard to navigate
4) too many text editors

My opinion, in order:
1) I love Keramik and I don't like Plastik or Alloy (what's with the names?). I like bright icons. But I agree that a bit of polishing is required in quite a few areas: some Crystal icons are missing (thankfully they're being added as we speak), sometimes they don't get loaded, etc. I can't say much about this because I kinda like how things are now.

2) This is the hardest point. Yes, there's a lot of configuration. And yes it probably overwhelms a novice user. But if you'd ask me if the solution was to remove the possibilities, I'd answer "No, No way in hell". There has to be another solution than to dumb down.

This probably has to be discussed and a solution found. I don't pretend to know it. But I'd like to have all options possible if I want to, not accessible through a hard configuration mechanism. Oh, and by the way, the new KDE framework for creating configuration files automatically generates a configuration UI: so you get lots of configuration possibilities because it's easy to let the user choose.

3) Quite often I do get lost myself in kcontrol or in the K Menu. kcontrol has already been reorganised for 3.2 and I think it had already suffered reorganisation not long before. The sheer amount of options makes things hard to find, so this is linked with #2 above. But I don't go to kcontrol on a day-to-day basis: once is enough for most of the tasks. Whatever I have to do more often, I know already where to find.

As for the K Menu, I don't agree. I like having all available applications in the menu, even if I most often use Alt+F2 to launch stuff. Want application XYZ? It's there.

Note: this could get even more cluttered as .desktop and virtual folders are standardised, so any application can easily install a menu entry.

4) KEdit, KWrite, Kate, Quanta, KDevelop.
KEdit is only there because Kate doesn't support BiDi yet. So users of right-to-left languages would be mad at you if KEdit were removed.
KWrite and Kate are the same application.
Quanta is a web designing tool and KDevelop is a programming environment. Both are way too heavy for text-file editing (which I do in Emacs anyways). What's interesting is that both use the same KatePart backend for their editors.

Some complaints people have here (can't remove the Up button, KMail pops up if you write "attachment", etc.), you can configure those. Maybe those things don't make sense for you, but they might very well do for lots of other people. (to quote one developer when he forgot an attachment, "why can't KMail attach ~/patch when I say 'the patch'?").

Finally, I'd like people that want to help (and not just troll) to use the KDE Bugzilla and post their bugs and wishes and get involved in the mailing lists. Idle speculation serves no good. Just please, please look at duplicates first, so as to save us work. Debugging symbols are greatly appreciated, as well. Please also note that KDE 3.2 is frozen for features; those will go in 3.3. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 07:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://developer.kde.org/documentation/tutorials/kdialog/t1.html Tue, 16 Dec 2003 08:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? nothing more to say Tue, 16 Dec 2003 09:06:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Registry!! NOOOO!
Then I would have change to something else that DO have menues to configure everything instead of some cryptic shitty strings in some database file..
Also, I find those "lines" in GTK apps very annoying and thinks KDE and QT looks *MUCH* cleaner because it DON'T have those. And lots of icons is what I *do* need in apps for easy access to stuff you don't want to (or can't have) keyboard shortcuts to.. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 09:11:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I didn't look at the screenshots before, due to my not so high speed internet connection, but now I checked and yes you have it there. :-) Just that the screenshot also shows that Quanta does not have the new vertical, auto-expanding widgets. So sorry for thinking you've expressed your opinion without looking it at, but neverthless what you said was not true. :-)

Regarding the crash: I can't reproduce, so if you have time and you care about it, you may fill a bug report, with backtrace and so. Might be a packaging problem though.

Andras Tue, 16 Dec 2003 11:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? There is a big difference saying that an app has too many Menu/Toolbar entries or that KDE itself is a bit unclean (the way it installs, no subcategories for include/library dirs as in GNOME or things like having 3 Editors.

But all this is in no way related to HIG.

Menu/toolbar bloat is indeed related to the HIG. You should read the first chapter of the GNOME HIG for a nice overview of usability principles http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gup/hig/1.0/usabilityprinciples...

Many people believe that the GNOME HIG is nothing but pixelpushing, but it's so much more than that; it's a comprehensive UI document for creating well designed and easy-to-use applications. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 11:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? This is due to using paragraph tags with font definitions inside them, without closing the font tags. What happens is that your HTML code opens up a paragraph and then a font tag inside of it. The font tag however is not closed until later in the html code (outside of the paragraph block.)

Konqueror is actually then following the standards on this. A font inside of a paragraph will be closed when the paragraph itself is closed. Other browsers seem to ignore this, just causing more bad HTML programming.

Placing the font tag definition outside of a paragraph tag and it instantly works without the problems that happened before.

Blaming a browser for not correctly displaying badly written HTML code is not really the best thing to do when one also state that standards should also be upheld. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 12:20:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Good if KDE team will hire some designers for redesign menus and applications styles. I mean gui designers. Now kde looks good but it is more cool-like style but not for proffesional work and it is not usable-flexible style. Tue, 16 Dec 2003 22:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? hooray for options. I love being able to change every little thing, and I do. Gnome often does not let me: instead a gnome developer decides how things should be and I am stuck with it.

As far as app bloat goes: using debian I am able to pick and choose what apps I want, and I certainly don't take all of them. It's nice to have the choice there though.

Looking forward to the 3.2 release, and I sure owuldn't mind seeing further tweaks (burn CD, cervisia etc on html context menu is dumb) Thanks to all who donate their time for this stuff. Thu, 25 Dec 2003 03:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments