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KDE 4 Screenshots
carlmenezes writes "Screenshots of the upcoming and much talked about KDE 4 have appeared at Planet Diaz. They include screenshots of the control panel, system tray, tabbed views, music and mail views, plus a mockup or two. I don't know what the Gnome guys are up to, but KDE is starting to look seriously cool."
I think that trying to judge a book by its cover is probably the worst way to determine the utility of a window manager. One ought not be swayed by high resolution backgrounds and pretty fractal images. Then, of course, we live in an age where Mr. Britney Spears has a hit album, so I don't really have much confidence in the general public's ability to discern quality products from glitter-encrusted dog shit.
Oh...Shiny!
BTW, the link is Schiavo.
let's be honest. You've probably heard the quote, "BSD is for people that love Unix; Linux is for people that hate Windows." The sad truth is, it's true. Many Linux users have no particular loyalty to Linux and would just as soon use something else. While we may protest that KDE or GNOME are better than OS X, the collective orgasm when Apple announced an OSx86 show that free (beer) beats free (speech).
More than a few people from my local LUG have installed a bootlegged copy of the OSx86 beta. One of our members showed off his toshiba laptop running OS X, which was quite popular, even among the old school unix types.
It doesn't really matter what features or eye candy KDE or GNOME add, because OS X does it better. Flame me if you will, but I've been using Linux and BSD for over a decade now. An OS is a tool, I want one that works, and I think most people feel the same way.
Wow, it's startling to me how many words you can use and say nothing.
First off, both KDE and GNOME will run in *BSD, making your distinction between users mostly irrelevent. Second, the links in this story are mockups of KDE. KDE. Not OS X. So let's break down the actual content of your moderated "insightful" post, shall we? It says (1) BSD and Linux have different users (2) your friends have installed OS X on x86. (3) OS X is better. (4) You want an OS that works...whatever that's supposed to mean. I guess we can distill your comments to something like "Hey, I like OS X better than KDE or GNOME!" Okay...
"Offtopic" isn't exactly right for your post. Neither is "troll". If only there were a "insipid", "bland", or "uninsightful".
Let's be honest. If there is any value to your post, it's that hopfully some of the mods can learn something about what not to mod up.
What's that idiotic quote about Linux vs BSD users got to do with KDE? KDE is *not* a Linux desktop, it's a Unix deskopt (i.e. Linux, *BSD, AIX, Solaris etc.) I don't understand why *BSD users continuously whine about how Linux is 'trying to emulate Windows' when GNOME and KDE are *their* desktops, too.
By the way, I started with Linux in 1992. I started with Linux in 1992 because I loved Unix and wanted it on my PC.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
It does? I have Mac Mini with OS X, and I have been using it for about a year now. I also have a tower-PC running KDE and Linux. And while OS X does have all kinds of nifty eye-candy, and I used it exclusively for few months (to find out what the noise was all about). But after that time I noticed that I simply enjoy using KDE more. It does what I want it to do, and it does it in a way I want it to be done. In OS X, I have to adjusts my workflow and expectations to meet the OS, in Linux and KDE it's the opposite. I can change the GUI and the system to meet my expectations.
OS X is a nice OS, no question about it. But it's not the Holy Grail of OS'es or GUI's (despite the fact that some people try to claim that it is just that). For me, OS X does NOT do it better. I do love the hardware, and I'm planning to install Linux on that Mini.
Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
The one with broken kde packages?
To me, it is a nightmare of redundant options,
They're only redundant if you don't use them, otherwise they're vital
unpredictable behaviour, and completely hideous defaults.
What're these? The defaults seem fine to me.
(Why they can be resized so small that they're useless in the first place I don't know.)
Because there are people who want to resize it that small. It's the Ritchie thing about "Do not try and prevent users doing stupid things, for you will also prevent users doing clever things".
I am trolling
Correct, many of them are probably mockups. Consider them concepts for look and feel and features which don't yet exist.
KDE is bloated with options, compared to what? I assume you are referring to Gnome which has virtually no options, and little possibility to make it work the way I want it to? A long time ago I was a Gnome user, but one day I started toying around with KDE... and I couldn't bear to go back into Gnome after a while. I could make this desktop work just the way I wanted
KDE might not suit you, but for me it is perfect. I don't find it bloated at all. I only run linux at home. When I have to use a Windows desktop at work, I always wonder how does someone cope with such a Gnome-like desktop? It's so... unconfigurable.
Each to their own, mate.
I assure you, it has very little to do with that. All KDE or GNOME discussions on Slashdot get completely swamped with trolls from the "other side".
The loaded comment at the end of the news snippet is literally engineered to create this controversy. The more people that come on here to troll, the more money Slashdot gets.
"I don't know what the Gnome guys are up to, but KDE is starting to look seriously cool."
Puh-leeeeease. Could it get more obvious?
I think the fact that KDE even exists means that Gnome shouldn't try to be more "advanced" (bloated).
So people like the advanced options, the glimmer and the numerous widgets. Those people pick KDE. Some people just a basic, day-to-day desktop environment. Those people pick Gnome.
The availability of both seems ideal to me.
but let's be honest. "You've probably heard the quote, "BSD is for people that love Unix; Linux is for people that hate Windows."
Okay, I'm being honest. I actually never have heard that before. I hate Windows and MS because my first computer came with Windows ME and I feel that I was totally screwed. If I'd wanted a Mac I'd have gotten one.
"Many Linux users have no particular loyalty to Linux and would just as soon use something else. "
Funny, but I've been thinking the exact opposite, that too many of them are rather blindly loyal to their distro of choice. Mepis retail will require a serial number to update soon, for example, and the serial number is tied to the MAC address of your computer. This means that you'll have to fill out a form to update if you switch computers and that they can refuse to allow you uto update. It also means that you can only use your copy on one machine; even Linspire lets you use one copy on up to 5 computers in your home IIRC. We *nix users have been telling people for years that you don't have to put with this kind of treatment from MS but the Mepis folks are loyal enough to think this is a good idea for Mepis for some reason, even though Mepis has been known for some time as having problems with bug-squashing. As I posted at Distrowatch, why bother with this when there are other distros that are more stable and free? But the Mepis people are loyal.
Much the same can be said for the Libranet people; Libranet was more stable but it was also expensive, and the only original code the developers came up with they've refused to share with the Linux community even though their product was over 90% based on Debian's GPL code. Now that Libranet has been discontinued the adminmenu has remained closed-source. Why the lead developer's son refused to share with the community their product was based on, I don't know. But the Libranet users have remained quite loyal to them. And don't get me started about Mandriva.
"More than a few people from my local LUG have installed a bootlegged copy of the OSx86 beta. One of our members showed off his toshiba laptop running OS X, which was quite popular, even among the old school unix types."
Why they bother is beyond me. Oh wait, I do know - bragging rights. That's what a MAC is apparently all about as Apple fanboys spend so much time bragging on how great it is. One would think if it was so perfectly functioal they'd spend more time using it. "Plus I have a system that everyone envies!" was one post I read at Digg. C'mon, admit it- we all know that's really why people want a Mac.
"While we may protest that KDE or GNOME are better than OS X, the collective orgasm when Apple announced an OSx86 show that free (beer) beats free (speech)"
Really? I don't remember having an orgasm over OSX. I have had plenty of orgasms since it was released, but my thoughts at the time had nothing to with OSX (or even computers, for that matter). The media and people at Digg have been fawning over it and they seem to think that everyone in the world wants a Mac. They're wrong; give me a Mac and I'll sell it and use the money to upgrade my AMD running Linux, thank you very much.
"It doesn't really matter what features or eye candy KDE or GNOME add, because OS X does it better. "
I disagree. I don't like OSX's cluttered UI and I don't like vendor lock-in. With KDE I can remove the icons and have everything on auto-hide if I want to. And sometimes I do; if I wanted all this junk on my dekstop why would I bother using a wallpaer? Plus it's convenient to get everything out of my way when I'm multi-tasking. Apple has a lot of great eye-candy if you don't mind it being in your way, but I do mind. And when I want eye candy KDE has plenty enough of it to satisfy me. Plus I want freedom of choice, not what Apple chooses for me. Kde lets me choose when I wan the eye candy, how I want it to look, but only when I want it.
I dream of a better world... one in which chickens can cross roads without their motives being questioned.
I think you have some good points, in fact, it reminds me of a Slashdot article a while back that basically said that the more complex an interface is, the more intimidating it is to most people. If you have a zillion widgets to click and boxes to look at, people tend to get lost and give up. In the comments of that article, several people made good points. For example, putting common tasks in the front and hiding the advanced stuff in another tab or window with a button to access it.
I think one of the key issues surrounding KDE is choice: you choose to run KDE, or you choose not to. Unix-based systems give the user/admin the choice of which window manager to run. Don't like KDE? Try a different one. Hell, you can even contact the KDE team, report bugs, and give feedback. While most large OSS project teams are busy as hell and aren't always the most receptive to outside communication, they are a lot more receptive than, say, Microsoft. Think it's too damn complex? Give constructive criticism to the KDE team. The other beauty of it is that besides the KDE core, a lot of "KDE" applications are third-party software that is just written for KDE and follows a specific set of guidelines. Odds are for some of the problems people have, they can contact a lone developer who has less to worry about and can dedicate more time to each problem.
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!