5 ms·

KDE is genuinely really good now. As fully featured desktop environments go it’s right up there with the commercial offerings. Unfortunately I’ve moved on and

by mnd999 4y ago

KDE is genuinely really good now. As fully featured desktop environments go it’s right up there with the commercial offerings. Unfortunately I’ve moved on and I don’t want that anymore. A minimalist tiling desktop like sway or i3 suits me much better. Particularly on a touchpad where dragging windows is a faff.

RedShift1 4y ago
There are commercial desktop environments?
- veidr 4y ago
  Maybe you're joking, but I think the comparison here is macOS and Windows, not commercial desktop environments for Linux.
  - RedShift1 4y ago
    I wasn't joking no, I thought commercial DEs for Linux.
- another_story 4y ago
  I think they mean Windows and Mac.
- 0dayz 4y ago
  There's was the Unix Desktop Environment. It used to be commercial.
jrepinc 4y ago
I would say KDE Plasma surpasses anything out there even closed proprietary alternatives. From time to time I have to use Windows and mac at work (to test on other platforms than GNU/Linux) and they are much worse when it comes to desktop use, especially macos is quite terrible. Not even considering all the trends of surveillance and ads they try to add into those two now and constant dumbing down of the interface.
- still_grokking 4y ago
  I feel the same. What I'm constantly wondering is why macOS is so popular, especially with tech people, like developers. It's the most terrible platform, imho. It's more buggy than Windows, it has the same malware problem as Windows, it's spy- & adware as Windows, it's inflexible, it's completely dumbed down, and it's incompatible to anything (even it former self). The usability of macOS is even worse than Windows, imho. Still it's very popular. Why is the brainwashing by Apple's marketing so effective? I don't get it.
  - jlpcsl 4y ago
    I also agree with this. Have to use all three OSes and Apple is a disaster. KDE Plasma on Linux is years ahead and only getting better, while the closed source OSes are just getting worse. Really too bad that KDE and Linux communities don't have the same marketing powers.
  - mikhailt 4y ago
    Because macOS has been the most consistent in the past 20 years and it works out of the box and has exceptional integration with exceptional hardware. Plus enterprise support. (Being consistent doesn't make it good or bad on its own, just being consistent can be a bonus for some). A lot of developers are not technical-savy either to deal with linux's hardware issues, dependency issues, etc. Many IT doesn't want to deal with linux for the same reasons. It's also easier to fix if everyone has the same hardware and software. Many devs use brew/iterm2 for package mgmt and advanced terminal support. KDE may be the best DE out there but it doesn't matter as long it is not available on typical commercial devices and works out of the box with 100% hardware integration support. Business has an impact on what hardware their employees can use and it is often macOS/Windows because it has the lower overall investment cost and much better integration support with their device management tools. > It's more buggy than Windows, it has the same malware problem as Windows, it's spy- & adware as Windows, it's inflexible, it's completely dumbed down, and it's incompatible to anything (even it former self). And Linux has been the most unstable OS for me with broken nvidia drivers, bricked installs and so on all from updating Linux a few times in the past 3 years. We can blame Nvidia for this but it doesn't matter to everyone else, it is still Linux's responsibility to ensure it doesn't happen. I never had to reinstall MacOS on any of my devices in the past few decades. Windows, I did have to reinstall because of bad Windows updates. macOS is nowhere as bad as Windows with its spyware/adware, it's there a bit but it's not that big of an issue. > it's inflexible, it's completely dumbed down, and it's incompatible to anything (even it former self). That's the best part of macOS and why businesses want it. KDE itself was hard to use for casual users because it is too flexible and comes with defaults that are not tailored to them. (I said was, because last time I tried it was a year ago and it had some weird defaults). If KDE could optimize their initial defaults for the incoming new users (which are growing up with iOS/Android devices first), then they might have a better chance.
nvarsj 4y ago
I pretty much went the opposite and gave up on sway/i3 after many years. I just want my computer to work so I can focus on things that matter to me now (tinkering with my Linux OS used to matter to me, but I'm over that). Every little thing on i3/sway is a chore to set up. I even went full click ops with OpenSuse Tumbleweed now. No more toiling over my NixOS/Arch configs - I don't need fully reproducible environments for 1 or 2 machines. I want to add a printer, I click YaST printer, add it, done. I want to install full Qt Creator IDE, I download it from the website, double click the rpm and I'm up and running in < 5 minutes. Want to auto hide my taskbar? Right click, set auto-hide, done in 30s. Plug into conference room HDMI cable and mirror? Go to monitor settings, set to mirror, done in 30s. Etc.
still_grokking 4y ago
> As fully featured desktop environments go it’s right up there with the commercial offerings. It's not right up there, it's ahead. As others here pointed out, it beats macOS regarding multi-monitor support. And it beats both, Windows and macOS regarding features, polish, stability, and configurability.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
imiric 4y ago
I've used bspwm for many years now, and recently started experimenting with KDE on NixOS. I have to say, the Plasma desktop is very polished and mostly works as I want it to. The amount of knobs I can tweak to set it up just as I want is not far off from minimalistic WMs. For window tiling, Bismuth[1] looks interesting, though I've yet to give it a try. There are some major issues, though, like random freezes and the compositor failing sometimes, which might be caused by Intel drivers, but I'm hoping that switching to Wayland might resolve it. I'd really like this to be my main productivity environment, as when it works, the experience is pretty slick. [1]: https://github.com/Bismuth-Forge/bismuth https://github.com/Bismuth-Forge/bismuth
kitsunesoba 4y ago
I would say that it’s not everybody’s jam, though. I’ve tried using it several times and something about its general UI/UX and design philosophy feels odd/grating to me, and no amount of twiddling with its numerous knobs fixes it. A lot of non-KDE Qt software also shares this problem.

by mnd999 4y ago

RedShift1 4y ago

There are commercial desktop environments?

veidr 4y ago
Maybe you're joking, but I think the comparison here is macOS and Windows, not commercial desktop environments for Linux.
- RedShift1 4y ago
  I wasn't joking no, I thought commercial DEs for Linux.
another_story 4y ago
I think they mean Windows and Mac.
0dayz 4y ago
There's was the Unix Desktop Environment. It used to be commercial.

jrepinc 4y ago

I would say KDE Plasma surpasses anything out there even closed proprietary alternatives. From time to time I have to use Windows and mac at work (to test on other platforms than GNU/Linux) and they are much worse when it comes to desktop use, especially macos is quite terrible. Not even considering all the trends of surveillance and ads they try to add into those two now and constant dumbing down of the interface.

still_grokking 4y ago
I feel the same. What I'm constantly wondering is why macOS is so popular, especially with tech people, like developers. It's the most terrible platform, imho. It's more buggy than Windows, it has the same malware problem as Windows, it's spy- & adware as Windows, it's inflexible, it's completely dumbed down, and it's incompatible to anything (even it former self). The usability of macOS is even worse than Windows, imho. Still it's very popular. Why is the brainwashing by Apple's marketing so effective? I don't get it.
- jlpcsl 4y ago
  I also agree with this. Have to use all three OSes and Apple is a disaster. KDE Plasma on Linux is years ahead and only getting better, while the closed source OSes are just getting worse. Really too bad that KDE and Linux communities don't have the same marketing powers.
- mikhailt 4y ago
  Because macOS has been the most consistent in the past 20 years and it works out of the box and has exceptional integration with exceptional hardware. Plus enterprise support. (Being consistent doesn't make it good or bad on its own, just being consistent can be a bonus for some). A lot of developers are not technical-savy either to deal with linux's hardware issues, dependency issues, etc. Many IT doesn't want to deal with linux for the same reasons. It's also easier to fix if everyone has the same hardware and software. Many devs use brew/iterm2 for package mgmt and advanced terminal support. KDE may be the best DE out there but it doesn't matter as long it is not available on typical commercial devices and works out of the box with 100% hardware integration support. Business has an impact on what hardware their employees can use and it is often macOS/Windows because it has the lower overall investment cost and much better integration support with their device management tools. > It's more buggy than Windows, it has the same malware problem as Windows, it's spy- & adware as Windows, it's inflexible, it's completely dumbed down, and it's incompatible to anything (even it former self). And Linux has been the most unstable OS for me with broken nvidia drivers, bricked installs and so on all from updating Linux a few times in the past 3 years. We can blame Nvidia for this but it doesn't matter to everyone else, it is still Linux's responsibility to ensure it doesn't happen. I never had to reinstall MacOS on any of my devices in the past few decades. Windows, I did have to reinstall because of bad Windows updates. macOS is nowhere as bad as Windows with its spyware/adware, it's there a bit but it's not that big of an issue. > it's inflexible, it's completely dumbed down, and it's incompatible to anything (even it former self). That's the best part of macOS and why businesses want it. KDE itself was hard to use for casual users because it is too flexible and comes with defaults that are not tailored to them. (I said was, because last time I tried it was a year ago and it had some weird defaults). If KDE could optimize their initial defaults for the incoming new users (which are growing up with iOS/Android devices first), then they might have a better chance.

nvarsj 4y ago

I pretty much went the opposite and gave up on sway/i3 after many years. I just want my computer to work so I can focus on things that matter to me now (tinkering with my Linux OS used to matter to me, but I'm over that). Every little thing on i3/sway is a chore to set up. I even went full click ops with OpenSuse Tumbleweed now. No more toiling over my NixOS/Arch configs - I don't need fully reproducible environments for 1 or 2 machines. I want to add a printer, I click YaST printer, add it, done. I want to install full Qt Creator IDE, I download it from the website, double click the rpm and I'm up and running in < 5 minutes. Want to auto hide my taskbar? Right click, set auto-hide, done in 30s. Plug into conference room HDMI cable and mirror? Go to monitor settings, set to mirror, done in 30s. Etc.

still_grokking 4y ago

> As fully featured desktop environments go it’s right up there with the commercial offerings. It's not right up there, it's ahead. As others here pointed out, it beats macOS regarding multi-monitor support. And it beats both, Windows and macOS regarding features, polish, stability, and configurability.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

imiric 4y ago

I've used bspwm for many years now, and recently started experimenting with KDE on NixOS. I have to say, the Plasma desktop is very polished and mostly works as I want it to. The amount of knobs I can tweak to set it up just as I want is not far off from minimalistic WMs. For window tiling, Bismuth[1] looks interesting, though I've yet to give it a try. There are some major issues, though, like random freezes and the compositor failing sometimes, which might be caused by Intel drivers, but I'm hoping that switching to Wayland might resolve it. I'd really like this to be my main productivity environment, as when it works, the experience is pretty slick. [1]: https://github.com/Bismuth-Forge/bismuth https://github.com/Bismuth-Forge/bismuth

kitsunesoba 4y ago

I would say that it’s not everybody’s jam, though. I’ve tried using it several times and something about its general UI/UX and design philosophy feels odd/grating to me, and no amount of twiddling with its numerous knobs fixes it. A lot of non-KDE Qt software also shares this problem.