KDE Rebrands, Introduces KDE Plasma Desktop 364
Jiilik Oiolosse writes "The KDE community has killed the term K Desktop Environment (previously the Kool Desktop Environment). 'KDE' had previously ambiguously referred to both the community, and the complete set of programs and tools produced by the KDE community which together formed a desktop user interface. This set of tools, including the window manager, panels and configuration utilities, which KDE terms a 'workspace,' will now be shipped under the term 'KDE Plasma Desktop.' This allows KDE to ship a separate workspace called 'Plasma Netbook,' and independently market the various KDE applications as usable in any workspace, whether it be the Plasma Desktop, Windows, or XFCE."
Re:Clarity? (Score:5, Interesting)
I have no idea why "a low end non power user" would know or care what their display resolution is.
"Is there a way I can make my screen bigger?"
"The power went out, and when I turned my computer on, everything was really big and now I have to scroll to see anything."
...
I don't know what end users you know, but the ones I know definitely care :)
I've never seen xorg.conf get corrupted the way the windows registry can. And that's probably partly because the xorg.conf is not open in read/write mode, nor with pending changes currently cached by some part of the system (fs cache, hd cache, etc.). Because it's read-only, owned by root (which you're usually not logged in as), and, heck, not even opened after X loads up, it's highly unlikely to be damaged by a power failure. Meanwhile, Windows keeps that information in the registry, which is probably opened in read/write mode at all times, with far too much access given to normal applications that may damage this particular part of the registry, and with pending writes that may be interrupted by the power failure, resulting in a partially corrupted registry. So you need to know how to do that on Windows.
That said, I'd simply point them to krandr (I'm assuming kde here, though I suspect there's a gnome equivalent) and let them play with it. It sits nicely in the system tray, too. Dynamic changes to the resolution? Just as easy as on Windows. Like anything else, though, only once you know where to look. (krandr will remember its setting and go back to it during log-in, so it's still permanent even though you don't have write access to the xorg.conf file. Just like things should be.)
Re:Clarity? (Score:2, Interesting)
Almost every sentence I've read which starts that way ends differently. This leads me to believe that customization is, in fact, important.
Re:Clarity? (Score:3, Interesting)
then you, by definition, is not one that will need support.
those are the people that use that mainstream linux distros. and there are not that many mainstream distros, nor they are that different from each other.
Re:Let me guess (Score:3, Interesting)
It's actually kind of funny how many countless tons of shit I had to go through with Windows computers to get the sound working.
Your statement may have been true a few years ago, but not anymore. Ever since the driver certifications I had sound cards not working in XP SP2 and above anymore. I actually had to run Linux to get my soundcard to work again.
Linux keeps evolving. Anti-Linux trolls will always be around. The same goes for people who are uninformed.
I am glad that I have a post-Windows 7 and Mac OS X 10.6 user interface, more stability, higher quality, easyer and more powerfull software and an OS that let's me compile a piece of software with a single command, instead of having to learn that piece of shit called Visual Studio.
All of you out there, go ahead. Use what ever you want. But please don't bash an OS that is light-years ahead of Windows, and miles ahead of Mac OS.
KDE plasma netbook? Netbook is copyrighted (Score:3, Interesting)
Great move - now you guys are going to have the Copyright Police after you!
The term "Netbook" is copyrighted by Psion Teklogix,... just ask them, they'll tell you! ;-)
Why would you choose a term that is already means a piece of hardware, and is copyrighted already to boot??
The sweet stink of rebranding! (Score:5, Interesting)
Witness:
How did you feel while the respective companies were doing this? Is there anyone in the room that remembers reading the headline, "Palm splits into PalmSource and PalmOne," and thought, "Man, that's some sexy marketing right there. I need to get me a Treo but quick." No. We saw it and thought, "the shark has been jumped, the drain is being circled." Yes, you did.
While I'm on a roll, for shits and giggles, let's look at the bastard sibling of rebranding, "editions."
The moral of the story, kids, is that rebranding is for the desperate, and editions are for suckers.
Peace out.
Re:Clarity? (Score:5, Interesting)
I've never seen xorg.conf get corrupted the way the windows registry can
The windows registry is not your ordinary file structure. It was, I believe, an outgrowth of the old Digital RSX-11M,RSTS/E virtual table construct (yes, I am that old). The original purpose of that file architecture was to make an indexible in-memory structure map to locations on disk when memory was very expensive, and available addressability even more so. It sort of made sense when the language of choice was 16-bit Basic Plus. It gave the ability to manage large-ish tables using only array addressing in a highly constrained environment, via a movable address window. Sort of like proto-virtual memory coupled with a tree index structure.
However as ol' Ben Franklin said, two removes equal one fire, and when the format adapted from RSTS/E -> VMS -> NT the format suffered a wee bit from bit decay.
Considering how cheap and powerful hardware is today, it makes eminent sense to simply read the file in and parse it as you please, so xorg.conf makes a lot more sense now. It's simpler, and that appeals to me.
In all, the file format used by the Registry was just a clever piece of code once to make more out of less. A noble venture, venerable, and rather obsolete.
Re:Clarity? (Score:4, Interesting)
Linux will not gain mainstream acceptance until it is easy to support.
Actually that's not true, Linux is already much easier to support than Windows, but I'm others here will jump at the chance to explain that to you so I won't get into it.
The biggest barrier to mainstream Linux adoption is Corporate email, messaging, and calendars. I've worked for several Linux focused companies the last ten years, one of them even had 'Linux' in it's name, but all of those companies still used Exchange for company communications. What I've realized is that IT departments are not choosing Exchange for _any_ technical or security reasons, they are making this choice because to choose anything else means they have to own that choice. With any other solution they actually have know pretty much everything there is to know about the package(s) they're implementing.
In most companies (that I've been exposed to of course) most of the IT staff are Windows only, maybe a few Ubuntu 'installers' sprinkled around. These people know where all the wizards are and which boxes need checkmarks but that's pretty much it. When there's a Linux based alternative to Exchange that this class of people can choose without feeling any risk, THEN you will a massive expansion of Linux on the desktop.
PS:I mean no slight to the intelligence of the IT staff -the OS they are using is essentially closed to them so they are merely not in the habit of digging deep, or radically altering the behavior of the OS or application stack. Also, job security is a really really powerful motivator when you have a family to care for, I can't fault anyone for making the safe choices.