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KDE 3.2 'Rudi' Beta Released
An anonymous reader writes "The beta of the next version of KDE, billed as 'the premiere Open Source desktop', has been released. Read the announcement at KDE.org. Notable features include a big clean up of the interface and menus, Improvements to KHTML from Apple, better accessibility and hardware support. There are also new applications such as JuK (a music player similar to iTunes), KDevelop (a graphical IDE), Kontact (an integrated communications package like Outlook) and more. Download it here and since this is a beta, report any problems or bugs you have." Also, nukem996 points out "The counter-terrorism unit on TV series '24' went KDE this season, too."
Maybe it should be more clear and say that the beta of KDevelop 3.0 is out now, perhaps?
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I'm seriously beginning to question the ability of any open source project to challenge Apple on the user experience front. Come on, look at these JuK screen shots and compare to iTunes screen shots.
Now, I will fully admit to never actually using JuK, but just from its appearance, I don't want to. I do use iTunes extensively (on a Mac, I only use UNIX-based OSs). So, on iTunes, I have 3 control buttons, a pretty status meter, and a search field. That is it. Now look at JuK. There is a crapload of buttons making the interface completely suck. Why is there a save button? I never save in iTunes, when changes get made, they automatically are propagated through the library. Easy. Why are there cut and paste butttons? Do they need to take up screen space. Leave them buried in a menu. How often are they used in the main interface screen? In iTunes, I rarely go to the menu's. About the only time is when I want to create a new smart playlist. The three buttons and the search field take care of 98% of what I want to do on the interface. This is what makes Apple user friendly and pretty to look at.
If open source wants to be the peoples' desktop, they have to start considering the interfaces they design. There is a reason why people like to use Macs and proclaim the interface as the superior solution: it is. There are things to be learned here, but time and time again, with each new release of a new program, the user interfaces continue to suck.
-- Fighting mediocrity one bad post at a time.
Interstingly, one CAN run KDE on Windows...
http://kde-cygwin.sourceforge.net/
I have a suspicion my old "C Programming Teacher" is behind this.
I had a teacher by the name of "Michael Loceff". That's the same name of the guy who's the producer/writer of the show.
When I took an online class from him years ago, he said he did screen-writing on his spare time. He even let his class know when a show aired on "Le Femme Nikita" that he wrote. Kudos to him for bringing real tech to the screen.