4 ms·

It started out as a political issue (KDE being dependent on Qt, and Qt not being GPL at the time). The history is here: https://www.kde.org/community/history/qt

by wenc 9y ago

It started out as a political issue (KDE being dependent on Qt, and Qt not being GPL at the time). The history is here: https://www.kde.org/community/history/qtissue.php https://www.kde.org/community/history/qtissue.php I've always preferred KDE to GNOME because I feel it is higher quality desktop environment, but I will be the first to acknowledge KDE mucked up around KDE 4 and even today there are weird glitches in the vastly improved KDE5. That said, I still run Kubuntu because I feel it continues to be better than Ubuntu (GNOME), and I can live with the little annoyances.

vram22 9y ago
What Kubuntu version do you use? I've had the same thoughts as you about KDE vs. GNOME in the past (at earlier versions though, don't know about how they stack up currently).
- wenc 9y ago
  I run Kubuntu 16.04 LTS.
  - vram22 9y ago
    Thanks for the info.
    - shaan7 9y ago
      I use KDE Neon, it has the latest Ubuntu LTS as base but with latest KDE. See http://neon.kde.org/ http://neon.kde.org/
      - vram22 9y ago
        Just saw this now. Thanks, will check it.
whateveruser 9y ago
Could also be that Red Hat has a lot of devs on Gnome. That means more contributions, which means greater control over project's direction, the only way that can happen in OSS. And with corporate backing comes faith from many people. Also Debian defaulted to Gnome since v1(?). So did Ubuntu(mostly). KDE is very much a community project despite considerable resources from SUSE and few other corporate entities. Add to it Gnome's almost fixed 6 month churn and it becomes a pretty enticing choice for organizations having to support that piece of software for 5+ years.
- blattimwind 9y ago
  Debian was initially released before either Linux desktop.
  - whateveruser 9y ago
    Hence the question mark. What did Debian have for v1 then?
- digi_owl 9y ago
  And you will also find that while KDE devs stay without their on sphere for the most part, Gnome devs "dives the stack". Meaning that you will just as often find them working on something under the Freedesktop banner, but with a massive Gnome slant, as on Gnome proper. In other words while KDE devs have a clear understanding of where the DE ends and the rest of the OS begins, Gnome devs seems to consider everything above the kernel (and is likely biding their time for the day Torvalds steps down) the domain of Gnome.

by wenc 9y ago

vram22 9y ago

What Kubuntu version do you use? I've had the same thoughts as you about KDE vs. GNOME in the past (at earlier versions though, don't know about how they stack up currently).

wenc 9y ago
I run Kubuntu 16.04 LTS.
- vram22 9y ago
  Thanks for the info.
  - shaan7 9y ago
    I use KDE Neon, it has the latest Ubuntu LTS as base but with latest KDE. See http://neon.kde.org/ http://neon.kde.org/
    - vram22 9y ago
      Just saw this now. Thanks, will check it.

whateveruser 9y ago

Could also be that Red Hat has a lot of devs on Gnome. That means more contributions, which means greater control over project's direction, the only way that can happen in OSS. And with corporate backing comes faith from many people. Also Debian defaulted to Gnome since v1(?). So did Ubuntu(mostly). KDE is very much a community project despite considerable resources from SUSE and few other corporate entities. Add to it Gnome's almost fixed 6 month churn and it becomes a pretty enticing choice for organizations having to support that piece of software for 5+ years.

blattimwind 9y ago
Debian was initially released before either Linux desktop.
- whateveruser 9y ago
  Hence the question mark. What did Debian have for v1 then?
digi_owl 9y ago
And you will also find that while KDE devs stay without their on sphere for the most part, Gnome devs "dives the stack". Meaning that you will just as often find them working on something under the Freedesktop banner, but with a massive Gnome slant, as on Gnome proper. In other words while KDE devs have a clear understanding of where the DE ends and the rest of the OS begins, Gnome devs seems to consider everything above the kernel (and is likely biding their time for the day Torvalds steps down) the domain of Gnome.