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Oh my, evertying about LWUIT seems ugly. It is an ugly acronym, the screenshots look horrible (green text on a very pink folded person) and the rotating cube is unaliassed and completely unnecessary.

There is an article on ZDnet explaining the differences between JavaFX and LWUIT. It explains that LWUIT is a stop gap for people that cannot use JavaFX yet. But looking at the content of the LWUIT homepage I conclude that SUN could have better not release LWUIT at all.

As for phone GUIs, I'm rooting for Plasma. At Akademy last week I saw lots of EEE PCs and other small PCs, Nokia internet tablets, OLPC and OpenMoko machines all running Plasma. And it looks amazing and is easy to use and customize.

The difference in race is only really marked when you compare the Hungarians to other Finno-Ugrians. As I point out in another comment, the Hungarians are so mixed genetically because they've lived in a crossroads between the Western European, Slavic and Turkic regions for so long. Their language reflects this, having virtually no similarities to other Finno-Ugrian languages anymore.

Actually, there are still some connections. I was amazed when a Hungarian guy in aKademy could effortlessly decipher the Finnish phrase "elÃvà kala ui veden alla."

Most of the documentation can be found on techbase. About usability, take a look on the project page and a specific example on label alignment. Of course, there are also the doxygen API docs.

I can't say it's as good or complete as MSDN, but don't forget we also have mailing lists and IRC to complement that.

Disclaimer: I'm not an expert myself, I never made a KDE GUI. But I think that the fact that we have people who focus this alone means that we will make advancements in usability which will create a better "desktop experience", for users and developers. And their moms.

Most of the documentation can be found on techbase. About usability, take a look on the project page and a specific example on label alignment. Of course, there are also the doxygen API docs.

I can't say it's as good or complete as MSDN, but don't forget we also have mailing lists and IRC to complement that.

Disclaimer: I'm not an expert myself, I never made a KDE GUI. But I think that the fact that we have people who focus this alone means that we will make advancements in usability which will create a better "desktop experience", for users and developers. And their moms.

Most of the documentation can be found on techbase. About usability, take a look on the project page and a specific example on label alignment. Of course, there are also the doxygen API docs.

I can't say it's as good or complete as MSDN, but don't forget we also have mailing lists and IRC to complement that.

Disclaimer: I'm not an expert myself, I never made a KDE GUI. But I think that the fact that we have people who focus this alone means that we will make advancements in usability which will create a better "desktop experience", for users and developers. And their moms.

Most of the documentation can be found on techbase. About usability, take a look on the project page and a specific example on label alignment. Of course, there are also the doxygen API docs.

I can't say it's as good or complete as MSDN, but don't forget we also have mailing lists and IRC to complement that.

Disclaimer: I'm not an expert myself, I never made a KDE GUI. But I think that the fact that we have people who focus this alone means that we will make advancements in usability which will create a better "desktop experience", for users and developers. And their moms.

Gotta say a good browser is essential, and KDE's konqueror browser is in a truly hopeless situation. The developers' attention is focused on KDE4, and they have no time to fix any of the literally 1000s of severe bugs in konqueror. They don't even have the time to confirm or reject the open bug reports from five years ago!! There are hundreds of really critical bugs like javascript crashes, remote code execution vulnerabilities, screwed up rendering, etc etc etc. It's a total mess. KDE has nowhere near enough developers to even make a start on konqueror's bugs. I'd say KDE's flagship browser is dead in the water.

http://techbase.kde.org/Projects/KDE_on_Windows/Installation#KDE_Installer_for_Windows

There is a standard installer that will download the packages and even put them in your Start Menu.

I also enjoy your signature. Very subtle.

I stop now joking. I really appreciate that Thunderbird now deflate. What use for RSS ou newsgroups or Calendar for the most people ? And why not having these functions as addons, for having Tb lightweight enough for being used on ... say... an eee pc ?

I use Kontact on my laptop and Eee PC. Both are running Kubuntu hardy.

I use the calendar, e-mail, RSS, news group and notes features of Kontact.

This post really annoyed me.

Go to http://bugs.kde.org/ and have a look at the types of bug reports we get and look at the responses.

I personally work on the task manager. I get around 1 bug report a day. Out of them, perhaps 1 in 20 is a suggestion for improving usability. And I have never received anything approaching a UI design document.

I have registered my app on www.openusability.org as well as with the internal kde usability group, and I browse forums for suggestions. And despite all this, I _still_ have not found a usability expert who has time to work on this app.

For the whole of the KDE project we have I think only 1 (maybe 2?) trained usability experts. There is far more demand than supply.

The fact is that people are willing to bitch about some app not being usable, but they are far less likely to put the effort into trying to come up with a good alternative solution and work with developers to get it implemented.

BTW if someone says that I should have filed proper bug reports, note that the bug reports concerning this problem have been reported a long time ago to relevant bugzillas.

What those issues need is a dedicated and experienced Gnome/KDE programmer to step in and solve them (I am not one).

How was the engineers able know what the ship could withstand beforehand? By the same methodology that lets engineers know that software has no bugs before an release? If that's the case, I can't really blame them for doing Quality Assurance.

A better explaination can be found here. I'm also running KDE4 with an NVidia 8800, yet this "choppy resize" problem does not affect me, so I haven't needed a workaround.

Which context menu on right click are you talking about? They do show up fine here as expected, like in one of the announcement's screenshots: http://www.kde.org/announcements/4.1/screenshots/plasma-folderview.png Thanks for calling people all these words, but note that it doesn't make you look good in the eyes of those that are actually able to find something as simple as a context menu without having to curse in public first. I guess it's just a bad day for you. Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

...from the KDE devs, read this before you install:

http://techbase.kde.org/Schedules/Is_KDE_4.1_for_you%3F

(Disclaimer: I used KDE 4.0, was aware it was a developer release, and liked it for what it was despite the lack of polish. I've been using the KDE 4.1 betas and RCs for a while and really like what's been done and it's really usable for me. But YMMV and there are some parts that aren't up to par with 3.5.x yet. That's fine - I didn't use those parts. But if you are using them, then 3.5.x is still being patched and updated, so it might be worth waiting 'til 4.2 before you switch.)

Hopefully they've gotten rid of that freakin' kidney shaped thing in the upper right corner. Talk about a useless static "feature". ugh!

Do you mean Aaron's Annoy Me Box?

(apologies to Aaron, whom I respect very much)

http://www.kde.org/info/4.1.0.php

but does it run on windows?

actually... somewhat. Not the desktop environment itself, I dont think, but KDE applications. I wasnt able to get it to work when i tried it a few months ago. it might be working better now.

Please provide an option to disable the upper right cashew.

Although putting an option to disable the cashew for desktops sounds reasonable, from a coding point of view it would introduce unnecessary complexity and would break the design. What has been suggested is, since the destkop itself (a containment) is handled by plugins, to write a plugin that would draw the desktop without the cashew itself. Currently some work ("blank desktop" plugin) is already present in KDE SVN. With containment type switching expected by KDE 4.2, it is not unreasonable to see alternative desktop types developed by then.

http://www.kde.org/download/#v4.1

- panels can be only horizontal. I had small vertical panel with apps buttons on it in 3.5. Doing this is no longer possible with kde 4.1.

- changing order of icons on the panel is not possible or requires some black magic. If it is possible then its hidden deeply.

Nice FUD you got here, mate. For the first question here is a video (made by yours truly) that shows that it can be done. As for the second, the Plasma FAQ gives an answer:

Can I move the applets on the panel?

Just before KDE 4.1 RC1, a change has been introduced in Plasma to allow movement of the applets on the panel. To do so, open up the panel controller (by clicking on the cashew or by right clicking on the panel and selecting "Panel Settings") and hover the mouse cursor over the applets. Its shape will turn into four arrows, and you'll be able to rearrange the applets as you wish.

It's actual functionality that it has really been needing. [...] they've done a very credible job of addressing many of the major shortcomings from the original KDE4(.0) releases.

It is one thing to call a set of libraries a "4.0 release", and another thing altogether calling a Desktop the same thing. Why anyone would label a major and respected Desktop environment as a technology preview and at the same time slap the 4.0 tag on it is beyond me...

The decision to go with 4.0 rather than 4.0 beta 5 was a mistake, in my opinion. Have a look at the release announcement and tell me where it does not describe KDE 4.0 as the immediate successor to KDE 3.5.x? Despite the obvious PR blunder, all this nonsense could have been easily avoided by continuing with the beta series until a product had been ready (rather than a technology). I personally fault KDE for the negative perception that followed their last release.

Are there any fixes? You could try to tweak your GPU-driver settings.

Check http://windows.kde.org/ and use the WinKDE installer to install it: http://winkde.org/pub/kde/ports/win32/installer/kdewin-installer-gui-latest.exe Amarok is available on Windows, too. I think it's not included in the installer yet but you can certainly donwnload it from http://winkde.org/pub/kde/ports/win32/releases/unstable/latest/ and extract the ZIP files yourself. This is what it looks like: http://www.elpauer.org/?p=259

Losing ground like this? And I think someone said that ASUS' EeePC also runs KDE, perhaps other UPMCs do that also? I wouldn't call that "losing ground" at least...

Innovation is messy... you invent a design idea and hope the masses like it. Sometimes the innovation is great and everyone loves it. Sometimes the innovation is awesome but it's not released soon enough so it never takes off and is eclipsed by a different technology. Sometimes the innovation is released too early and everyone hates it.

You don't want innovation from Microsoft. What you really want is a Windows 7 that is enough like XP that you know how to use it and most of your existing application still work, but includes the few features you've come to enjoy on Mac/Linux/BSD/etc. Please stop using the "innovation" buzzword.

Where you understand that the KDE 4 is not complete?

They didn't know, but should have known.

A number of people on kde-devel@ made exactly this argument -- calling it 4.0 would mislead people into thinking it was ready for end users when it's not.

It's not enough to say "Yay, KDE 4.0!", and then follow up with "oh, by the way, this is a technology preview/developer release".

Go read the KDE 4.0 Press Release. There is not one mention of the fact that 4.0 is intended for anything but the general user population. Saying it's "the beginning of the KDE4 era" implies nothing about the quality of the 4.0 release; it only indicates there are more features in the pipeline.

If KDE wanted to send a clear message that 4.0 was not ready for anyone but early-adopters, the press release was the definitive place to do it. But they didn't, and all this angst is the result.

PR mistakes aside, I still think that KDE is, and has been, a great desktop. I've been using trunk as my main desktop for several weeks now, and now that 4.1 has been branched, I'm really looking forward to what 4.2 has to offer.

Not completely. That is, you can't have two versions of each app installed at the same time (unless you install them with some secret incantations and slaughter a goat, etc., you probably know the drill), but you can mix and match with for instance the KDE4 desktop and some apps from KDE3, or vice versa. The good news is that KDE4's settings reside in .kde4, so it won't screw up KDE3.

Another thing you can do is to create a new user, compile KDE from source (very easy to do), and run it from within the source tree without installing. Then you won't be able to screw up anything unless you try hard. Here's a HOWTO.

If you want to use Debian's packages, I recommend you wait a couple of weeks until 4.1 in out and in experimental. Right now the packages are in something of a mess.

We only failed with KDE 4.0 if we measure the work based on others' criteria, not our clearly stated goals.

This particular line is especially pathetic — even if truthful. Yes, according to others, we royally screwed up, but, fortunately, we had our own definitions of the goals.

To see this guys try to wriggle out of this shame is as unpleasant as trying to use their software. They've "redefined" an alpha pre-release as a "4.0". They've followed up with several minor post-releases (it is at 4.0.4 right now, is not it?) — which continue to be both feature-incomplete and buggy. But, I guess, if none of that was among their "clearly stated goals", things are dandy...

To call release of Plasma — the "new development from the ground up" — a "success" by any definition is a bad joke. The software screws itself up every once in a while so badly, the Internet-forums are already full of of advises, like this "just delete .kde/share/config/plasmarc".

KDE appears to have grown a serious marketing department some time ago — I noticed this during their pre-release "tension build-up", which was not unlike that of a new X-Box or iPhone. Heck, their "release party" was Google-sponsored! Except the new X-Box and iPhone work (save, maybe, for a few glitches). KDE4, on the other hand, does not — by anybody's definition, except, maybe, their own.

This most recent "gracious" response is just another marketing spin-attempt...

"Still I often have the case where I have 2 Terminals and 1 Firefox open and need to constantly switch between them"

What I want is something like this:

http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=121349

Summary: you do alt+1, alt+2, alt+3 and so on till alt 9 for the 9 different apps/windows in a "stack" of windows. You press alt+0 to "renumber the stack" by most recently used windows - 1=most recent, 2=next etc.

I don't really care what keystrokes are used as long as it's not too difficult. I don't want to do stupid stuff like "alt tab tab tab tab", or alt tab, move hand to mouse and select the task.

I thought as KDE eV president he was the man responsible. I stand corrected. You are to blame. :-)

The KDE e.V. is a non-profit organization which is intended to handle legal and financial matters for the KDE project. So it has a lot to do with KDE but one thing it does not do is dictate the coding done or the direction the project takes. Which is just as well as many KDE contributions are not KDE e.V. members

KDE is my favorite desktop, and I think you're doing great work. I don't take issue with any of that. I just take issue with the release cycle/version numbering. I would not have released a 4.0 without the KDE killer app - KOffice - ported and ready to go. Did MS release Win95 separate from Office? No. What good is a platform release if none of the major apps are ready? Why upgrade?

Well I wouldn't say *none* were ready. :) But yes, before KOffice and for example KDE PIM (the "killer app" for a lot of people) could be ported there had to be libraries to develop on. Even right before we released 4.0 we were debating internally on whether or not it was a good idea based on the status of the applications and libraries. In the end I think the fact that only released software actually gets used (and therefore tested) won the day. We didn't release a bomb with known show stoppers and I know it was put somewhere that Plasma had some changes yet to go, but it was important to at least release something once we had something that we could release.

Think about it this way, with the release of 4.0 we got *tons* of user feedback, mostly from bleeding-edges users who don't have the time or inclination to manually build betas or release candidates. There was a corresponding large increase in code quality from 4.0 to 4.0.1 (and on to 4.0.4). In addition since the number of people routinely using 4.0 went up after the release we got a lot of feedback about where to go as far as features are concerned and right now the 4.0 to 4.1 leap is looking like one of the most impressive minor version bumps in the time I've been using and working on KDE.

Had we not released KDE 4.0 then at this point we might just be getting to a 4.0.2 quality and 4.1 would still be a ways off yet. I know people are annoyed when they install shiny new 4.0.4 and it's missing stuff they liked in 3.5 but if KDE holds onto its code forever then it risks becoming completely irrelevant. And that's all we did, a release, we didn't make people use it, we didn't put things into the release notes that didn't actually exist, and although based on the feedback we managed to oversell 4.0 that was not our intention.

I hope you understand that my interest is just in KDE succeeding.

I appreciate that, I'm just trying to stick up for Aaron when he receives undeserved criticism. I understand that he is in many ways the public face of KDE but it's still a project whose path is dictated by where the development takes it. Aaron leads by example with Plasma but there is much much more to KDE 4 than just a new taskbar and widgets.

Protip: If you're married/in a relationship then attach a "Picture Frame" plasmoid of your significant other to your desktop. It's in the background so it won't interfere with your work but when the desktop is visible so is the picture which has scored me major brownie points with my wife at least. ;)

This is not the default.

Yes, it is the the default for the product called KUbuntu Hardy Heron. Version, mind you, 8.04.1 at the moment — not "beta" or "pre-release", not even a x.0, which we've learned to be wary of by now.

And yet, the beta-versions of the much-derided Windows are a lot more stable and feature-complete than this. And it is not even Ubuntu — their only fault is attempting to "turn shit into chicken salad". KDE-4 remains a poor ingredient — it was "released" a year too early, evidently, because even 4.1 (still in beta right now) is not offering the same features, that KDE-3.x has.

If you don't like it, deinstall it

Same can be said about all free software — are you suggesting, all criticism of it is "baseless"?

There is a bug filed against Konsole. If I still had the patch I'd send it, but having been told it wouldn't be accepted I didn't feel like maintaining an install from svn just to have that one thing and went back to using gnome's terminal.

https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=156636

Yet no one knows what the long term design plans for Plasma are. The users keep getting surprised, and they feel that Plasma over-promised and under-delivered.

On top of that you have Aaron Segio now suggesting that users should have less control over configuration, fewer choices, and saying that end users are dumb. He also has suggested repeatedly lately that if you're not a coder, then you can't comment on UI issues.

Why don't you ask the Plasma developer*s* (i.e. more than just Aaron)? In addition the KDE feature plans are linked to from the front page of the KDE TechBase. For things not covered there you could add Planet KDE to your news reader or subscribe to the panel-devel mailing list. Want to see all commits made just to plasma? Use the KDE commit filter.

As far as Aaron he's been under a constant heap of criticism lately because Plasma in KDE 4 is not *exactly like* kicker+kdesktop in KDE 3 so perhaps you can excuse him for being irritable. Perhaps you have examples that are not taken out of context however, instead of just claiming that he hates users? On that note was there an announcement that KDE made that you felt over-promised what Plasma would do? If that's happened we at KDE need to get that rectified.

Gnome already has a few of those problems (removing choice, treating users like they're dumb)

Have you ever thought that taking the trouble to make a program easier to use doesn't necessarily imply that the user is dumb? I'd respond to your specific comment except that you have mentioned none.

For corporate environments, or people who can't be troubled to configure things, they just want working defaults and simplicity. That isn't a flame, but rather the way things are.

A system that just works and is simple to use? Oh heavens, no! If GNOME has already achieved that (I haven't used it in awhile) then that is something to be congratulated for. Defaults that work are a good idea in general and are separate from features. Adding more checkboxes doesn't make a program more powerful.

Yet no one knows what the long term design plans for Plasma are. The users keep getting surprised, and they feel that Plasma over-promised and under-delivered.

On top of that you have Aaron Segio now suggesting that users should have less control over configuration, fewer choices, and saying that end users are dumb. He also has suggested repeatedly lately that if you're not a coder, then you can't comment on UI issues.

Why don't you ask the Plasma developer*s* (i.e. more than just Aaron)? In addition the KDE feature plans are linked to from the front page of the KDE TechBase. For things not covered there you could add Planet KDE to your news reader or subscribe to the panel-devel mailing list. Want to see all commits made just to plasma? Use the KDE commit filter.

As far as Aaron he's been under a constant heap of criticism lately because Plasma in KDE 4 is not *exactly like* kicker+kdesktop in KDE 3 so perhaps you can excuse him for being irritable. Perhaps you have examples that are not taken out of context however, instead of just claiming that he hates users? On that note was there an announcement that KDE made that you felt over-promised what Plasma would do? If that's happened we at KDE need to get that rectified.

Gnome already has a few of those problems (removing choice, treating users like they're dumb)

Have you ever thought that taking the trouble to make a program easier to use doesn't necessarily imply that the user is dumb? I'd respond to your specific comment except that you have mentioned none.

For corporate environments, or people who can't be troubled to configure things, they just want working defaults and simplicity. That isn't a flame, but rather the way things are.

A system that just works and is simple to use? Oh heavens, no! If GNOME has already achieved that (I haven't used it in awhile) then that is something to be congratulated for. Defaults that work are a good idea in general and are separate from features. Adding more checkboxes doesn't make a program more powerful.

Yet no one knows what the long term design plans for Plasma are. The users keep getting surprised, and they feel that Plasma over-promised and under-delivered.

On top of that you have Aaron Segio now suggesting that users should have less control over configuration, fewer choices, and saying that end users are dumb. He also has suggested repeatedly lately that if you're not a coder, then you can't comment on UI issues.

Why don't you ask the Plasma developer*s* (i.e. more than just Aaron)? In addition the KDE feature plans are linked to from the front page of the KDE TechBase. For things not covered there you could add Planet KDE to your news reader or subscribe to the panel-devel mailing list. Want to see all commits made just to plasma? Use the KDE commit filter.

As far as Aaron he's been under a constant heap of criticism lately because Plasma in KDE 4 is not *exactly like* kicker+kdesktop in KDE 3 so perhaps you can excuse him for being irritable. Perhaps you have examples that are not taken out of context however, instead of just claiming that he hates users? On that note was there an announcement that KDE made that you felt over-promised what Plasma would do? If that's happened we at KDE need to get that rectified.

Gnome already has a few of those problems (removing choice, treating users like they're dumb)

Have you ever thought that taking the trouble to make a program easier to use doesn't necessarily imply that the user is dumb? I'd respond to your specific comment except that you have mentioned none.

For corporate environments, or people who can't be troubled to configure things, they just want working defaults and simplicity. That isn't a flame, but rather the way things are.

A system that just works and is simple to use? Oh heavens, no! If GNOME has already achieved that (I haven't used it in awhile) then that is something to be congratulated for. Defaults that work are a good idea in general and are separate from features. Adding more checkboxes doesn't make a program more powerful.

> I asked in the #kde-devel channel if it
> was removed intentionally or just hadn't
> been re-added.

It just hasn't been re-implemented.

You should have been pointed at me rather than Aaron. Terminal related queries will reach me if they are sent to konsole-devel@kde.org , robertknight on #kde-devel or be filed as bugs against Konsole at http://bugs.kde.org/ . Your patch hasn't crossed my path yet and I cannot comment on it until I see it.

KDE is probably the best Desktop out there. Version 4.0 looks promising and shows that they really care about technology. The earlier we switch the better for the platform because a platform grows when its used.

As long as we get a working terminal everything is fine. In particular KDE became now a coding dream. If something is missing for you go and contribute.

http://techbase.kde.org/Welcome_to_KDE_TechBase

http://lists.kde.org/?l=kde-devel&m=121545768518834&w=2

KDE is probably the best Desktop out there. Version 4.0 looks promising and shows that they really care about technology. The earlier we switch the better for the platform because a platform grows when its used.

As long as we get a working terminal everything is fine. In particular KDE became now a coding dream. If something is missing for you go and contribute.

http://techbase.kde.org/Welcome_to_KDE_TechBase

http://lists.kde.org/?l=kde-devel&m=121545768518834&w=2

On top of that you have Aaron Segio now suggesting that users should have less control over configuration, fewer choices, and saying that end users are dumb.

Of course, we are dumb... We want KMail to preserve the HTML-layout of the original, when we are replying to or forwarding it. The enlightened developers have been telling us for years, how stupid it is, but we continue to foolishly insist.

If that's not valid grounds for contempt towards users, I don't know, what is.

On top of that you have Aaron Segio now suggesting that users should have less control over configuration, fewer choices, and saying that end users are dumb.

Of course, we are dumb... We want KMail to preserve the HTML-layout of the original, when we are replying to or forwarding it. The enlightened developers have been telling us for years, how stupid it is, but we continue to foolishly insist.

If that's not valid grounds for contempt towards users, I don't know, what is.

http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=154535

Read his blog. (Oh wait, you can't. He took it down, but check for archived versions!)

And read dot.kde.org and you'll see a plethora of these comments lately from him.

That bug is a good source of many such comments however.

will avoid the problems that plagued KDE 4.0's release.

I made the folly of installing KDE-4 on my mom's new computer (she had KDE-3.5.x before). There were no "problems". There was a total disaster.

The amount of features available in KDE-3 for years, that did not make it into KDE-4 is staggering... Add bugs to that.

And I was not entirely unprepared — I knew better, than to try KDE-4.0, when it came out with the enormous (and Google-sponsored) hoopla. I waited for 4.0.2... You can't even move widgets around on your task-bar yet — that's "scheduled" for version 4.1!

The all-new "plasma"-desktop can't show you the contents of files in ~/Desktop/ — that's still "in the works". Showing the list of files themselves is buggy — every time you login, a new set of icons (one for each of your files) is added to the desktop.

And to think, that I was getting impatient with FreeBSD KDE-team for not upgrading the KDE-ports! These guys were simply protecting me, but no, I wouldn't listen... I installed the much tauted Kubuntu and paid the price (don't even get me started on Ubuntu itself)...

will avoid the problems that plagued KDE 4.0's release.

I made the folly of installing KDE-4 on my mom's new computer (she had KDE-3.5.x before). There were no "problems". There was a total disaster.

The amount of features available in KDE-3 for years, that did not make it into KDE-4 is staggering... Add bugs to that.

And I was not entirely unprepared — I knew better, than to try KDE-4.0, when it came out with the enormous (and Google-sponsored) hoopla. I waited for 4.0.2... You can't even move widgets around on your task-bar yet — that's "scheduled" for version 4.1!

The all-new "plasma"-desktop can't show you the contents of files in ~/Desktop/ — that's still "in the works". Showing the list of files themselves is buggy — every time you login, a new set of icons (one for each of your files) is added to the desktop.

And to think, that I was getting impatient with FreeBSD KDE-team for not upgrading the KDE-ports! These guys were simply protecting me, but no, I wouldn't listen... I installed the much tauted Kubuntu and paid the price (don't even get me started on Ubuntu itself)...

Why listen to a "pundit" when you can go to the source where the issues are dealt with. Yes, eventually you get to something useful like this to sort the FUD out. Basically, KDE 4.0 is not "ready". Though it is more flexible and has all of the old features and more, not all of those features have been exposed yet. This is not a big deal because reasonable distributions still ship with the still excellent KDE 3.5 applications. Bruce needs to do more research before he spouts off like that.

Except that the post isn't about KDE 4.0 it's about KDE 4.1. ANd what, by the way, does your post have to do the post you replied to?

Why listen to a "pundit" when you can go to the source where the issues are dealt with. Yes, eventually you get to something useful like this to sort the FUD out. Basically, KDE 4.0 is not "ready". Though it is more flexible and has all of the old features and more, not all of those features have been exposed yet. This is not a big deal because reasonable distributions still ship with the still excellent KDE 3.5 applications. Bruce needs to do more research before he spouts off like that.

Except that the post isn't about KDE 4.0 it's about KDE 4.1. ANd what, by the way, does your post have to do the post you replied to?

The issue with reviewing KDE 4 betas while you are on Linux is you don't see the big picture. For Linux, it is just a new, high tech looking, bulky KDE. For the other OS'es beyond Linux, it is a game changer for software and desktop.

I am speaking about these:
http://mac.kde.org/
http://wiki.kde.org/tiki-index.php?page=KDE4+Windows+Port

There are people on OS X waiting for Amarok 2, Digikam , KDE PIM to get stable and they will move to them (I trust Digikam more than iPhoto 08), I have never seen anything eagerly waited as Amarok 2 for Windows stable and so on.

KDE 4 deserves some understanding just like Firefox 3 early betas. Firefox moved to Cairo to work a bit natively (only the GFX), KDE4/Qt4 speaks about using Quicktime on OS X and Windows Media Framework on Windows in future.

The issue with reviewing KDE 4 betas while you are on Linux is you don't see the big picture. For Linux, it is just a new, high tech looking, bulky KDE. For the other OS'es beyond Linux, it is a game changer for software and desktop.

I am speaking about these:
http://mac.kde.org/
http://wiki.kde.org/tiki-index.php?page=KDE4+Windows+Port

There are people on OS X waiting for Amarok 2, Digikam , KDE PIM to get stable and they will move to them (I trust Digikam more than iPhoto 08), I have never seen anything eagerly waited as Amarok 2 for Windows stable and so on.

KDE 4 deserves some understanding just like Firefox 3 early betas. Firefox moved to Cairo to work a bit natively (only the GFX), KDE4/Qt4 speaks about using Quicktime on OS X and Windows Media Framework on Windows in future.

I run semi-nightly builds of SVN from Project Neon and I can say I'm very satisfied with KDE 4.1. Compared to 4.0.x there has been a tremendous leap in features and polishing, and the new Plasma features make it better for me to work. An explanation: Plasma enables you to zoom-in and out of your current desktop. When zoomed out, you can add another desktop ("Activity") in which you can place plasmoids like the one you were using before. You can switch between them using keyboard or zooming in and then out.

What makes it different from X11's standard virtual desktops? The fact that activities are completely independent from each other. I have one set of plasmoids on my "leisure" view, a different one in my "coding" view, and yet another one in my "writing" view. In this context, Folder View is absolutely brilliant, as you are not enslaved to ~/Destkop, but instead you can view many more dirs (including remote ones: anything that KIO supports works), and you can filter for file names/extensions (there are plans to do MIME type filtering in the future, IIRC). Like that, I actually work much better than with the old desktop paradigm (I *hated* when desktops became huge and pointless dumping grounds for anything).

Some missing features have crept in since last beta, including moving the applets on the panel.