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This week in KDE: New features and many bugfixes for Plasma 5.25

ChuckNorris89 4y ago
I urge anyone on the fence to give Plasma a try. The effort the team is putting into new features and squashing bugs is incredible. Also, the dev community is very open to feedback and actively improving things based on it. Like after last year's Linus Tech Tips issues with Linux, they immediately pushed some updated to smoothen out some of the problems pointed out by Linus. Ideally, I'd recommend OpenSUSE Tumbleweed to get the latest polished KDE experience rather than KDE Neon or Kubuntu.
- GekkePrutser 4y ago
  Seconded. KDE is amazing and the configurability a breath of fresh air after using highly opinionated software like macOS and Gnome. Finally it feels like the computer works for me again. I had been using macOS as a daily driver for 15 years and I was so frustrated with needing/wanting to do something and always running into the "we don't work that way","why would you want that", "you're using it wrong" invisible wall. Especially on macOS. Gnome at least has an ecosystem of plugins but it's hard to keep the system stable between upgrades as plugin devs struggle to keep up. Now when I want to change something in the way it works, usually the option is already there and I just have to switch it on. It feels like the software was made with my needs in mind rather than just the vendor's or developer's. I think the opinionated model works well for interface-constrained consumption devices like phones but not for production devices like desktops. Because end user usecases vary much more there. KDE really shines here.
adlpz 4y ago
I've been using Plasma for about a year now and I find it... underwhelming. Inconsistent "feel", things like the main menu search or the alt-tab feature are not frictionless to me. Not sure what it is but I'm changing soon. I guess it's the nostalgia talking but I miss the golden old days of KDE 3, browsing away with Konqueror before Apple forked the KHTML engine.

I urge anyone on the fence to give Plasma a try. The effort the team is putting into new features and squashing bugs is incredible. Also, the dev community is very open to feedback and actively improving things based on it. Like after last year's Linus Tech Tips issues with Linux, they immediately pushed some updated to smoothen out some of the problems pointed out by Linus. Ideally, I'd recommend OpenSUSE Tumbleweed to get the latest polished KDE experience rather than KDE Neon or Kubuntu.

GekkePrutser 4y ago
Seconded. KDE is amazing and the configurability a breath of fresh air after using highly opinionated software like macOS and Gnome. Finally it feels like the computer works for me again. I had been using macOS as a daily driver for 15 years and I was so frustrated with needing/wanting to do something and always running into the "we don't work that way","why would you want that", "you're using it wrong" invisible wall. Especially on macOS. Gnome at least has an ecosystem of plugins but it's hard to keep the system stable between upgrades as plugin devs struggle to keep up. Now when I want to change something in the way it works, usually the option is already there and I just have to switch it on. It feels like the software was made with my needs in mind rather than just the vendor's or developer's. I think the opinionated model works well for interface-constrained consumption devices like phones but not for production devices like desktops. Because end user usecases vary much more there. KDE really shines here.

adlpz 4y ago

I've been using Plasma for about a year now and I find it... underwhelming. Inconsistent "feel", things like the main menu search or the alt-tab feature are not frictionless to me. Not sure what it is but I'm changing soon. I guess it's the nostalgia talking but I miss the golden old days of KDE 3, browsing away with Konqueror before Apple forked the KHTML engine.