[gentoo-amd64] Re: Heads-up: KDEers: Particularly kde3-ers,

[Duncan]

Barry Schwartz posted on Mon, 24 Aug 2009 17:20:50 -0500 as excerpted:

> Sebastian Beßler <sebastian@××××××××××××.de> skribis:
>> The last reason I stick with kde 3.5.10 for a while is that working
>> with kde 4.x just doesn't feel right. Switching to kde4 is like
>> switching to a completly different DE. KDE 4 isn't kde anymore, it is
>> something absolutly different that calls itself kde.
>
> A few months ago, having used KDE4 for a bit and sensing what was ahead,
> I pre-emptively dumped KDE and now run just fluxbox and rox pinboard
> (which I was running in place of the KDE3 wm and desktop, anyway).
>
> I don't know why I should adapt to the software, rather than the other
> way around. It's not really a Gentoo problem that other projects won't
> settle on a basic plan and stick with it, and I'm glad Gentoo hasn't
> been like that.
>

KDE has lost a lot of users with the way they've handled kde4, no doubt 
about it.  Many will likely eventually come back, especially since it 
looks as if gnome is about to have some major changes of its own with the 
planned jump to 3.x, tho I do hope they learned from kde and manage it 
MUCH better, but some won't, and even for those that do, the level of 
trust and loyalty KDE had gained is now entirely gone, and will take 
/years/ to rebuild.

Change is always difficult, but it wasn't the change so much here, as the 
way it was, and still is to some degree, being handled.

But regardless, it's not like there's any better options for me, a 
confirmed power-user that LIKES and USES many of those configuration 
levers KDE exposes that GNOME etc likes to hide, and other desktops 
simply don't provide the utility.  Plus, the technology is sound, and 
despite the terrible management of the transition, KDE now has a very 
solid and powerful platform, that once the bugs are worked out, has the 
potential to be every bit as smoothly polished as 3.5.10, without all the 
cruft and kinks, as they're dealing with a far cleaner and more modern 
and modular code base now.

So really, even after all this, I'm still a believer, even if I /don't/ 
trust the PR-speak any more and have had to put to use that thick hide 
that years surviving the infamous gentoo-dev list flame wars has given 
me.  (FWIW, nothing either previous in this thread or on the kde lists 
came even /close/ to the humiliation I've seen certain former devs 
inflict on other supposedly same-team devs on the gentoo-dev list, simply 
because it was allowed, for no more than entertainment.  I'm glad /that/ 
dark period seems to be over!  Call it the verbal parallel to Abu-ghraib, 
which I'm also glad is over.)

Anyway, that's why I'm still on KDE, and with 4.3, it /is/ beginning to 
get there, finally.  But the trust isn't there any more, and won't be for 
awhile, and I don't blame folks for deserting them.  In fact, after what 
I went thru on the kde lists, I'm surprised they continue to have the 
followers they do.  Oh, well...

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman