KDE4 vs. GNOME (please no religion :-)

[Jerry Feldman-2]

At one time, KDE was the better desktop system for Linux for technical
reasons of stability and applications. Today, it appears that GNOME has
surpassed KDE.  I use GNOME (RHEL4) at work and on my laptop (Ubuntu
8.04) and KDE4/SuSE 11.0. I always install both KDE and GNOME on my
desktop so I can switch. I've always preferred KDE for my desktop, but
I am getting used to GNOME, and it does appear that KDE is starting to
be more screwed up.  What I would like to see is a non-religious,
objective discussion of various features of GNOME and KDE.

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On Saturday 05 July 2008, Jerry Feldman wrote:
> At one time, KDE was the better desktop system for Linux for technical
> reasons of stability and applications. Today, it appears that GNOME has
> surpassed KDE.  I use GNOME (RHEL4) at work and on my laptop (Ubuntu
> 8.04) and KDE4/SuSE 11.0. I always install both KDE and GNOME on my
> desktop so I can switch. I've always preferred KDE for my desktop, but
> I am getting used to GNOME, and it does appear that KDE is starting to
> be more screwed up.  What I would like to see is a non-religious,
> objective discussion of various features of GNOME and KDE.

Obviously, this is just your opinion vs mine, but I don't see how KDE is
starting to be more "Screwed up"? Works great for me. Do you mean the desktop
functionality and embedded apps, like systemsettings (kcontrol in old
parlance) plasma, etc? If you mean other apps, which ones? Any missing
functionality in this transition period is filled by running KDE3 and 4 apps
together. Works nicely. 4.1 is great, and getting better every day. KDE 3.5.0
even, with k3b, amarok and Konsole ranks right up there with other
indispensable things such as iced tea and sushi.

Certainly, nobody is pushing you to use the newer KDE 4.x, right? You can
stick with the same ole 3.x and your apps for a year or more and still be
productive as you ever were...

GNOME is fine, I guess, just not my cuppa. The top bar is kind of cool.
The "Places" and such seems well thought-out. Have always thought it's
dog-butt ugly, but most of my objections are obviously biased, being a KDE
dev.

On a side note: Until now, with QT4 on Windows, I was a huge fan of the GTK
stuff (Gimp, gramps, etc.) finding it's way onto Windows, when I was stuck
with an in-law computer I could tinker with. My sig other loves Gimp on
Windows. These things are just in support of GTK, though, not GNOME-proper.

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[Jerry Feldman-2]

On Sun, 6 Jul 2008 03:49:33 -0400
Brendan <mailinglist@...> wrote:

> On Saturday 05 July 2008, Jerry Feldman wrote:
> > At one time, KDE was the better desktop system for Linux for technical
> > reasons of stability and applications. Today, it appears that GNOME has
> > surpassed KDE.  I use GNOME (RHEL4) at work and on my laptop (Ubuntu
> > 8.04) and KDE4/SuSE 11.0. I always install both KDE and GNOME on my
> > desktop so I can switch. I've always preferred KDE for my desktop, but
> > I am getting used to GNOME, and it does appear that KDE is starting to
> > be more screwed up.  What I would like to see is a non-religious,
> > objective discussion of various features of GNOME and KDE.
>
> Obviously, this is just your opinion vs mine, but I don't see how KDE is
> starting to be more "Screwed up"? Works great for me. Do you mean the desktop
> functionality and embedded apps, like systemsettings (kcontrol in old
> parlance) plasma, etc? If you mean other apps, which ones? Any missing
> functionality in this transition period is filled by running KDE3 and 4 apps
> together. Works nicely. 4.1 is great, and getting better every day. KDE 3.5.0
> even, with k3b, amarok and Konsole ranks right up there with other
> indispensable things such as iced tea and sushi.
>
> Certainly, nobody is pushing you to use the newer KDE 4.x, right? You can
> stick with the same ole 3.x and your apps for a year or more and still be
> productive as you ever were...

A couple of things that are different between KDE4 and KDE3 is how one
sets various options. For instance, in KDE3 I was able to configure the
task bar such that when is got crowded, it would stack multiple
instances in one slot. In KDE4, there are only 3 task manager settings:
Show Tooltips
Show only tasks from the current desktop
Show only tasks from the current screen.

Additionally, the task manager and pager options were available from
the KDE control panel, but they are no longer there.  Mostly just minor
things. Someone on this or another list mentioned that GNOME was more
mature. In any case, I thought a good discussion between KDE and GNOME
is always relevant, just to discuss the state of things

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Jerry Feldman <gaf@...>
Boston Linux and Unix
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On Sunday 06 July 2008, Jerry Feldman wrote:

> > Obviously, this is just your opinion vs mine, but I don't see how KDE is
> > starting to be more "Screwed up"? Works great for me. Do you mean the
> > desktop functionality and embedded apps, like systemsettings (kcontrol in
> > old parlance) plasma, etc? If you mean other apps, which ones? Any
> > missing functionality in this transition period is filled by running KDE3
> > and 4 apps together. Works nicely. 4.1 is great, and getting better every
> > day. KDE 3.5.0 even, with k3b, amarok and Konsole ranks right up there
> > with other indispensable things such as iced tea and sushi.
> >
> > Certainly, nobody is pushing you to use the newer KDE 4.x, right? You can
> > stick with the same ole 3.x and your apps for a year or more and still be
> > productive as you ever were...
>
> A couple of things that are different between KDE4 and KDE3 is how one
> sets various options. For instance, in KDE3 I was able to configure the
> task bar such that when is got crowded, it would stack multiple
> instances in one slot. In KDE4, there are only 3 task manager settings:
> Show Tooltips
> Show only tasks from the current desktop
> Show only tasks from the current screen.

Hmmmmm, I've never been a fan of that setting, so I didn't even see it
missing. I know that this is a screenshot of it being configured, but it does
seem like that is missing.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a7/Plasma-panelcontroller_4.1_beta_1.png


> Additionally, the task manager and pager options were available from
> the KDE control panel, but they are no longer there.  Mostly just minor
> things. Someone on this or another list mentioned that GNOME was more
> mature. In any case, I thought a good discussion between KDE and GNOME
> is always relevant, just to discuss the state of things

Agreed. It's going to be awhile before it's as slick/mature as 3.5.9, but
there are so many other things that are thrilling about it, that's it's hard
to fault it for the little things right now.

July 29th, we'll know how it turned out.

B



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[Tom Metro-12]

Jerry Feldman wrote:
> What I would like to see is a non-religious, objective discussion of
> various features of GNOME and KDE.

What I'd like to see is a wiki page or two with a table showing a
side-by-side comparison of features with screen shots. I wouldn't be
surprised if such a thing existed already...

Lets see, this page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNOME

linked to:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_X_Window_System_desktop_environments

But it is broader in scope than just KDE vs. GNOME, and doesn't cover
those in enough depth to make a good decision. In fact for some of its
comparison tables it groups KDE and GNOME together due to them being so
similar relative to the other desktops.

A Google of the obvious terms turns up these articles in the first page
of results:

Linus versus GNOME
http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS8745257437.html
[A summary of comments made by Linus Torvalds about GNOME.]

KDE vs Gnome, What is the better desktop environment?
http://linuxreviews.org/software/desktops/

KDE vs. GNOME: A Screed from a Supposed Corporate Flack
http://opsamericas.com/?p=739

KDE vs. Gnome: Which is better for you?
http://digg.com/linux_unix/KDE_vs_Gnome_Which_is_better_for_you
[Has some discussion you may find of interest.]

That Digg page has a broken link, and probably should go here:
http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/kdegnome


That last link comes the closest to a side-by-side comparison with
screen shots, though it only covers a dozen or so features - mostly
superficial differences.

  -Tom

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Tom Metro
Venture Logic, Newton, MA, USA
"Enterprise solutions through open source."
Professional Profile: http://tmetro.venturelogic.com/

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