You know... I think most of what you stated here is WAY overrated and exaggerated. I'm a KDE user and I used to use Gnome.
However, there is one thing you said that I have never been able to figure out myself:
"Looking at art.gnome.org reveals the same old theme in different colours. Since gnome dosen't provide a colour changing dialog for its widgets most "themes" are just colour changes."
To get my KDE apps to look good in Gnome I simply loaded up KDE, changed my colors to match via the control center and life was good.
To get my Gnome apps to look good in KDE (since I had switched to KDE and could fine tune my themes EASILY) I had to make a gtk2rc file and mess around with the settings by hand. It wasn't too hard to do but that's the kind of thing that I shouldn't have to do by hand.
I have found that there's more variety with KDE and I like that. However, get over yourself. Gnome's a fine product. (At least it doesn't override my X cursors by default *grumble* *grumble*.)
And... uhhh... Gentoo and Slackware don't support jack by default. You either install Gnome or KDE or none of the above.
Because software is getting more complicated? Because we like eye candy? Because smooth fonts are nice?
No one has to wonder anything. If KDE 1.0 did the job, install it again. I'll bet it's super zippy on a box with 64 megs of RAM.
I'm so tired of hearing statements like this. The reason we're making computers faster is so we can do more with them and so we can add aesthetics and other such things. Are SVG icons NECESSARY for work? No. Will they look nice though? Yeah. Will they help make a desktop resolution independent. Pretty much. Is that necessary for work though? Not really, but it is nice.
If you want something to run on your 486, install software designed for that era of computing. Does Max Payne 2 run on my 486? No. Do I complain? No.
So no, no one has to wonder. That's the natural evolution of software. Generally more features = more code = things go slower. I'm not advocating inefficient code because we have the crutch of faster hardware, but efficiency will only take software so far.
And honestly, sometimes efficiency is sacrificed for convenience. Otherwise we'd still be coding in assembler.
When you can buy an Athlon XP 2000+ with an ECS motherboard with almost everything integrated but the video and 256MB of DDR for about $150, who cares if it runs on a 486?
And if you need lightweight for the older stuff, there's always XFce4 or fvwm or whatever.
KDE 3.1 runs fine on my Athlon and on my laptop. So... what can I say?
I was about to say... "Gee, I wonder how much longer it would have taken Apple if they had to write their own rendering engine for their browser."
These trolls piss me off too. I fail to see the point of flaming another DE. It's like, okay use what you like and let me use what I like. Is there a point to flaming someone for their choice of tools?
KDE has turned out some fine stuff and the price can't be beat.
Oh yeah... and when OSX runs on more than one platform, I'll be impressed. Windows and OSX can bind you to whatever... but KDE runs not just on multiple platforms, but under multiple OSes and that's something OSX has yet to mimic. (Although... it's not quite the same because this is a DE vs. OS so it's not quite a normal comparison, but I think you get my point.)
I switched over to KDE from Gnome about 2 months ago after using Gnome since 1.4ish (and I used 2.0, 2.2 and 2.4).
I like KDE better. That's really all I can say. Gnome isn't bad, but I spent too much time wondering if Gnome was ever going to get polished. That and Nautilus just sucks.
When I was using Windows I used Directory Opus as my file manager and when I first started to use Linux full time that was the program I missed the most. Then... then I found Konqueror. Life's been good ever since. From that point it was a slow conversion to KDE as a whole.
I'm very happy with it. Koffice included. I'm very much looking forward to SVG support in the next version as well as a few other little bits I've read up on.
Good job guys!
And just a clarification, I like Gnome. I just like KDE better and you know what's cool? I'm not longer stuck between these two choices:
They were creepy. I can't say they weren't. Perhaps saying "sequences" as a plural was wrong too. It was the second one where you're just kinda walking around with those red path things. Although... they are funny as hell when you pick the phone up.
Okay... so the only thing that annoyed me was the red path things and the jumping.
It was more than slightly above par. The only other third person games I've liked as much have been Rune and Jedi Knight II. Of course, JK2 is only third person when you're using a lightsaber and Rune is all about melee.
I've yet to play a third person shooter that was as fun or had the play control of Max Payne. The comic book deal was great too. About the only fault I can give the game is the dream sequences were a little annoying.
Eh... I want to make this statement so I'll make it here since it's as good a place as any.
I have a number of friends that use Windows and pirate it. (Who doesn't?) When I say that they should either pay up or use Linux I get a string of excuses... but the most common reply is this, "Microsoft isn't getting my money so who cares?"
Every single time a legitmate user or a business says, "We'd like to use an alternative but everyone uses Windows and we need to be compatible." It's the fault of all users, even the ones that pirate.
Photoshop has become a de facto standard, I believe, in major part due to piracy. Honestly scan your friends and the people you know and tell me what percentage uses Photoshop "legitimately." I'll bet almost none.
I love Photoshop. I really do, particularly the effects engine but... I can't afford it so I'm just not going to use it. Furthermore I'd like to see someone come in and kick Adobe's ass with a better product... preferably one that runs in Linux.
Warez solves nothing because paying or not paying, you're still part of the user base and thus still part of the problem (from the perspective of someone protesting).
Am I the only person that likes the Gimp's interface? Mind you, I'm using the current development version (which, ironically hasn't crashed on me once since I installed it months ago).
It doesn't do everything Photoshop 7 does (I miss effects... how much I love effects) but aside from that it gets the job done and it's free. Given that I'm using heavy CSS and actually code sites to web standards now, I use my painting program A LOT LESS now.
But seriously... About 1 in 10 people that I know that use Photoshop actually use a legit version. Almost no one pays for it which is one of the reaosns it's become a de facto standard.
Funny that, I used to go into IRC rooms with the handle "beach`girl" and those nerds were dying to help me out. I dunno know the name of the chick whose picture I was handing out to them when they asked but hey... that got something new to wank to and pretend it was a Linux interested girl and I got information.
Maybe this should make me feel dirty but... I'm pretty much a whore.
Not really... because he's referring to Microsoft products. He's not talking about programs beyond Microsoft's scope. Apache, MySQL, and PHP are all different groups whereas IIS, MSSQL and ASP are all Microsoft.
All in all a "Linux System" and a "Windows System" are very different animals. I think it's silly the way a lot of things are identified with Linux. Like... Apache. It runs on EVERYTHING! Win32, BeOS, BSD, etc. It has nothing to do with Linux.
You NAZI! (I feel better having said that.)
The problem with "Linux" patches is that often times it's not "Linux" being patched. Windows is far more than an operating system anymore. It's a software suite included with a kernel.
If Apache has a vunerability it has nothing to do with Linux. I realize this is along the lines of the GNU/Linux naming ordeal, but seriously...
If there's a vunerability in say... Winamp, that's a Winamp thing. But it seems like if it takes four weeks for an XMMS patch, it's a "Linux" issue.
Who cares? I remember when I started into the hardware world back in the days of the Pentium and the benchmark war that would later rise between the Pentium II and the Super 7 platform.
I've used AMD's offerings since my lowly K5 133. The benchmarks said it was slower, but I hardly noticed. I'm a programmer. How fast does my text editor need to run?
Even now, I have an Athlon XP 2000+ and it runs sufficient for what I do. In fact, it's more than enough at the moment.
I honestly don't see why we have this obsession over benchmarks. Home computers, across the board, are FAST. Newer G4s, G5s, Athlons, Athlon64s, and Pentium IVs are all fast. The RAM is fast and the offerings from nVidia and ATi are fast.
At this point it really has less to do with speed and more to do with a feature set and software availability. I primarily use Linux on an x86 because:
1. The hardware is cheap and I can build it myself. 2. Linux is free. 3. Linux has all the programs I need. 4. I like KDE's interface MUCH better than Windows.
I also dual boot into a Win2k partition that is nothing but games and sometimes I use it to check IE on the websites I work on.
I would also love to get a Mac. The problem with a Mac, for me, is the hardware investment. While I can upgrade a part here or a part there on my PC every few months AND it can be something that's NOT the latest and greatest, it's nice. I haven't had to go buy a whole computer since the mid 90s.
OSX is cool. I would love to start using on at least a part time basis (I'm hoping to have 4 OSes on this x86 by the end of the year anyway, so that'd be a 5th to play with). I would use OSX for OSX. When we're talking about the difference of a couple seconds I really don't care.
OSX ran reasonably on my friend's old G3 ibook and he did video editting with it. It wasn't quite fast enough for that, but seriously. I don't care what the benchmarks say. Used it and it worked just fine.
Unless you're building a heavy duty workstation for something like 3D or video editting (pretty major stuff might I add) or a server that's going to be under heavy load, then the only thing you need to consider is what OS do you want and what hardware platforms is it available on.
Price will always trump performance for me, as will Linux compatibility.
Intel will release benchmarks that show it on top.
AMD will do the same.
Apple will do the same.
nVidia will do the same.
ATi will do the same.
Microsoft will do the same.
Linux guys will often do the same.
Benchmarks are crap. An Indy car has got all our cars whipped for speed. But speed is not the primary issue of car buying. The number of seats, fuel economy and and the sound system are generally more of a concern.
My operating system is a FAR larger consideration than my hardware. If I was gonna buy a laptop that wasn't an ebay special (because I'm a cheap bastard) it wouldn't be an x86. It would be a TiBook. Why? They're gorgeous and they're nice to the touch and OSX is cool. Enough said. Do I care if I can get a "faster" x86 book? No. Because nothing I've seen in the x86 world even touches the elegance of those TiBooks. Nothing.
Speed has become a joke in the computer world with the exception of some very specific applications and professions.
What I'm tired of hearing about is crap like "Linux isn't GUI-centric" and "we'll have to retrain our people."
Bullshit.
If you can use Windows, you can use KDE. AND there is the advantage that it is REALLY HARD to fuck up your system too. As opposed to Windows. I switched my dad to Linux and it took some adjusting, but since he already knew how to use web browsers and email clients and office programs, it wasn't a big deal.
There was certainly no handholding going on.
"You can't expect an average person to install a new kernel!"
Eh... if you look at things the concept of installing a patch, service pack, or driver update is too much for the average user. Either way, you need a sysadmin to keep machines secure an up-to-date. Doesn't matter what the OS is.
I switched to Linux, more or less, cold turkey about 6 months ago. I figured it was time to put my money where my mouth was and I was fairly familiar with some things because I've used it for servers for years.
You don't realize what an unpredictable piece of shit Windows is until you're away. At first I was almost irritated when I had to go to a forum to look up something that seemed like it was a no brainer in an MS OS. But you know what? There's always a solution.
Some stuff might be harder, but it's nice to actually FIX THE PROBLEM rather then reinstall a driver/program/entire fucking OS and and think, "I wonder why that fixed it."
So yeah. Anyway...
OSX is a good idea too, just thought I'd add that after my rant had concluded.
I remember when I first started doing ASP/PHP type work just after I'd picked up HTML. Programming was always more my forte anyway. After doing this for a while I stated in a conversation:
"Nah, I don't do much layout anymore. I'm a backend guy now."
I don't think I even need to bother explaining the fallout. "Oh yeah, don't mind him... he's a backend kind of guy."
Blah. And Gnome has a file manager that was designed by Nazi exiles that were attempting to find a subtle way to punish people. Seriously. (Gnome panels rock, but when Midnight Commander was still choice for a file manager... I knew there was a problem. Of course some CLI jackoff will probably comment here too.)
Choice is a nice thing. Seriously.
Wait, what am I talking about? I should start using Windows again so that I can go back to the days of when something sucks I wait rather than look for an alternative.
Choice is a good thing because one size does NOT fit all and it never will. There's no reinventing the wheel anyway, there's only extending the wheel.
I hear a lot of people complain about KDE because it's "too slow." As I recently left Gnome in favor of KDE 3.1.x (since its file manager isn't a component of the goatse dude like nautilus) and I've found that on my Athlon XP 1600+ and my Duron 650 that it runs just fine. It runs as well as Windows as far as speed goes.
I mean, KDE isn't going to run well on an old Pentium (my assumption anyway) but OS X and new versions of Windows aren't going to run on yesterday's hardware either.
Generally if you use yesterday's hardware, you better get used to yesterday's software. The nice thing about Linux is that I have a choice. Fluxbox, Xfce, Gnome, KDE, Rat Poison, etc.
And playing as America isn't playing as a country run by a mass murderer?
I mean... we nuked Japan but hey... they don't count. They're just, you know... Japs.
It's actually really disturbing. I was in a veteran's museum not too long ago and I was reading some of the archived newspapers. The Germans were always the Germans. The newspapers didn't use the term "kraut" or anything like that.
But the Japanese? Nope. They were "The Japs."
About the only war that's anything more than a bunch of tyrants using pawns to butcher one another is a revolution and that's limitted in and of itself. There was no "good guy" in WWII.
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You know... I think most of what you stated here is WAY overrated and exaggerated. I'm a KDE user and I used to use Gnome.
However, there is one thing you said that I have never been able to figure out myself:
"Looking at art.gnome.org reveals the same old theme in different colours. Since gnome dosen't provide a colour changing dialog for its widgets most "themes" are just colour changes."
To get my KDE apps to look good in Gnome I simply loaded up KDE, changed my colors to match via the control center and life was good.
To get my Gnome apps to look good in KDE (since I had switched to KDE and could fine tune my themes EASILY) I had to make a gtk2rc file and mess around with the settings by hand. It wasn't too hard to do but that's the kind of thing that I shouldn't have to do by hand.
I have found that there's more variety with KDE and I like that. However, get over yourself. Gnome's a fine product. (At least it doesn't override my X cursors by default *grumble* *grumble*.)
And... uhhh... Gentoo and Slackware don't support jack by default. You either install Gnome or KDE or none of the above.
Because software is getting more complicated? Because we like eye candy? Because smooth fonts are nice?
No one has to wonder anything. If KDE 1.0 did the job, install it again. I'll bet it's super zippy on a box with 64 megs of RAM.
I'm so tired of hearing statements like this. The reason we're making computers faster is so we can do more with them and so we can add aesthetics and other such things. Are SVG icons NECESSARY for work? No. Will they look nice though? Yeah. Will they help make a desktop resolution independent. Pretty much. Is that necessary for work though? Not really, but it is nice.
If you want something to run on your 486, install software designed for that era of computing. Does Max Payne 2 run on my 486? No. Do I complain? No.
So no, no one has to wonder. That's the natural evolution of software. Generally more features = more code = things go slower. I'm not advocating inefficient code because we have the crutch of faster hardware, but efficiency will only take software so far.
And honestly, sometimes efficiency is sacrificed for convenience. Otherwise we'd still be coding in assembler.
When you can buy an Athlon XP 2000+ with an ECS motherboard with almost everything integrated but the video and 256MB of DDR for about $150, who cares if it runs on a 486?
And if you need lightweight for the older stuff, there's always XFce4 or fvwm or whatever.
KDE 3.1 runs fine on my Athlon and on my laptop. So... what can I say?
I was about to say... "Gee, I wonder how much longer it would have taken Apple if they had to write their own rendering engine for their browser."
These trolls piss me off too. I fail to see the point of flaming another DE. It's like, okay use what you like and let me use what I like. Is there a point to flaming someone for their choice of tools?
KDE has turned out some fine stuff and the price can't be beat.
Oh yeah... and when OSX runs on more than one platform, I'll be impressed. Windows and OSX can bind you to whatever... but KDE runs not just on multiple platforms, but under multiple OSes and that's something OSX has yet to mimic. (Although... it's not quite the same because this is a DE vs. OS so it's not quite a normal comparison, but I think you get my point.)
I switched over to KDE from Gnome about 2 months ago after using Gnome since 1.4ish (and I used 2.0, 2.2 and 2.4).
I like KDE better. That's really all I can say. Gnome isn't bad, but I spent too much time wondering if Gnome was ever going to get polished. That and Nautilus just sucks.
When I was using Windows I used Directory Opus as my file manager and when I first started to use Linux full time that was the program I missed the most. Then... then I found Konqueror. Life's been good ever since. From that point it was a slow conversion to KDE as a whole.
I'm very happy with it. Koffice included. I'm very much looking forward to SVG support in the next version as well as a few other little bits I've read up on.
Good job guys!
And just a clarification, I like Gnome. I just like KDE better and you know what's cool? I'm not longer stuck between these two choices:
Windows DE or Windows DE.
As I heard it the K was mocking the C in CDE and it never really meant anything (although "Kool" was kind of a de facto thing).
They were creepy. I can't say they weren't. Perhaps saying "sequences" as a plural was wrong too. It was the second one where you're just kinda walking around with those red path things. Although... they are funny as hell when you pick the phone up.
Okay... so the only thing that annoyed me was the red path things and the jumping.
The dialog was hilarious!
It was more than slightly above par. The only other third person games I've liked as much have been Rune and Jedi Knight II. Of course, JK2 is only third person when you're using a lightsaber and Rune is all about melee.
I've yet to play a third person shooter that was as fun or had the play control of Max Payne. The comic book deal was great too. About the only fault I can give the game is the dream sequences were a little annoying.
Funny, evolution runs just fine on my K6-III 400 with 128MB of RAM.
Eh... I want to make this statement so I'll make it here since it's as good a place as any.
I have a number of friends that use Windows and pirate it. (Who doesn't?) When I say that they should either pay up or use Linux I get a string of excuses... but the most common reply is this, "Microsoft isn't getting my money so who cares?"
Every single time a legitmate user or a business says, "We'd like to use an alternative but everyone uses Windows and we need to be compatible." It's the fault of all users, even the ones that pirate.
Photoshop has become a de facto standard, I believe, in major part due to piracy. Honestly scan your friends and the people you know and tell me what percentage uses Photoshop "legitimately." I'll bet almost none.
I love Photoshop. I really do, particularly the effects engine but... I can't afford it so I'm just not going to use it. Furthermore I'd like to see someone come in and kick Adobe's ass with a better product... preferably one that runs in Linux.
Warez solves nothing because paying or not paying, you're still part of the user base and thus still part of the problem (from the perspective of someone protesting).
Am I the only person that likes the Gimp's interface? Mind you, I'm using the current development version (which, ironically hasn't crashed on me once since I installed it months ago).
It doesn't do everything Photoshop 7 does (I miss effects... how much I love effects) but aside from that it gets the job done and it's free. Given that I'm using heavy CSS and actually code sites to web standards now, I use my painting program A LOT LESS now.
But seriously... About 1 in 10 people that I know that use Photoshop actually use a legit version. Almost no one pays for it which is one of the reaosns it's become a de facto standard.
Step 3 was Profit!!
Funny that, I used to go into IRC rooms with the handle "beach`girl" and those nerds were dying to help me out. I dunno know the name of the chick whose picture I was handing out to them when they asked but hey... that got something new to wank to and pretend it was a Linux interested girl and I got information.
Maybe this should make me feel dirty but... I'm pretty much a whore.
His use of the term "FAGBALL" perhaps?
Not really... because he's referring to Microsoft products. He's not talking about programs beyond Microsoft's scope. Apache, MySQL, and PHP are all different groups whereas IIS, MSSQL and ASP are all Microsoft.
All in all a "Linux System" and a "Windows System" are very different animals. I think it's silly the way a lot of things are identified with Linux. Like... Apache. It runs on EVERYTHING! Win32, BeOS, BSD, etc. It has nothing to do with Linux.
You NAZI! (I feel better having said that.) The problem with "Linux" patches is that often times it's not "Linux" being patched. Windows is far more than an operating system anymore. It's a software suite included with a kernel. If Apache has a vunerability it has nothing to do with Linux. I realize this is along the lines of the GNU/Linux naming ordeal, but seriously... If there's a vunerability in say... Winamp, that's a Winamp thing. But it seems like if it takes four weeks for an XMMS patch, it's a "Linux" issue.
Obligatory at this point...
In Soviet Russia the bugs fix YOU in an average of 24 hours in Windows, but it could be a few weeks with Linux.
I don't care about the benchmarks but I do care about people's reactions. That was my point.
Who cares? I remember when I started into the hardware world back in the days of the Pentium and the benchmark war that would later rise between the Pentium II and the Super 7 platform.
I've used AMD's offerings since my lowly K5 133. The benchmarks said it was slower, but I hardly noticed. I'm a programmer. How fast does my text editor need to run?
Even now, I have an Athlon XP 2000+ and it runs sufficient for what I do. In fact, it's more than enough at the moment.
I honestly don't see why we have this obsession over benchmarks. Home computers, across the board, are FAST. Newer G4s, G5s, Athlons, Athlon64s, and Pentium IVs are all fast. The RAM is fast and the offerings from nVidia and ATi are fast.
At this point it really has less to do with speed and more to do with a feature set and software availability. I primarily use Linux on an x86 because:
1. The hardware is cheap and I can build it myself.
2. Linux is free.
3. Linux has all the programs I need.
4. I like KDE's interface MUCH better than Windows.
I also dual boot into a Win2k partition that is nothing but games and sometimes I use it to check IE on the websites I work on.
I would also love to get a Mac. The problem with a Mac, for me, is the hardware investment. While I can upgrade a part here or a part there on my PC every few months AND it can be something that's NOT the latest and greatest, it's nice. I haven't had to go buy a whole computer since the mid 90s.
OSX is cool. I would love to start using on at least a part time basis (I'm hoping to have 4 OSes on this x86 by the end of the year anyway, so that'd be a 5th to play with). I would use OSX for OSX. When we're talking about the difference of a couple seconds I really don't care.
OSX ran reasonably on my friend's old G3 ibook and he did video editting with it. It wasn't quite fast enough for that, but seriously. I don't care what the benchmarks say. Used it and it worked just fine.
Unless you're building a heavy duty workstation for something like 3D or video editting (pretty major stuff might I add) or a server that's going to be under heavy load, then the only thing you need to consider is what OS do you want and what hardware platforms is it available on.
Price will always trump performance for me, as will Linux compatibility.
Intel will release benchmarks that show it on top.
AMD will do the same.
Apple will do the same.
nVidia will do the same.
ATi will do the same.
Microsoft will do the same.
Linux guys will often do the same.
Benchmarks are crap. An Indy car has got all our cars whipped for speed. But speed is not the primary issue of car buying. The number of seats, fuel economy and and the sound system are generally more of a concern.
My operating system is a FAR larger consideration than my hardware. If I was gonna buy a laptop that wasn't an ebay special (because I'm a cheap bastard) it wouldn't be an x86. It would be a TiBook. Why? They're gorgeous and they're nice to the touch and OSX is cool. Enough said. Do I care if I can get a "faster" x86 book? No. Because nothing I've seen in the x86 world even touches the elegance of those TiBooks. Nothing.
Speed has become a joke in the computer world with the exception of some very specific applications and professions.
"The Windows guys don't do it, and the Mac guys mock them as unintelligent, unimaginative copycat second-class citizens."
Well you know what they say, if the shoe fits...
Am I the only person sitting here going, "Who cares?"
What I'm tired of hearing about is crap like "Linux isn't GUI-centric" and "we'll have to retrain our people."
Bullshit.
If you can use Windows, you can use KDE. AND there is the advantage that it is REALLY HARD to fuck up your system too. As opposed to Windows. I switched my dad to Linux and it took some adjusting, but since he already knew how to use web browsers and email clients and office programs, it wasn't a big deal.
There was certainly no handholding going on.
"You can't expect an average person to install a new kernel!"
Eh... if you look at things the concept of installing a patch, service pack, or driver update is too much for the average user. Either way, you need a sysadmin to keep machines secure an up-to-date. Doesn't matter what the OS is.
I switched to Linux, more or less, cold turkey about 6 months ago. I figured it was time to put my money where my mouth was and I was fairly familiar with some things because I've used it for servers for years.
You don't realize what an unpredictable piece of shit Windows is until you're away. At first I was almost irritated when I had to go to a forum to look up something that seemed like it was a no brainer in an MS OS. But you know what? There's always a solution.
Some stuff might be harder, but it's nice to actually FIX THE PROBLEM rather then reinstall a driver/program/entire fucking OS and and think, "I wonder why that fixed it."
So yeah. Anyway...
OSX is a good idea too, just thought I'd add that after my rant had concluded.
I remember when I first started doing ASP/PHP type work just after I'd picked up HTML. Programming was always more my forte anyway. After doing this for a while I stated in a conversation:
"Nah, I don't do much layout anymore. I'm a backend guy now."
I don't think I even need to bother explaining the fallout. "Oh yeah, don't mind him... he's a backend kind of guy."
Blah. And Gnome has a file manager that was designed by Nazi exiles that were attempting to find a subtle way to punish people. Seriously. (Gnome panels rock, but when Midnight Commander was still choice for a file manager... I knew there was a problem. Of course some CLI jackoff will probably comment here too.)
Choice is a nice thing. Seriously.
Wait, what am I talking about? I should start using Windows again so that I can go back to the days of when something sucks I wait rather than look for an alternative.
Choice is a good thing because one size does NOT fit all and it never will. There's no reinventing the wheel anyway, there's only extending the wheel.
I hear a lot of people complain about KDE because it's "too slow." As I recently left Gnome in favor of KDE 3.1.x (since its file manager isn't a component of the goatse dude like nautilus) and I've found that on my Athlon XP 1600+ and my Duron 650 that it runs just fine. It runs as well as Windows as far as speed goes.
I mean, KDE isn't going to run well on an old Pentium (my assumption anyway) but OS X and new versions of Windows aren't going to run on yesterday's hardware either.
Generally if you use yesterday's hardware, you better get used to yesterday's software. The nice thing about Linux is that I have a choice. Fluxbox, Xfce, Gnome, KDE, Rat Poison, etc.
And playing as America isn't playing as a country run by a mass murderer?
I mean... we nuked Japan but hey... they don't count. They're just, you know... Japs.
It's actually really disturbing. I was in a veteran's museum not too long ago and I was reading some of the archived newspapers. The Germans were always the Germans. The newspapers didn't use the term "kraut" or anything like that.
But the Japanese? Nope. They were "The Japs."
About the only war that's anything more than a bunch of tyrants using pawns to butcher one another is a revolution and that's limitted in and of itself. There was no "good guy" in WWII.