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- Decent priced PDF editor for filling in PDF files? No. (sorry, I am not buying Acrobat for that).

If you're talking about filling in PDF forms, Okular (part of KDE) already does that, though it won't do the self-calculating forms (unless it's added that more recently).

Not quite. Okular is merely fooling you into thinking it can do that.

Okular will add some *Okular specific* metadata to PDFs, and will display that as annotations and text, but all of that will **not** be saved as a standard PDF info. So if you send said PDF to your lawyer per email and the lawyer opens it using, say, Adobe Acrobat they comments and filled information will NOT show up.

http://armbrust.blogspot.fr/2010/02/do-not-use-okular-to-fill-out-pdf-forms.html
http://okular.kde.org/faq.php#addedannotationsinpdf

I would love kio_slaves if they were implemented in a desktop independent manner. What good reason is there for virtual file systems to be tied to a GUI?

They are implemented in a desktop independent manner, simply not at kernel level. You can however install a bridge:

http://techbase.kde.org/Projects/KioFuse

Because I'm a programmer and I just cannot support anything that forces people to use C++.

Next time try a more convincing lie.
http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Languages#Stable_and_Mature
http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Tutorials/Plasma/JavaScript/API
http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Tutorials/Plasma/QML/API

Because I'm a programmer and I just cannot support anything that forces people to use C++.

Next time try a more convincing lie.
http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Languages#Stable_and_Mature
http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Tutorials/Plasma/JavaScript/API
http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Tutorials/Plasma/QML/API

Because I'm a programmer and I just cannot support anything that forces people to use C++.

Next time try a more convincing lie.
http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Languages#Stable_and_Mature
http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Tutorials/Plasma/JavaScript/API
http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Tutorials/Plasma/QML/API

A bloated race to the fattest!

http://www.kde.org/announcements/4.6/platform.php

http://windows.kde.org/
Enjoy

I've always found Gnome to look wrong - the icons look like they're aimed at kids. KDE3 was great. KDE4 LOOKS beautiful, but I really can't put up with all the extra crap it insists on running but which gives me no functionality I want.

All I want in a desktop environment is something that manages my windows and provides me with a couple of toolbars for launching applications and switching between them. And I can never really feel confident enough to rely on KDE after the debacle with Kaddressbook. I'd always be scared that any update might break too much functionality

And this screenshot illustrates it:
http://www.kde.org/images/screenshots/gwenview.png
KDE Still pretends it's 1999 and pack applications with plenty of visible features and redundant ways to do the same task to make them look more impressive.
However, the world has changed and people don't want to be bothered having to learn about stuff they don't care about, so the look and usability of KDE helps detract more users than it attracts.

for example, this: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=165044
keeps my wife off.

There's no KDE for Windows 7.

You mean like this:

http://windows.kde.org/

Yeah--exactly like a program who's website states it is considered unstable and has been in development for over 2 years. How did you know? I'm switching back to Windows and KDE right the fuck now...

you mean like http://community.kde.org/Mac you have to compile from source but you can run it

..and switched to LXDE. Simple reason, KDE started getting toooooo much garbage. The last straw was Akonadi. There was no way to completely disable it and it would randomly pop-up error messages even after tic'ing the checkbox to "disable" it.

I don't care much about what Desktop I use, I'm just glad there are alternatives so when the one I'm using starts to suck ass, I can easily find something else. You can't do that with Windows or Macintosh.

There's no KDE for Windows 7.

You mean like this:

http://windows.kde.org/

KDE would be more usable for us developers if the KDELibs crew would (re)implement the basic --geometry command line feature. Removed in KDE 4, available everywhere else. It has been listed as a bug since the release of KDE 4.

https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=165355

Please vote for this and maybe the KDE developers will take notice.

Vote for a command line feature from KDE 3 (and X in general) that was never implemented in KDE 4 -- "--geometry"

https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=165355

"KDE is an international free software community" -- Yes, well, when I install Linux it asks me whether I want a Gnome or a KDE desktop. Never thought I was choosing between two "international free software communities" ;)

WTF? Obviously Plasma Desktop is a KDE desktop because it is a desktop by KDE.
If your distribution calls the desktop simply "KDE" then your distribution is simply wrong: http://kde.org/community/whatiskde/
http://kde.org/workspaces/plasmadesktop/

"KDE is an international free software community" -- Yes, well, when I install Linux it asks me whether I want a Gnome or a KDE desktop. Never thought I was choosing between two "international free software communities" ;)

WTF? Obviously Plasma Desktop is a KDE desktop because it is a desktop by KDE.
If your distribution calls the desktop simply "KDE" then your distribution is simply wrong: http://kde.org/community/whatiskde/
http://kde.org/workspaces/plasmadesktop/

Both KDE and Gnome are hardware-intensive desktops. There is a reason why Canonical switched to Unity. A KDE powered tablet? With KDE on a diet, maybe.

As others already explained, KDE is not a desktop or even the name of software: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KDE
As for your diet remark: http://www.kde.org/announcements/4.6/platform.php (from 1.5 years ago)

Hopefully it won't have kmail2...

No, it won't. KMail2 was actually never released. Only an alpha version shipped along K Desktop Environment 1.1 ever saw the light of day: http://kde.org/announcements/changelogs/changelog1_0to1_1.php

After that the KDE community continued to develop KMail 1.x until they eventually shipped KMail 4.6 -- the current release is KMail 4.8.

Wrong place. KDE is Desktop Environment - same software category as LXDE, Gnome, etc
For information goto http://www.kde.org

KDE is a free software community, KDE Plasma Desktop is the desktop environment. It even says this on http://www.kde.org

Wrong place. KDE is Desktop Environment - same software category as LXDE, Gnome, etc
For information goto http://www.kde.org

#5 Ease change of the desktop environments

I mean a complete change, not just like a theme. I really like to replace the whole Windows desktop with KDE.

You should know better than that. Also, here.

QT is already licensed under LGPL and GPL v3 which answers the question of who has the right to continue developing and distributing QT libraries. The answer is: you, me and everybody.

Furthemore, there is an agreement in place the ensure that QT continues to be licensed under LGPL. Here it is. Additionally, there is an open governance framework in place to guide ongoing development, which frankly places the QT project head and shoulders above Android in terms of community engagement, open development and good citizenship.

QT is already licensed under LGPL and GPL v3 which answers the question of who has the right to continue developing and distributing QT libraries. The answer is: you, me and everybody.

Furthemore, there is an agreement in place the ensure that QT continues to be licensed under LGPL. Here it is. Additionally, there is an open governance framework in place to guide ongoing development, which frankly places the QT project head and shoulders above Android in terms of community engagement, open development and good citizenship.

Then the KDE Free Qt Foundation kicks in: http://www.kde.org/community/whatiskde/kdefreeqtfoundation.php

...change explorer.exe to what exactly?

KDE? Sure
Gnome? Why Not?
XFCE? Not yet. But for lightweight you have LDE(x)

First, note that my reply was to a post that claimed that "[t]he FLOSS community hates to pay money". I wasn't writing about how much, but I gave some evidence (not definitive, but some) that this wasn't true.

Second, the link that you posted seems to be about the much larger super set that includes the KDE-related Nepomuk. I don't understand the full stack, not even the subset or implementation that includes the KDE-related technologies. But if you check out the page about the pieces released as open source, you will see that they claim that not the whole project is open source, and Nepomuk-KDE (the project that was asking for funding) is only one part. I haven't found many references, but an article on KDE news gives some pointers and explanation. So I think that your comparison is not accurate. The larger project includes many implementations and lots of research. Now we are talking about a single implementation that is more or less done, but needs features and bug fixing.

Third, I wasn't the one setting the milestone. Sebastian Trüg, the lead Nepomuk developer did, and he claimed it was a reasonable amount to "secure long-term funding for Nepomuk". I guess that if he started the fundraiser on September of 2011, and he finally joined a regular company on February 2012, it was enough to live with some dignity during some months (he was working for Mandriva previously, and it seems the financial troubles of the company forced him and other employees to work without a salary). I don't know about the living expenses in every corner of the world, but I can tell you that in Spain, I would be terribly happy if I could dedicate myself to work full time on my favorite project for 3000€ before taxes per month. If I'm not mistaken, many programmers are working here for about 1200€ per month after taxes, maybe even less. With a 23% of people unemployed, I don't expect salaries to be much higher in some time.

It could, using the alternative windowing subsystem (X11). And in fact that branch is used to compare Wine vs. ReactOS behavior in certain cases.

Accoding to http://windows.kde.org/ the Windows port of KDE is not functional - but a Windows port would mean that all of the underlying API calls implemented by ReactOS have to be implemented and correct, or the port won't run anyway.

Finally, the point of ReactOS is that Windows programs should run on it. There is no reason to introduce KDE, when you have to write things like explorer.exe and the whole shell that Windows programs expect to have. The "crap that they spend their time on" is making a binary-compatible Windows OS.

I think I smell at least one example of prior art.

Ughhhh, Unknown Lamer, you're making defend an Amazon patent. The earliest timestamp I can find for Okular is August 27th, 2006 while the patent in question was filed a year and a half earlier on January 19th, 2005. I'm not saying that there is no prior art, I'm just saying I couldn't find any hard evidence of Okular being conceived prior to Amazon's patent. Now I have to go take a shower ...

3.5 ??! WTF ?

http://www.kde.org/announcements/visualguide-3.5.php

They changed the taskbar style and improved KHTML (those were the days... ). I mean, sure, changing to fluxbox because you did not need a desktop, sure. Because you wanted to try something else, why not.

But this is serious LSD-grade shit. Troll.

No need to switch. KDE will work fine, you just won't have all the fancy effects you may have become accustomed to.

Don't make that pronouncement so fast; Qt5 has a requrement for OpenGL (ES) 2.0 or above, and KDE4 is now being developed using Qt5.

http://labs.qt.nokia.com/2011/05/09/thoughts-about-qt-5/

The current "compilation requirements" are listed for KDE 4.4 but not for any version newer than that, but it is very likely that KDE4 will eventually have a baserequirement of OpenGL (ES) 2.0 due to that being a requirement for Qt5.

http://techbase.kde.org/Schedules

http://www.kde.org/applications/office/kplato/
http://sourceforge.net/projects/openproj/

Isn't KDE substantially more popular in Deutschland than anywhere else?
I mean, the KDE founder was given the German Federal Cross of Merit for pete's sake

As SomeKDEUser pointed out above, KDE has different workspaces (as they call it) for desktops and netbooks/tablets. They don't try to force desktop users to use a tablet UI, as do Microsoft, Canonical & Gnome. Nor do they try to have a desktop UX on a tablet. That way, they can fine tune each workspace to its target platform.

The Active Plasma screenshots show how they've finetuned the interface for a tablet. More details can be found on the KDE website

All the gameplay elements are 100% identical.

But would you agree that gameplay elements are the "methods of operation" of a game?

I see absolutely nothing whatsoever in Dream Heights that isn't in Tiny Tower.

And I see nothing in Free games like KBlocks that isn't in Tetris.

The ability to pass geometry information to KDE apps via the command line has been broken for 3.5 years (well, a bug was filed that long ago). So the developers aren't too interested in fixing basic functionality!

https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=165355

I'm guessing konsole will get a lot more use with this crowd

I use konsole as an engine, but Yakuake runs my life.

I'm guessing konsole will get a lot more use with this crowd, that, say, Marble. I'm not sure this feature list is worth the effort of upgrading, but here it is:

http://konsole.kde.org/changelog.php

Noteworthy:

        Before any window is opened, make sure pty device has right size before starting the terminal process.
        Allow an image to be set as the background in the terminal window.
        Close session reliably when the session process doesn't die with SIGHUP.
        Don't show the default profile in menu New Tab list when no others are listed.
        Add "Select All" action for selecting the whole history of this session.
        Add popup menu for drag-n-drop operations using KonqOperations::doDrop.
        Bidirectional text support is on by default.
        Left-To-Right direction will always be used in the terminal area even when the language is Right-To-Left.
        Add support for Unicode decomposed characters and in general better unicode displaying.

With the exception of section 2 of that video (invoking app menu functions), which I'll admit is interesting but not necessarily useful, KRunner does the same things and more, and has since KDE4 was released several years ago.

KRunner has many different features that can be enabled or disabled based on what you want to use, including the following:

* Program search by name, description, and window contents (if running)
* Shell command execution. If you can do it in one line in bash, it should work here.
* Browser bookmark handling
* Calculator
* Calendar event access
* Find and display address book contacts
* Music player controls
* System controls, such as power management, user switching, reboot, shutdown by command. (e.g. "reboot" or "screen brightness 20%")
* Email and IM integration for finding contacts by name and sending messages.
* Some interesting "fluff" stuff like unit conversion and wikipedia search.

There are some more, and it's probably extensible, too.

I didn't use the extra features very much at first, and only use a small subset of them even now (mostly email, IM, shell, calculator, and unit conversion), but now I hate environments that don't have something similar. It's nice to see other DEs finally catching up a bit.

MeeGo seems to be going somewhere

MeeGo stalled in the water after February 11th, 2011, and just slowed down after that due to Nokia walking away and Intel left in the lurch.

There is a community initiative continuing where MeeGo left:
http://merproject.org/
Its separated to:
MER - the core software stack
Nemo - Qt based UI

Nemo is not the only UI, both Plasma active and Cordia use MER as core and provide its own UI.

So far, I would rather bet on MER than on Tizen...

I don't give nice answers to rude accusations made by rude people like you. You should be grateful that I gave you an actual solution to your problem anyway, even though you didn't deserve it.
Next time simply ask nicely on http://forum.kde.org/ and you'll get a nice answer.

Well, I've had no luck in getting anything like that. So I just tried that (though I'm sure I tried it before), and all that does is completely get rid of the dialog all-together.

Duh, you obviously have to log off and on again to fully apply that setting.

It's just irritating when every new release seems to break the things that worked so well in the previous release

The only broken thing is your brain.
If you'd ever executed Dolphin in another DE, you'd know that the progress window in there and never was gone.
So your tiny, broken brain might be irritated by the fact that at one point KDE started to utilize dbus to allow for a wide range of progress indicators, including the traditional clunky window, the smooth default Plasma version, or even 3rd party implementations like http://kde-look.org/content/show.php/SmartNotify+(unobtrusive+notifications)?content=133472

Oh btw: I would've used another tone but you decided to always blame someone else first ("they" do dumb things, "they" break stuff,...) when the only one to blame is yourself. Next time simply ask on http://forum.kde.org/ first before blaming someone just because you can't find a setting.

I believe that developers of modern DEs don't spend a lot of time optimising for memory-starved situations.

At least in the case of KDE that's absolutely wrong.
Since quite some time it is possible to compile KDE software in 'mobile' mode which strips dependencies. This document shows the progress made a full year ago: http://community.kde.org/KDE_Mobile/PlatformModifications
Since then even more such work has happened and is still happening in preparation for KDE Frameworks 5 coming up in summer 2012. Same for Qt itself which will be even more modular with Qt5 on which KF5 will be based.

I think he is talking about this bug : http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=180051

There is no way to have default printer settings, which means setting again the options you need every time. This is the fourth most hated bug in KDE.

RMS himself says the goal of GPL is to destroy non free software and RMS makes it clear he WANTS GPL to be "viral" and cause businesses to be forced to open up their code, as his whole goal is to destroy non free software.

Maybe... however the post by RMS you linked says otherwise: "writing non-free software is not an ethically legitimate activity, so if people who do this run into trouble, that's good! All businesses based on non-free software ought to fail, and the sooner the better", which means that RMS thinks that non-free software is bound to fail and that's a good thing in his opinion. GPL or not.

So yes having a more permissive license is of the good, it means that companies that might need a document engine or spreadsheet engine can easily use OO.o as a base without worrying of running afoul of the GPL. Remember that like it or not RMS IS a militant, always has been, and with each version of GPL he tries his damnedest to close any and all possible loopholes that would allow a non free company to use it.

This is exactly the FUD I was talking about. If a company wants to use parts of a GPL program as a base for its own program without distributing the source code, it can. The GPL (version 1,2,3...) says that the aforementioned company has to distribute the source code alongside the compiled binaries, however if it does not distribute them to third parties, it is not bound to release the source code. Obviously if it intends to sell the program (in a way or the other), there's a price, like for everything I could add, and that price is the release of the source code.

As for RMS willing to destroy non-free companies, I've got the impression that the feeling is reciprocal and that's not just because RMS is used to talking over the top, but because GNU and Linux (and not BSD) are a threat to the revenues of some companies. Even the mighty Apache web server owes a big part of its success to all those Linux servers.

Its not FUD when RMS himself says the goal of GPL is to destroy non free software and RMS makes it clear he WANTS GPL to be "viral" and cause businesses to be forced to open up their code, as his whole goal is to destroy non free software.

So yes having a more permissive license is of the good, it means that companies that might need a document engine or spreadsheet engine can easily use OO.o as a base without worrying of running afoul of the GPL. Remember that like it or not RMS IS a militant, always has been, and with each version of GPL he tries his damnedest to close any and all possible loopholes that would allow a non free company to use it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_shell_replacement
http://windows.kde.org/
etc.

KDE is ported to Windows. Check http://windows.kde.org/ for the installer. It works sort of like synaptic, where you pick the applications you want and it deals with dependencies for you.

Some things in it work better than others, and you'll have to download a lot of Qt and KDE dependencies at first. The applications generally work pretty well but aren't all feature-complete compared to their *nix counterparts (but Kate and IOslaves work! aweosme.)

I'm not sure about the state of Plasma itself (the desktop, widgets, etc.) but it's been available for a while. I don't think Kwin is available, so it will still use the normal Windows window management (ick)

I think the purpose of the GPL is to ensure that those that profit from your work also give back.

Its purpose is economic warfare against all non-copyleft software, with the ultimate goal of world domination (eliminating non-free software).