A look at GNOME 2.14, comparison to KDE

[Kurt Pfeifle]

On Monday 20 February 2006 21:54, Iñaki wrote:
> El Lunes, 20 de Febrero de 2006 22:21, Aaron J. Seigo escribió:
> > > and the "Services" tab with
> > > Fonts and Printers information??
> >
> > people actually find this useful.
> 
> Not the people I know. Konqueror is a web browser and file browser. 

No, you are wrong. At least partially wrong. It's what you *think* it 
is. And you think so (only these two roles) because you compare it with 
other apps, which you knew before you came into touch with Konqueror.

And yes, you are also right. At least partially. Konqueror indeed can
act as a web browser (and a damn good one at that). As well as for a 
file browser/manager.

But you'll be shocked to see what Konqueror shows you if you type into
its address bar other things. Start simply:

  man:/cupsaddsmb

A man page reader! O my god, bloat!

  info:/ls

A GNU info format browser. Even more bloat!

  fish://kpfeifle@linuxprinting.org

Oh, a graphical remote SSH browser! Why can't we have separate tools
for each of these tasks??

  webdavs://mediacenter.gmx.net/

A remote WEBDAV file manager that is able to encrypt all traffic.
B.L.O.A.T!

  smb://workgroup/windows_xp_box/my_share

Uhmm... a client for accessing Windows file shares. What is that good
for? Out with it from Konqueror, out!

And "settings:/", "applications:/", "help:/konqueror", "help:/konsole",
and "fonts:/" to name a few more... ?

In reality Konqueror is not bloated at all. Konqueror is very thin, and
very lean. Konqueror is "only" an empty shell. An empty shell which is
able to load other programs ("kparts") into itself and into its tabs so 
that the user can access them from one place.

And as such Konqueror is an extremely powerful tool in the hands of the
knowledgable user. Many users just happen to know about the two profiles 
("web" and local files) you named (if at all).

Of course, you and everyone is free to only use Konqueror for one of its 
purposes (like web browsing), and ignore or even hide the rest. Just 
don't ever click on the "home" icon and you will never get to see Konqui's 
file management abilities (or weaknesses if that is your opionion). Best, 
remove that icon from the top tool bar; and remove it for your users too, 
if you happen to be an administrator who does not want his users "abuse"
a web browser for file management...

My defense of Konqueror does *not* mean that we and KDE couldn't 
improve a lot in the next stage of development, and that we could not
learn a lot from looking at other people's work -- Apple, Microsoft,
Gnome. [They also look at ours... and honestly, in some respects we
are *leading* the pack, not trailing behind!] 

It means that we should not throw the baby out with the bath water.
To simply elevate that one principle "let's get rid of 40% of icons,
70% of lines and borders, and all 'extra' widgets" into the First Holy
Commandment will not make things better.

KDE has 2 thirds of Linux desktop users behind it. 

And a large percentage of those have *choosen* it by their *own* will, 
and have not been ordered by their bosses or husbands to use it. There 
must be a reason for this, no? -- Can you imagine that a quite 
significant minority of KDE users are even "fans" for their desktop 
platform? And that this is mainly because of the power and of the 
configurability it provides to them?

Taking away things like this will surely alienate the most powerful 
allies KDE has (the "active" and outspoken part of our current userbase)
but will not automatically winning new users in turn.

I completely agree with all efforts to "polish" the UI and make it 
more pretty, and even with removing buttons *for the default*, "first
start" view. But do not take away my option to re-add it for my own
personal desktop!

Don't forget a few other things:

* Usability, quality and "giving a professional impression" is not 
  only tagged to the polish level for toolbars and icons. It is
  also about things like user documentation. If you are not a coder, 
  or a graphic designer, you may be able to help writing manuals, 
  FAQs, articles; triage bug reports; make educational movies, adopt 
  an application and make its "WhatsThis" help items complete; help 
  look after the *huge* amount of content of the KDE web sites...

* KDE4 will give the oportunity to go much beyond petty "icon this, 
  toolbar that, border there" discussions. What are your ideas here?
  Completely new ideas? Ideas that go way beyond what was done by 
  anybody in desktop computing before? Yes, it is not easy. If we 
  find 2 or 3 major new concepts for UI designs, we will probably be 
  very lucky + successful. And below that Olymp, someone will still 
  have to make pretty all the icons and toolbars and how they blend 
  together...

Cheers,
Kurt