[Computerbank] Re: [cai-sa] Teen Challenge -Network

Wed Apr 2 11:29:09 UTC 2003

On Mon, 31 Mar 2003 16:59:21 +1000
Daniel Stone <dstone at kde.org> scribed:

> De-workifying myself now ...
> 
> On Mon, Mar 31, 2003 at 11:38:45AM +0930, Peter Gossner scrawled:
> > That fantastic ... um why not ...?  Or have I heard all this
> > before..
> 
> Because it's not easy to use; I, as someone who's been using computers
> for 9 years, and worked on a desktop environment, struggled to
> configure GNOME to do what I want.

After 9 years ...  Well some of us are quicker than others...
Sorry seriously .... we should end this now I am not going to waste my
time on it ..
I take back everything I said KDE is the best desktop since Apple XXX 
.. 
It will not eat anybodies Children or pets and is good for mind body and
soul.
If George Bush used KDE there would be no war in the Middle East..

> 
> > In my opinion both are valid choices though I come down on the side
> > of Gnome2 ..
> 
> Yet you go on to tell us all how KDE is the devilspawn, and will eat
> our children.
Actually I said it was my opinion .. and a bent one at that.
Well not my children .. but if you got that impression.. fair enough.
I was a touch verbose.. The leading disclaimer should have been in blue
with blinkies or something.
> 
> > This is totally my own and probably bent opinion but KDE not only
> > sucks it's positively evil, just a free version of windows.

That WAS an overstatement it way better than Windows but then so is
TWM... 
> 
> Haw. You haven't backed your argument at all, just made a childish
> assertion without any proof. It's also not a "free version of windows"
> in any way. We co-ordinate extensively with GNOME and other
> capital-F-Free desktop projects, all our file formats are open, as is
> all of our source code - nothing is proprietary (more than I can say
> for, oh, Ximian).
> 
Yep Ximian sucks to I don't go near it.
Evolution is only on this machine because I have to have something like
it
..
> If you would care to back your assertions up, then maybe I might
> bother continuing this debate further, but at this childish,
> ad-hominem-like rate, it's not.
Wasn't much of a debate  just me venting steam.

> 
> > If you like that sort of thing well great go for it .. thats your
> > problem. 
> > To indoctrinate clean minds with that idiom should be , and in my
> > opinion, is a crime against choice, intelligence and diversity. I
> > like to use my computer not see how much RAM I can afford / fit in 
> > my ageing mother board.

The stuff about RAM / resources is true for both ...

> 
> See below - it's usable with a couple of minor tweaks. I agree that
> its out of the box configuration isn't the best, by a long shot. It
> doesn't make it "evil" and "suck[y]".

Desktop environments are evil not just KDE.  
Forgive my overstatement  and childish demeanour it just small and
inferior mind struggling before a morning coffee.

> 
> As I say below, too, I believe in *educating* people about
> desktop/application *fundamentals*, not just teaching them how one
> particular product works. That's never the answer, ever.

Absolutely agree with you .. 

> 
> > NOTE : I think they both suck .
> > 
> > Gnome 2 sucks somewhat less . 
> > It uses XML for most things has multiple paths for development  etc
> > etc... i18N.
> 
> KDE uses XML where appropriate, and plain text when not (KOffice
> documents are XML). KDE had i18n a couple of years before GNOME, too.
> 
Yep it did .. 
> > At least it leaves your system alone, runs faster and gives you real
> > choices. 
> 
I should have said KDM / browser etc... 
(and how many processes does it take at start up ... then I probably
never bothered to configure it properly.)

> How does KDE intefere with your system? I've done side-by-side testing
> of KDE and GNOME on a few boxes, and they come out equal if you bother
> to tweak anything at all. I was using KDE on a P100 with 32MB of RAM
> for quite some time, and it was perfectly usable.
> 
Well would a newbie tweak anything ? 
All I can say is that by the time KDE starts I can usually have a coffee
made..
(333 96Meg RAM)
Why not ship it so that it detects RAM  size  and disables the greedy
whizzbang stuff when it's below some cut off point.

> > It also has a future. If you learn Gnome you can learn any desktop.
> > .. Still RAM is cheap processor speeds are high, support bad code I
> > don't care, just make sure they learn to fish beyond going to the
> > Mall. To totally bend a metaphore)

KDE has a bright future in all the places where / applications that
Windows has.
Gnome2 looks like it's heading for the professional desktop (networked
environments etc)..
They both do both.
 They are both guilty of sucking RAM  and poor coding (in the sense that
they get fatter and slower for the same end-user task)
They have both made attempts at fixing this.
Gnome2 is faster than the old version KDE3 does not seem to be faster
than KDE2.

I am sorry but Gnome does run apps perceptibly  much faster on every box
I have tried both on, this becomes very noticeable on low RAM boxen. 
Now I may have missed some twigs and configure tricks and I tend to run
Gnome from the Window Manager and not the other way around so _my
fault_.  I was once a KDE user (pre Gnome in the non-free QT days) 
They were both absolutely nasty beasts in those days and have both
improved remarkably. 
We are lucky to have the choice. 

> 
> I agree that teaching them Windows methodologies is bad, and that
> *educating* them with desktops, is a good thing. My current setup
> looks and feels *nothing* like Windows, especially with I play with
> slicKer. If you'd spent more than 30 seconds in the KDE Control
> Centre, you'd realise that it's actually *far* more customisable than
> GNOME, and the whole Windows thing is yet another myth propagated by
> the same KDE-bashing crowd who believe it's evil because Qt was, at
> some point, not GPLed (ironically, Ximian now claim KDE sucks
> *because* it's GPLed, so you can't do propreitary apps on it, and have
> paid off show organizers to prevent KDE people from speaking in
> previously arranged timeslots, and get more GNOME people in. Oh well).

Hmm KDE as victim it must be good .. All us bashers 
a:/ just misunderstand it 
b:/ Are self evident idiots
C:/ Members of a corporate conspiracy
d:/ Enjoy wasting our lives with inferior software
e:/ All of the above
> 
Have we wasted enough time yet ?

Your first line is something we can both agree on (at least) ... 
Um you bought up the GPL stuff so ... Yep, It is ironic.
I play with my desktop a fair bit and I don't use either of them. 
When I feel like using a desktop environment I use Gnome2. 
I usually last about 20 minutes and I chuck it. 
My point is when do I NEED to run a Desktop environment............. ?
As other people use this box I run GDM ..
(ditto KDE but it lasts even less time as I get bored waiting for stuff
to open).

The main reason I have grown to hate them both is that I have spent too
much time building boxes from junk to something like a reasonable state
and then have to watch as a perfectly usable machine gets crippled by
greedy software who's primary function is was meant to be making the
user experience more  productive / pleasant / fun ... It's a shame to
see a great OS and a good box ruined like that. On modern gear NO
problem (beyond the idiom itself) It should be up to the end user. It's
all about choice.

QT is a well thought out widget set, perhaps because it was designed to
be Windows like in the first place is the reason they seem to have held
that reputation. The few working professional coders I know (who have to
write for Windows) like it. 

Now as we give poor unsuspecting recipients comparatively low end boxes 
I believe we should be installing software that makes their experience
pleasant / easy.  That means it should be responsive.

> > Gee one day with DSL and I get all grumpy :)
> 
> It's showing.
LOL ... No I'm always that rude .
Hopefully your bored enough by now to let this die, we will not change
each others minds, I am under no obligation to meet any criteria other
than my own real life experience. I do have an obligation to not waste
this lists bandwidth on this sort of rubbish though 
and I apologise for doing so...

Happy to take it off list, the car-park, whatever.
Sigh .. I will dig up some hardrive space and reinstall the thing ...
Maybe I can run some tests (that you devise) and send you the results...
Happy Hacking :)
Pete.

Congenital Idiot (obviously)..
> 
> -- 
> Daniel Stone 	     <daniel at raging.dropbear.id.au>            
> <dstone at kde.org> Developer - http://kopete.kde.org, http://www.kde.org
> 

-- 
<gossner at arcom.com.au>
<http://arcom.com.au/~gossner/>
<http://bigbutton.com.au/~hazzaday>