- Site menu:
- Latest Discussions
- Latest Newswire
- Archives
- Submit Story
- Story HOWTO
- Syndicate
- E-mail Alerts
KDE SC 4.8 – Is KDE In A Permanent Feature Freeze?
So what is going on? To be honest, I don’t know. I don’t follow the KDE development community as closely as I used to (which may be an indication that KDE is just not generating any excitement in its user base any more). However as a KDE user, I worry. I worry that KDE is no longer moving forward. I worry that somehow its developers have lost their passion, their drive and their way. |
|
Comments (14)
I'd put the question a different way.....
That's why I'm considering Lubuntu as my new desktop (for the future). The simplicity of LXDE, combined with Compiz & Cairo-dock gives me a simple, effective desktop. I don't need all the widgets or other bells & whistles. And Gnome (or Unity, for that matter) takes away too much user control. I want my desktop to work for me, not for everyone else.
@JaseP:
For what it's worth, I've been using Lubuntu for a while (sometimes in the form of the little spinoff-of-a-spinoff, Peppermints One, -Ice, and -Two) and just recently shifted to XFCE. So far I find XFCE just a bit more polished (it's more mature) and certainly more stable against my rather frequent attempts to do something tricky.
Tried XFCE,... it just didn't agree with me... Maybe it was too long ago, and it would be more to my liking now... But LXDE was fairly nice for me straight off... and had the nice margins feature of XFCE (good for dealing with overscan on HDMI output to TVs)...
Another clueless wannabe Linux blogger
"KDE 4.8 is a major release number. As such, I was hoping for some pretty cool new features."
Um no. A major release will be KDE 5.0. Why on earth would anyone think moving from KDE 4.7 to 4.8 would yield myriad new features? It's a point release for crying out loud and as such, common sense would dictate that it would encompass bug fixes (which it does), ever more spit and polish (which it does) and perhaps a "feature" or two that serve to evolve the overall system and solve problems (which the few new features do). This blogger needs to understand how FOSS works and stop waiting with baited breath for the next big shake up. If he wants that, then maybe he needs to circle over the Canonical Unity camp.
Um no. A major release will be KDE 5.0. Why on earth would anyone think moving from KDE 4.7 to 4.8 would yield myriad new features? It's a point release for crying out loud and as such, common sense would dictate that it would encompass bug fixes (which it does), ever more spit and polish (which it does) and perhaps a "feature" or two that serve to evolve the overall system and solve problems (which the few new features do). This blogger needs to understand how FOSS works and stop waiting with baited breath for the next big shake up. If he wants that, then maybe he needs to circle over the Canonical Unity camp.
Actually, won't 5.0 be a beta?
From the blog: "One example is the use of akonadi in KDEPIM. This was not stable enough to release until KDE 4.6. I have tried to use kmail in each of the releases since, as kmail was (in the past) my favorite mail client ever. However, it simply does not work. I cannot enter account details without it crashing."
If my favorite email program was not working, I would take steps to correct it (help forums for instance), rather than simply giving up when it wouldn't accept my account information. kmail is working fine on my 4.6 system.
If my favorite email program was not working, I would take steps to correct it (help forums for instance), rather than simply giving up when it wouldn't accept my account information. kmail is working fine on my 4.6 system.
@ andyprough
Yeah, I don't know what's been up with KDE's PIM suite lately. It received absolutely horrible reviews in a recent 'Linux Format' issue. It seems as though the KDE devs WANT this suite of programs to die a slow and ugly death. I agree with you wholeheartedly, someone is asleep at the switch with regards to fixing what's broken! And for the record, I disable akonadi. In my opinion it's a terrible implementation and fails to work as advertised most of the time.
Yeah, I don't know what's been up with KDE's PIM suite lately. It received absolutely horrible reviews in a recent 'Linux Format' issue. It seems as though the KDE devs WANT this suite of programs to die a slow and ugly death. I agree with you wholeheartedly, someone is asleep at the switch with regards to fixing what's broken! And for the record, I disable akonadi. In my opinion it's a terrible implementation and fails to work as advertised most of the time.
I'm still laughing at the phrase, "wannabe Linux blogger" -- as if the bar is so high ...
Honestly, people have been throwing tantrums complaining (to paraphrase) that stupid KDE developers keep doing all these stupid new features that nobody wants and they should just fix what the stupid bugs and stop wasting time on new features (stupid).
Now people are complaining that they're just fixing bugs and not making new features.
I'm convinced people just like to complain.
(For the record, though, I have to agree about kmail - when it works, it IS still my favorite email program, and 4.7 was working pretty well, but the 4.8 release-candidate seems to be having stability issues. Hopefully will be working correctly again when the official release hits.)
Now people are complaining that they're just fixing bugs and not making new features.
I'm convinced people just like to complain.
(For the record, though, I have to agree about kmail - when it works, it IS still my favorite email program, and 4.7 was working pretty well, but the 4.8 release-candidate seems to be having stability issues. Hopefully will be working correctly again when the official release hits.)
@cmost --
So -- if you call a a to-may-to a to-mah-to, will it still taste the same?
KDE developers have been piling on new features in the assorted 4.x releases. Is calling the .x releases "major" and worse than the KDE team's decision to designate 4.0 as, ummm, 4.0?
How useful, exactly, is hyper-correctness when KDE 3.0 went on for 6 full years? How about the Linux 2.6 kernel -- nearly 8 years of minor tweaks? Try telling that to somebody who needed wireless support back in 2004.
So -- if you call a a to-may-to a to-mah-to, will it still taste the same?
KDE developers have been piling on new features in the assorted 4.x releases. Is calling the .x releases "major" and worse than the KDE team's decision to designate 4.0 as, ummm, 4.0?
How useful, exactly, is hyper-correctness when KDE 3.0 went on for 6 full years? How about the Linux 2.6 kernel -- nearly 8 years of minor tweaks? Try telling that to somebody who needed wireless support back in 2004.
Try telling that to somebody who needed wireless support back in 2004.
Good point Dino. I will ALWAYS remember the 6.27 release day. That was when about 75 percent of Linux wireless problems evaporated into the mist and my job, hence my life, became so much easier.
Good point Dino. I will ALWAYS remember the 6.27 release day. That was when about 75 percent of Linux wireless problems evaporated into the mist and my job, hence my life, became so much easier.
Quoting:Honestly, people have been throwing tantrums complaining (to paraphrase) that stupid KDE developers keep doing all these stupid new features that nobody wants and they should just fix what the stupid bugs and stop wasting time on new features (stupid).Not the same people.
Now people are complaining that they're just fixing bugs and not making new features.
Quoting:Honestly, people have been throwing tantrums complaining...
____________
Not the same people.
You can't please everyone soo you've got to please yourself
I guess that is what they did.
Post a comment
A free account is needed to post. Write your comment here first: your text is kept in this browser while you sign up or log in, and is waiting for you when you come back.
Your message:Markdown: **bold**, *italic*, [text](https://link), - lists, > quotes, $x^2$ for math. Formatting help
Sign up and post (it is free) or Log in and post
At the risk of being called an absolute Luddite, I'll confess I have no interest in the frills and various desktops of KDE4. My instant reaction is always to put KDE4 into folder view and then take steps to make it resemble KDE3.5 as closely as possible. Why ? Well, KDE3.5 is a DE that just works for me personally. Quite honestly, this constant "improvement" has begun to irritate me because as far as I am concerned, the "improvements" are negative in their impact on me as a user. KDE4.4.4 was superb; KDE4.6 is simply not quite as good in certain aspects of speed and software, while the later version released with openSUSE 12.1 (KDE4.7 ?) is even more annoying as regards its quirks and complexity with data folders in its software suddenly disappearing from where they were normally stored.
I think Gnome3 (and Unity ?) are also beginning the same paths to either complexity or "simply not what the users want", and my impressions are that there is already considerable angst and resistance from the relevant communities.
I just don't know where these two DE's are now going. My requirements have always been simplicity, stability, the ability to run a range of software (versatility) and finally, sufficient modification settings to allow me to set the DE running just the way I like it. Gnome2 forks are already appearing in protest over Gnome3 while on the KDE side, Trinity is the DE on which I pin my future hopes.