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KDE GUI GNU is Not Unix

KDE 3.1 Released 487

Posted by timothy from the good-things-take-time dept.
Ashcrow writes "KDE 3.1 was released early this morning and boasts new usability enhancements, VNC-compatible desktop sharing, tabbed browsing, and a new download manager, among other enhancements. You can read the release anouncement here and start downloading from the closest mirror. Kudos to the KDE Team!"
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KDE 3.1 Released More

KDE 3.1 Released

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  • KDE 3.1 is really a step above 3.0. Kudos to the rest of the KDE team!

    • But what I am rellay looking forward to... (Score:4, Interesting)

      by greppling ( 601175 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:13AM (#5173566)
      ...is 3.2, when the safari improvements will be fully merged into khtml.

      VNC is nice to have (but would I ever use it), some might like tabbed browsing, etc. etc., but that's nothing like finally having good javascript support, better and faster rendering in konqueror.

      I'll wait for 3.2 with upgrading.

      • Re:But what I am rellay looking forward to... (Score:5, Informative)

        by nitehorse ( 58425 ) <clee@c133.org> on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:18AM (#5173583)
        Well, if you know how, CVS has most of the Safari patches merged in, and the Safari guys are also integrating stuff from our branch into theirs. We're gradually moving towards a unified source tree for both projects (originally, they took a snapshot from the KDE 3.0.2 version of KHTML) but we're not quite there yet.

        (I'm using CVS HEAD and let me tell you, Konq is faster than ever. It's actually faster than Mozilla on my machine.)

        I wonder if the 'save this process' trick is in 3.1. I've been using CVS for so long that I sort of forget which features make it into release and which don't. :)

        (The 'save this process' trick is a way to have a set number of Konqueror processes stay alive after you quit the last Konqueror window. This way, the next time you click on the Konqueror icon, it re-uses the last process that was open, which is a nice little hack that makes Konq appear to launch faster when it's not actually launching at all.)
        • (The 'save this process' trick is a way to have a set number of Konqueror processes stay alive after you quit the last Konqueror window. This way, the next time you click on the Konqueror icon, it re-uses the last process that was open, which is a nice little hack that makes Konq appear to launch faster when it's not actually launching at all.)

          So.. just like Internet Explorer then? :) [duck]

          Well, it seems like a good idea, but why not just shove it into kdeinit and be done with it?

          • Actually, it is rather IE-like. :)

            However, this is slightly different from kdeinit because kdeinit preloads the libraries into RAM so that process initialization takes less time, while this actually keeps the last Konq process open and the next time a 'start Konqueror' request is interpreted, it sends a message to the sleeping process saying "HEY! Open a new window!"

            Since opening a new window takes exponentially less time than linking and loading a new Konqueror process (and since prelinking isn't quite finished yet) this makes Konqueror appear to launch much faster, but again, it's not really "launching" anymore.

            Also, it's configurable so that you can say "Ok, instead of just one, I want you to keep at most 2 [3,4,x] of these processes alive." Of course, this means that the processes stay alive and continue to eat RAM while they are, but if you don't use Konq for a while they'll get swapped out to VM. It's still faster than launching a process cold, though.
        • Speaking of Safari and a unified source tree for both projects, is there a public mailing list or newsgroup where one can monitor the progress (and the communication) between the two teams? Or is most of this happening in private mail between the developers?
          • Since I'm not Dave Hyatt or Dirk Mueller, I really don't know how much of the communication going on is private mail and how much is on the mailing lists. However, I do keep tabs on what Dave says about Safari over at his blog [mozillazine.org].

            As far as the KHTML side, I just keep watching CVS and I've lost count of how many messages I've seen marked with "merge from safari". It's amazing. Within two weeks of Apple's announcement, half of the code had already been imported back into the main tree and the Safari guys had picked up the new table rendering code on their end.

            So subscribe to kde-cvs@kde.org and check Dave's blog, or check the kde-cvs digests (dot.kde.org links to them every time they come out) since kde-cvs is extremely heavy traffic-wise. That's the best way I know of to keep up to date on this info.

  • And most importantly ... (Score:5, Informative)

    by YeeHaW_Jelte ( 451855 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @08:59AM (#5173503) Homepage
    ... the new drop down shadows for the menu's!

    And a hefty decrease in startup and rendering time for konqueror, and a limit to the gif-animations allowed per second.

    And a brand new splash screen!

    Much compliments to the KDE-team!

  • Screenshots From Site (Score:5, Informative)

    by TheRIAAMustDie ( 628852 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:01AM (#5173510)
    screenshot 1 [kde.org]

    screenshot 2 [kde.org]

    screenshot 3 [kde.org]

    screenshot 4 [kde.org]

    Don't know how the lameness filter got involved, but here's what I'm doing about it.

  • superb desktop, always top notch from the KDE team (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mark_lybarger ( 199098 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:04AM (#5173528)
    what an awesome (and of course slightly :) behind schedule) release.

    tabbed browsing is an excellent that i love to use in moz. i notice it in konqueror, but the hot keys are different. perhaps there's a way to change them, but after months and months of using ctrl+t to get a new tab, i konq uses something different. i'm curious why not use the "standards" the moz dev team included. yeah, there's probably not an rfc for hot keys on opening a new browser tab, but something i use daily is standard.

    another thing. i test drove konqueror in rc6, and pop-up windows were enabled by default. i guess this just makes the user find out how to turn them off? most people might not even know that they can turn them off. i think pop-up s/b off by default.

    all in all - a very well polished desktop. the kde team delivers quality code as usual!

    • Re:superb desktop, always top notch from the KDE t (Score:5, Informative)

      by nitehorse ( 58425 ) <clee@c133.org> on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:14AM (#5173573)
      Here's the thing (about Ctrl+T).

      See, KDE 2.0 had support for embedding a Konsole frame into the Konqueror window. As I'm sure you noticed, if you hit Ctrl+T, 3.1 still embeds a Konsole frame in the Konqueror window.

      Fact of the matter is that we had a binding for Ctrl+T first... and changing around things that our users are used to as far as keybindings go is obviously a no-no. (Believe it or not there are people who use the embedded Konsole stuff. And it is pretty nifty.)

      However, if you go to Settings->Configure Keybindings, you can alter it to change it from Ctrl+Shift+N to Ctrl+T or add Ctrl+T so you can use both. KDE has really good keybinding support, and it's very configurable.

      Hope this helps.

      • standards? (Score:3, Insightful)

        by gimpboy ( 34912 )
        would it be prudent for developers who work on applications similar in nature (eg web browsers) to get together and decide on a standard for things like this?

        integration issues such as this are a useability issue that i think will seriously effect the success of linux on the desktop.

        dont take this as a negative slice towards kde, since communication works both ways, its just a suggestion. it's also a problem which occurs in all applications: email clients, editors, etc. it would just make sense for developers to work together on this and come up with a default set of key bindings that is standard across all applications.

        apart from the constructive criticism above, the screenshots 3.1 looks very sharp. i look forward to the tabbed browsing in konqueror among other things. good job to all of you.

  • Random complaints (Score:2, Interesting)

    by dizzyPhoenix ( 122352 )
    Well, no RedHat packages, which is not surprising considering the 'treatment' that KDE was subjected to by RH.

    Also, I never managed to get the Win key mapped to anything in KDE 3.0.x. I wonder if the situation changed. As I recall, KDE wanted a 'Win' modifier and xmodmap did not have any knowledge of a modifier called 'Win'. Rather unfortunate.
    • Well, no RedHat packages, which is not surprising considering the 'treatment' that KDE was subjected to by RH.

      No, this certainly isn't surprising. Redhat has always been bad about this, indeed in getting along well with KDE in general, the notable exception being Bero, who left Redhat full of sincere frustration over the worsening of the situation. He was the guy that typically produced the Redhat packages. I know that there's a new guy who's doing their KDE packaging, but I have no idea if he / Redhat intends to release updated KDE packages.

      Also, I never managed to get the Win key mapped to anything in KDE 3.0.x. I wonder if the situation changed. As I recall, KDE wanted a 'Win' modifier and xmodmap did not have any knowledge of a modifier called 'Win'. Rather unfortunate.

      Actually this is pretty easy if your keyboard is configured properly in X. You need to have it set to using a pc104 keyboard instead of the standard pc101. After that, mapping the key in the KDE shortcuts menu works beautifully.

    • kde3.1 packages for for redhat (Score:4, Informative)

      by rdieter ( 112462 ) <rdieter@ m a t h.unl.edu> on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @10:09AM (#5173868) Homepage Journal
      Editorial comments aside, you can expect kde-3.1 packages (currently, for rh73 only) to appear soon at kde-redhat.sourceforge.net [sourceforge.net].

  • Screenshots (Score:4, Informative)

    by Guiri ( 522079 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:08AM (#5173550) Homepage
    Here [kde.org] . It's amazing... Some people are complaining that they didn't use AA fonts for the screenshots, and that's a bad PR decision. More on Osnews [osnews.com]

  • DNF? (Score:3, Funny)

    by secondsun ( 195377 ) <secondsun@gmail.com> on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:10AM (#5173557) Journal
    Does this mean Duke Nukem Forever is out? Or can I have a snowball fight with Satan?

    Really though, I have been using KDE 3.1 since beta2, watching it move through its different stages to what is is now has been a great joy. The new control panel is much more intuative, keramic is purdy, and all the little toots and whistles you will find will make it enjoyable. KDE is the main reason I don't go back to windows.
    • Heh,

      Well, I don't like Keramik, but hey, Mosfet is still hacking away at mosfet-liquid, and that looks pretty too.

      Maybe tonight I will finish building (I hope) so I can use the new goodness. Woohoo!

  • OS X looks boring compared to new open source UIs (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Has anybody else come to the same conclusion that OS X's Aqua or Jaguar are starting to feel boring and lame while open source UIs offer more innovative and fresh themes all the time and ever more often? I honestly think so. I don't see anything cool in Jaguar anymore. No pun intented.
    • Dear Mr. Troll,

      Mac OS X has a unique look while both KDE and Windows uses a very similar interface.

      The new thing with this KDE release is that it now really drags away from Windows with excellent icons and windowstyles.

      I, and many people [kde-look.org], have used this themes for a long time.

      It's really interesting to see how much the german government has spent on KDE development. Wish more government would do that.

      Ciryon

  • KDE Rules the Desktop (Score:4, Interesting)

    by HereAllNight ( 645064 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:15AM (#5173576)
    Every time I read about how "Linux is not ready for the desktop", I just laugh. It's KDE that's the real desktop star, and yes it is ready! I've been using KDE at home since KDE2 came out, and find myself using Windows at work less and less.

    When Windows XP came out, I gave it a fair shot. I didn't boot Linux/X/KDE for 3 months. Outlook was a giant pain, compared with KMail. IE was a nightmare, and I had to install Phoenix to escape unwanted programs and scripts. Easy CD Creator had me longing for X-CD-Roast. And XP crashed way too often.

    Now KDE is getting even better. The SSH stuff is exactly what I need! Life is good.

  • Is KDE trying to be Windows? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Vapor8 ( 240870 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:17AM (#5173581)
    This is another terrific release by the KDE team and I commend them on yet another release of some pretty sweet code.

    I have one concern though, that I have seen others raise in the past and which makes me wonder if we're heading in the right direction. A quick scan through the new features is almost like reading about the new features introduced in a previous version of Windows. Is KDE simply trying to be 'more like Windows', which in turn would make KDE a much more familiar 'interface' for newbies to use? If so, then that's great and I'm sure that it will help increase its use amongst the masses.

    What bothers me is that I'm beginning to see less and less 'innovation' and more and more 'feature copying'. Now, I understand that it's difficult to add a killer new feature without first having a base that an average user would expect to have, but when will we be able to reach the point where we can begin to 'differentiate' KDE from Windows in a unique way in order to furthur 'entice' potential users who simply see KDE as a 'Windows wanna-be'?

    I for one love KDE and have used it as my primary desktop environment for at least a couple years now, and I always look forward to updates such as this one. They're always full of neat goodies. But I always get that feeling in the back of my mind that maybe we should try to 'think out of the box' a little more...
    • A quick scan through the new features is almost like reading about the new features introduced in a previous version of Windows. Is KDE simply trying to be 'more like Windows', which in turn would make KDE a much more familiar 'interface' for newbies to use? If so, then that's great and I'm sure that it will help increase its use amongst the masses.

      I think partly that's due to the style in which the new features guide was written. It sounded very much like promotional material to me.

      KDE is pretty close to Windows (except better) yeah, there are other desktops if you'd rather avoid that. The default GNOME2 desktop is less like Windows for instance. Bear in mind for all its faults the Windows UI isn't actually a bad one, so it makes sense for KDE to use this as the basis for their work. I think from reading the lists though it's often a case of "How shall we do this? We could do it this way, that way or this other way? Which is best?" and it turns out the best is the way windows does it too.

    • Re:Is KDE trying to be Windows? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by rutger21 ( 132630 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:41AM (#5173694)
      The developers of KDE have been discussing [kde.org] the subject of UI enhancements lately. This discussion was caused by the jumpstart of a project (slicker) [sf.net]) which tries to radically change the UI, which so many people are used to.

      In time, I guess you will see less and less feature copying and more and more innovation. And if something innovative is good enough for mainstream, will it be accepted?

    • Re:Is KDE trying to be Windows? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by sultanoslack ( 320583 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:55AM (#5173779)
      First a few things to consider: most of us KDE developer folks don't use Windows -- at all. I used Windows XP for the very first time when I was home for Christmas.

      Second, Windows has some very useful and well thought out features. I prefer to substitue copy with learned from. Windows has certainly borrowed many things from Unix land; we shouldn't be too arragant to learn from the things that they've done right.

      The last, is a resounding, yes, we do aim to innovate and produce and authentic Unix desktop with all that is entailed by that. I think one of the most innovative examples of this is something like the KDE IO Slaves, which extend the Unix metaphor of everything is a file to exverything is a URL. Being able to use your file browser to copy things directly from an audio cd to a remove machine via scp -- all transparently -- is *really* cool, and I think very Unix like. Or how about regular expression support in many find type of places, or rather nice console, IRC, GPG apps; the list goes on.

      For all of the talk about KDE being Windows like -- remember that it's developed by old-school Linux/Unix guys. We're all very comfortable at the CLI; the debate between XEmacs and Vim is a vigorous here as anywhere. KDE is and will remain an Open Source *nix desktop; ideally making such an environment so usable as to bring this environment we know and love to folks that traditionally wouldn't be able to use it.

    • Re:Is KDE trying to be Windows? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by infiniti99 ( 219973 ) <justin@affinix.com> on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @10:01AM (#5173817) Homepage
      I say, "catch up before moving ahead." Users expect X to be in a good desktop, and KDE would be best implementing X before moving onto Y and Z. In some ways, KDE is up to Windows XP (video previews in the file manager), but in others it is not even at Windows 95 yet (easy folder sharing). Of course, sometimes it is beyond everything (kio_fish).

      As far as copying goes, KDE (and most open source software) make no qualms about copying. They just take what they feel is best in all cases. Often, Windows does things a nice way so they copy. You don't reach the top by avoiding good ideas.

      However, I do sometimes feel the way you do, in that there is not enough innovation (but I can justify it, by saying KDE is still in the "catch up" phase). Even so, what kinds of things would you prefer added to KDE? What kinds of innovations do you speak of?

      • In some ways, KDE is up to Windows XP (video previews in the file manager), but in others it is not even at Windows 95 yet (easy folder sharing).

        "Rightclick, select Share" isn't easy enough for you ?!!

    • Re:Is KDE trying to be Windows? (Score:5, Informative)

      by JimDabell ( 42870 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @10:26AM (#5174004) Homepage
      A quick scan through the new features is almost like reading about the new features introduced in a previous version of Windows.

      I don't see that at all.

      • Internet Explorer doesn't have a download manager.
      • Windows doesn't have anything even close to quanta.
      • Windows doesn't come with a large selection of games or educational tools.
      • Windows doesn't come with an advanced editor like kate.
      • Internet Explorer doesn't have tabbed browsing.
      • Explorer doesn't transparently browse remote filesystems over ssh.
      • Explorer doesn't let you edit meta-data in things like jpeg files.
      • Windows still doesn't have support for multiple desktops
      • Windows still doesn't have a taskbar as functional as KDE's
      • Windows still doesn't have decent scripting of gui applications.

      It seems to me that I use virtually all of these features on a regular basis. Yes, some of them have been done before. Yes, a lot of the features are available via third party software in Windows. But this doesn't mean that KDE is copying Windows. It means that people using KDE and people using Windows need a lot of the same features.

      There have been a number of interoperability improvements, for instance palm and exchange compatibility, but this isn't the same as copying windows. It simply means that KDE is trying to be as compatible with your other systems as possible.

      There is a feature guide [kde.org] that details a lot of this.

    • Although I see nothing wrong with copying good ideas from Windows, I do wish KDE would differentiate itself a little bit by copying some abandoned ideas from older Unix Window Managers.

      I have worked with this a great deal and I believe the changes are simple and user-friendly, and would very much like to see a main-stream desktop make these changes:

      1. STOP RAISING WINDOWS ON CLICK! The only way a window should be raised is if the user clicks (not drags) on the TITLEBAR! This is absoultely 100% necessary for overlapping windows to be useful. Without it we are going to keep making stupid tiled and MDI interfaces (which if they really were a good idea they would not have been abandoned with Andrew and Windows 3.0) And anybody who thinks this is wrong should think again: a program can raise *itself* and thus it can easily do this on any mouse click and thus emulate exactly the current behavior. All I want is the ability for a program to decide if the click should cause a raise.

      2. STOP RAISING "PARENT" WINDOWS when a "child" window is raised. This also makes overlapping windows impossible to use. This one is worse in that no possible arrangment of options for the KWM makes it work correctly. Because of this it is impossible to make a program with child windows and two overlapping main windows, again forcing kludges like tiled windows.

      3. If point-to-type is on and you feel compelled to change what window has focus, warp the pointer to the nearest edge, so that the system is always consistent. This mostly has to do with new windows popping up, it does seem useful to have them get the focus, but the current KDE behavior causes me to always type to the wrong window. It appears the mouse cursor is a much stronger indication of where focus is going than the titlebar highlight so when it is wrong errors happen.

      I've asked for this sort of stuff about 100 times but there is never any response. I think small changes like this would go a long way to making KDE *better* than Windows. It would allow very useful GUI's that could not be emulated on Windows (because it has the #1 and #2 bugs above).

    • As a long time KDE user, I have to say it really isn't. KDE seems much more Mac (classic Mac, not OS X) to me than anything else. The KDE-bundled applications are very non-Windows like. They tend to be simple and streamlined, rather than bloated and complex. KWord, for example, is very elegant, like WordPerfect, rather than like MS Word.

  • Longtime GNOMEr Ready to Try (Score:5, Interesting)

    by philovivero ( 321158 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:19AM (#5173591) Homepage Journal
    I've been a long-time GNOME user, and I'm just about ready to try something else.

    I recently made some new themes for my GNOME2 desktop [homeip.net] and was stymied by my GTK1 applications that... well... just wouldn't cooperate.

    I'd previously made some GTK1 themes that more-or-less matched the GTK2 ones, but I cannot figure out how to convince GTK1 apps to use certain themes under my GNOME2 desktop environment. It's completely opaque.

    There are so many apps I use that are still GTK1 (Galeon, Evolution, GAIM, etc etc etc) that my desktop is just plain ugly right now.

    I'm getting fed up, and am trying to find something that will give me a nice even look & feel across applications. My main fear is that KMail and Konquerer won't be good Evolution/Galeon replacements.

    In the end, I'll probably go OS/X, but I really hope it doesn't happen.

    • Re:Longtime GNOMEr Ready to Try (Score:5, Interesting)

      by nitehorse ( 58425 ) <clee@c133.org> on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:30AM (#5173637)
      KMail is not a replacement for Evolution proper.

      Kontact [kontact.org] will be, but Kontact won't be released until 3.2 (at the earliest.) KMail is, on the other hand, a damned good email client, but it's not a full PIM suite.

      Konqueror is really starting to come into its own now, and 3.1 even includes a slew of bugfixes from the Safari team for the HTML renderer. It's getting faster, and it's only going to get better. The Apple guys have brought KHTML up to speed and they keep on making improvements. In 3.2, I'm quite sure that Konqueror will be an even better browser than Mozilla (let alone Galeon) for anyone interested in Linux web browsing.

      But you have to take my opinion with a grain of salt; I'm a KDE developer. :)
      • Wow. You sure have posted a lot in this thread, and they all seem to be modded way up. You come across as knowledgeable, polite, friendly, and sincere. All the qualities one could ever want in a geek. So, um...are you up for adoption [slashdot.org]?
      • So when can we expect IMAP filtering in Kmail? :) [that's the only thing I really could use on a daily basis]. Overall I have to admit, great work folks. In fact, Kmail in kde 3.1 fixed some problems with IMAP that I had in 3.0.x [such as topics of e-mail messages still showing up in my main Inbox, after moving them to another imap folder].
    • You include both themes in the same tarball, so that in the directory "MyTheme", you should have the directories "gtk" and "gtk-2.0".

      The latest versions of the gnome theme-selector is supposed to change both gtk and gtk-2.0 themes based on this. If it does not, then it is a bug, and should be filed at http://bugzilla.gnome.org.

      I know it works like this in Red Hat 8.0. Now, Red Hat did patch some things in 8.0 that was not in GNOME 2.0.x, but if so, then it should most definitely be in GNOME 2.2 scheduled to be out next week.

    • Re:Longtime GNOMEr Ready to Try (Score:5, Informative)

      by ultrabot ( 200914 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @10:04AM (#5173831)
      My main fear is that KMail and Konquerer won't be good Evolution/Galeon replacements.

      Why do you have to replace Evolution/Galeon? They work normally in KDE. There is nothing that forces you to choose KDE version of each and every application.

  • Building on gentoo as we speak... (Score:5, Funny)

    by CoolVibe ( 11466 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:24AM (#5173608) Journal
    And I just finished building 3.1rc6 yesterday. Grmbl...

    Also, a pretty release guide is available here [kde.org] Can't wait to try the new S/MIME support in Kmail. I'm so stoked!

    • Re:Building on gentoo as we speak... (Score:5, Funny)

      by TheTomcat ( 53158 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @10:06AM (#5173840) Homepage
      Building on gentoo as we speak...

      Post back on Thursday (when it's finished); I want to see how it went.

      </sarcasm>
      (-;

      S
    • Don't get tooo excited by the mime support.
      It isn't supported by default - you need to use Aegypton(wrong spelling - close enough).
      It doesn't integrate particulary well, and for me was a pita :) Also, for me and few others, the kde interface doesn't work, so you end up having to use the gtk message box to enter the password.. Plus the cancel button doesn't work, the error handling is bad, and sometimes both kde and aegypton want your password.
      Oh, and I keep getting bad signatures on mailing lists. Other people do as well - I'm not sure why - I think it is to do with the =20 being done incorrectly, or the language encoding or something.

      But otherwise it is really cool - I can't wait till it is polished. I grumble a lot, but I love it really :)

  • Is KDE everything? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by cerenyx ( 250774 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:24AM (#5173610) Journal
    A quick scan through most of the comments on this page reflect the sentiment that KDE represents one of the pinnacles for why any windows user would want to switch to linux, and why linux "is ready".

    My two cents on this matter is that what I feel should be Linux's selling point, what should be the reason why people start using Linux, is not so much a single desktop GUI, a smattering of 'features' that windows lacks, or anything. It should be the notion that Linux is an aggregate whole of multiple works, and that under Linux there is always more than one answer to something.

    *sniff*
    Now wasn't that sentimental and goo-gahish.

    Congrats to the Kdevelopers for Kde 3.1

    • My two euro-cents on the matter say that the fact that there is always more than one answer to everything is actually a barrier to more widespread acceptance of Linux. I'm with RH8 on this one :-)

    • Re:Is KDE everything? (Score:3, Informative)

      by rseuhs ( 322520 )
      Well, KDE really stands out. KDE has gone from nothing in 1997 to KDE1, then a complete rewrite for KDE2 and now the refined, optimized and beautified KDE3.1 with a whole bunch of applications.

      No other project has accomplished so much in such a short time span. Most server-centric products are mostly finished, the big developments happen on the desktop in the Linux-world. And that's KDE.

  • Thanks KDE team (Score:5, Interesting)

    by trtmrt ( 638828 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:42AM (#5173701)
    The speedup in 3.1 is very noticeable. It looks great but also everything is much more responsive then before.
    I don't quite understand the complaints people have about KDE looking like windoze. Yes, it has windows :) but it feels so much different (i.e. better). The only issue I had before was that KDE was always slower compared to windoze running on the same machine but that difference seems to be almost completely gone.

  • Truly Special (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rookkey ( 74788 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:43AM (#5173707)

    Once again, I am absolutely amazed at what this little thing called Open Source can do.

    Just six years ago [google.com], an ambitious proposal was made to the world by a German university student named Matthias Ettrich. The goal of the project was to create a user-friendly, open source desktop environment similar to CDE, the Common Desktop Environment. CDE, at the time, was popular on Solaris and many proprietary Unix platforms. However, CDE's code base was closed and the Linux community was searching for a suitable replacement. Enough support built up that dozens of developers came together to create an entire desktop environment out of nothing. Over 20 months later, KDE 1.0 was released to the public. And there was much rejoicing.

    Taking on Sun was an ambitious enough goal. But who would have imagined that Microsoft (Word document) [microsoft.com] (Google cache) [216.239.53.100] would ever specifically name KDE as a viable competitor to Windows?

    Microsoft may even start to get a little hotter under the collar if recent events are to show anything: Wal-Mart's on-line shopping site quickly ran out of their PC's built with a Linux distribution [lindowsos.info] using KDE for its interface; most of the government computers in Largo, FL [slashdot.org] run KDE; and Apple implements a new Web browser [apple.com] based on KDE's KHTML [kde.org] library.

    And if there is nothing else that the release of KDE 3.1 proves, it is that the naysayers are wrong again. All too often, there are those who try to suggest that there is some sort of heated conflict between the GNOME and KDE projects. Nothing could be further from reality. For example, on the Xdg mailing list [redhat.com] prominent developers from both the GNOME and KDE projects work together in forming a consistent .desktop file standard. The people that actually make GNOME and KDE have nothing but the highest respect for one another's projects. There is none of the hostility that so many trolls would like others to believe.

    It has just been wonderful seeing this release happen. I have been watching the KDE developer's mailing lists since July and I find it fascinating how the whole thing has come together. The graphics designers, the documentation writers, the translators, the event organizers, and, of course, the coders. All of these groups have been equally important in making KDE the enormous success it has become.

    So, I just want to say thank you to everyone who made it happen. I just have to wonder what the next six years will bring!

  • Where to Go; What You Need (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:46AM (#5173723)

    Do not worry about finding a list of mirrors. download.kde.org will automatically forward you to an open mirror.

    For a direct link to the packages, here are:

    Note that you need a version of Qt >= 3.1.0. There are additional requirements [kde.org]for 3.1 you may want to know.

  • Do they have an installer yet? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by bwalling ( 195998 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:47AM (#5173731) Homepage
    One thing I have never figured out with KDE is the lack of an installer. I like the installer from Ximian for Gnome. It is simple, and it handles dependencies (moderately well).

    With KDE, I have to download a ton of files, and then figure out the aRTS dependencies and whatnot. I also have to figure out how to make Linux use KDE instead of Gnome. I can do it and get it installed, but why not have an installer?

  • Inevitable 3.11 joke (Score:5, Funny)

    by arvindn ( 542080 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @09:47AM (#5173734) Homepage Journal
    Kroupware is planned [kde.org] for the 3.2 release.

    Pity it couldn't make it earlier. Otherwise we could have had KDE 3.1.1 for workkroups ;^)

    • Keep in mind, the whole "Kroupware" name was and is only a working title; I'm fairly sure that they're going to release the whole package as Kontact [kontact.org] but I could be wrong.

      (It appears there was a KDE-PIM hackfest [kde.org] recently in Germany where all of the guys hacking on KMail and friends sat down and discussed where they were going and what was going on, and came up with a unified approach to solve the lack of an Evolution/Outlook killer.)
  • Well, not from VNC in particular, but at least in the rc6, the other person really needs to have KDE to use it. *OR* they need to know how to set up VNC on their end and configure it properly. What would have been much nicer is to have the Java applet built in on the KDE side, such that it'd let someone connect on a port (80? 8080? whatever) to get the Java viewer applet, then use that applet VNC viewer to connect to your desktop. Right now it's still very limited in its usefulness to techies. Being able to *easily* demonstrate to a non KDE user how useful the sharing is would have been nicer than simply saying 'it's really cool'.

  • The end of GNOME. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @10:10AM (#5173875)
    I was a long time GNOME follower. Knowing GNOME 1.x and 2.x of it's best but I must admit that KDE 3.1 is the best Desktop Environment that I've seen so far.

    - It's fast,
    - Clean,
    - Consistent,
    - Really integrated,
    - Usable,
    - Beats Windows in certain situations on length.

    I belive that with the 3.1 release of KDE that there is no real future for GNOME and I sometimes wonder why they still work on it and put so much effort into that project. GNOME will never comes out of the 'development' phase. Once an application looks halfway usable (still in development phase) it then starts to get changed once again which then makes it unusable for the next couple of months again.

    There are a lot of nasty issues in GNOME even now in the stabilized gnome-2-2 branch which will get released in 2 days.

    - Log in as user under console (not gdm) and then enter startx to load up X and GNOME then try to immediately log out. Nothing happens for the next 3-5 minutes. Then one time the logout dialog pleases itself to show up and let you log out (even this doesn't work seriously often). This problem has been announced on bugzilla.gnome.org and hasn't been fixed till yet.
    - Gnome-Terminal install the bluecurve theme and fullsize it. The theme disappears.
    - Bonobo and Glade toolbars are looking differently get a look here [gnome.org].
    - Documentation for programmers. There are still no sign for usable GNOME 2 documentations, how should a programmer get into GNOME 2.x development when he knows shit about howto use the functions and what purpose they have. There is the API reference manuals for all libraries (still unfinished and incomplete), there are old documentations for GTK1 and GNOME1 and there is the GTK 2 tutorial which only describes the first 20% of the Toolkit but nothing more. No documentation explaining Gnome-VFS, Bonobo and other complex things. You've been told to 'use the source Luke' all the time but it's hard spending 3 months into buggy code of others to get a clue how things are made and then adapt maybe buggy code to your own project because you don't know it better howto use these things.
    - Still nothing as simple as a Fileselector yet,
    - Still no snap to grid feature.
    - GNOME is mostly a hacking around when I have the mood to it or when I feel that I need to tweak this and that. There is no real roadmap or featureplan such as in KDE even months ago I was able to read and KNOW what will be in KDE 3.1 and even now I know what will be in 3.2

    GNOME are hyping and making shitty things such as 'open recent' features look like its a revolutionary progress in the desktop while on the other hand its a little gift from KDE.

    Sorry to come over with the same shit all the time but people tend to compare KDE and GNOME all the time so do I. I really like KDE and I also like GNOME very much (used to be a GNOME follower) but all this is soo sad. Now seeing KDE 3.1 and compareing it with 3.0 then I ask myself wow. What's wrong with GNOME ? 2.0 and 2.2 is no big step if you compare it with the changes made in KDE.

    Well this can endlessly be expanded. I appreciate and welcome the work of the GNOME developers they are definately trying to do a good job but imo it's not enough for the public. And it makes me sick reading all the shit from GNOME zealots replying to KDE people how much mature GNOME is (which it definately is not). Fancy themes and icons doesn't make a good desktop environment.
    • "And it makes me sick reading all the shit from GNOME zealots replying to KDE people how much mature GNOME is (which it definately is not)."

      HUH????? When was the last time you read Slashdot? 1998? The pro-KDE anti-GNOME trolls overwhelmed Slashdot like... 3 years ago. About one year ago, they seem to have reduced exponentially.

      And now YOU suddenly jumps in, claiming that there are lots of GNOME zealots posting shit, while it's more than obvious that they are almost extinct now? Get a life!
      THERE IS NO GNOME VS KDE WAR!!!!!!!

  • Windows user:(( (Score:2, Interesting)

    by krishy ( 461184 )
    Good for you lucky people with Linux boxes!. Here I am stuck up with Windows.
    Hey is someone porting it to Cygwin;)?.
    Is there a KHTML port being planned?.

    Yes, am stuck in windows!

  • Brought to you by the letter K (Score:5, Funny)

    by stuntpope ( 19736 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @10:16AM (#5173936)
    You know this K-naming thing has really gotten to the KDE folks when you read about the new game Atlantik: "Inspired by the famous boardwalk in Atlantik City, New Jersey...".

  • KDE VNC (Score:4, Interesting)

    by gimpimp ( 218741 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @11:06AM (#5174291) Homepage
    The vnc desktop sharing idea is a pretty cool one (using it for support is an XP idea, i believe), and is something Gnome could do with. I think it'd be a good project for Red Hat to get involved with. So, if you purchase a high level of support from them, and you *really* can't solve a problem you're getting, you can call tech support and they could remotely do it for you in front of your eyes. Theres money to be made there I think.

    As for KDE, well it's got a load of new features etc....but it's....still....ugly. Sorry.

  • The best part is... (Score:5, Informative)

    by MrEd ( 60684 ) <<tonedog> <at> <hailmail.net>> on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @11:15AM (#5174373)
    KDE 3.1 was released late last night, ~7:30PST. The Slashdot editors waited overnight for the mirrors to pick up the new release before posting the announcement!


    What a nice thing to do. Konsider it for your new kpolicy!

  • Basic desktop functionality (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ChrisWong ( 17493 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @01:08PM (#5175297) Homepage
    Will we ever see a complete desktop environment? I think of a typical PC GUI desktop as one with folders, each one unique. I want each folder to reopen with its own original size, position, view setting and visual fluff. This was what I took for granted on OS/2's WPS. But on KDE, directories that I create on the desktop or elsewhere all open up in Konqueror in the same standard file management window. Sometimes I want a folder with links to apps or music or pictures or video: a single default view profile will not do. To me, files are better displayed in a list, JPGs as preview icons, etc. Sometimes, the full-featured window with sidebar and command line is great. Other times, I just want a simple window of icons. But there is no way to specify this for each directory.

    I'm not sure if I am expressing myself clearly. I just want to express my wonder that for all the eye candy and features built into KDE, its basic file and desktop browsing seems so inflexible. It still seems so far from the original 1984 Mac in some ways.

    • Re:Basic desktop functionality (Score:4, Informative)

      by fault0 ( 514452 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2003 @01:57PM (#5175652) Homepage Journal
      > But there is no way to specify this for each directory.

      In KDE 3.1, settings menu->view properties saved in directory..

      Anything changed with the view menu will be saved with the directory (such as icon mode, icon size, sorting, background image, background color, file previews, whether hidden files are shown, whether directory icons reflect contents)

      This has been available in KDE for a very long time, and in windows as well (since ~98SE or so).

      The only thing that can't be done through this is showing the sidebar (I think!), and saving window size.. but both of these can be done with KDE's excellent scripting facility, dcop.

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