That day has already come and passed; dubbed “KDE Frameworks 5” for the technology, and “Plasma 5” for the environment/applications, these technologies have been in circulation as technical demonstrations and alternatives for some months now. A combination of nervous anticipation and memories of being burned by the 4.0 releases lead all but the bravest to venture early and discover nothing nearly as painful as the transition between KDE 3 and Plasma. With KDE Plasma 5.2 being formally announced as the default environment of Kubuntu 15.04 due only months away, Frameworks 5 and Plasma have been recognised as maturing usable products – which means it’s time to take a serious look at what to expect when you turn it on for the first time.
I am extremely impressed with the progress the KDE team has been making with 5.0. I can’t wait until the 5.2 release hits. In any case, this is a very in-depth look at what the current state of KDE 5.x offers – grab a cup of coffee and enjoy.
KDE is now good enough. What´s needed to get Linux out to the masses now is actually to quit all the other attempts so there will be “one linux desktop”.
Choice is good. Except, our moms and dads doesn’t quite get the concept of distros.
Personally, I like Mate more than KDE.
Massive shrug.
I found nothing as flexible as KDE. As the author put it:
That’s a key feature for me.
Edited 2015-01-22 23:40 UTC
Why does it have to? Sure, it’s nice when Linux and open source becomes more widespread, but not at the cost of its freedom and diversity. Let there be competition of ideas and visions. Stopping other attempts will just result in stagnation. It’s survival of the fittest: it might take a bit longer short term, but it ensures progress in the long run. A failed project or idea is also a good thing, it teaches us what steps or directions to avoid.
Besides, who is going to tell other people to stop working on their projects?
Edited 2015-01-22 22:04 UTC
That’s exactly the cost.
Why does the KDE project use meaningless names like “Plasma”, “Plasmoids”, “Kickoff”, “Muon” & “Krunner”? Surely these are names only a geek could love. To me they even seem juvenile.
On a more positive note, I’m glad they’ve put work into reorganizing the dog’s breakfast that is the old system settings.
I don’t know why I got down voted. I’ve never seen user interface guidelines on big, successful projects that say “call core components by whatever names you want, especially if they in no way aid user comprehension”. Even the metaphors don’t match. “Plasma” and “Muon” remind one of science, but where on Earth does Krunner get its meaning from?
The technology underlying KDE is impressive, but silly stuff like this is a real shame.
Well, for one, those things aren’t even meant to matter to the Average Janes or Joes. Does Metro, for example, really reflect the new Windows 8 UI? Is it really a sane, descriptive name that will appeal to regular folks? No? Well, there you go, then.
Metro is a much better name that Plasma. Visually the connection between the rectangular style of Metro and a real-life metropolitan skyline with rectangular buildings and windows is immediately obvious, like any good metaphor. In a visual sense Plasma is what, exactly? Something to do with gas? Something else? Nothing at all?
Metro if it means metropolitan denotes style which very restricted and rigid.
Plasma sounds like something very dynamic and turbulent as well as bright and radiating light. I.e. very flexible and alive look and feel.
Fitting names it seems for very limited Windows and very flexible KDE.
Edited 2015-01-22 23:51 UTC
Plasmas also tend to be unstable…
(vs rigid/stable metropolitan buildings)
No that’s not immediately obvious, I’ve never associated the way Metro looks and behaves to that of a real-life metropolitan skyline, and I still don’t see it.
In a visual sense, Plasma is bright, colorful and dynamic.
You realize “Krunner” is “K Runner”, right?
I didn’t until you pointed it out. And one reason why is that it’s another meaningless term. What is a “runner”? In English it has many meanings, and none in everyday use mean “launcher”. Presumably the intended meaning is “run program”, and therefore “runner” is derived from that, but it’s drowned out by the meanings the term “runner” already has.
Not any more than launcher. Launch what? Run what? It’s quote obvious when it comes to programs.
Oh come on, really?!
Runner as the name for something which runs stuff.
Not very obscure is it?
This just sounds like a justification of your original claim.
Let’s look at some other names:
Excel, Powerpoint, Outlook, Skype, Explorer, Visio
Humans are pretty good at learning new names. Its just that you are unfamiliar with those names.
Don’t invent problems that aren’t there.
Yes, really. There is a KDE wiki entry to explain the meaning:
KRunner is the launcher built into the Plasma desktop. While its basic function is to launch programs from a sort of mini-command-line, its functionality can be extended by “runners” to assist the user to accomplish a lot of tasks.
https://userbase.kde.org/Plasma/Krunner
I added the emphasis. What it does is in bold. The obscure term is in italics. If it were obvious what “Krunner” means (note the spelling on the wiki page), then this text would not need to explain it. If it were obvious what “Plasma” is, then the text would not need to add the term desktop to indicate that “Plasma” has something to do with the desktop.
To KDE geeks this is all very obvious and they know everything by heart. To regular users who are not familiar with KDE, the confusion resulting from unfamiliar terms is compounded by the mixture of science metaphors, computer metaphors (e.g. “frameworks”), and random terms beginning with K.
I know of no other mainstream OS that takes this approach.
Perhaps KDE might like to tap a linguistic anthropologist on the shoulder and ask him or her to study KDE program names and how ordinary users perceive them.
[q]To KDE geeks this is all very obvious and they know everything by heart. To regular users who are not familiar with KDE, the confusion resulting from unfamiliar terms is compounded by the mixture of science metaphors, computer metaphors (e.g. “frameworks”), and random terms beginning with K.
I know of no other mainstream OS that takes this approach.
well ‘frameworks’ is an underlying architecture so its unlikely to bother a user.
Prefixing names with arbitrary letter? errr, iTunes running on an iPhone, iPod, iPad. I think people get it.
Safari is an internet browser. People understand that. As they do with Chrome, firefox, opera.
You seem to be attributing an approach solely to KDE which is common, and in fact the standard approach.
Applications can and do have all kinds of names, no doubt about it. Some are clever and memorable, some purely functional.
Giving names to core parts of the OS experience is quite different. Here we are far more likely to find functional metaphors like “menu” or “desktop”. I don’t use OS X, but I guess “spotlight” must be related to searching, so if I’m right I’d say that’s a pretty good metaphor.
The departure from functional metaphors is why KDE is forced to say “Plasma desktop” when talking about Plasma to those outside of the KDE community, otherwise no one will have any idea what they’re talking about.
This is also one important reason (among others) why even Microsoft, with all their marketing $, now uses the name “Windows Store Apps” to refer to what we here all know as “Metro”. It’s much clearer than “Metro Apps”.
Does anyone else other than a KDE geek care that there are some things called KDE Plasma and Plasmoids? Why should they care? If they are a KDE user but not a geek, maybe they have some vague idea it’s something to do with desktop.
So what is the prospective or current KDE user who is not in on all these strange names supposed to make of the most recent release announcement, where “Plasma” and “Frameworks” are absolutely front and center? It’s hardly welcoming. In fact I suspect of a lot of users it’s off-putting. It certainly is to me.
No one had have any idea what Metro was either, until MS added desktop to it.
KDE’s wiki may describe KRunner as “the launcher”, but runner is definitely good name for it. When you write something on it, it runs a search for things it can do with your input. If you wrote an app name you can choose to launch that app. If you wrote a command line command, you can run that command. If you wrote something that can be converted to another unit (e.g., 10 m), it runs unit conversions.
Because it’s 1) fairly subjective, and 2) refreshing to have names that aren’t obviously dreamt up by a herd of marketing sheep.
Have an upvote. It’s a shame downvotes sometimes get abused to voice disagreement with what at least to me looks like your honest opinion.
Because people used to complain about KDE components having telling names but with a K. Like Konsole, KMail, Kontakt, Kalendar, Konqueror, KOffice (KWord, KSpread and others) and so forth.
This was one of the more common critiques against KDE3.x.
This changed in the KDE4.x series, with new components like Plasma, Akonadi, Nepomuk, Dolphin (replaces Konqueror), Calligra (former KOffice) and so forth.
And was done to accommodate those who like you, didn’t like the names they used.
I know I’m being pedantic, but Calligra and Dolphin are different applications from KOffice and Konqueror (in case you were implying they were new names for the old).
Calligra is a fork of KOffice, which continued development for about a year afterwards before it was discontinued, and Dolphin is a different filemanager – Konqueror still exist, and still works as a file manager. It just isn’t the default.
You’re technically correct, the best kind of correct.
I was trying to imply that Dolphin was new and replaced Konqueror as the default filemanager. (Technically Dolphin already existed as a separate project late in the KDE3.x life-cycle and was ported to KDE4.x, but that’s not important right now).
Calligra is a fork (originally with most of the same developers), but since KOffice has been discontinued and Calligra replaces it, I don’t consider the distinction important for an ordinary user or for the point I was making
Well, I prefer KDE3 in every way even the silly K-names cause at least they were self-explanatory and meant something.
I loved KDE2 and 3 so much, I even contributed code to some parts of them… with KDE4 everything went to hell and sadly KDE5 follows the same path. It’s really sad, no trolling, KDE was my favorite open source project of all time.
Today the only usable Linux desktop for me is MATE. It’s simple, sleek, not trying to reinvent the wheel.
I don’t consider an honest opinion trolling
I completely disagree with you on KDE4.x and KDE5.x. I started using KDE around version 3.5 and loved it, it was one of the reason I kept using Linux. Of cause it helped that a small contribution to Kopete landed my first real job, for which I flunked the interview and only got the job because of that contribution.
But after KDE4 matured I started loving it even more, than KDE3.x.
I’ve been running KF5 for a while now and aside from some stability issues and glitches, I find it a very positive experience.
It’s not perfect, I think some applications like Kontact and KMail needs a serious UI upgrade. At work I’m forced to use Evolution for our Exchange serve, I wish that Akonadi supported Exchange, so I could use KMail and Kalendar (K-names).
I don’t know MATE, so I can’t comment on that
I’ve been using KDE since 1.x, semi-liked KDE 2.x, hated KDE 3 at first, but at loved it by the time it reached 3.5.
KDE 4.0 was a horrible mess, but gradually made its way to being the best DE out there.
I still get a chance to use KDE 3.5.10 from time on a couple of old machines I maintain, and comparing KDE 4.1x to KDE 3.5 is night and day.
I’ve yet to try KDE 5.x.
Let me explain the differences between 3.5.10 and 4.14 in opinion.
1. Plasma:
a. I can actually place different plasmoids on different virtual desktops.
b. The folder view is unbelievably useful when used correctly. I place different folders views on different virtual desktops depending on their use.
c. krunner. I use it all the time.
d. Notifications are much, much better. Ordered by type, more informative, etc.
e. KDE UI 3.5.10 looks very dated.
2. Konsole:
Better interface, more configurable, I can attach and detach sessions, etc. In short, far better.
3. Dolphin:
a. Faster.
b. Cleaner look.
d. Far more configurable (especially when it comes to size and grouping).
e. Better preview.
Last week I used KDE 3.5.10 for a couple of hours. It felt like using a UI from the mid 90’s…
– Gilboa
Baloo? Akonadi? Nepomuk? Strigi? I totally agree: there could not be any less descriptive names.
CHrome? Opera? Safari? FireFox?!?! let’s all just use Internet Explorer. Now there’s a really descriptive name!
What’s in a name? That which we call a Plasmoid by any other name would smell as sweet.
I want to like it but can’t because it still looks like this: https://kver.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/snapshot6.png
WHY IS THERE SO MUCH WHITE SPACE
I’m really tired of the current trend to make everything flat. I don’t want to guess if something is a button or not and whether or not that button has been pressed.
Finally the window manager decorations are starting to look less incongruous with the rest of the UI. In earlier revisions, the default window manager just looked ugly and stuck out like a sore thumb. The new flat look is better, but it’s still not all the way there. They need to make it look more like plasmoids because (a) it would make the UI look more unified and (b) plasmoids look cool.
I´m using Plasma 5 now for two months. Imo it looks mature, like something you can expose Mac users to. It is also fast, and it allows all of my usual workflows.
Except they redid the systray, which makes Thunderbird and KeePassX not fit in there anymore, so I have to run an second systray now in another corner of the screen. Which is annoying.