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Linus Switches From KDE To Gnome
An anonymous reader writes "In a recent Computerworld interview, Linus revealed that he's switched to Gnome — this despite launching a heavily critical broadside against Gnome just a few years ago. His reason? He thinks KDE 4 is a 'disaster.' Although it's improved recently, he'll find many who agree with this prognosis, and KDE 4 can be painful to use." There's quite a bit of interesting stuff in this interview, besides, regarding the current state of Linux development.
I first read the summary wondering why anyone cares what Linus uses, but then I noticed that he agrees with the general consensus that KDE4 isn't turning out as well as everyone had hoped...
Here's to KDE doing better with v5.
Viable Slashdot alternatives: https://pipedot.org/ and http://soylentnews.org/
Linus switches from KDE to Gnome
Thus proving beyond the shadow of a doubt the weakness of arguments from authority.
Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure everything I just said is completely wrong.
Linus will be back. KDE 4.2 is turning out very nice and I'm sure he will give it a try. By upgrading his Fedora he was more or less forced to choose between GNOME 2 or KDE 4.0. Fedora should not have chosen KDE 4.0 over KDE 3.5. Only now with version 4.2 has KDE reached an acceptable level of quality again.
DNA is the ultimate spaghetti code.
Linus has plenty of other things to say in this interview. Why focus on this less important aspect of the discussion?
Because LT doesn't like how KDE is right now? That's his choice, just as it was to like KDE more than Gnome before.
Software is not perfect and it only achieves usefulness by stages, as LT himself mentions in discussing Git. A living project is a changing project. Not everyone is going to like the changes.
Rich And Stupid is not so bad as Working For Rich And Stupid.
True, but then again, many people cite the 'ease' of configurability of KDE as being why they like it.
A halfway-house would be nice - good default installation but easy tweaking via GUI as users got more advanced and confident. A bit like - dare I say it - Windows does it. Then again, even with windows you still end up having to download stuff like TweakUi or other powertools - or directly ediing the registry - for some stuff, (or using the console, which is OK).
I recently switched to Gnome because KDE 4.1 whatever shipped with Fedora 10 was a cluster (wouldn't remember the position of stuff in the panel). Configuring Gnome was painful and significantly less intuitive that the previous versions of KDE.
The specific setting I wanted was focus follows mouse, don't raise. Setting this involved the configuration tool (don't know the name) and using gconf and using google to figure out what and where the configuration setting I'm looking for is. Even KDE 4.* made setting focus follows mouse easy, I'm not sure why Gnome choose to bury half the options.
Gnome is configurable, but the tool used to configure it (gconf) makes it significantly more complicated than it needs to be.
I am not a script!
My favorite, of course, is how they made it so that cursor blinking is a global setting. It doesn't matter if you use gconf or not, either your cursor blinks everywhere, including the terminal, or it blinks nowhere. That is, neither setting is acceptable.
Wow. If that is your favorite thing to complain about, I guess Gnome must be pretty good...
This author takes full ownership and responsibility for the unpopular opinions outlined above.
There are six pages of interview with Linus. Him now using Gnome instead of KDE is covered in three and a half paragraphs. Come on, this is a little sensationalist, picking on this rather minor issue for the headline, isn't it? No, I'm not new here, I just like to point out how childish that seems.
Linus says KDE 4.0 was a "half baked release". Yes it was. He complains he got the update pushed through Fedora and that it "was not as functional". I'm sure it wasn't. He also might want to reconsider his choice of Linux distribution if he isn't happy with their update policy.
We've been through this a million times here and on most any other tech site on the whole of the web: KDE 4.0 wasn't ready for general use, KDE themselves said so, it might have been a mistake to release it anyway, or not, the communication could have been a lot clearer, yada yada yada.
Linus thinks so, too. Fine. Also, yawn.
Not quite. Back when Linus advocated KDE over GNOME, he was right on. KDE3.5 or so was vastly superior to GNOME in terms of features and polish. However, KDE 4.x has taken a step backwards, and shows no convincing signs of progress, which is why I've switched back to GNOME as well (having not used it since about 2.2). Linus is promoting the best option available at the time, without bias. Which is perfectly sane, and valid.
Basically, KDE has great tech. BUT core developers seem to have some sort of arrogance about listening to the community and some sort of project-deathwish which manifests in a horrible release process, minor versions that don't work until x.4 or so, and poor support for non-core developers. Moreover they've alienated some of the very groups they tried to encourage early in the KDE 4 brainstorming process. Finally, they generally seem to suffer from lack of manpower, which they have never really tried to solve. If you believed the hype the core devs were spouting, KDE 4 was going well, and no help was needed, until the product actually appeared as a release and everyone saw the real situation. KDE technology is great. If 4.4+ rocks the way 3.4+ did, and they don't make the same mistakes with 5.[0123], then they still have a chance. But for now, frankly, it's been terribly mismanaged.
I used to be a KDE user spending hours tweaking my Desktop. Nothing wrong with that -- there are some cool setups out there. For the last couple years though, I've been using Gnome. Not because it's better or anything like that, it's just that I got tired of tweaking the look of my Desktop and I like Gnome's defaults better than KDE's.
I do like how Konqueror will let you just type "ssh://SOMEADDRESS" and act as nice file browser with all the drag and drop joy you get locally, and maybe Nautilus will let you do that -- it does let you set a server connection over SSH which obviates the need to type out "ssh://SOMEADDRESS" every time, but I still like Konqueror's functionality. Also, remote launching Konqueror works great, but remotely launching Nautilus is a disaster.
All that aside, I've simply grown tired of tweaking my Desktop. Half my computers still have the default wallpaper from whatever distro I installed. Luckily, the linux world has something for everyone -- KDE for tweakers, Gnome for the lazy or tired, xfce for the agile, Enlightenment for -- I dunno -- etc. etc. etc.
Use what makes you happy.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
I love KDE, I have done from the start, but there is no getting away from the fact that the way the switch to KDE 4 has been handled is a completely disaster (I've been using KDE 4.1 for a few months now). I can sort of see why the team directing KDE have done this but I'm sure it could have been handled a lot better than it has been.
Hind sight is a perfect science but before I radically changed KDE I would have made damn sure that the most popular software that relies on KDE was going to have a version ready about the same time KDE was released. Not having a KDE 4 version of Amarok for example is terrible.
Over all I think KDE will end up stronger for this change. The bits that are working are really nice I'm just worried that it will take 5 years to get to the point where full advantage can be taken of the effort that has been put in. In the end I think KDE will be the dominant desktop but Gnome must be seriously gaining support at the moment.
I used to have a better sig but it broke.
I think Linus is right on this one. I have been using KDE based linux desktops on my primary computer for ~7 years now. KDE 4 is a huge step back. The even bigger problem is that linux distros (Kubuntu and OpenSuse) are happily pushing KDE4.1 as the default KDE desktop. In fact with Kubuntu 8.10, there is no option. For KDE 3.5 you have to use 8.04. KDE 4 takes the GNOME approach to desktops (i.e. user's IQ is equivalent to a mostly dead rodent of unusually small size and any options would confuse poor afore mentioned user and therefore options are bad). Before the GNOME loving flames begin, yes I know there exist external tools to start fiddling with options, but the amount of flexibility is not the same as KDE 3.5.10.
/rant
KDE 4 unfortunately takes the GNOME approach, and removes flexibility. Worse still, all the developer time for KDE 4 is now going into polishing the interface (which while shiny is no better or more intuitive than KDE 3.5) while not bothering fixing apps people actually use. For example, on KDE 4.2, if you add a webdav calendar from a https source which has a self signed cert, you will be prompted every time it reloads, whether you want to accept the cert or not. Yes thats right, even if you click accept cert permanently, the DE is incapable of understanding it. This has been outstanding for a while, but all recent activity seems to be towards fixing desktop effects or making the kicker work. Its ridiculous.
Legally obligatory sig : My opinions are my own... etc etc
It seems that nobody remembers the transition between KDE 1 and KDE 2. KDE 2 was a major redesign over the 1 series, and at the beginning had the same issues that KDE 4 right now has. But eventually it grew up into the beautiful 3.5 series. So I think we'll have what we're expecting from KDE 4 around 4.5 version. Go KDE! Just my 2 cents.
You could always just grow a brain and use gconf,
Or I could be lazy and use KDE, which, instead of forcing me to use arcane commandline utilities and XML, provides me with a nice GUI and a much simpler, much more UNIX-y set of config files. KDE4 screwed it up a lot, but it's still nowhere near as bad as GNOME.
I'll remind people one of the older reasons Linus chose KDE: There's a nice GUI for configuring what each mouse button on the title bar of a window does. In GNOME, this functionality simply wasn't available. I assume it wasn't in a config file either, because Linus ended up having to write a patch. Once he wrote it, he couldn't figure out where to send it.
Now, if Linus fucking Torvalds can't figure out where to send a patch, you have a problem.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
What is wrong with having the options? And there is a very good reason why the terminal should have a separate setting for textfields: it's not a textfield and it doesn't act like one. I don't want an annoying blinking box of a cursor in my terminal. It is, however, nice to have a blinking cursor in textfields.
Now on to the rest of your points. Who does it hurt to have extra config options? If the defaults are sane, then regular users don't have to touch them, but for people who care, the options are available. I mean, I thought this was the whole point of Linux and FOSS, that you wouldn't have some monolithic entity telling you how you are going to use your computer and what is "best" for you. GNOME is the anti-thesis of this. GNOME knows how things should be. GNOME knows that you only need to care about blinking cursors globally. GNOME knows that you don't want to make good use of your screen real-estate so all themes have to have huge amounts of wasted space. GNOME knows that you don't want to change settings, so they are hidden away in gconf instead of being in a useful and documented config dialog. Etc. etc. etc.
Actually, I think the key word is missing there. The real fallacy is "argument from false authority."
As a hypothetical example: If an recognized astrophysicist says that there's something fishy about the amount of existing dark matter, that's a real authority on the subject matter, and is certainly something to keep in mind. If Obama says it, he's just not qualified to make that kind of a judgment, and it's simply something to ignore. For all his authority in politics and law, he's as qualified to talk about astrophysics as the local barber.
In this case I don't think Linus is an authority on usability or anything even remotely relevant to KDE vs GNOME. It's his personal tastes vs yours, nothing more. Unless you happen to know that his tastes accidentally match yours to the letter, it's something to thoroughly ignore.
Of course, that won't stop people from being fashion victims and trying to imitate him anyway. That's why celebrity endorsements work. That's why you see video clips with Van Damme and whatnot saying that they play WoW, for example. Because a lot of John Does out there will try to be like monkeys imitating that celebrity. Or why you see Fatal1ty branded heatsinks, although I don't think he'd know enough physics to actually judge a design, nor the experience of having tested 100 heatsinks and picked the best. That's appeal to false authority.
I don't doubt that here too a lot of people switched to KDE just because Linus blasted GNOME, and will now hastily switch back to GNOME because Linus uses it now so it must be cool.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
True, Gnome simply ignores your wishes. And _if_ you want to configure Gnome stuff, it's either text files or their version of regedit.
No bad feelings, everyone should use what they want. But to claim that Gnome is easy to use is a misrepresentation in _my_ opinion.
"I make controversial statements without thinking a lot."
They couldn't because a decision was made to make KDE 4 more compatible with the future is to redesign it now and go from there.
KDE 4 is a major change and devs are trying to adapt to that change. So it's natural there are going to be some bumps along the way. Maybe V4.5 will be the version to use.
Some people don't like change at all and probably still running Windows 95.
Sorry to disturb you, but what you're saying is that a) they made the same mistake twice and b) it won't "grow up into something beautiful" until 5.5 - unless I misread that, in that case attribute that to significant amounts of excellent beer.
Still, looking at the way prior releases have matured is a valid point.
I hope I didn't brain my damage.
Which isn't exactly the same thing, and probably not many people at KDE will be all that surprised. KDE4 is new, it has teething problems. It was risk, but we'll find out later if it was a risk worth taking.
You don't roll out half baked software over the top of working software. If KDE 3.5 was working for people releasing something that would cause users significant grief is simply irresponsible. We are beyond the days where Linux users were all geeks who used Linux as a learning platform, and who wouldn't care too much about broken features.
Linux is now being used seriously by people in their day job. Yes - Linux is "free" - but it is also such a vital piece of infrastructure that there is an expectation that delivery is equal quality OR BETTER THAN commercial alternatives. Open source should be an evolutionary process - you don't expect things that were previously working to become broken.
However, this whole "start fresh" idea has occured several times. It can potentially kill a project. It is not unique to open source, and every time I've seen it done its been done badly. Is it harder to refactor an existing application into shape? Yes. However, refactoring tends to be far less painful for users who will have a working system throughout.
Some people claim that if users want to keep using the old app they can. This is true, except in open source people will tend to abaondon applications not in active development. Although a new "fresh" version is on the way a project in this state looks to the external world like an abandoned project.
I know one project that took over three years to rewrite a vital library. The old version worked, but had bugs. The bugs were going to be addressed in the new version, but it took so long to do that we were forced to find something that was actually maintained.
Open source isn't a toddler any more. It has grown up, and people now depend on it. We cannot afford to be using users as our QA department. We could afford to do this in the past, and certainly there is are still hackers who don't mind installing the latest builds, but we cannot assume that all our users are going to be grateful for whatever we ship. It must be quality.
I run Mandriva Cooker and have been using KDE 4.2 quit a bit. I like it a lot. I am normally a Gnome user, but I have been attracted to KDE 4 much more than 3.5. 4.0 was very unstable, it is true, but I think that Mandriva KDE users will be happy with KDE 4.2 when 2009 Spring is released. The main Gnome thing that I miss in KDE 4 is the Nautilus file manager.
It's a step in the wrong direction as far as the desktop goes. Their desktop metaphor is terrible. Users have desktops and large monitors for a reason. They want sprawling desktops that they can organize and use according to their habit. Limiting us to a tiny box which doesn't in anyway resemble a desktop (rather it resembles an inbox on a desktop) is the wrong thing to do. KDE4 won't gain acceptance in any significant way till they put the desktop metaphor back to what we had before.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
This is just pure insanity. I'm a Linux user and I have no qualms about saying so. You are saying, "Well, it's just the initial release. I'm sure it will get better in like *5* more releases". How can you possibly justify that when the vast majority of the people here that say, "Well, Vista will be better with SP1" get flamed.
Well, how much did you pay for KDE 4.0? How much did you pay for Vista? Did KDE take all copies of 3.5.10 off the shelf when 4.0 was released? (Hint: No.)
KDE4 is literally the linux equivalent of Vista. After 5 service packs (and possibly renaming it KDE 5), it might be usable.
No, it's usable now. I'm sorry if it's not usable for the exact same sequence of tasks that 3.5.10 was but then we're not trying to make 3.5.10, we're trying to make something better.
It's a disaster and a lesson to those that would try to re-write good things because, "We know better".
LOL! Do you know how much source code is in KDE 3.5? There's no way we "rewrote" that all.
However, it does provide an interesting principle about how much change you can put into a project. This is actually the second time KDE has dealt with such a large transition (the first being KDE 1 -> 2).
Now with KDE 3.5 -> 4 our developers were able to produce quite a few positive changes to modernize KDE and take the steps necessary to keep it relevant. Yes, there were features that were dropped that still need to be added again, and some things don't work as well as they used to in KDE 3.5.
What were the alternatives? A straight port of 3.5 to Qt 4? If you seriously believe that, where do you think we started from?...
It took a lot of effort to get the 3.5 codebase onto Qt 4. Believe me, I was there. It took ages to get kdesktop to be able to display its background again, and that was hardly the largest of the broken features. And that was just from the porting process!
Any major changes we wanted to be in KDE 4 had to be there (at least architecturally) before KDE 4.0 due to source and binary compatibility concerns.
So what do you do, take a year or two to re-architect, and another year of bugfixing before you release (and meanwhile become completely irrelevant in the Internet age)?
Or do you take a year or two to re-architect, while application developers port what they can in the meantime and then try and quickly start releasing again? You'll (hopefully) stay relevant but the desktop won't be as shiny.
By releasing early we were able to get immediate user feedback. What if three years down the road we released a polished release that no user wanted to use? At least now we know that desktop icons is a REALLY BIG DEAL for lots of people. ;)
By releasing early we were able to keep developers interested. What do you want to do? Create the next generation of KDE, or do maintainence bugfixes on 3.5? You can attract some developers on the basis of Subversion code alone but at the end of the day you need to make releases, especially for application developers.
By releasing early we were also able to maintain relevance. Who on Slashdot hasn't heard of KDE 4 now, one way or the other? =D Although obviously you never want to shortchange your good name, my experience has been that the harshest comments have come from the most uninformed.
I've seen valid complaints about a feature that is missing or doesn't work as well, or how they don't like the way the desktop is handled now, etc. That's all fair enough. But there are also people who complain about KDE 4.0 being tremendously overhyped, that we said it was going to provide world peace, etc. etc. And I don't see why.
I develop for KDE and let me assure you, the 4.0 release was controversial internal to the project as well. We weren't a bunch of developers telling you that we had the best flavored Kool Aid ever, why don't you have a drink? We certainly had developers
You don't roll out half baked software over the top of working software.
In this specific case, Fedora is responsible for that decision. The real question seems to be why are distributions jumping to these releases of KDE. I understand how a commercial product might want to be able to advertise having the latest version of everything, especially if it can result in some pretty screenshots (as KDE4 can), but how competitive does Fedora need to be here?
The Mac OS has only been overhauled like this once in its 25 year history.