KDE Plasma 5.9 Hits The Web With Global Menus, Better Wayland Support

[Del_]

So much hate... I am still on Debian stable and kde4 on all except one machine. One bug on kdepim bit me, it was fixed within a couple of days though. Other than that, rock solid on Intel, amd and nvidia gpu's. One machine running Debian testing for timely updates to radeonsi. Only issue after a couple of years is some libs shipped with steam colliding with the system libs, nothing related to KDE. I am very impressed with plasma 5, and will be rolling all machines over when it hits Debian stable. Huge thanks to all the developers that have indured the never ending hate fest from gnome users. Any chance you gnomes are a bit envious? (that would sure explain a lot)

[mir3x]

Im using Lxqt and when I read this, its feel gnome users are frustrated bc of using gnome.
Facts:
- in lxqt every window manager works except Mutter and Marco, even cinnamon is ok. I use kwin bc its good.
- kde apps are superior to gnome, personally I use only Gimp. Yakuake, kate, k3b, kdevelop - gnome has only poor cousins.

[Guest]

100% Agree. After KDE failed as a desktop it is more like a social experiment. Each year less relevant, less senior developers and more dormant code.

KDE has failed? Everyone's moving to Qt which KDE is based on. Furthermore, it seems Canonical is looking at KDE more closely now. The fact is gtk and gnome have failed and they're dying. And.. this is a good thing! Crap should be dead.

[CrvenaZvezda]

KDE, the only awesome desktop experience out there.

[polarathene]

Do it. Trust me, you won't regret it. I switched away months ago

I actually did the opposite, was on Gnome for about 8 months after leaving Windows, not sure if Gnome was entirely to blame but had so many issues/bugs with my experience using it. Has been much better for me with KDE since. I've also liked both UI and UX with KDE over Gnome so I think that's personal preference.

And since when I switched, GNOME got a lot better. You'll notice

Funny that, since I switched to KDE with 5.7/5.8 it's got a lot better too, I've noticed! Actively developed projects tend to do that don't they? Who would have thought! :P

They have a UX team that actually knows UX, and doesn't make it worse with every release

Anything to back this up? They have guidelines or a team from memory, they do an alright job. KDE likewise(since last year or so?) has the VDG to help in that area. I think UI/UX preferences can sometimes be biased, there is some foundations that make or break good UI/UX but I don't think either Gnome or KDE is superior over the other. I have enjoyed using Dolphin over Nautilus, the file dialog for apps is seamless UX for me with Qt one, but when a Gnome app has the Gnome file dialog it's painfully obvious for me as I recall navigation to the file to be less than pleasant in comparison. I really like the configurability KDE provides it's users to better tweak the UI/UX, it seems more flexible/easier than my experience with Gnome.

Could you give some examples where KDE has poor UX for you and where it gets worse with every release? It's all been improvements to me.

They have more than one people working on Wayland stuff, and things are actually usable compared to with KDE

I've not personally used Wayland yet but I have heard the experience to be better with Gnome than KDE presently, RedHat has done some nice work getting Gnome to support nvidia implementation for using Wayland, little jealous of that

They rarely break functionality and features just because "lol, I felt like it" and they are in general a lot nicer to work with

Examples of this behaviour with KDE? There is usually a good reason that something like that might happen and it's usually due to the transition from KDE4 to KDE5 where quite a few bits under the hood changed. Now that the core experience/usability is more stable since 5.8 KDE devs are working at bringing back many of those features. What features did you have in mind that were cut like that? If anything Gnome has it's fair share of problems in that regard too, didn't the Solus dev jump ship from GTK because of regular breakage? I recall this being the case with themes too always breaking with updates due to APIs being reworked often. Same happens with some themes on KDE that were designed during KDE4 days.

The toolkit (GTK) is actually built for their needs, they are not a niche product using it, which is neither tested nor supported

Qt has a much wider use base and I'd imagine funding/development. Each has pros/cons, Qt is in no way perfect. KDE has testing, not sure what type of support you mean? Which kind are you saying it lacks? Support from Qt? Quite a lot of KDE development I've read has actually been pushed into Qt to benefit those that use Qt elsewhere rather than KDE alone. Qt also works quite closely with KDE to support them, yes the slipped up with the recent Wayland issue and that was promptly fixed with a point release. If they had no support from Qt at all that wouldn't be the case. Mistakes happen, neither Gnome or KDE or their toolkits are perfect in that regard.

And basic, essential stuff like a multi monitor setup just works, out of the box.

Works out of the box for me. Since 5.8 it's been pretty decent for multi monitor. Are you still running into issues? Plasma 5.8 and Qt 5.7 should be good, what sort of problems were you running into with multi-monitor?

GNOME has extensions that make it far more powerfull than KDE.

KDE has plenty of extensions too....? Are you referring to any in particular? I've found Gnome to be less powerful. Would love to know which extensions these are that KDE doesn't have.

[ldo17]

Bring back Keramik!

[Alejandro Nova]

KDE fan, running GNOME 3.22 in a convertible laptop, here.

The truth is: I'm running GNOME here because all those negatives that hinder GNOME in every single type of computer are pluses here, and GNOME seems to be made with convertible laptops, and ONLY convertible laptops, in mind (I have also a normal PC with KDE inside, I just love KDE). To mention:

1. In a normal computer, I need to press Start and navigate with my mouse until I reach the "All applications" button to see all apps installed, so, it's a nightmare. In my convertible, I swipe from the right and access is instant. So, the full screen menu that is a liability everywhere else, here is a blessing.
2. The disjointed GNOME notification experience is not an issue when you can swipe from the edge and get what you want quickly.
3. Those massive title bars become suddenly useful when you have a touchscreen close; you can drag them and move windows easily.
4. You can navigate between virtual desktops with a four finger gesture.
5. GNOME can recognize the gyroscope built into my convertible laptop, and can use it to rotate the screen automagically, even in Wayland.
6. GTK recognizes well finger gestures, Qt not so much (at least in a non-Wayland environment, from my testing).

KDE has none of these features. But these features are only relevant if you use a convertible laptop. And I hope they are implemented in KDE soon.

[eggbert]

For a 'failed desktop' I still see a lot of development and, anecdotally, more installs of it among the Linux desktop users I know than any other desktop or WM (Unity coming a close second). This suggests it's doing something right. The Linux desktop users I know are a mixture of web operations people and developers, all fairly high-powered users.

I was just thinking this myself as I notice the same. Professionals seem to tend more toward KDE. Also it seems like older folks tend more toward KDE. Those who like playing around with themes and icons tend to Gnome or newer DE's like Cinemon, Elementary, etc. Just my observation... Not intending to start a DE war....

[FuturePilot]

Now that we have a bunch of features back from KDE 4 it's time to redo everything and lose them all again for KDE/Plasma 6!*


*I'm joking, I love KDE

[smitty3268]

I really wonder why you have so much hatred in your mind, and why you focus it on a free software project of all things in the world. How did you get to making this your daily obsession?

There's got to be some great psychological studies out there on this phenomenon. How people get so wrapped up in Apple, Gnome, KDE, even Windows and then feel the need not to just gush about their preferred product but go to great lengths trolling everyone who likes other competing products.

It's really quite strange. The console wars, graphics cards, etc. It clearly fills some void in a lot of people's lives.