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The Future of KDE
Samawi writes "linux.com has just published an interview with core KDE developer Daniel M. Duley. Topics covered include the upcoming KDE 2.0 (including links to screenshots!), Corba & TinyMico, the advanced widget theme designer, the new high-color icons for the very-soon-to-be-released KDE 1.1.2, influence of Gnome, etc. "
What are you talking about Linux is the kernel. It is possible to make a linux distro with absolutely no command line. You can say at the heart of windows 9x is the GUI but it built off of MS-DOS. Hmmm... Commandlines or GUIs are the user interfaces which are part of the OSs not the OS. I think Microsoft has brainwashed you!!
Not that old cancard. QT is now open source and even the zealot nutcase RMS himself agrees.
If they were really calling them "wizzards", then they would probably be infringing on Rincewind's copyright...
If you want to get rid of the bathwater, you've got to throw out a few babies.
I mean, I could swear I saw a post just like this one when RHAD labs opened (what was it, a year ago?)
I suppose either your definition of "no time" is different from mine, or your subtle irony just passed over my head.
BTW: if you wanna count how many people work full time in KDE , you need to count some places besides MandrakeSoft (which anyways accounts for about 1/3rd of RHAD labs already anyhow?)
That web site is running FreeBSD, I thought it could handle the load.
So many bickering babies at home today... wow... I guess you let the cat out of the bag regarding your systems admin skills... oh well... And it's named...
Some would argue that the first is visually better.
This is a very important point indeed! It's much more intuitive and reflects the notion of 'objects' whith their own member functions.
In the C notation the object is just another argument.
The point is that C can be made to use all the OO features of C++, in not a significantly more cumbersome way.
That's simply wong. In particular, you lose many of the data hiding and encapsulation features that make up reusability. Due to necessary casts or typeless callbacks etc the compiler can't find errors at compile time which could be found with C++.
More typechecking is crucial, unless you don't make mistakes...
I don't know of an easy way to implement inheritance in C either.
In more complex programs, it's also vital that you don't dublicate code, but reduce it to a more abstract basis. In C++ you can use polymorphim (overloaded functions) templates and containers for that, while C doesn't offer anything secure (i.e. you'd need to use casts from/to voids).
Actually, one aspect of using gtk+ I think is an improvement over C++, and that is that you are required to use cast functions to pass arguments.
Those casts are EVIL. In any case, a clean separation of components like the signal/slot mechanism is IMHO preferable.
Avus
My god, these screenshots are fantastic. I never knew themes could look so nice. I hope GNOME themes become like this.
Perhaps, but I would wager that is because C++ automatically puts you in an OOP mindset (because if you aren't going to use OOP, why use C++? Oh yeah, inline functions and const variables).
I think C++ does encourage bad OO design in many ways, unless you are wise to them. Operator overloading, multiple inheritence are things that must be handled with extreme care. Overuse of any kind of inheritence is bad. Sure, C can discourage good OO design, from where I see it mostly by making the programming constructs more unwieldy. That, and by not complaining when you access members of a struct that you shouldn't. For that, I have to go with some philosophy from Perl - you shouldn't touch something because you aren't supposed to, not because the compiler won't let you.
My point is that both C++ and C require you to have a solid understanding of OO design, and that neither stop you from doing it right.
C++ makes it a smoother process, easier on the programmer, for sure. Sometimes I think that's a really a hinderance, though.
The enemies of Democracy are
Win95 sucks but Win98 rocks. I dont know why you dont like win98, but anyways, if windows sucked so bad why is kde trying to copy it?
PS: I think it even has a built in option to make everything look like windows....Hmmmm
Zurk - it is clear that you don't know a thing about either C or C++ ...
/. that would probably fit you well, but do not comment on the stuff you completely don't understand - it makes you look stupid, you know ...
There are many subjects here on
What are the consequences?
The Qt public license says:
a. You must ensure that all recipients of machine-executable forms of these items are also able to receive and use the complete machine-readable source code to the items without any charge beyond the costs of data transfer.
b. You must explicitly license all recipients of your items to use and re-distribute original and modified versions of the items in both machine-executable and source code forms. The recipients must be able to do so without any charges whatsoever, and they must be able to re-distribute to anyone they choose.
Basically, you have to allow every dork in the known universe to fork off his own version of your code and redistribute it under his own name.
Alternatively, you can choose to acquire a commercial license for the small fee of $1500 per developer.
KDE symbolizes a Marxist approach to software development. But hey, who are *you* to decide which development model is best for you. Either you give up all rights to your own software, or you pay a fortune for the privilege to develop a KDE compatible product.
This, ladies and gentlemen, is why KDE sucks.
If you're going to spend money, you might as well spend it on something that's enterprise ready. If you're not going to spend money, then use Linux/BSD. Don't waste it on NT.
Wah!
STL??
KDE seems to go a different way, they're moving away from STL (using ministl and Qt containers), and I can't say that's really a bad thing.
STL takes forever to compileand has a reputation of being quite a bit bloated.
CORBA ORB???
Gnome wants to stick to ORBit, although is crashes quite easily and has a lot of features missing. They won't accept MICO as this is C++ based.
KDE will cut down the size of MICO, creating some 'tiny', less bloated version.
Not only will they remain apart, they may even become incompatible as GNOME adds non-standard features to ORBit which can even break IIOP.
libArt???
Don't know about that, but both teams develop their own canvas, and Baboon remains incomptible to KOM/OpenParts.
Doesn't look very promising at the moment...
So the whole point is to deprecate MS Office "standards"... Corel's come back from the brink more times than I can count, anyway. I'm sure they'll be okay.
Anything that you can do in C++ can also be done in C. After all, the first C++ compilers were actually wrappers around C compilers.
notext
Wah!
I only know gtk (for coding) because of the license issues at the time (when I decided to play w/ toolkits) However, I recently switched over to kde (1.1.1) mixed w/ debian (slink) and it is entirely too slick (in a good way) Its definitely the system to impress your friends in a functional kind of way. (in the complementary way that enlightenment was the one to impress your acid dropping friends :)) The best examples are if your SO is a mac addict, make her theme MacOS2 (okay unfortunately this one has been removed from themes.org but its still available), put the menubar at the top of the screen and it looks and acts like a mac to the T! Try doing that on a windows box! :)) It also seems that kde (and i'm sure the gnome kids are doing this as well) have realized we don't need 10zillion versions of minesweep and samegame (what on earth is that thing? :! ) and have started to put a lot of really nice utility programs.. kppp is really sweet, runs in usermode, hangs up properly runs scripts before and after.. (like setting up ddns crap) i found it much easier to set up than pon/poff (which on hanging i'd have to manually kill -9 and zap the modem on and off), kvirc is entirely too sweet w/ built in servers lists, buttons out of control, korn,kexpress are finally starting to look like newsreaders (yes I realize trn is the be all and end all of all newsreaders but!), kxicq lets you register icq (which was the first time i ever messed w/ icq) of course that was pretty much the last time :)...,kdvi is *so* much better than xdvi. But I really recommend keeping a versions of kde (and its friends) along w/ your installation just to see how it is progressing (its my default windowmanager at home now)..
:) (No menudropdown thingies tho :( ).
(Its a fantastic way of converting your skeptical gf's who make fun of you for calling latex a wordprocessor
Oh and kfm is simply the best! Not so much for the filemanager (which I suppose is cool too) but it really is a superfast easy to run web-browser that is utterly responsive , its not completely as functional as netscape but it gets the job done w/out waiting for the 20 seconds for netscape to pop up in that cludgy kind of way that is so annoying! Oh yea and the back button takes you to where you were on the previous page (not further up the page like netscape (or at least every version of netscape i've come across)) for slashdot threading alone its worth it
Seriously kde really is starting to look like a desktop that most kids think of when they think of gui apps and 'modern' computers (for better or worse)! As far as stability, I was actually having some weirdness w/ kde and 1.1 (this was a 'contrib' type debian package unofficial, not something compiled on my own).. Its definitely the one to give your nongeek friends *imho*
-avi
Now that egcs is the official compiler and KDE only compiles with gcc-2.8, this presents a slight problem.
Zurk, I can't really believe that you can advocate: 1. A Java Graphical Environment. 2. C more flexible than C++ (one example please?) 3. Gnome getting faster and more reliable Bruce.
Reminder, this is alpha quality software -- it's likely to change. I think they designed the device manger to be as similar as possible to the Windows device manger (while not messing up the interface like Microsoft), so that new users that have never used UNIX for an extended time can easily use device manger -- although name the serial ports after their Windows equvalants is just plain tacky...
The current KDE 2.0 user manger is much like the one in 1.x.x, it's quite a bit different then the Wndows version, in features and in the way it works... and it works pretty good.
KDE is an open-source, open-minded project, they don't mind reusing interface ideas from other platforms, and adding radically new ones, and tossing out several bad ones (MDI / parent child windows comes to mind).
Remember if you can write a better version of KUser or the device manger in Qt 2.0/KDE 2.0 feel free to submit it ftp://ftp.kde.org/incomming/
I'm so glad I'm not forced to use it! :-)
There is no K5 cabal.
I am not the real rusty.
Click on a Link, hold mouse button down for 2 seconds, will get you the contextual menu in either Internet Exploiter or Netscape Navigator 4.x.
Or rather like 0.8333 years, as there was slightly less than a 10 month gap, from October 16 1996 to sometime in early August 1997.
If you can write something like the machine generated C from CFront, you are not human.
Also, you are factually wrong: the generated C didn't implement private members, for example. Simply, the translator refused to generate the C to access the member that was supposed to be private, and spews an error *before* trying to implement it in C.
So, private members are feasible in C... as long as that means "I am a C programmer who can remember not to access that member!"
Yes, Mosfet is not only busy working on themes / look and feel of KDE 2.0, he is also one of the core developers of KImageshop, a flexable corba-based image editing program.
It is similar to the GIMP -- and is compatible with all GIMP plugins, making a powerful, KDE/Corbra aware Imaging program, with an interface that doesn't totally bite (although GIMP 1.1.x is getting better -- part of the GIMP are just strangely designed -- and rely on right clicking way to much!)
A good user interface is obvious to new users -- the GIMP takes experience to figure it out.
Having Mosfet working full time on these key issues is important, users like an interface that is flexable, and yet doesn't required a degree in CS to understand how to use it.
PS Slashdot is not displaying all the articles you need to unthread.
Another thing that really might be good to improve is the Minicli (the mini-command-line KDE gives when you press Alt-F2.) When it works, it works nicely, but I quit using it for anything serious because... nothing happens when the command you execute is misspelled or something. I'm thinking that they could pop up a small xterm-window that contained all text sent to stderr the first time anything sends to stderr when you exec something with minicli. (Would this be a Wretched Hack, a Good Idea, or some disgusting hybrid? Just curious.)
I'm still learning C++, otherwise I'd have done these things already. If KDE had been coded in C, I'd have "fixed" these by now :-).
Finally: Sure, the desktop screenshots are cool. But who ever has time to look at the desktop? With a GIMP window here, X11amp there, kvt there, and assorted other delights, at least 3 of the virtual desktops are completely covered, and I pay much more attention to the contents of the application windows than what's behind them. Yeah, I'm weird, but I think "themes" are the spawn of the devil and an animated Pink Panther cursor is akin to a bow tie with embedded blinking Christmas lights... cute, but you get sick of it really quickly.
Give a monkey a brain and he'll swear he's the center of the universe.
I have a P133 with 32meg notebook. Windowmaker fits in as the perfect balance in speed/functionality. I've not tried blackbox or icewm. I've heard good things about them too. Windowmaker is just really easy to setup/configure (even if you've never used it before). It looks nice and is very good for just getting work done.
KDE and GNOME are nice but unless you have a lot of RAM to throw around, I would avoid them like the plague.
This is not bad design, this is just the way it is. I really wish I could get mozilla to compile so I could avoid the memory bloat of netscape. M7 did fine but M8 just wouldn't make.... oh well..
Civ CTP is awesome! Thanks Loki!
Romans 10:9-10
KDE 2.0 is coming along nicely. Those screenshots look pretty cool. Few guys around the office can't wait to have a crack at 2.0
"Imagination is the only weapon in the war against reality." -Jules de Gautier
Think for a moment and you'll realize there's two machines involved here.
The original server ("www") is one we've been having problems with lately anyway. We simply weren't prepared. It's just a members web server.
Had we been aware of the article we would have moved Donald's site to the server that is now the mirror sooner. It's now on the commercial web server ("halley" or "www2" if you don't have a cached entry), and it's not even blinking at the load:
3:22PM up 83 days, 21:50, 2 users, load averages: 0.05, 0.07, 0.04
--
My comments and opinions completely reflect those of anyone and anything I am remotely associated with.
Thanks for the tip. I'll try since I am forced to use a Mac in the lab.
But this calls into question how intuitive Mac UI really is, given that
I couldn't find a way to do it despite looking hard.
Granted, many of the things they are doing is helpful, application interoperability, ease of use, etc. But until they get on the track of making a better desktop, people will be sticking to windows desktops.
-- these are only opinions and they might not be mine.
The KDE team was working on an open source replacement (clone) of the QT library. This library would no doubt cut deeply into the profits of Troll Tech. (Why pay for something if you can get the exact functionality for free?) TT was scared by this and had two choices. They could sue the KDE developers (and thereby having the open source community shun them) or release their QT library as open source (and hopefully have the open source community embrace them). So, of course TT went open source. Their hand was forced.
Are certainly not vital to the continuing success of KDE. Its enough to have a good set of very competently done bindings not a whole slew of mediocre ones. Anyway, the language bindings can come later as the KDE wedge penetrates further into the soft underbelly of the mainstream computer market.
This is the first I've heard of Mosfet joining MandrakeSoft. You go boy!
Mmmm, and great interview/screenshot page. Update KDE News!
> I can't write Ada programs for KDE
True
> I can't write graphical perl programs for KDE
You will. The PerlQt port is lagging behind right now.. but that doesn't mean that it won't catch up again.
> I can't write python applications for KDE
Why not? Last I looked (yesterday), the python binding for KDE were quite complete.
> I can't write C applications for KDE
Would you even if there was a binding?
I think that this entire line of argument is a red herring. I hear this mostly from people who inherently don't like KDE and want to find something to pick on (now that the license issue is mostly a moot point, let's attack the lack of language support!)
The fact is that for all the talk, whenever language bindings *are* created, nobody uses them. You say you want to use perl with KDE. Okay.. a binding was created... but it fell behind since nobody used it! You say you want to use C. Fine enough. Why is it that when there *was* a C binding that nobody used it?
What it comes down to is this: if people really wanted to use other languages with KDE, then that binding would happen (e.g., python)!
A fact of life, is as software become more advanced and powerful, you are eventually going to need faster hardware. Yes, forward compatiblity exists to an extent, but running Quicktime 4 on an 68020 or running a modern Linux version + X + full featured desktop + network services demands more then a i386.
UNIX is inheritably bigger, not because it's bloated -- but because it's designed to be more flexable -- since traditional UNIX hardware makes PC's look like toys -- so you do need some RAM and speed to use a modern UNIX setup completely with advanced desktop configuration.
We will try to support old machines as much as possible -- but it's not always pratical -- you can always yourself hack the code to preform better on your machine.
In the days of 450-600 mhz processor machines, with 128 megs of RAM, and the majority of users using machines around 200mhz with 32-64 megs of RAM, the OS is going to be more optimized for this hardware -- and not as much for a 16 mhz or 33 mhz machine.
KDE themes are much faster than GNOME themes fortunately.
I think I used a thing called "Wizard" on my Atari, way back in 1987. I even believe there were little helpful tools on the C=64 that were called "Diskwizard" or sth. Im sure that the term "Wizard" is a commonly used one like "Window". They simply CAN`T copyright it. (Thats my opinion...) Lispy
yeah...but do you have to reboot everytime you make a change :)
I think in the long run one of the benefits of Linux is going to be that the user will have a CHOICE of what desktop / WM to use. I've played with KDE and Gnome and I enjoyed both of them for different reasons. I have been using KDE for the past couple months just because I grew tired of cleaning up core dumps every day with Gnome, but I plan on trying it again with the next release.
When the level of the "average" computer user grows they will want more than what "The Man" tells them is good, they will want to make that decision for themselves. Long kive Freedom of Choice !!!!!
This sort of thing has cropped up before. And it has always been due to human error.
--
This sort of thing has cropped up before. And it has always been due to human error.
HAL9000
It's just like Mico, but 1/8th its size. They should call it....
:)
Mini-Mico!
(bows, then runs
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
They're also COMPLETELY, TOTALLY, and UTTERLY OPTIONAL!
You can go with a stripped-down non-pixmap theme if you want to - or get the fanciest desktop out there. It's your choice.
Eeew.. Use Linux. BSD TCP/IP sucks.
KDE, GNOME, too much stuff I don't want.
Everyone knows that Windows 98 is just MS-DOS! MS-DOS + Microsoft's latest poorly designed window manager = Win 98. Most Linux users know that Win 98 sucks so they don't try it. Those that do hate Win 98, so theres no future in it.
you should definetely take a look at tcl/tk. it is in my opinion, superb. i use it at work to do gui's for both unix, and windows (a feature you cannot get with VB), it has extensions for DDE, and COM, and it has very simple semantics (which perl is not known for). to top it off, you can easily embed it into your applications to provide a scripting front end, similar to how excel has VB as a macro language.
newton's notation for the calculus kept british mathematics behind european continental mathematics because (in part) leibniz notation was superior. of course it matters.
Inheritance is a struct(the child) that has the same data and methods as some other struct(the parent), plus some new stuff. For polymporphism, a vtable would be necessary, yes. That's just an array of function pointers, or better a function pointer member of the struct, one for each function. The 'constructor' function for the struct can set that up as needed. No big deal, and _still_ all you need to do is pass the struct pointer to a function and it will use that struct's vtable. I mean, in this sense, that's not really any more difficult than in C++.
Private, protected, and public interfaces are usefull only if you don't trust people using your class. I have go with the Perl philosophy on this one -- programmers shouldn't touch class internals because they aren't supposed to, not because they aren't allowed to. Not that declaring something 'private' will keep anyone from accessing the private members if they want to. Yes, C can't do it at all, I just don't think it's an important part of good OO design.
C macros cause code bloat, but templates don't?! Sorry, but that is just craziness. Just like macros, templates generate source code, one set of it for each instantiation of the template.
Exception handling is a whole different ball of wax, not really related to OOP except that it is a feature of C++ (and a relatively new one at that), which is an OO language. setjmp/longjmp are evil, and certainly not a replacement. Exceptions could be done well in C, with way too much work on the part of the coder. This is one area where C++ wins... except that I've had so much trouble with compilers that I never use them. They are a new feature, after all, and compilers are still trying to handle the ANSI standard (which is itself not very old).
I like templates. I (guardedly) like exceptions. I like inline functions over macros, const instead of #define, and other C++ features. But OO is still very doable in C, and it isn't markedly more cumbersome.
If you really want to see how this is all done in C, then browse the gtk+ source tree.
The enemies of Democracy are
hey man, bash and awesome ui. Not as configuarble yet, but there have been whispers of kalidescope(sp) for r5. There is window's decor if you so choose. Give it whirl.
Jesus christ!!@$ what the hell is the matter with you people? "it looks too much like windows, therefore it sucks." 1) what the hell do you want it too look like? some futuristic GUI from 2067?
2) GTK is the most customizable GUI. it can be made to look like win9x, or nothing like it. quit it with the flames. it seems more than half of people using linux (or whatever) use it for the sole reason its not windows, which is pathetic. why not use something 1) because you like it 2) and helps you work better. quit worrying about what your friends think when they find out you use redhat..............AND KDE*(^*(&*( OH NO^^&*^^%$.
----------
Have FreeBSD questions?
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Have FreeBSD questions?
http://balambiris.ne.mediaone.net
I ran KDE from Beta3 up until 1.0 on a 486/66 with 16 and later 20 megs of RAM. I had no complaints. Win95, however, was at times quite frustrating. The changes between 1.0 and 1.1 were mostly bugfixes and speedups, so I can only assume that the people complaining have badly configured boxes (it's clear from most posts on excessive memory usage that they don't understand shared memory very well).
Was my message not plain enough? I suggested a couple of changes to the way the Gnome and KDE interface work. Those suggestions are valid. My note was to let people know that simply copying Microsoft is not good enough. Try to make a UI that is better than Windows. If the goal is to only be as "good" as windows, then mediocrity wins again! At the current state, Gnome and KDE are simply ripoffs of a poorly designed UI from Redmond. Why would anyone copy such a design?
As I said before both Gnome and KDE suck! They could have set the bar up a bit higher, but they settled for the same crappy interface.
> See topic.
Topic seen. You: see doctor.
hey josh, stop reading slashdot
If you want something that allows you to work faster and easier, you want a command-line. Graphical desktops are mainly there because they're easy to learn, not easy or quick to use.
Heh, you make Bill Gates sound an awful lot like RMS. Gates doesn't want to be God, he just wants all your money.
One mouse button? This is the thing that most annoys me about a mac, too.
Question: Is it possible to buy a three button mouse for a mac? Or a wheel mouse?
Question2: IF it is possible, do any programs take advantage of enhanced mice?
Question3: Why doesn't apple abandon its only-one-button-for-everybody mouse strategy. After all, they've dropped a lot of the cruft from the original mac (M68k, black and white only, no internal expansion)...
Remember if you can write a better version of KUser or the device manger in Qt 2.0/KDE 2.0 feel free to submit it ftp://ftp.kde.org/incomming/
I think the kde developers want it to look like windows since the help system also looks similar (it has the same icons) and the tree in the file manager is the same as explorer
Thanks alot.
Actually, the issue of KDE-GNOME interoperability is being addressed. Eventually, one should be able to do something like embed a Gnumeric spreadsheet into Kword. That's probably not something that were going to see for quite a while, maybe in the next couple years.
DNS was working fine. Just made some address and TTL changes that didn't propogate rapidly enough.
And it's FreeBSD anyway.
--
My comments and opinions completely reflect those of anyone and anything I am remotely associated with.
>
the point is, that it is all done by the compiler, not you, if you would try to implement good inheritance (multiple, public/private etc.) it would not be all that easy and not that easy to use (if you want polymorphism).
>
it's not about trust. you want to make it known, which functions/members are internal and which are for general use. objects have internal mechanizms (change with time) and external interfaces (should not change in time). you want to differentiate between these.
>
they generate one function for each different value of template parameters, the macros are simple peices of code inserted everywhere where the macro is called.
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you seem to be missing that all the programming languages generally do the same, everything that you can implement in one of them, can be implemented in machine code. yet we have different languages for different purposes. the computer languages are for people. OO is much easier to do if the language supports it (like C++) or even mandates it (like Smalltalk).
erik
...all excited, don't know why...
1) All of your arguments apply to Linux and the GPL. (Can't produce a shareware version of Linux, can't develop hybrid license version of Linux, can't distribute freeware (no source) version of linux). The difference with QT is you can buy a license to develop proprietary software.
2) If you are going to make money by selling proprietary software what is wrong with the idea of having to give back some of that money to troll tech? (How much you can argue about but surely there is nothing wrong with giving something back!).
3)KDE symbolizes a Marxist approach to software development
KDE development has no political or religious affinity. Each project can choose their own development model. Different projects contribute code under different licenses. Core development tends to be done on an anarchy/meritocracy basis.
Basically KDE development encourages Open Source development but allows proprietary development at a cost.
Microsoft will have a real run for its money if RedHat, Mandrake, Caldera, Suse and Corel ship this as the main desktop environment. Like it or not, but this will win over many newbies.
---Got Coffee?---
UNIX is a server OS which is making inroads into the desktop marketplace. Windows/Mac OS are desktop operating systems making inroads into the server marketplace.
Windows and a few tag-along friends have been at a decided advantage where bridging the server/desktop gap is concerend. "Any moron can administer" (desktop) equals "cheap sysadmin." "Stable" (server) equals "fewer reboots in the typing pool."
Linux has helped further UNIX's position by adding "cheap" and "popular" to the list of features. Now it's time to really hammer on creating a solid target application environment and, most of all, to focus on ease of use.
There are already countless Linux distributions competing to create the easiest-to-install distribution. The key players know they need to get people up and running painlessly.
But KDE and to a lesser extent, Gnome, represent the next critical step. Fewer of the important players seem to realize (or know what to do about the fact) that ease of use and a consistent desktop are what are going to make or break the huge desktop market for them.
Linux-Mandrake seems to realize this, with their support of David Faure, and FreeBSD seems to be considering methods for a sneak-attack. (There are more KDE threads there.)
Linux or not, whoever can make themselves synonymous with KDE when KOffice and KDE 2.0 go public will have the desktop market locked. Execs will be tripping over each other to be the first to suggest the "stable" "cheap" "popular" and "EASY" OS for every last PC in the place.
Who's it going to be? Will they turn RH into a tiny, forgotten memory? ...will they still remember Linux?
Actually neither should win.
This is wrong also. The correct answer is both should win. What we need to get away from is the idea that there has to be just one winner and everything else is a loser. If both KDE and Gnome develop into excellent desktop environments (and both show potential to do so), then they will both be winners. Users will be the winners if they continue to have more than one viable choice. The only losers will be those who feel they have to control everything (like Microsoft) or those who are deathly paralyzed by fear that they might have to make a decision, even if there is really no wrong choice.
John
John_Chalisque
I think a lot of people would agree that overall, GNOME still isn't where KDE was a year ago... so it's actually falling behind.
Templates are instantiated once, not once for each use, like macros are.
find / -name "kcmdevmgr*" -exec rm {} \;
should do.
Witness the original NeXT machine, which had a two-button mouse: but they acted the same! And this same-acting was not in the toolkit or at any software level, it was in the window server, so that it was *impossible* for a program to differentiate the buttons no matter how much it wanted to (you could send a command to the window server but that would split the buttons for all the apps).
I don't know about KDE/Qt 2.0, but surely GTK+ provides this feature.
The latest GTKStep theme puts the scrollbars in the left, so it seems that you are able to choose its position...
Only thing I don't know is if it is possible to add a "toggle" option for this, or if you have to write a theme to change the positioning...
From the screenshots of KDE 2.0, it seems that it'll be easy to set that up.
Windows already does everything KDE currently does, will do, and will ever do.
I have tried multiple virtual desktop managers for Windows NT. I have yet to find one that works in the presence of Visual C++ in debug mode. KDE handles multiple desktops quite nicely.
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
Hehe... Doing that is the easiet thing of all in Linux. In Linux, just click the middle mouse button on a link, and presto! You have it open in another window :)
:)
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
Vatos locos for life esse!
Windows for life too, esse?
Corndog
I'll delete it in a week. I hope my ISP doesn't kill me - but they should be able to handle the load (T3's etc).
PS. You server might be able to handle the load, but your network pipe seems unable (pages load slowly).
let me expand what you said a little bit. QT themes are faster than GTK (what you meant, even if you don't know it) "Pixmap" themes. GTK theme engines work in the same way as KDE themes, and are equally fast. There is nothing stopping anyone from writing a QT pixmap theme like the one GTK has, but it would be equally slow (Someone may very well have written it by now). The reason most GTK themes are Pixmap themes is because its several orders of magnitude easier to make than an engine.
Now that the facts are out of the way, stop spreading FUD.
All of the so called "window managers" for Win32 are nasty hacks; they install a global handler for WM_NC* messages and handle them before the normal code sees them. This breaks other apps that customize their titlebar.
Well well, who said Microsofties don't hang out at SlashDot. Worried about your stock options are you? Just think, if KDE 2.0 makes it out before the 'official' release of WinNT2K, MS will have even more egg on its face.
It would not surprise me at all if they trademarked 'Wizard' in that context, since I seem to remember competing programs having parts with identical functions but somewhat different names (not an unusual event: remember Borland's DAD vs. MS's MOM? That's as silly as Unix naming traditions...).
So call 'em Assistants, Advisors, Aides... or if you want to tweak MS at the cost of obscurity, Conjurors.
I'm actually a tad surprised they never went after StarDivision, given that StarOffice (at least early versions... 3.0-ish) looked very, *very* similar to MS Office in many, many details.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
Actually, what most annoying me about the Mac isn't the single mouse button. That's like #2 on my list.
Things that most annoying me about the Mac:
1) The shared menubar! (I CAN'T STAND IT)
2) The one-button mouse. (It's like using a computer after being in a disfiguring accident)
3) Everything else. (When using a Mac, I feel like I want to smash it in raging fury. It won't actually let me just get stuff done.)
A-ha!!! You *ARE* a microserf!! I knew it!! Admit it, you're in the marketing department, aren't you? You're the one spamming /. with OT replies (err... not like my off topic replies *cough*)! FUD at it's best!!
:)
For a while, you had me going. I suspected a fellow linux weenie trying to make MS marketing seem worse than it is. Glad I was wrong...
(um.... sorry 'bout that. I'll stop now
"One man can change the world with a bullet in the right place."
- Mick Travis, "If..."
I think the point is that it is much easier to write object-oriented code in C++ than it is in C. I've been exposed briefly to both languages, and from what I can tell, C++ provides higher-level language structures, such as classes, which allow one to write object-oriented programs relatively straightforwardly, while C is by nature a procedural language, so that one who wishes to write object-oriented code in C must find a way to force C's language constructs into an object-oriented mold. In other words, AFAIK, if you're talking about objects and classes, it's easier to say what you mean in C++ than it is in C. This could very well make the difference between code that is easy to debug and code that isn't.
I could be wrong here, and all you real programmers out there are free to correct me.
So how can a theme changes this (as some other poster mentioned) when it's hardcoded?
i dont trust Qt's new opensource licensing and am much more comfortable with the GPL anyway.
That's your problem, of course. But, as a matter of fact, the new Qt license is great. It's effectively the GPL without licensing hassle when using other Open Source code.
And as for trust: TrollTech has done what no other company has done before, they have handed over the control of their products future to the OpenSource community. Even GPL'd code can be changed to another license (sure, old code stays free) when you own the copyright.
TrollTech has handed over the right to change the license to the KDE Free Qt foundation, where the KDE representatives have veto power. Therefor TT can't change the license themselves.
They can't even sell their company (say to M$) without losing their revenue: Qt would then become BSD'd.
All in all the best solution I can think of.
Yeah, the same people who complain that X is trying to copy activeX and other ideas, are the same people who complain linux is lacking the functionality of Windows. You can't win! :
>Remember the benchmarks from Mindcraft, ahh you forgot about those >didn't you?
And you forgot about the Windows 2000 farce,er challege haven't you?
Microcrap products just can't hack it in the *Real World* it seems only in unrealistic benchmark testing....
Perhaps if your text is 3 or 4 pages long, but using an intellimouse to scroll down 90 pages would, in a word, SUCK.
Who the fuck would want to use something designed by frigging sons of famous SS. Fucking hitler jugend is playing Linux now ?
Funny you should mention that. A while back I read in an interview, with Miguel De Icaza, where Miguel said that KDE had no future. But then again, that is becuase he is an asshole.
I agree completely. I am after all a KDE developer and not impartial at all ;-)
I was just replying (perhaps too subtly) to the claim that KDE had been in development for "years" before GNOME.
In my senior year of high school, I had to fill a dual-enrollment block at the local community college. (great way to drop high-school periods.) Since there wasn't much to take, I took "Programming in VB" for the heck of it. I thought it would be easy and potentially useful to learn. I entered the class with an open mind.
I now hate VB. Coming from a background in real languages (Pascal, C, C++, etc.) I found VB frustrating. I always knew exactly what I wanted to do and how to do it. But getting VB to do it is another story. VB makes the really easy stuff easier, and makes everything else a pain in the ass.
Back in my day, we used AppleSoft Basic. It had line numbers, and "?SYNTAX ERROR" messages on perfect code! It didn't even have an editor. Any we liked it!!!!
You go on about your fancy shmancy "structured programming". Back in my day, we had so many GOTO's we could hardly figure out what we wrote!
Basic is a wonderful language for teaching little kids how to program. It should never have progressed further than maybe QBASIC. VB was an attempt to take an old language that isn't good enough for real programming, wrap it in point 'n crash garbage, and get people to use it. Once you learn a real language, you'll never touch VB.
First of all, let me clarify that I love KDE and it is what I use.
Re-arranging widgets is definitely nice. But I was trying to re-arrange the window widgets (program menu, sticky, maximize, minimize, close) and discovered that you can rearrange them a little, but not much from where they're expected to be.
Do you want to put minimize to the right of maximize? You're out of luck.
Do you want the program menu on the right side of the window? Sorry. You can click the button there but the menu still opens up on the LEFT side.
And then there's the completely arbitrary restriction that you can't have more than 3 widgets on each side of the window. I wanted to put EVERYTHING on the right side, because of the way I often lose the upper left corner of a window behind the top-left taskbar. Sorry, only 3 per side, and of course the program menu has to be on the left. But I dealt with it by getting rid of maximize, which I never use.
Anyway, I realize I'm complaining about TINY little things, but I hope that KDE 2.0 fixes these arbitrary restrictions.
--
Win dain a lotica, en vai tu ri silota
KDE faster?!? Hardly. KDE is as bloated as Windows. In fact Win98 will run better on a low end system than Linux/KDE. Try running KDE on a 486 w/16 meg of ram...be prepared to wait a long time for everything. On modern, current hardware there is little to no speed difference between Windows or KDE, in fact threres little visable performance difference between a PII350 and a PIII550 in terms of how the desktop performs. CUP intensive apps (RC5 for example) obviously perform better with more hardware but not the desktop.
I can't help but think that if there were 'bosses' of GNOME + KDE who could make a deal (and force their programmers to accept it), we could get some co-ordination between the two projects. But if that were the case all the time, we wouldn't have Linux, there'd just be Windows.
Wah!
Why not try visual tcl? There are plenty of good books on it and it can make tclets which will run in Netscape or MSIE with a plugin. http://www.neuron.com/stewart/vtcl/ should get you started nicely.
but I won't use it. I have to agree that for what I personally need, a simple traditional window manager is far superior. But then again, I am a nerd who enjoys the command line and uses vi to code.
But QT is under a license that won't allow that. Hence Gnome.
It's FreeBSD, and it's still up.
--
My comments and opinions completely reflect those of anyone and anything I am remotely associated with.
And several months ago, he was lamenting about how unstable Windows was, but how we had no choice, and he added in parentheses: "(Well, there's Linux, but only the weird kid next door uses that.)"
But Al has finally seen the light - he now runs many columns about Linux. Contrary to the pessimists who say Microsoft has a monopoly over our minds, this is a victory. It was pretty much his job to give advice on Windows, but he's converted to Linux anyway.
--
Win dain a lotica, en vai tu ri silota
Win98 on a 486 w/16 meg of ram???
Nice try, Wintroll, try again!
The main problem is X, which is optimized for network-enabled display. Xggi or he new, more modular XFree 4 could possibly help.
Almost there:
1) Writing theme engines (called styles there) for Qt is a whole lot easier than doing it for GTK.
Why? OO design. You can *inherit* the, say, platinum style, and hack the widget that annoys you the most. On GTK the closest equivalent starts with "copy the sources for the GTKStep engine to that other directory".
2) Qt's user (non programmer) definable styles (the equivalent of GTK pixmap themes) are faster. One of the most used elements of those styles are gradients. In GTK you do them by stretching pixmaps, while in Qt you do them programatically (and actually, you do it from mosfet's cute designer), and they get rendered using optimized code instead of a general purpose pixmap routine.
Of course, if I am wrong, I invite anyone to correct me.
Totally agreed with your cooperation proposal.
I can't help but think that if there were 'bosses' of GNOME + KDE who could make a deal (and force their programmers to accept it), we could get some co-ordination between the two projects.
The main problem are the bosses, i.e. one of them, Miguel from GNOME. He has obviously a serious ego problem, and he is agressively against any kind of cooperation with KDE. Just look at the GNOME-KDE mailing list (at gnome.org).
Cooperation between 'normal' developers works sometimes, but as soon as Miguel appears, he pisses off all other developers.
The reason that Linux isn't ready for the masses is that there aren't enough GUI applications that work together.
The great thing about UNIX is how you can get commands that process data streams and pipe them together. The problem is that there isn't a similar widely adopted standard for GUI programs on Unix. The analagous capabilities are inter app cut and paste, and object sharing (as in OLE or OpenDoc).
KDE and Gnome are addressing this issue. When you can build the functional equivalent of Office 2K (in terms of functionality, not quality) with free software, and can work easily with third party apps w/ no special rigamarole, then you have a Windows killer. It seems to me that KDE is further down this path.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Now let me start off by saying that I love KDE, I use it on my Linux box, and I previously used it on my sparc (but I have to support CDE now and it's much easier to do so when actually running it). Bugs and all (like consistently losing all but two of my desktops) I still like it.
But the screenshots of the device manager and user manager really made me wince. These are identical copies of the windows equivalents. Know what immediate impression I get? Microsoft leads, KDE copies. This is not a reputation we deserve to get.
I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
--
I have been busy with the theme designer and other misc stuff. Nonetheless some very good people have made an impressive start with KIM. They got a canvas going along with several tools. mosfet@kde.org
Does anyone have a mirror of the screenshots page? All I have is the front page and probably the first screenshot cached.
So much for all the silly "Gnome and KDE are at war" flaming that users who can't compile either project get on with on Slashdot.
Looks to me like at least this KDE developer just sees the contest as a reason to improve his own software. Frankly the tone looked thankfull.
I wonder what the Gnome core members wold say ? Probebly something similer like KDE made us write more apps
Forge at another PC.
Windows already does everything KDE currently does, will do, and will ever do.
Your kidding right? Please tell me you are kidding? You mean your third party hacks are better than things KDE and GNOME do inherently. Try configuring hardware with out the control panel? The customizeability of *nix and KDE blows windows out of the water! Do you think people are moving to linux because linux and windows are the same? KDE and Windows are not the same thing, if you would use *nix software before making baseless comparisons you probably would not have posted that silly comment.
The point is still valid, right? Having been around longer, it would make since that it would be farther ahead. More obvious than it being more oop.
I know I will be moderated down for this, but . . . Vincent
what a choad... he got you... hook, line, and sinker... LOL!
The server buckeled in a matter of minutes....
Anybody have a mirror?
Gotta love it.
>> you have to use dos to do everything
>> linix will go bankrupt
Beautiful. And you fooled the moderators, too. Y'oughta get bonus points for that.
But hotgrrl67532 is mine; stay away from her or else I'll send you the Good Times virus.
I think that's entirely possible. I tried it out from CVS.
It's pretty good, though somewhat buggy. Konqueror (which just might convert a old nc/mc guy like myself, quite a feat) looks great but is pretty unstable right now. It works though. Just needs some bugs fixed.
I'm confident it'll be very useable very soon. I'm currently doing a reinstall, and I'm going to try it out again.
I also tried out XFree86 3.9.15. Pretty damn slick. I only had to add *one line* to my XF86Config file: Driver "MGA". I also changed the X symlink to point to XFree86 rather than XF86_SVGA.
My only problem was that it "broke" kdm/xdm. Now it only goes into twm no matter what I select. I glanced through some documentation and went through a load of config files trying to find out what's running twm. I found some and changed twm to startkde and it's still doing it.
Ho hum, I'll figure it out.
So much for all the silly "Gnome and KDE are at war" flaming that users who can't compile either project get on with on Slashdot.
Looks to me like at least this KDE developer just sees the contest as a reason to improve his own software. Frankly the tone looked thankfull.
I wonder what the Gnome core members wold say ? Probebly something similer like KDE made us write more apps
Forge at another PC.
For those old enough to remember, Doesn't the current KDE vs. GNOME debate sound a lot like the Linux vs. 386BSD one?
386BSD was always a step behind, had a very "vocal" leader (Jolitz vs. Miguil?), and eventually failed to accomplish its goals, splintered, and pretty much no one rememebrs 386BSD now.
Just a thought.
Gnome 2.0 will have a lot more things then you think. First of all the dependancies on imlib will be replaced with a libart and gdk-pixbuff which are already currently implemented. The panel will have a lot more features such as better resizing. The file manager will be replaced with a new a better one. the pager should get some improvemets also. I think that justifies a 2.0 version.
Eat that
Because ActiveX is the ripoff of CORBA/COM. It's essentially an after the fact subset, much like Gnome.
The revolution will be mocked
Or if you have a two button mouse (like myself), simply click both buttons on the link.
I find it makes Slashdot reading much less annoying in Netscape. If you click a link regularly, it's really slow coming back, and it won't be displaying the right part of the document.
Compile WM (or blackbox, or...) with KDE support, and use it instead of KWM. The only thing missing is a KControl module for WM...
IIS? 22% market share and stagnant for over a year, according to Netcraft. The right ($$$) IIS/NT configuration could probably handle the load, but so what? Who cares about Microsoft products anymore? There are too many advantages to the open source approach for me to waste time thinking about any of that proprietary, legacy MS stuff. Put it on Unix and open up the source code, I might look at it. -Doug Lay (forgot my password)
I only use 3 of the buttons, all on the right side (which makes sense to me since that's where your scroll bar is, usually). I only have minimize, maximize, and close. For program menu, I simply right click on the titlebar, and the meu pops up wherever I click (IIRC, X is not running right now so I can't check it, and I rarely need that menu).
WordPerfect called them Coaches, and had equally tracky icons to go along with it. Wizard is a generic enough term I doubt that MS could sue "KDE" if they wanted. After all, who would they sue? If they went after individual developers they'd most likely have to take it to a German court. *grin*
The revolution will be mocked
Perhaps they learned their lesson early on that look and feel lawsuits won't hold up. Or perhaps it's because they'd have to sue a German company. Or is it the DoJ case currently pending. By not suing SO they look like they have competition.
The revolution will be mocked
It's a matter of choice. With Windows (which I do use BTW), you are pretty much stuck with *one* integrated desktop, and no other choices. Even apps like litestep and the like are only appearance, they don't have any real effect on the underlying interface thema.
With Linux/X, however, you get to choose whatever level of integration (or not) that you prefer. In addition, you can choose from *two* separate integrated desktop environments, and you can use the one *you* like, not the one that was provided for you.
Nunc Tutus Exitus Computarus.
Your comment is so 1997... Qt is free software, RMS, ESR, everyone important agrees.
Well, from what I can see, KDE still has the best chance of being the Windows killer .. lets face it, the biggest thing stopping windows sheep from using Linux is the lack of a robust, fully functional GUI. And while the vets might argue other window managers offered it, I still think its the KDE team thats going to have the best chance of bridging that gap. I work with a guy who swears by command line - what he's yet to understand is that neither command line nor GUI are in themselves better than the other. It's the proper balance, and a well thought out GUI that actually increases productivity. I think the KDE team has got the best vision so far. The increased use of CORBA in KDE 2.0 is really what has me on the edge of my seat though ....
"Old man yells at systemd"
To paraphrase the Camel: "People should stay out of my house because it's the polite thing to do, not because I have a shotgun"
I love that line!!
If only "common" sense was actually that common...
KDE2.0 really seems to be a 2.0 version, and
the interface is really starting to look
polished and integrated with the OS, from
a functionality point of view.
I really feel sorry for GNOME. It seems their
development team executes poorly. I mean,
do people really feel GNOME is at a 2.0
level? Get serious.
And isn't OSS supposed to be about sharing,
about taking the best ideas of others, etc.
So why is GNOME creating yet another component model almost a half year after both Mozilla and KDE introduced workable models that have existing applications proven to work around them?
It's like, not only have the KDE guys developed a great desktop, but they also wrote a whole bunch of nicely integrated apps around it. The GNOME guys seem to have trouble just creating a directory browser.
Maybe this is a benchmark on OO languages and development. GNOME in C, KDE in C++. And yes,
while KDE had a head start, KDE seems to progress at a faster rate and is more stable.
So either the GNOME programmers aren't as good managing their project and the KDE guys are, or, OO programming with real OO languages (and not "let's try to do OO design with C") forces a better design of the libraries which reap bigger rewards later on in the life cycle of the application maintainence?
Hmm, food for thought.
(I don't even use KDE either, but it's obvious from looking at the documentation, source, and design vis-a-vis GNOME, that it is superior, and by the quality of the final product too)
Eat that GNOME kiddies.
Seems like the ole slashdot effect has hit the site. Anyone mirroring the pictures?
I disagree, the new license is pretty well thought out from a business standpoint. They get money from people who develop cross-platform apps, so why not go ahead and let the Free Software people use the toolkit gratis? Since KDE runs on a variety of OS/hardware combos, it may well be the desktop environment across Unices that CDE tried and failed to be.
Companies looking for a cross-platform toolkit can now purchase devel licenses to develop a QT app that just _happens_ to integrate with your desktop _if_ you run the full KDE environment. It's all about mind (and desktop) share. Rather than take the widget set and try to create a CDE-like desktop, they let us do it for free, distribute it for free, and ride the commercial licensing wave.
I think this (along with VA's "you write the OS and we'll make kick-ass high-end hardware for it and give back any changes we make") is an excellent example of how businesses can work _with_ the Free Software community, not against it. (even though TT _did_ start out on the wrong foot with us)
$1500 for a devel seat is not really that much for a smallish medium to large company after all. We worked on a project a while back, and in the middle of it we found some references to some libraries that we couldn't find with the source. After tracking down the company who owned those libs, we found out that they wanted several $1000 PER SEAT for just the "rights" to _negotiate_ the actual devel costs!!! Needless to say, we found some replacement libs really quick!!
If only "common" sense was actually that common...
NOTE: This is not flamebait -- it's my opinion on KDE's functionality
Okay, I'd been using KDE way back before the 1.0 releases, and I liked it. Then I got side-tracked trying to get gnome to compile (over and over and over). Finally GNOME is relatively stable, and... yeah, I've got cool themes and capplets out the wazoo.
... anyway, the other day I installed Caldera OpenLinux 2.2, and all I can say is that I was very impressed, and that's not something I say often. I would probably recommend a KDE-based desktop to a non-unix guru over GNOME at the moment for the following reasons:
1 - KDE doesn't suffer from the Desktop Environment / Windowmanager duality that GNOME does. -- yes, I know you can run differnt WM's with kde, too, but most people don't. Fact is that KDE is just plain a more cohesive desktop environemt - much similar to a newbie-friendly MacOS or Windows9X (which is what new linux users are familiar with...)
2 - while developers may still remember the stigma of the old qt license, end users don't care, and they probably don't know what a widget is, or what the difference between c++ and c is. So... for once, we finally get down to "which environment makes me more productive?". While I like gnome and use it at work on Solaris and linux, it does have a lot of funky bells and whistles, and it's arguably much slower than KDE
3 - stability. maybe it's just me, but living on the cutting edge of gnome development hurts. People tend to break fundamental pieces quite often (witness gnome-print - try getting it to work on Solaris or non-redhat 6.0) panel sometimes craps out, and combined with development versions of E, my dual xeon linux box sometimes hangs for a second or two. That's not good. My experience with the KDE cutting edge has been much more cross-platform friendly, and it seems to be a more focused and coordinated effort. Nobody comes out of left-field with a new method that only works on the latest RedHat, or worse yet, only compiles on their system.
I still use gnome at work, I prefer gtk toolkit for development projects, I prefer c to c++, and my gnome/e desktop looks really cool, but if I were setting up linux for my mom or sister, I'd probably give them a KDE desktop.
The Gnome and KDE people have made some great strides in bring a more usable GUI to X. However, they seem to fall into the same problem: "improvements" via 3D, translucent, bitmapped windows. Does this stuff help anyone? Yes, some themes are easy on the eyes, but most are glaring. The Mosfet/KDE interview does mention some of the cool CORBA plumbing in KDE 2.0, but will that make my computer user to use?
This seems to be a common problem with open source projects. Everyone wants the "glory" and that comes from either whiz-bangy graphics or sexy low-level code. These things only indirectly help Regular Users. They don't improve usability. sigh..
cpeterso
I'm looking forward to seeing KDE 1.1.2 & 2.0 !
I have to admit that the main piece of software that made the transition from Windows to Linux palatable for me (more than a year ago) was the KDE beta 3 desktop.
(And that was in my second year of a computer science major at university, I was definitely above the level of an average computer user.)
As powerful as the command line is (and I've learned some really useful items in the last year) software like KDE (and GNOME) really *are* what's needed to increase the Linux user base on the desktop. Users just don't feel comfortable in anything else... and I have to extend some congratulations to the GNOME and KDE teams for their work in this area. Keep it up, it's a Good Thing!
As for speed and high-color bitmaps, the more the better! People who don't want them don't need to use them. I would bet that a large percentage of CPU's in use out there sit idle for a lot of the time... might as well make the desktop look nice.
Go KDE! Go GNOME!
Perl is about as easy as easy gets:
you don't have to declare variables
if you go past the bounds of an array, that's just dandy! Perl will extend the array!
you can use C-type syntax or BASIC-type syntax, or even both together
you can read a whole file into a single string! Up to the limit of you systems memory!
If you use a String variable as an Integer, or an Foat as a Srting, or any other type-changing, Perl knows this and does the right thing.
What do you want?
the only thing easier would be to have the code written for you!
(oh wait. that's what VB does. I forgot.)
-geekd
The nice thing to note is that most ISPs I know would rue a user who's freebe web page got them slashdotted. What most ISPs wouldn't do is take time out of a sysadmin's day to build a mirror on a higher powered and better connected box, and arrange more bandwidth with the telco until the wave subsided.
- H
In a comercial environment the (somewhat higher) price for the Qt toolkit is payed back once you have created your first cursom widget. It is so easy I can hardly imagine it to be true.
Hey, I liked it all until "Eat that GNOME kiddies." Your argument was well thought out, but was the (arguably) flame bait really neccessary? In the end, you use what you like anyhow. If no one started these loyalty wars, more people would probably try /both/ of them and decide for themselves. As it stands, people tend these days to stick to their guns with which ever product they tried first.
"Old man yells at systemd"
Troll Tech is a commercial company
/.
If you are gonna make money off thier widget set, then you must pay them for it.
On the other hand, they have been kind enough to say that if you give away your software for free, then you DON'T have to pay them for thier widget set.
I may be dumb, but I don't see aproblem with this.
If you have a problem with the GPL, you aren't gonna find much sympathy on
-geekd
Uhh, if you don't want a desktop because it looks good then there are plenty of existing WM's. fvwm2,fvwm95,etc... So what was your point again?
That depends on how you define functionality. KDE runs on Unix, so it's already way more functional than Windows can ever hope to be, as far as I'm concerned.
Windows might have a reasonable interface (and KDE is right to incorporate what it can), but it's deeply rotten at the core.
Why, when a game crashes on Win98, does the OS claim I have no memory to start anything else? Even when nothing's running, and the machine has 192MB of RAM! Heh, DOS is still alive and well at the heart of it all, I can see.
Why did Windows fail to update my CD-ROM drive letter when I added a new hard drive?
Why does Windows ask me to insert a floppy when installing new drivers, and then claim that the drivers can't be found in C:\windows\system? That's just shoddy.
Why, when I upgraded a soundcard driver, did Windows lose my Glide DLLs, forcing another driver reinstall and another two reboots?
And why, when I had to replace a network card due to hardware failure, did Windows force me to reboot no less than 8 TIMES? Guess how many times I had to reboot Linux on the same machine? That's right, once.
So you can keep your bloody brain-damaged functionality. I'll keep an OS that works. Now, if only Everquest ran on Linux...
What is the point of having moderators if this
sort of crap is left untouched?
Toby
That is not a universally held opinion. I know quite a few beginners that have had no problems learning to use Perl. Perl isn't for everything, but it is a great tool for a lot things.
I would think Perl is only hard to learn for people that have no programming experience, though I personally wouldn't know. When I first started getting into Perl, I already had quite a bit of C/C++ experience. I did a man perl, and about an hour or so later I was hacking away.
So much for hard to learn.
72656B636148206C72655020726568746F6E41207473754A
I've been wondering for a while if the customization options for QT/KDE or GNOME/Gtk will allow me to place my scroll bars on the left side of all windows by default. That control alone would be worth having independent of 3d pixmaps and such. Anyone know if this property is themable?
-- This is not a signature.
The reason people don't post pro-windows posts to /. is that they tend to get rather badly flamed or told to 'get a decent operating system' in a sickeningly patronising way.
/., as it can be a very intolerant environment. There are a vocal minority (or at least I hope it's a minority) who are very open source, but not very open minded.
Also, many windows-related posts will get moderated down as 'Troll', even if it's a perfectly valid point or question.
/. is vastly biased to towards Linux, supportive of less popular alternative OSs, and very biased against Microsoft operating systems. Don't be suprised if windows users don't read
If AOL can't copywrite common phrases like "you've got mail" then I'd say the DOJ won't uphold any M$ complaints. My 2
"I want to use software that doesn't suck." - ESR
"All software that isn't free sucks." - RMS
Then don't use it. You have plenty of other choices.
Actually I agree.... both KDE and Gnome suck. They seem to both be made to emulate the Windows interface. Including some of its more stupid designs! For example, in windows the "start" button opens up menus that have nothing to do with the apps and folders on the desktop.
OS/2 has this system down pat. The menu in OS/2 Warp reflects the desktop exactly. If you add or change the desktop in any way (adding applications, moving nested folders), it reflects in the menu exactly as it appears on the desktop.
I wish if people were going to try and make a gui desktop, that they would actually improve on the Windows desktop, rather than making it a clone. Both Gnome and KDE seem to be stuck in a Windows style world. Pity, as I was hoping someone would try and do Microsoft one better. Seems all we have to look forward to is another unintuitive GUI like Windows.
Yes and no. KDE themes are faster than GTK themes since GTK only supports pixmap theming. GNOME will let you code your own widgets if you desire. It's just that pixmap themes are easier to write so that's what most themes are. KDE supports coded widgets, you can have a pixmap based widget set as well. So far they are the same. The difference is that KDE supports things like gradients etc. w/o having to write code or fall back on pixmaps. That way you can have pretty and fast widgets. Also, KDE allows you to re-arange the way widgets work (I don't know if GNOME does). This way you can have the little triangle buttons on a scroll bar right next to each other, instead of at opposite ends, which IMHO makes much more sense.
-matt
I would think Perl is only hard to learn for people that have no programming experience,
Actually, several of the biggest Perl fans I know had no programming experience prior to Perl.
though I personally wouldn't know. When I first started getting into Perl, I already had quite a bit of C/C++ experience.
I did as well... Plus I had shell scripting, sed, awk, etc... A lot of the things that Perl borrowed from. Made learning Perl even easier, but certainly not a prerequisite.
I did a man perl, and about an hour or so later I was hacking away.
Actually, I didn't even do that at first... I had about 50 or 60 Perl scripts dropped on me to document, fix, maintain and enhance... So I went out and bought a copy of the 'camel book' and basically just dug into the code and occasionally looked up things I wasn't sure of in the book.
So much for hard to learn.
No kidding... I don't think Perl is hard to learn for anyone who isn't fixed on a certain mindset.
that you publically state you don't use?
In fact, you state "I don't even use KDE _either_" which implies that you don't use GNOME as well.
So you are comparing 2 products which by your own admission you know nothing about.
This is either a poorly executed troll, or the mark of a moron. Take your pick.
...as a Microsoft/Windows advocate.
"No, I LIKE being a slave! Slavery roolz! I enjoy being told what to think and do! You free men suck!"
And I'm not just saying that as flamebait (though it may be), I believe that KDE has an advantage over GNOME in many respects, and may be the largest of the various wedges that Linux is putting into the desktop market.
First of all, KDE is fast. I recently installed Red Hat on my P75 at home, and fired up X with FWVM. The speed was decent, but, frankly, it was on a par with Win95 (the previous OS). It was fully usable (though ugly), so I tried starting up GNOME/Enlightenment. Completely useless. The memory requirements and processor usage, even sitting still, were such that I couldn't even play Mp3s at 64 kbps. KDE, on the other hand, is only slightly slower than FWVM!!
KDE's also much more stable (for me, at least) than GNOME/E. GNOME's little deskbar-applets die frequently, preferences go astray, and many other annoyances crop up. KDE, so far, seems a helluva lot more stable. Am I right on this?
Add to this KOffice, and KDE's looking pretty good! While the Linux community is not known for sticking to one standard (RPM vs. deb, vi vs. Emacs ... Not that multiple programs are a -bad- thing...), I think that if it were GNOME vs. KDE... Well, you can guess my preference. If we could only convince the bright minds working on GNOME to pile their efforts onto the other bandwagon!
Wah!
All you do is click on the link and hold down for a pop up menu to appear... next?
You can get a kensington trackball - other mice will probably do it as well - which you can program the buttons to do whatever you want. For instance, you could make the left button "control-click" so that it would bring up a contextual menu in apps that supported that. Or have the button launch netscape... Whatever
KDE, GNOME, too much stuff I don't want.
The original quote was not developing ideas. This is simply complaining. I did not overreact. I simply asked why one would make such a (basically useless) comment. The original post should have said something like "I think GNOME does/does not need feature X, but it does need feature Y."
Sorry folks. Had to increase mbufs.
Mirror is up at http:/www2.jorsm.com/~mosfet/screensho ts.htm.
JORSM Admin
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My comments and opinions completely reflect those of anyone and anything I am remotely associated with.
Sorry folks. Had to increase mbufs.
Mirror is up at http://www2.jorsm.com/~mosfet/screens hots.htm.
JORSM Admin
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My comments and opinions completely reflect those of anyone and anything I am remotely associated with.
I find it itneresting that GNOME apparantly has something like 300 developers working on it. I don't know what the count is for KDE, but I'm sure it's not that high. Yet KDE is way ahead of GNOME and even gaining ground, despite all the marketing and hype of the latter. I think this is clear evidence of what I've been saying for a year now: the KDE/Qt API's are just so much nicer and more elegant that it will attract many more developers than GNOME. GTK+ is a very well-designed toolkit (GNOME itself is not as good), but it's still OO done in C, which will never produce a clean interface. This is clearly a huge factor in why KDE developers are so much more productive. They don't need to keep going in and redesign and rewrite code because everything is fully OO and therefore an extremely flexible architecture.
To anyone who has worked extensively with both procedural and OO based code, this is very obvious. So what I really don't understand, is why the GNOME team has never made a more conscious effort to produce better C++ compatibility. They should be producing both C and C++ interfaces concurrently. Whenever something gets done in the C interface, it should IMMEDIATELY be incorporated into a C++ interface in the way that makes most sense. Any major design decisions should take into account both the C and C++ interfaces. Developing entirely in C, and then trying to wrap all that in C++ after the fact is a doomed strategy that will certainly fail.
The next one is better I promise.
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My comments and opinions completely reflect those of anyone and anything I am remotely associated with.
I'm sure the original poster will be reading this, but perhaps he meant that he doesn't use either on a regular basis. I've used both in the recent past (but I don't use either now), and I agree with his observations.
Wah!
Right, I don't use KDE on a regular basis, but I have KDE and GNOME installed to play around with, and I have written sample apps on both. I just added the "Eat that GNOME kiddies" to provoke a flame and get the most number of comments. Look like it didn't work. Maybe slashdot users are wising up to trolling, and tiring of flame wars. Christians suck. Atheists rule. Emacs rulez. Linux sucks, FreeBSD rules. GPL sucks, BSD forever!! Muahaha. (that's the general sentiment anyway(
than Windows themes. I've got that cool tiger background on mine at the moment.
Slave ?? You are free to fuck up your Windows install as many times as you want. You can install GNU tools on it and make it look like a Unix box
What's all the point of Corba activeX ripoff stuff if the KDE stuff doesn't work with the Gnome stuff. That should be the first priority. But if it doesn't work with Windows then why bother anyway
I am not in total agreement with the KDE style of windowmangler, but it looks very intuitive. New users will certainly have fun using *nix if they try this out.
As for the GNOME project, it looks like they are moving over to better support for the power users, like me. Too bad I haven't found usage in GNOME just yet, but I'm quite sure I will. I wish that GNOME followed KDE's path in using CORBA. Wouldn't this mean that their parts would be interchangable? Just a thought
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Rolling cows gather no moss...
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ping -f 255.255.255.255 # if only
Does anyone know if the KDE and Gnome people are planning to make their objects compatible? It would be great if I could drag a bonobo component into a KWord document - I could blend the best components of each project.
There are great python bindings available for KDE, see developer.kde.org.
Perl is outdated, but I've read someone wants to take it up again.
Java is coming as well.
I'm pretty sure there will never be a decent C binding, as people simply don't see the need. Even if you don't like C++, you can cade in a C-style C++, leaving away most of the C++ features.
Together with code generation through GUI builders this hould be acceptable to most.
FLAMEBAIT: Say, you want a desktop that helps you work faster and easier without getting in the way? Get a Mac! :)
Hmmm...did MS actually copyright that. Of course MacOS had all sorts of wizzards. I though either WordPerfect or Lotus 1-2-3 had something they called a wizzard (perhaps not though). Was MS really the first company to use the word "wizzard" to describe these sorts of things.
Of course, it wouldn't be the first time KDE ran into a problem like this. I recall some discussion over whether KDE could continue to have a trash, because the the rights to the term trash, in the context of an icon on the desktop where you put files to be eventually deleted were owned by Apple.
Bizarre, but true.
'nuff said
Everyone knows that Linux at heart is a commandline OS just like MS-DOS. Most people don't even know Linux has a GUI so don't try Linux, those that do hate KDE, so theres no future in it.
I doubt that MS can claim a copyright on Wizards if AOL can't lay claim to "buddy list", "IM", and "You've Got Mail." They certainly can't prevent someone from using the concept. If MS tries to raise a fuss, they can just call them something different, such as Gnome's Druids. -scott
"there once was a big guy named lou
Had to move around some IP's and make some DNS changes. Requests were going to the wrong server.
http://halley.jorsm.com/~mosfet/sc reenshots.html
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My comments and opinions completely reflect those of anyone and anything I am remotely associated with.
I keep seeing KDE people using "Wizards" for easy setup and such. I have a problem with this - isn't "Wizard" in this context a trademark or copyright of Microsoft? Seems like KDE people are setting themselves up as Cannon Fodder of Microsofts lawyers here if they continue to brazenly steal Microsoft's "ideas" and trademarks.
IS THAT FAIR ENOUGH??
I use VB to make my Windows applications, what easy to use programming languages do you have for Linux, and no, Perl is not easy to use for the beginner.
If they'd used NT and IIS it could handle the load. Always use the best tool for the job, that's what I say.
KDE has come a long way since i started using it in march. only 5 months... and KDE is better than windows98. and it's even easier to set up too. the screen shots look great, i can't wait for it come out. hopefully with KOffice, and the corel version of linux, even large non-technology companies will see the advantage of linux over windows.
http://github.com/gbook/nidb
>(Please pardon my sarcasm, the Redmond trolls have been out in full force today and I simply couldn't resist. I'm starting to suspect that the "Anti-Linux" group that Micros~1 was forming a while ago was just a bunch of script-kiddies they hired to post as AC's on Slashdot.)
I noticed that too, if that is the best they can do, we have nothing to worry about.
Hell, I would welcome alternative viewpoints if they were presented with intelligent arguments - either there are no intelligent arguments for pro-windows, or those making the comments are a bunch of vacuum-cranium doodz with nothing better to do than show their stupidity.
It's no where near as functional to use as Windows yet.
theyve already done that. i dont think we can bloat them any further...2 CDROMs to install the small business edition of Office2000 ???? gimme a break.
I'm currently a KDE-user (and contributer...) myself, but I'm not religious about it, and I hate it when people get their facts wrong like that. :-)
As others have said - I just wish, wish, wish the GNOME and KDE people would get their heads out of... whereever it is they keep them, and standardize on a method which would allow their objects to interact seam- lessly. I have yet to see evidence that this is really happening, except in the drag-and-drop area.
The way things are going, this looks like something they'll "kludge together" after the fact, once each group has become firmly entrenched, for better or worse, in their respective architectures. Not being familiar with the Corba technology, I'm not sure whether such a kludge will be ugly or if it's even feasable... but I am a bit worried.
Host your own websites, anywhere!
Eat that GNOME kiddies
I like the above. I like KDE's look and feel, but it is not very easy to configure. I Hate having kfm always ask if I am sure I wish to delete files and many of its other quirks. I do like kfm as an internet browser. I wish I could simply use it as such and diable the desktop icons, etc.
Gnome is nice, but I agree that not enough development is done to match the high version numbers they use.
One of the major philisophies behind Linx/OSM is giving the people a choice. I have tried both KDE and GNOME. As of now, GNOME impresses me more (I like the versatilitiy of GNOME), but that doesn't mean I hate KDE. On the contrary, I think it's an excellent desktop environment, I just like GNOME more, that's all. So to each his/her own and best of luck to GNOME and KDE.
"And now you shall learn the secret of boot to the head"
They do it because it's the feature that more people ask for than anything else. THEMES! THEMES! we scream. After years of ugly motif and ugly TK and uglier still Xaw, everyone wants their environment to be jsut a little more fun.
And it doesn't neccesarily make things much slower.
The count for the KDE developers is about the same if you take the CVS accounts (over 200). But: there are the translators, graphical artists, people working on the packaging etc. The level of involvement varies, because people have less or more time, other jobs etc. On the other hand, I still think that productivity in C++ is higher. Lotzi B.
GoVFM, VFM is what counts.
KDE folk are hardly going the wrong direction. Mosfet (to my knowledge) is about the only guy that's been working on theme support and pretty buttons. Everyone else is working hard on core application features and/or KOffice.
Besides, I remember a common argument about KDE 1.0. "Sure it has a lot of features but it's so ugly!" I wish you people would make up your mind!
Finally, since he's the theme developer, his screenshots are oriented at what he's working on of course. Go check out the rest of the screenshots on www.kde.org and koffice.kde.org and, more importantly, read some of the mailing lists. That way you can make an informed decision instead of basing your comments on a short interview with only one of the KDE developers.
I agree
I'd take 10 good developers who can work together over 300 dimwits.
This new feature will enable you to place your scrollbar at either the right or the left side of the screen (this was requested by our lefthanded customers who naturally look to the left for controls), it will even be possible to make the scrollbars disappear for those using Intellimice which look like becoming the standard.
This feature will be available to all applications using standard Windows controls (widgets) but applications using specialist widget sets may only display the standard way (scrollbar on right). It will also be possible for applications to have their scrollbars in a fixed position which ignores the users preferences.
As for repositioning the titlebar, our Office applications already have a removable titlebar and we hope to extend this to all other applications.
Upon reading my original post, I think I contradicted myself once or twice. My point is that GNOME has more people doing development on it because of the marketing and hype (and RedHat), whereas KDE has way fewer developers but the KDE developers are much, much more productive. I'm not sure this is entirely because the KDE developers are "better" (though there are some great programmers working on it to be sure), I think the language thing has a lot to do with it.
The GTKStep and Xenophilia themes have the two scrollbar buttons together. However, the code to do this is new, and isn't quite stable (like the gnome-pager will crash when you change it's setting if you use those themes, and the gnome-font changer freezes with them). But it's possible.
I know I will be moderated down for this, but . . . Vincent
i wouldn't have wasted my time...
Corel went into Linux as they couldn't compete with the superiority of MS Office on the Windows platform so they moved to Linux to sell office suites to those that can't afford both an OS and an office package. Now KDE are trying to give an office package away free. Corel won't be happy. and I bet this office package can't handle the industry standard office 2000 formats, probably not even 97.
A computer with one mouse button cannot be productive or easy to use.
Example: on a Mac there is no easy way to open a link in a new window
in Netscape. That is the single most annoying thing about any computer
hardware arrangement, short of plug and pray.
How could it be infinitely more flexible when C *IS* C++. You can use C++ without using classes at all if you want, or inheritance, or templates, etc. dumbass.
Gnomists, do not fear! Red Hat the company largely behind GNOME will pour millions of dollars into GNOME and GNOME will catch up with KDE in no time. Mandrake is a little company and nothing it can do will match what Red Hat can do.
There is a great new transpanent console that comes with KDE called Konsole. Start a few of those up and run bash all you want.
While KOffice may become a serious contender next year, they won't be capable of providing a really good MS Office file format import due to the extreme complexity of those formats.
As MS interoperability is what counts for companies, Corel and StarDivision will still have enough customers.
http://halley.jorsm.com/~mosfet/slashdotted.gif
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My comments and opinions completely reflect those of anyone and anything I am remotely associated with.