A look at GNOME 2.14, comparison to KDE

[Janne Ojaniemi]

On Tuesday 21 February 2006 22:36, Aaron J. Seigo wrote:
> On Tuesday 21 February 2006 11:37, Janne Ojaniemi wrote:
> > I fail to see how you or any other KDE-developer would suffer from bad
> > moral if I or someone else tested KDE with an intention to pick every
> > nit.
>
> testing is great. saying "kde sucks", or approaching it from that
> perspective, is hard to take after a while. been there, done that. good
> news is that we can do these things with a positive attitude as well.

To use an real-life example here: My father-in-law is a big fan of Saab cars. 
He's a card-carrying member of local Saab-club, and he's constantly telling 
me how great and reliable Saabs are. And while he's doing that, he totally 
overlooks the fact that his Saab has been in the shop two times over the past 
two months, how it sometimes spontaneously turns the turn-signals on and how 
the handbrake doesn't work properly. To him, those problems are irrelevant 
because he's in love with the car.

In a way, same thing would apply here. If I tested KDE with a mindset that 
everything is absolutely fabulous, minor problems might get overlooked.

If I really pushed my in-law to mention 10 bad things in his Saab, he propably 
could notice and mention required number of flaws. But if he just keeps on 
thinking that his car is the best thing since sliced bread, those flaws would 
go overlooked. THIS is what I'm talking about here. 

Note: I'm _NOT_ claiming that KDE sucks (well, all software sucks, some just 
suck less than others ;)). Far, far from it. It's my desktop of choice and I 
use it every day. That said, I think it could be even better, and it is my 
intention to nitpick my way through KDE. And it helps there if I make the 
conscious decision to find the flaws in KDE. To some, some of the flaws that 
I might discover are so minor that they are not worth worrying about. But 
again: if I make it my life's mission to find those flaws, then I will find 
them.

This isn't about how I feel about KDE. That do I really think that it sucks or 
not. It's about the mentality. If I test KDE while thinking "KDE sucks", it 
doesn't have to mean that I really think that KDE sucks. I'm having problems 
putting my thoughts in to words here...

> ah, dualism. =) it's either kick ass or it sucks, but it can't be both at
> the same time?

Sure it can :). Make no mistake: I love KDE. What I'm talking about here is 
the _mentality_ of testing KDE, not the actual feelings towards the desktop.

> personally, i tend to subscribe to a school of thought that 
> says something can be great on the one hand and need help on the other,
> simultaneously. it's much easier to feel like you aren't spinning your
> wheels in the mud with that attitude.

I do not have an "attitude". I do not think that KDE sucks, overall. I talked 
about mentality, not actual feelings towards the desktop.

> and if it sounds like i'm going on and on about attitude and not technical
> issues, that's because when someone comes to me with an idea but no
> willingness or capability to work on it themselves (aka they want me to do
> it) it's usually their attitude that makes me decide to join them or not.
> this is pretty typical.

Again: I'm not saying that KDE sucks, and I apologize if it sounded like that. 
What I talked about is a way of testing KDE. If I test KDE thinking that 
"this thing sucks", it desn't really mean that I think KDE sucks, it's just a 
preconditioned way of thinking to find any flaws in the system. If I start 
testing KDE and I already think that "KDE is the best thing since sliced 
bread!", then I might overlook many flaws and errors in the desktop.