Why Isn't KDE the Default?
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- Опубликовано: 23 июл 2024
- Today I talk about why KDE Plasma isn't more popular.
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For me personally, KDE is undoubtedly my clear Nr. 1. Simply the best!
KDE is without a doubt the customization king but its just too unstable for my liking. It could just be because of my nvidia graphics card but gnome doesn't glitch out like that at all.
Not to mention, all I would have to do to mess up KDE is suspend it and boot it back it.
I really wanted to like KDE but I just couldn't stand all the bugginess.
@@joemann7971that suspend issue is actually a NVidia driver problem. If you install and enable nvidia-persistenced it'll go away
@@joemann7971 It'll probably be in a good spot come plasma 6. Ever since valve's been pouring money into it things have improved dramatically. And from my personal experience the most bugs I've had on nvidia all came down to the xwayland implementation. Something that should get better with time as more things get native wayland support.
Same feeling, I do want to like this DE but for my use at work too unstable and overwhelmed with options I don't care that much
Kwallet just jinxed kde out of my options. I went from gnome to xfce.
I'm thinking of going to lxqt because I want to abandon the gtk too.
Maybe I should even leave the qt vs gtk war and go directly to enlightenment. Since I am going to buy a new laptop. I probably should leave the mainstream 🎉
The real reason is that KDE used Qt and for years the Qt license did not allow for redistribution of modified sources, being different from the GPL. So even though KDE pre-dates Gnome by 10 months (1996 vs. 1997), it was not adopted as the default and Gnome, that used the GPL-compliant GIMP Toolkit, was. KDE only became GPL compliant in 2000.
Then Gnome destroyed a decade of established UI design and completely flipped it on its head with GNOME 3. KDE was already GPL compliant when that happened, yet distros stuck with GNOME, despite it having lost 90% of the functionality it used to have, a very immature GTK3 toolkit and a host of other issues.
Though to be fair, KDE was transitioning from KDE3 to 4 at the time and oh boy did that not go well initially. KDE5 is so much more stable than 4 ever was, and I am actually glad KDE devs are spending most of their time improving stability and fixing bugs for the Plasma 6 release rather than new features. KDE has more than enough features now, but many need a bit of polishing.
@@max_im_um It's nice hearing some of the history, because yeah, when I tried linux originally gnome just seemed too simple and alien coming from Windows, while KDE offered a lot more - albeit not looking as slick at the time.
@@RedSaint83 For me, the fact that Gnome looked nothing like Windows was a big selling point.
^ this
Kde is stuck in the 90s. Open source doesn't mean software is good.
the problem isn't that KDE has "too many" options/settings, its that they present every single setting all at once which is overkill. they should present sane configurable options upfront, and hide away the granular stuff in an "advanced/extra/whatever" tab/page.
CInnamon DE has the exact balance between number of options and beginner friendly implicity. Never moved from Cinnamon after discovering it.
You and me both. Distro hopped for years, Cinnamon feels like home to me.
I've tried cinnamon, I think it lacks some basic features like smart window placement for example, xfwm4, kwin, compiz, and openbox seem to be the only window managers that have it, personally I can't use a desktop environment or window manager that doesn't have it.
Now that you mentioned it, Cinnamon should be the default from now on. No confusion, everything is just where it should be. Feels like driving a fully functional car. ;-)
@@benjy288 I tried Openbox, but I returned to Cinnamon. It fits perfectly with my workflow (not the sahrpest knife when it comes to WMs but I tend to stick what it works for me).
Hopefully they work on Wayland support. Cinnamon is a good DE but it cannot stay in the past forever.
This video is pretty spot on as to why it's not more popular. Gnome is just simple. Personally i like KDE better. Most of the issues people have with it has answers and can be fixed. I feel that people just don't know and don't care to find out.
I prefer GNOME because it is more polished and looks way better by default. After all, one of the responsibilities of a desktop environment is to work well, be responsive and, nontheless, be pretty to look at.
@@softwarelivre2389 I disagree, because rounded corners I hate and they are not consistent. File manager for instance has rounded corners on top and bottom, when not maximized, but Firefox for instance only on top, not bottom when not maximized. And the title bars are to thick. But we all have our preferences. And KDE is much easier to theme.
True, things can be fixed. But I imagine most people don't like to maintain their OS so much, they often just want to turn on their PC and have enerything work so that they can do what they have to do. And it's fine to be like this. A lot of us Linux users love to tinker, but we have to accept not everybody wants to do that.
This is high praise coming from Matt aka: Mr Tiling Guy
2 Reasons: #1: It is all about the Benjamins..Gnome has SO MUCH more money invested into it and corporate sponsership and therefore an army of developers. #2) Many Linux users are rabidly resistent to anything that looks and operates like Microsoft Windows and Gnome represents a "liberating" shift into a different desktop paradigm that only exists on Linux. The forums are littered with Gnome users who critize you for even using KDE if you are Linux user. Personally, I am on KDE...Solid with no issues..So much lighter on resources. I tried Gnome numerous times and it absolutely slows me down..But that is ME...Whatever tool you use is all that matters in the end.
The funding situation is changing as Valve is employing a substantial number of developers to work on Plasma.
I think gnome is crappy since 3 was released. cinnamon is better.
It's amus8ng to me that KDE while being so visually appealing and offers so many customisation options is lighter on the resources than the plain Jane Gnome.
Trying to copy Windows UI/UX is and always was a terrible idea. Windows always had bad UI/UX, and Linux should be trying to do better, not making better or worse copies of a bad design. Gnome has the right idea. They try to do the right design and then sell users on the merits of it, rather than give the users what they expect from the last OS they used.
@@fakecubed isn't gnome kind of a macos clone, like kde is a windows clone (I use the word "clone" loosly)?
I use kde as well, I personally like gnome UI compare to kde. Kde likes border-lines and columns rows a lot. ( you can see it on the settings and in their software center)
Also, gnome makes their app names so simple, the terminal is called terminal, calculator is called calculator, contacts is called contacts, and so forth. kde has some weird name for their apps. Kwin, krunner, konsole, Kcalc, Gwenview, kamoso. Those are some app name that new users are not going to know what they are. It's just so foreign so Gnome looks like the obvious choice for Ubuntu.
I generally heavily prefer KDE over GNOME, though GNOME has some nice stuff about it.
That gnome naming, assuming it's always referred to as e.g. "GNOME" terminal, and never just as "terminal", is pretty much ideal. KDE's ^k convention makes me constantly wonder whether something is a random kde process, or part of the kernel, as processes also typically have a 'k' prepended.
I hate using GTK apps because of the fucking client side decorations that are always there, explicitly running SwayWM with NO decorations besides the window title - not even a close icon (s-S-q FTW) - as I do.
I started with KDE plasma but I left it for Sway because I felt parts were too coupled together and I wanted to pick and glue together exactly what I wanted. If I had to go back to desktop environment at some point, I'd choose KDE, though if on a laptop I might want to try GNOME.
for shits and giggles, I clicked on the menu icon. typed "terminal". Ah there they are. one time find. Konsole, retroterm (fun), xterm, terminal (superuser mode). Yes, that was an issue.
I am not complaining on how bad gnome's structure and how feature-incomplete it is. I just take a few monites to found out, even when I hate gnome.
That's nonsense just do alt+space type something and u get the right suggestion
And just replace C with a K and u are good to goo.
Genome is shit at the name of clean look they just remove features IMO
The applications you mentioned are the _Friendly_ names for them. The applications you mentioned in order is gnome-terminal, galculator and _if I am not mistaken_ empathy. xprop your apps and you'll know better; they still have weird names underneath. That's par for the course really; the GNOME 2.18 fork known as MATE has mate-terminal, mate-calc and no default mail client of its own, but rather than gedit, they have pluma.
So many more exampels of weird names, but I couldn't fit it in the first four lines. Engrampa? Why is their file-roller fork engrampa? The founder of MATE is Argentinian, so no surprise most of the default names are in Spanish. But here's a thought; if you don't like any application in MATE, XFCE or KDE, you can just _replace them_ nine times out of ten without major repercussions. GNOME? Keep and use what they've got or *suffer.* It's mad-stupid how vertically integrated that whole DE is.
Other weird examples; does nautilus, caja, thunar and dolphin invoke supposition of their purpose as file managers to you? Because that's what they are. In order; GNOME, MATE, XFCE, KDE.
@@bluephreakr and let's be clear, putty, outlook, excel aren't also giving a cue what it does, let alone explorer.
And now people will say "yes but everybody knows that..... is a program to..." -- which obviously isn't valid for people who trywindows for the first time either.
So yeah, complaining about names.... is just about complaining, not really something useful.
I’ve run fedora with KDE Plasma for about a year now. No issues at all, and it is a dream to use (count myself as a noob on linux though)
Have tried Gnome and can not stand it at all.
I think anther factor for distros like Fedora/RedHat and Ubuntu/Canonical is their ambition to offer enterprise solutions - if handing to a company's IT department, they will also want to deploy something relatively standard and locked down so they don't waste time in supporting an environment that users could have fiddled around with and set up in radically different ways, confusing the heck out of IT staff trying to help them. Overall, here a simpler, less flexible - and also because there's less of it potentially more stable - environment becomes a very positive thing. Similarly, where a distro wants to partner with hardware vendors, being able to offer stability and consistency of experience become primary concerns. Though the configurability (and breakability) of KDE is just what lots of Linux enthusiasts like, it becomes a liability in these other contexts.
Does KDE Plasma have a way to change the machine hostname through its quick settings? Last time I tried, I could not find it. If I have to drop into the terminal do this then I consider that a fail. Even Gnome has a way to do it through their settings under 'About' as I recall -- no terminal needed.
I use Plasma on my laptop for classes, and I've had multiple students stop me and ask about how I got my desktop to look so cool.
As a forever Linux noob, I love Plasma and its many customation options and built in KDE store. The only thing I wish is that Kvantum and SVG options were built in to the appearance settings
Do you think the GTK vs Qt factor is a part of this as well?
It was the small things in gnome that annoyed me to my wit's end. I needed an extension to change the simplest thing. I tried to change the format of the date and time...and I needed a freagin extension for that! I get why KDE can be called overwhelming and "too feature full". But I want my work laptop to look, feel and function the way *I* want... not the way the gnome devs want. I'm not a hardcore ricer but it really helps me to theme and clean up the desktop to cut down on eye strain. Transparency, stripping down and moving the taskbar, better contrasting cursor, icons...to me it really does make my workspace better for me.
I use extension called 'Date Menu Formatter' for changing date format. For placement or show/hide any item on the panel I use 'Just Perfection' extension.
@Winaras79 exactly an extension. It's nonsense to need an extension for something that basic. Even Cinnamon has a way to change it without an extension.
it feels so feature-incomplete for me. Same kind of issues.
I absolutely adore KDE. Unfortunately, there's just the right amount of jank that I can't personally justify using it over GNOME, especially with how awesome GNOME's trackpad gestures and workspaces are.
If you don't need any advanced functionality and are content with a basic, touch-focused interface, then GNOME is fine. But if you need anything more, and many of us do, GNOME just won't cut it without an extreme amount of extensions that will break with each new release. It's just not worth the hassle to spend hours to make GNOME barely useful when KDE and XFCE exist.
@@max_im_um second this.
@@max_im_um I guess I just prefer a DE that works for me, as opposed to the other way around. The only thing I've had to actually use an extension for is quarter tiling. (Seriously, who at GNOME decided that half-tiling was enough?)
Exactly. Was a big fan of KDE but it became a permission nightmare. Wifi became flaky, couldn't mount a remote drive at boot, wasn't able to run Dolphiin. Spent 3 months trying to solve the issues and failed. All I found out was that permissions were causing all the problems.
@@tonyprindelthey wanted to have quarter tiling for a long time, but they didn't had a developer with time and commitment to properly implement and maintain this feature in the future.
Gnome unspoken rule is more or less "A feature has to be well integrated and maintained while being approved by trusted design contributors to be accepted"
Haven't used it in awhile but KDE settings always perplex me. I don't know what the kdewallet business is that I have to figure out how to disable. Then it feels like each setting is in its own separate settings location. Each time I want to modify something is like whack a mole.
Nice to see someone else running Krusader.
I've been running Plasma for quite a long time (version 2, maybe), and I generally like it, but it is a nightmare having to redo all of the (for me, quite substantial) settings the way I like. I often went back to Icewm, and now I run Openbox. It takes a while to set things up, but once done, just copy the settings to a new install, and the job is done.
For some machines, there can be a huge difference in memory usage as well.
I dont get why having too many options is a downside for anybody. I think most people would want to actually be able to change something over having a nice clean settings menu. Thats like some apple "our users are too dumb we have to protect them by not allowing them anything" type shit imo
But gnome got the rounded corners tho
yep. I mean i'd love to have a "simple" and "advanced" mode in the system settings but even the way it is, why not just ignore all the settings which you don't need right now? That's why they implemented the powerful search. I'd much rather have these options for when i'll need them one day than not at all.
exactly !
Thanks for your channel. I watched a couple of videos and I see that you have interesting content. I just subscribed, hope you thrive
KDE was my main until a couple of months ago.
But I have shifted to the simplicity of XFCE4, and I feel quite at home now.
Missed two things. First, KDE originally was not licensed under a free license. Gnome was a direct response to that. KDE very quickly did get a free license, but some people even 20-ish years later still have not gotten the memo. Second, one of KDE’s major releases (I think it was 4) was not correctly labeled as a beta or alpha, so distros tried to ship that version of KDE before it was ready. The communication around the update was poor, and KDE’s reputation and user base suffered.
Having covered those two things, I think it’s a real shame, because Gnome is the reason I thought for a long time that you get what you pay for when you use Linux. Doing anything in Gnome is unnatural and irksome-or even impossible in some cases. And the Gnome developers basically tell the rest of the community to pound sand when they need a feature for some other project or even just for the betterment of Gnome itself.
Can you please describe what you dislike about GNOME?
@@Dudik28 Did you not read the second half of his comment?
@@PhayzinOut I read it and I still have no idea.
Qtile is feelin great again!! I have XFCE as well, and it feels so laggy. Probably something I did setting up my system
What's Your go-to daily driver, when it comes to linux distro?
I've daily driven Gnome2 (now Mate), Unity, Gnome3, XFCE and KDE all for 1+ years at least (Gnome3 being the one I've used the most time) and KDE is by far my best DE. I'm using a bleeding edge distro and using latest and greatest KDE plasma and it's pretty stable. I do have some weird artifacts form time to time, but overall very stable. Mind you, I'm the type of user Matt mentioned: I use the dark theme in the settings and a few key bindings, that's pretty much my "customization".
What really set KDE apart for me was the supporting applications : KWrite (text editor), Okular (PDF), Specacle (screen capture) to name a few. They are very well polished and just work out of the box.
I think Kubuntu or Debian w/KDE Plasma are well worth trying as distros. Most major distros don't hide that KDE Plasma is a major option for those who are more adventurous. I use KDE Neon on one device and really like it a lot.
did you created the gruvbox theme? because there is already a theme called "gruvboxPlasma" but the reason I don't use it, is because you cannot revert the panel back to plasma breeze. It's bugged so, it force me to re install fedora.
Also, I loved you're xfce customization video. I'd love to see one for kde as well, especially when is kinda hard to navigate kde . it's counter productive to have so many features be badly implemented that it doesn't want to make you explore to customize kde.
No, I just used the plasma global theme that is in the kde store, and the Kvantum theme
Can you speak more about the Plasma instability issues you mentioned?
They come and goes with updates, simply. This is an issue because other desktop doesn't bring black screen on log in after a regular update. KDE team should reduce the frequency of updates in favor of better stability. It's better to have one upgrade each two months than 5 in 1 + a hotfix that force you to use the command line in case you don't have an alternative desktop session ;)
I feel the settings are ordered based on how often you use them, rather than the amount of people who would use them. When my network, input devices and displays are set up, I won't touch those settings for months, if ever. Meanwhile I could change the look several times a week.
I've tried to like KDE Plasma but I just can't. When I'm not using a WM my Xfce desktop is highly customised, quite beautiful and steady as a rock!
XFCE never betrays.
I love Gnome, it's 99% perfect for me and I don't understand personally why people dislike it (other than the fact that it is difficult to theme). Eventually I stopped fighting it and just accepted Adwaita dark, and it's fine. There are a couple of tweaks that Gnome could implement that would make the UI perfect in my opinion; a simple way to set accent colours, and the Pop Cosmic tiling (though a better tiling option and accent colours look to be coming down the line so fine).
Maybe... maybe I'll switch back to Pop OS when it finally returns because COSMIC looks nice.
I kinda want to try out tiling WMs but I just don't have the time/inclination to learn a bunch of new keybindings and spend hours editing config files. Just give me a decent tiling option Gnome devs, it already exists, System 76 made it for you.
I can give you a few of my reasons why I dislike it, its severly lacking in customization options, you have to rely on third party extensions just to get basic functionality, like creating app launchers on the panel for example, but these extensions can be buggy and lead to instability, not to mention they can break whenever they release a new gnome version, they had a good file manager in gnome 2, but for some reason decided to dumb it down and remove a bunch of features from it.
Poor window mangement, when you open a window it will get placed in the center of the screen, and when you open another window it will get placed on top of the other window, and you can't really change that behavior, your only options are even worse than the default, like random and under mouse, there's no option for smart window placement where a window will get placed in the top left of the screen, and a new window will get placed beside it., and you can't change the window manager.
It looks like its been designed for touch interfaces with massive title bars, and it has to be one of if not the most resource heavy desktops on linux.
I use the adw-gtk3 theme for gnome. It makes everything match.
WONTFIX
Just give me the dash to dock by default and the app indicator support back by default and I’m pretty happy with gnome. As well as pop shell like you said. About the only customization I make other than dark theme. With my 1440p monitor and easy workspace switching I feel like I have all the space I need
Oh and i just saw brodies video about the new gnome tiling announcement. Can’t wait
hi, can you tell us your icons and collors of your system in that video tks
Tks i found in your video
I like KDE Plasma, although I was a bit skeptical about it after my previous experience with KDE4. Not a huge fan of Gnome as a whole, otherwise I would have picked XFCE instead which is still easy to customize.
GNOME is an awesome GUI for laptops, while KDE is probably what I prefer on a stationary. When it comes to the settings application, it should definitely have an easy/advanced options interface, where the easy is the most common stuff, while advanced opens up detailed options that the user get free realm to change, and in the personalise pan, it should be a tab where you get limited options such as light/dark theme, and accent colours, and some featuring layouts. Mac/Windows/Gnome/Cosmic/Unity style for a new user to switch between, and in the advanced settings everything is extends to full customisation.
I think that would be one of the best ways forward for KDE, and it would be able to hold hands and give an experienced user the tools to the playground.
I'm using Kubuntu on all my desktops. It's super stable and all are running 24/7. Lenovo, and two AM4 platforms, one with Ryzen 5 for gaming and Ryzen 9 as a workstation mostly for coding at work
Hey yo Matt! For no special reason I am in this video to let you know something: you are almost the only Linuxtuber I follow that actively talked about his experience on Fedora, and for some reason I finally decided to take a look at it... And I found home, bro! Fedora stopped my distrohopping impulse, I think I found the most perfect environment to work with.
From the installer to the actual Gnome desktop, everything is delightful. I thought about you, preaching about Fedora, and came here 😂
Fedora is awesome! Probaby my second fav, right now. OpenSuse is treating me well. Glad you're loving Fedora. Have you tried Silverblue?
When it comes to being user friendly - thinking about new users and those migrating from Windows - I have to give it to Cinnamon. It has enough functionality out of the box and is still somewhat familiar. I love me some KDE but it is so, SO much to get into.
It took me some attempts to get Gnome. Now I like it and it feels very intuitive. Before that, Xfce and Cinnamon were my favorites.
Tbh, I feel that Gnome has the same exact problem, not sure why
I'm 100% for there being more than 1 desktop environment. I don't like Gnome's setup, it's just not my style.
Just have a DE chooser in the OS installer like Debian has and mark whichever one as the primary DE. I'll always choose Plasma though!
You're right on target! I am a long-term Ubuntu user. I finally tried KDE in 2023. It's my favorite!
After using Cinnamon for over six years, I switched to KDE Plasma a couple of weeks ago, and I'm impressed with its customization depth, lots of add-ons and modularity. I agree with this video, though, that Plasma isn't as straightforward as Cinnamon or other DE.
When I first tried Linux some 20+ years ago I just couldn't understand the desktop fragmentation, why I couldn't run gnome apps in KDE, because KDE was already me favourite then.
Matt you are forgetting Gnome is a corporate desktop while KDE is community desktop.
and corporate desktops are generally less functional, just like the corporate (enterprise) serverversions.
I started with Kubuntu (Ubuntu + KDE) because I found Gnome so weird, too mobile-like. I switched to Ubuntu then Fedora and I realised that Gnome is more ergonomic than KDE which is too Windows-like. I know you can twist KDE to make it behave like Gnome or MacOS with a light top bar, a dock and an activity viewer when pressing the meta key. I like to have a ready-to-use distro which is also more stable (now you have to compile Latte-dock from its Github repo as it's more stable than the deb package) . Moreover I find the default Gnome prettier than the default KDE
I like KDE but found its' instability annoying so after spending the last 3 weeks distro/de hopping back and forth (which has taught me so much, i feel at home on linux now) i finally settled on xfce+arch and couldn't be happier. having a nvidia gpu puts a hamper on getting wayland + hyprland type setups going for now.
So you're on EndeavourOS and calling it XFCE on Arch because you're afraid someone will make fun of you for using the Arch-curious novice's default popular derivative option? Nobody would do that. Mainly because if somebody _does_ do that, their existence should not be acknowledged and their presence should be ignored, as one would block a person on any social media service to make them disappear.
If someone doesn't respect you for trying, that someone is nothing.
@@bluephreakr No......I'm for sure running vanilla arch, but I will admit to using the included archinstall script because I am a novice indeed. This is going to sound stupid, but I settled on xfce because its been the only DE/WM that's handled icons in the system tray correctly. But yeah, for sure running a rather slim and default arch+xfce install.
@@bluephreakr The real reason to use arch over the arch offshoots isn't for the internet points. It is because arch offshoots come and go... but arch remains.
Why go for EndeavourOS after Antergos was discontinued? You could have just stayed on Arch the entire time and not know anything even happened. Seriously, I didn't even know EndeavourOS existed until this comment thread. I have been happily plodding away at my unreasonably stable Arch install for years, blissfully unaware of the offshoots.
For me kde has been amazing so far, only problem I have is that it's an absolute shit show when it comes to gaming, poor frametimes on x11 and frequent crashes on wayland despite having an amd gpu (6800m), literally set up a windows 11 kvm because of this
On CachyOS here. Had an Nvidia card before and have an Intel card now. Honestly haven't had issues with crashing on the A770. Under Nvidia I had some issues with using Wayland, but on Intel that thang is smooth as buttah. Customized my desktop and laptop (Intel 12th Gen, no dGPU) the same, rock solid. Granted, I am using Flatpaks for anything not in the Arch repos & avoid the AUR if possible to avoid making more work for myself.
I use an Ubuntu system at work and by the gods I love GNOME for multitasking. It's easy to segment out my data recovery, data backup, and server maintenance tools. I honestly like both for very different use cases and reasons.
8:30 I have to say, I always open monitor and nearly every page in the systemsettings by searching for it in the menu, as in typing display and then click on the result
Surely the problem is not the number of configuration options, but rather the way in which those options are presented? As you said, I can change *anything*, but the most *important* things I am going to want to change, like network stuff, how many monitors I have and in what configuration, and so on, those things have to be front and centre in Settings, IMO.
I would question how you would present that many options. I don't think any way is going to solve the big problem
@@TheLinuxCast Could it be as easy as bigging up the 'welcome' app, where newbies would get to set the really important stuff up? Don't know, honestly.
BTW, tried Kubuntu on a live boot last night - it wouldn't even go past the initial boot screen. Given that my base is Ubuntu 23.04, what would be your recommendation for a good stable KDE thing maybe in a Live boot or a VM?
And thanks, as always!
For me, as a standard user with no background in computer science but enthusiastic about open-source software, KDE feels confusing and uncomfortable for some reason 😕
I have switched to KDE and haven’t looked back. Good stuff.
I must be weird, because while my daily driver is Gnome and is the DE I have spent most of my years in (well the Ubuntu flavour of it), I do find KDE Plasma to be very usable.
That said I have used XFCE in the past when needing a more lightweight DE, and spent a couple of years in LXQT for desktop while continuing with Gnome on a laptop.
I'd tried Zorin's implementation of Gnome which although almost unrecognisable as Gnome if you choose the Windows-like layout, again feels quite approachable for a newer user.
It does support Matt's point about if you want to customise the look (beyond accent colours) that does rely on a level of tinkering or layer of extensions, but it can be done (by the distro maintainer).
I don't find any of them to be counter-intuitive. And I am pleased to see when they borrow successful ideas from each other.
Compared with XFCE, Plasma has more settings options whereas XFCE has what I'd consider to be about the right default amount exposed. But Plasma has looked more polished for a time, even if that is only down to the default theming.
I am aware that XFCE is flexible enough that you can make it look and freel pretty swish (subjectively).
Plasma could have a Basic / Advanced settings toggle, which for a clean installation could start out as Basic.
For an upgrade or where existing home folder configs are found, the default visibility could be based on whether any of the Advanced settings have been customised or not.
In other words the experience for pre-existing users need not feel over simplified while newer users are not put off.
Perhaps that is what the telemetry collection is supposed to help with? (runs and hides!)
I support and manage layer2/3 network switches, which have have both a CLI interface and a Web GUI interface.
Granted, it's a strange analogy but while bulk port configuration tasks and pasting of saved config snippets can be accomplished much quicker in the CLI, even the web GUI for these have a Basic and Advanced Mode.
If even Cisco (whose UIs are of variable quality) can figure out a subset of controls to hide from new users then I am more confident that KDE / Plasma can come up with some ideas.
I am looking forward to COSMIC this summer with Pop_OS 24.04. Up until Plasma 5.25, I used KDE, but 5.25 really put me off, so I shifted Pop_OS with COSMIC as my main de; and I haven't regretted it.
Couldn't a distro use KDE, but not have the system settings app installed by default? They could have a simpler settings app with the things you mentioned, and make the full featured app available on their repository, for those that want it. It's quite common to see a friendly software manager on the same system as the more full-featured synaptic package manager.
Have used KDE on Arch distros for some time but more recently am liking KDE on MX Linux. MX-23 (just out) plus KDE makes for one nice distro.
I actually agree with pretty much everything you said :) My preferred Gnome variants are ones like Zorin, POP, and Ubuntu because they theme Gnome and set it up with nice extra features. Vanilla Gnome, for a mouse point and click user, is a right royal pain in the butt. Which, I guess is why I generally prefer the Cinnamon and Budgie DEs compared to Gnome. Plasma can be made into anything, but it does require a lot more work and learning on the part of the user. As you said, the system settings are a nightmare for a new user... and probably for distro maintainers as well lol.
Gnome 2 was good, but when they released 3 it was unusable garbage. It's only gotten slightly better. Cinnamon is nice.
> Plasma vs Gnome discussion
> me laughing in Xfce :3
The discussion about the system settings app should have included a side by dude with Gnome. It would have been immediately apparent why so many people do not want to use KDE.
Well, for ME, Plasma is in fact the default personally. If KDE didnt exist, I wouldn't use Linux, simple as that.
I always say that Gnome is for people who "don't like Apple but still like being told how to use their system". On KDE, I'm free, and it looks gorgeous. I also don't trust a DE that's unable to have blur by default 🤗
Hi Matt,
I fully agree that KDE offers way too much options and some off them are in a very unlogical place. For example I wanted to change the single click action in KDE and use double click (like in Windows). I started looking under the mouse options, but I could not find it. This setting needed to be changed in the 'Desktop Behaviour'.
But I fully disagree that Gnome is more user friendly. I guess a lot of (new) linux users come from a Windows environment with the Windows Desktop Paradigm in mind. Gnome is very far from this idea and my time with Gnome 40 was really frustrating and confusing. There is no 'taskbar' so in one glance you have no overview of what applications you have running, you first have to figure out that you'll have to install an extension, then figure out what it is called, that run into the problem that this is (was) not compatible with Gnome 4X and then realize that this can break in future updates. I can't accept the "Gnome is not broken, you are using it wrong" excuse. This is just very user unfriendly. Another example: the minimize and maximize icons are hidden by default, why?
I've tried Gnome paradigm so many times, it's just one frustrating, convoluted enviroment for me.
If Gnome reduced their memory usage to under 1 gig, I'd probably be okay with using it. It resembles more of an Android look and feel ( in landscape mode of course). So it might be better for those running Linux on touch screens.
Here are two issues I consistently have with Plasma that still aren't fixed:
1. Creating a new profile in Konsole and then modifying it to look how you want is broken. If you create a profile and set the font size, color, etc. When you re-open Konsole, none of those settings are saved. You have to create a profile, then close Konsole. Then open it back up and customize it the way you want.
2. Keyboard shortcuts for switching workspaces (desktops) are not enabled and once you have found where they exist and try to change them to use the GNOME workspace switcher settings, they don't apply until you open those settings again and have to set them all over again.
I genuinely hope that these glitches will be fixed in Plasma 6.0
A personal experience. I've bought a Tuxedo computer with their distro that feature Plasma. I use this computer for remote work and need Discord and Teams to work but (maybe after update to Tuxedo os 2 and the Plasma update) the use of these apps where freezing when a notification is triggered. Happened to every private message and some of channel notifs. I've read that the problem come from those apps with outdated Electron. I needed a solution so tried to migrate to Ubuntu and it all works fine.
I've tried Plasma before that computer. Really nice. But I agree that bugs don't promote it and the regular Plasma restart is frustrating when you try to work. And some apps provided with the KDE environment where terrible.
From my perspective and experience, the first contact with Plasma is a 'whaouh effect' and it's cool and all. But now if I get asked about Plasma for me it's a no-no and I don't recommend it, especially for a computer that must be kind of reliable.
I gave KDE a try for two years. I got it to be relatively how I want but that took a while. There was just too many’s little things that annoyed me about it. But I remembered how quickly I adapted and got work done on gnome. Now I’m back on gnome and I’m fine
KDE Plasma is great but I think Gnome is the default because it's the supported DE of the largest commercial distro Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Ubuntu tried to compete with Unity but that project is only community supported now. I think the only major Distros that comes default with KDE Plasma is Opensuse and also Slackware if you count that. Also what the other commentator mentioned about QT being closed source for a few years in the start really changed things. Personally I'll stick to Xfce and LXDE on my rpi. Nice video dude, always nice to see how KDE is doing currently!
I do find kde overwhelming with too many options then I find myself Changing things I forget hoe to change back
KDE has a right click context menu that has display settings and desktop settings on top like on windows.. just fyi but yeah I agree with most of what you said.
8:20 - It doesn't look that much more complicated than Windows settings (whether on Win10 or Win11). So it's a bit odd.
off topic: @TheLinuxCast: On each one of your video's the font rendering is so blurred. Why is that? Or do you just don't care? KDE has a ton of options yes, but you don't have to use them. I for one don't. About stability, I've had some issues on KDE Neon, but lately it has been very stable. Issues I've had didn't happen anymore. I always use Suspend. I hit enter, give in my password and I'm good to go. And KDE is so much better when it comes to theming. Much more consistent throughout the system. I agree with you about Gnome. Without Dash to panel I just don't like it. I don't like docks or planks. I like to theme my desktop too, but lately I just use the Breeze dark theme, but with Papirus icons, my favorite icons. White Breeze cursor.
Love KDE but it's the only desktop that just freezes on me. If I run a KDE session for longer than a day, at some point that second day my whole machine freezes. That's across multiple KDE distros for over a year now, consistent, power down it locks up hard. Currently running Xero's distro love it but the freezing drives me crazy. Ultimately I switch back to Hyprland (also on Xero's distro), I just don't have any issues with it. Goes for days with no problems.
interesting... something weird going on with your setup then. "across multiple distro's" is a trigger for me that something else is going on there. I don't know what though. It won't help you but here, any DE works fine, except when it's on wayland as that breaks copy/paste (for me) between a host OS and the virtual machine(s). And since the work laptop is windows... I MUST have a vm with linux to get my work done.
Anyways.... if I even could help you finding out the issue...
No1 - plasma with its sddm has very buggy Wayland support, esp. if you run it on Nvidia.
hello you said that you started using linux from 2017 but at 12:06 you say in 2000s when you tried suse. i would like to know what i'm missing
Gnome has a workflow. Plasma has a tinkering and experimenting flow.
KDE is really solid on Debian Bookworm
Using KDE for 20 years, it rocks :)
This is exactly what I feel about KDE. I really like that it allows to customize everything but I hate using it because it doesn’t feel intuitive to me. And I don’t consider my self as a new user :)
The overwhelming a new user problem could almost certainly be fixed with an "experience" slider. When you first install the system it's set to novice and you have the ability to crank it up to expert. As you increase it more settings become available. Perhaps even make it so that you need to do sometime to find the slider so a novice wouldn't accidentally alter the setting.
Anyway, I use KDE, as far as I'm concerned it's the best desktop but I'd be lying if I said it doesn't have issues. It's got a lot of settings which is great, but I engage safety squints every time I change one. If it's a setting that you rarely see on other systems it's generally best left alone as something will probably break. Personally, I think KDE needs to focus more on making sure what they have works first time every time.
a more advanced user will find the kde spin while a beginner will more likely stick with the default. hence the default has to look after the beginner. moreover, gnome feels way more polished and the animations and especially trackpad gestures are phenomenal.
Distro maintainers sooner make Xfce its default over KDE and I bet a lot of that has to do with BUGS.
Plasma usually have more bugs than gnome due to an smaller testing period and gnome have better accessibility options than Plasma wich also is an legal requirement for public use in alot of countries, due to goverment adoption of linux around the world, the accessibility options are critical
Distro makers should probably use the LTS version of KDE for their LTS/stable release allways. Like what Debian did for Debian 12 with Plasma 5.27 LTS. Cinnamon is my number two choice, and Linux Mint Cinnamon is one of the most user friendly distroes out there, in my opinion.
It's all about the OOTB experience especially for new Linux users. Trying to make the desktop look like windows seems to be the way that most distro developers take the approach but it's not what new users are actually looking for, it's about what is intuitive or not. Gnome looks great and IMO is actually a very efficient and intuitive (though managing the extensions using a browser is a weird, forced way to go about customizing it, and it admittedly might be a little heavy on memory/CPU). Gnome is really easy to use and understand, more so than even Mac desktop, and it's much less limited then you'd think it would be given the minimal desktop elements. Cinnamon is also pretty good in this regard, looks good OOTB and is different enough from Windows that you feel like you are in a different OS (which is desirable), but I wish they would take it a step or two even further from the microsoft feel.
Plasma is not really that difficult it's just a lot of work to set it up the way that looks good and feels natural, and most distros do minimal theming on it - the default blank slate OOTB setup with Plasma is bland, and a missed opportunity.
KDE-Plasma is the best DE yet, I stick to KDE since KDE3 and it was/is best daily-driver experience.
Kate's VI mode does not seem to be popular among kate developers, so even though this settings exists it's not usable as a daily driver. For example shif-left/shift-right are unbound, kate just blinks at you when you to try and select text. I think the downsides of having too many options is important to consider. Edit: When in insert mode nothing happens with the keys that are supposed to select the next|prev char.
It works okay, but VScode's plugin for vim is much better
My point was that the KDE is having problems supporting all the settings they have and by that metric they have too many settings and should remove some.
I use plasma as well. But plasma lacks a very important feature. I use a laptop and I like using tap to click. But there is no option to change the tap delay for double clicks. So I keep on getting false positive double clicks on my desktop all the time. It’s frustrating that such a useful feature is lacking…
Some very valid points Matt. Good job.
Between KDE and GNOME, I have always preferred KDE since the '90's. That said, I find myself using Xfce on the bulk of my installs. I attribute this to the fact that I am not someone who spends a lot of time "tweaking" my UIs. I make a few changes on all my installs, but that is about it. Doing this allows all of my computers to operate basically the same, no matter which distribution I happen to be running.
I'm a firm believer that, in every day use, the Desktop Environment is much more important than the actual distribution when judging usability. After all, Linux is Linux is Linux.
I dont understand why expansive menus are bad. There is a search at the top, you can easily find whatever you need. If you get scared by menus, you probably need to buy an iPad instead of a computer. Trying to dumb things down leads to bad results, look at the windows 10 settings app compared to the control panel.
Given how crappy Gnome is I ask the same thing.
When I first started to use linux, I ran Knoppix from a CD - it was amazing, I really liked it - so I installed it onto the HD of the computer. When I booted up from the HD, it looked shit. I ran the live version again from the CD and it looked amazing - installed and it looked shit. Did this for a third time and same thing - could not understand why it looked amazing live and shit when installed. - turns out the live version was running KDE and the installed version was defaulting to Gnome. That's when I understood the concept of different desktop environments - changed the installed DE to KDE and never looked back - Thanks KDE you are amazing!
Since KDE Plasma is used with Steam OS on the Steam Deck, it might be the most installed Linux User Interface. Probably not the most used though as I suspect most users will use the Steam UI and almost never boot into Desktop Mode.
Stock Gnome is dead simple. Anyone can figure it out in a minute. The thing I don't like is the wallpaper constantly zooming in and out. That's probably why they supply only graphic wallpapers and no scenic ones. Plus it's ugly but that can be fixed with Blur My Shell and Dash to Dock. I've tried everything and am staying with Zorin Core. Elegant and simple. The wallpaper never moves.
Redhat influence
I just don’t have a lot of luck with kde. I love the team and passion but every time I’ve tried to daily drive it ends in something breaking and me going back to gnome in frustration.
why does your neofetch look so prettier than mine
ruclips.net/video/Ov3yi-9jbFI/видео.html
Agreed. Gnome is weak. KDE is wonderful in every way.
One thing I know is my favourite distro should use plasma and maybe and extra window manager like Wayland or bspwm.
And KDE has a lot of great apps like Dolphin, for me the best file manager, Kwin, konsole Gwenview, and also other KDE's not included in Plasma like Kdenlive, Krita, Ink scape, etc
I like KDE because the out of the box experience is just so simple and yet so elegant looking. For me It's basically the spiritual successor to Windows 7.
GNOME just has too many weird bells and whistles I don't want to use and I don't like how everything is all over the place instead of one single panel.
Plasma has good fractional scaling by default. Other DE don't.
I think both are great- GNOME and KDE and it's a matter of personal preference.
I assume, your arguments have a lot to do with why KDE is not default on distros. You're probably right.
My preference is for GNOME, but I'm not anti-KDE in any way.
To me GNOME looks and feels to some (or even great) degree like working with your phone, so it IS user friendly, intuitive and even to newcomer it should be obvious what to do to start an app for example.
Also, let's not forget GNOME Shell Extensions, which unlock it to great extend.