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What you call needless cruft, I call useful features... But to each his own.



That is strange, as in general every KDE application is completely network transparent, which means you don't need a local copy for most things.

There lies the problem, the features are useful to you, but clutter to others. So the interface is logical to you but full of noise for other people.

Gnome, Firefox and many other programs have a simple solution: plugins.

Now you can hand pick what features are available and not be bothered by features cluttering up the interface that only a few people use, sometimes.

no, he's right, afaik the KIO systen in KDE 3 needs a local copy. Fixed in KDE 4 of course ;-)

Yes, this is really annoying. It breaks the natural workflow. Draging things from one point to another fits well in the Desktop metaphore, while linking and copying stretches the concept a bit. The menu that pops up have four items:

"Move Here"
"Copy Here"
"Link Here"
"Cancel"

Now consider this:

On most computer systems I have worked with, the number of links usually is around 1/1000 of all files in the system, and most of them are created by scripts.

Now ow many times do we actually want to cancel a drag operation when it have gon as far as we hold the file(s) over the drop target?

This means that two of the four menu items will be used very or even extremely seldom, while of the remaining two one ("Move Here"I most likely will dominate. E.g. consider sorting files from a digital camera into different folders depending on subject.

In other words every time we move a file we are asked what we want to do even though some of the alternatives are so much more probable than others.

Another thing, if you actually want to make a link, the "Link Here" behavior is completely hidden, i.e. the only way to find out that the functionality is there is to drag and drop a file. How would a blind person find this out, as the easiest way for him to move or copy files would be to use copy and paste from the ordinary konquere window menus.

The only environment that does this good is actually windows, here simple drags and drops can be performed with the left menu buttons, but if you hold down the right menu button and drag a file, you get a menu similar to that in KDE. Not to mention that in windows the the "Link Here" behavior is not hidden

It is also something that makes it stand out against most other desktop environments available, making a transition from e.g. windows to KDE harder.

This shoudl really be configurable in KDE, they can hardly argue that this would have resulted in too many optioions, as there are allready so many options for things that are far less groundbreaking differences in beheavior.

Not being able to configure this in konqueroer or dolphin is also inconsistent with KDE itself, as a similar menu exists in Kmail, where you actually can configure if you want the menu or not.

Even worse the problem remains in KDE4 and dolphin. In fact the problem gets worse. If you drag a file from a Konquerer or Dolphin window to the desktop a plasmoid is created on the desktop without any menu popping up as it do if you drag it to another konqeror or dolphin window.

The following is unfortunately all in the realm of "anecdotes and personal preferences" (as a previous poster put it), but as I can only speak for myself I don't know what else I could do.

In other words every time we move a file we are asked what we want to do even though some of the alternatives are so much more probable than others.

I use "link here" all the time. I can also be a spaz and realize I've dragged something over the wrong directory (never mind when I didn't actually mean to drag something in the first place). Being able to cancel is welcome.

Now from what I read about dragging with the middle mouse button in Gnome, they have a nice solution for that (one I didn't realize until now, despite using Gnome for a few months now). I'd be satisfied with that for linking, though I'm left with the question of visibility, given that I had no idea that option was there.

Even worse the problem remains in KDE4 and dolphin. In fact the problem gets worse. If you drag a file from a Konquerer or Dolphin window to the desktop a plasmoid is created on the desktop

The desktop in Plasma is broken (see my initial disclaimer).

Edited 2008-03-22 21:19 UTC

"In GNOME it defaults to moving the file and copying it if the those two locations aren't under the same mount point."

Guess what... that is exactly one of the things that annoy me in GNOME. I prefer to be asked what I want to do whit that file.

Then middle click + drag and stop whining. You'll get the same menu as KDE gives you by default, but only when you want it, not every time you attempt to copy a file.

The great myth perpetuated by you and others is that GNOME isn't configurable. The truth of the matter is that sane defaults are used and prominent, whilst geeky or rarely used functionality is left to the geek to track down. Power users and desktop tweakers will possess the knowledge (and let's face it, time) to hunt down the proper settings (typically in GConf).

I'm not in any particular "camp" regarding the Desktop Jihad, but uninformed arguments like yours do nothing to further the development of either platform. GNOME's file drag 'n' drop behavior is an excellent example of UI design for both geeks and mortals. If this is the great flaw of GNOME, we need more failures like it. If this is your argument in favor of KDE, I'll stick with WMII, thank you very much.

LOL... You've got to hand it to you gnome fanboys. You can turn any missing function into a "usability" advantage and actually believe it.
Worse, when KDE has a feature that gnome lacks like global spellchecking, well we'll just call that clutter.
You are totally owned.
Drag and drop functionality in gnome is just deranged.
How is a user to know how it works? What if you don't have a middle mouse button like 90% of laptops?
Gnome is an abomination.

Just like on MSWindows, you can use the standard keyboard modifiers. Start a drag-n-drop and press shift to move, ctrl to copy, or alt to open a context menu.