OSNews.com: Interview with KDE and Gnome Developers

OSNews.com is featuring an interesting three-way interview (5 pages) with KDE's very own Waldo Bastian and Aaron J. Seigo as well as GNOME's Havoc Pennington. An interesting diversity of opinions on various UI and usability issues is presented. "On the Ok/Cancel issue: KDE has implemented things in such a way that allows all KDE applications to have the order of these buttons flipped with a change to a single line of code. It is exactly this sort of brilliant design that allows KDE to be so internally consistent. So the question often comes down to whether or not we should make a change, rather than if we can. Personally I think it is irresponsible to impose personal aesthetics on your users in a seemingly random fashion by disrupting the interface they know without very compelling reasons to do so."

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Comments

by Ali Akcaagac (not verified)

Nice try Minkwe, now trolling here eh ? Now you understand why people like to stay anonymous for various reasons. For not being trolled from jackasses like you.

by Navindra Umanee (not verified)

In what way has KDE won? It may be more popular in Europe, but GNOME is the default on Red Hat and the Sun platforms which are quite big wins indeed.

GNOME has its fans and that's okay, let's just concentrate on making KDE better. Making everyone angry against KDE clearly isn't the right approach.

by FooBar (not verified)

No, KDE lost. Windows XP won. Compare the number of KDE users to the number of Windows XP users; Windows XP clearly has more market share.

Why don't you concentrate on making KDE better than Windows XP instead of trying to "proof" that KDE is better than GNOME? _Microsoft_ is our enemy.

by AC (not verified)

Of course you are absolutely right. But we are comparing Linux and Linux Desktop alternatives here. If it goes for Linux Desktop vs. Windows Desktop then the most logical consequences would be to drop GNOME and work on KDE to make it even better than it is now instead putting GNOME and KDE back for another 2 years by unifying underlaying framework. KDE is not in the need of a cooperation with GNOME. It's GNOME who made the fragmentation not KDE.

by Navindra Umanee (not verified)

Come on man, I'm sure any GNOME enthusiast can dig up 3 online polls with GNOME in the lead.

by AC (not verified)

Show me just one.

by Soup (not verified)

From ZDNet a few years back

As part of Tuesday's Gnome Foundation unveiling, Compaq Computer Corp. (cpq), Hewlett-Packard Co. (hwp), IBM Corp. (ibm) and Sun's (sunw) hardware business all lent their backing, by committing to make the GNOME interface an integrated part of the client user interfaces going forward.

Compaq said it is working on integrating the GNOME environment onto its iPaq handhelds. HP, IBM and Sun all said they are planning to offer GNOME as an adjunct to the Common Desktop Environment (CDE) on their Unix platforms.

by Richard Moore (not verified)

I don't think being default on Sun's is much to boast about really. Hardly anyone uses a Sun box as a desktop, in general they're servers. Red Hat is a bigger deal, but again it is mainly used on servers. On the other hand the inclusion of Qt/Embedded in IBMs handheld reference platform is likely to help KDE (through things like Konq/Embedded).

Rich.

by Navindra Umanee (not verified)

Sun also brought ATK to GNOME, which GNOME advocates/Red Hat are using as a marketing tool to clobber KDE in the market place.

Btw, as for Red Hat only being used on servers well there's cases like the City of Largo which have deployed Red Hat (and KDE) on the desktop already. I'm sure they'll be more in time.

by Roberto Alsina (not verified)

Oh, yeah. GNOME has that huge Sun desktop market. All 4 of those guys will use GNOME soon!

by Navindra Umanee (not verified)

Still, the question remains, in what way has KDE won?

Development clout aside, Sun has industry clout too. There are vague hints (yes, yes from that incommunicative MAS guy) Sun may push X.org to officially adopt GNOME. Whether X.org is relevant or not is another matter, but it sure is good PR for GNOME and in the end it might mean that more (US) companies will feel safer standardising on GNOME.

Of course, this is a double-edged sword for GNOME which is practically at the mercy of corporate agenda these days.

It would still be nice to have someone like IBM championing KDE. We've always got the German government I suppose, while GNOME is gunning for US government adoption.

by Soup (not verified)

Unfortunately, Trolltech belongs to the Canopy group under which is also a SCO sponsor. After what SCO has done, I don't think that will happen, besides under linux, IBMs SWT is based on GTK.

by Navindra Umanee (not verified)

Trolltech does not belong to the Canopy group.

by Navindra Umanee (not verified)

Maybe I should put your logo on my homepage as proof that I own you?

Stop spreading FUD.

by Soup (not verified)

Doesn't change the facts:

Both SCO and Trolltech belong to the Canopy group wether you like it or not.

by Navindra Umanee (not verified)

The fact is that you're spreading lies and FUD.

by Ryan (not verified)

Actually its a bit silly to dispute fact Navi. Im sure canopy never consulted troll tech but it doesnt change reality.

by Navindra Umanee (not verified)

Let me repeat slowly for you Rya, and others happily believing Soup's FUD:

Trolltech Does Not Belong To The Canopy Group.

investors.html

That's the facts, face them.

by Ryan (not verified)

Your right that is the facts:

Canopy Group 5.8%

Man its nice to see you refuting youself. Saves me all the work. ;) If your going to accuse me of fud, I think Ill accuse you of being Chicken Little.

Cheers,
Ryan

by Navindra Umanee (not verified)

> Your right that is the facts
> If your going to accuse me of fud

Hey kid, it's spelt "you're" as in "you are". "Your" is the possessive form of "you".

> Man its nice to see you refuting youself.

Ahh, kiddo kiddo. "Its" is the possessive form of "it"; you should use "it's" here, short for "it is".

> Both SCO and Trolltech belong to the Canopy group wether you like it or not.

Trolltech does not belong to the Canopy Group. Period.

Given the facts, maybe you should go back to school and learn to read instead of trolling here? Just a thought... but if you're going to argue with me, you better know what you are talking about.

by Ryan (not verified)

This is becoming actually kind of funny! Let me get this straight: as "proof" that Troll Tech isnt in the Canopy Group you post Troll Tech's own website which says Canopy Group has a 5.8% stake in Troll Tech? Then you tell *me* to get *my* facts straight?? LOL!

"The sky is falling!"

Man, you know youve won when they have nothing left to pick on but your spelling.

We'll have to do this again some time!

Cheers,
Ryan

[NU: Since I don't want to continue this thread, I'll put the response right here: It's called investing. Look up the difference between a 5.8% investment and total ownership some time. It's simply FUD when you go around saying Trolltech belongs to a 5.8% investor. Think about it.]

by Anonymous (not verified)

Belong is wrong when they only hold a 5.8% share: http://www.trolltech.com/newsroom/investors.html

by Robby (not verified)

I have used KDE and Gnome and I personally prefer gnome over KDE. I wouldn't call GNOME a "big joke" and say gnome has horrible failure nowadays. I use ubuntu and this is the first Iv ever heard somebody, talk about how much KDE is better then gnome and I have talk to alot of people that have Kubuntu.

by KDE (not verified)

On the GNOME newspages I was able to read that KDE and GNOME found an agreement already and that they are ALREADY cooperating to do this work together. I'm quite confused now because while following the kde-core-devel list there is no such comments that gives me the impression that ANY cooperation has been started. So my question, why did the GNOME people write that cooperation in adapting, Pango, ATK, DBUS, GConf, GLIB and other things has been started already ?

Someone please comment on this.

by Anonymous (not verified)

> So my question, why did the GNOME people write that cooperation in adapting, Pango, ATK, DBUS, GConf, GLIB and other things has been started already ?

Wishful thinking? :-)

by FooBar (not verified)

Cooporation != same implementation.

What matters is a standard *specification* or *interface*, not a standard implementation. Look at the Internet: it runs on TCP/IP. Yet it doesn't matter which OS or browser you use: they all implement the same TCP/IP standard, and are interoperable.
The point is to make things interoporable by defining a standard interface/specification, not by making GNOME and KDE use the same implementations. XDnD is a good example: both GTK+ and QT implement that standard.

by AC (not verified)

"Havoc has called for KDE and GNOME to adopt an underlying 'Star Trek' layer that would sit underneath all of the object platforms between the two desktops and Qt/Gtk+ would wrap this 'Star Trek' layer. He has said that he wants a common component framework, object model, messaging system, multimedia system, configuration system, ... all of it merged! Others have said that we should stop calling ourselves KDE developers and GNOME developers rather KDE/GNOME developers and have spoken of all these shared specs only as the 'first step' into eventual merging of the two. Go read *and* understand the lists and then start talking...

In his world the two desktops would be the same and applications would integrate equally well with each other. Gtk+ components embedded into KOffice and so on. Others have called for the same. Never mind the huge *hack* this would be and the sheer ugliness of all of it and the fact that it is not going to happen ... It doesn't change the fact that this is precisely what Havoc is saying."

This is a quote from Adam on OSNews.com. Maybe you should read it and follow the conversation between Havoc and the KDE developers on this place:

http://lists.kde.org/?t=104719951800001&r=1&w=2

by Soup (not verified)

Maybe you should stop spreading FUD and actually do something useful for your favorite DE.

This is not a war, so don't use those propaganda tactics that you learnt in the military here!

by Navindra Umanee (not verified)

The person going around with different nicks and posting trolls, flamebait and obscenities (all with the same IP): BALEETED!

by Christian Meyer (not verified)

Well, reading all those comments here make me feeling sad. It basically isn't the appropriate answer for all the work GNOME/KDE developers have been accomplished so far. It seems like people/users are more interested in destroying efforts than supporting them.
I'm a GNOME developer/user and I really enjoy being together with KDE developers. I'm also using KDE from time to time, to see what's been done.
But all those trolls in the kde/gnome/osnews/... forums are very annoying. They aren't really helping on improving the desktop, be it GNOME or KDE. They are archiving the opposite.
Maybe someday people will think about it, maybe we'll have the same solution in a few months/years as now. Let's hope the best!

Greetings,
Christian (chrisime)

by Ryan (not verified)

I totally agree with you. I like Gnome, I like KDE, I like linux. I have no idea what primitive peice of human behavior is responsible for such us sv. them attitudes, but the only people that will benefit from it are microsoft shareholders.

Cheers,
Ryan

by Rainer Cartier (not verified)

Why are all these Gnome people here trolling and defending their poorly written Desktop ? Don't you people have your own trollpages ? Oh wait gnomedesktop and gnomesupport are not reachable for 90% of their users. That must be the answer.

by Anonymous (not verified)

> Oh wait gnomedesktop and gnomesupport are not reachable for 90% of their users.

90%? The problems for T-Online users have been fixed: http://gnomedesktop.org/article.php?sid=995

by Ryan (not verified)

Maybe because we like KDE, and are blinded by some primitive childish need to destroy things that are different. "gnome trolls go home" sounds way too much like "nigger go home" for my taste. you should really be frightened by yourself.

Cheers,
Ryan

by Ryan (not verified)

oops, that should read "ARENT blinded [...]"

:(

by Christian Meyer (not verified)

If you think KDE is superior then use it and be happy; that's no problem for people who prefer GNOME.
You'll win nothing with your childish behavior because you don't know nothing about the underlying architectures of GNOME/KDE as it seems.

Cheers,
Christian

by anon (not verified)

You didn't answer the question. Why do GNOME trolls come here? Who sends them?

Why do you talk FUD about architectures?

by Ryan (not verified)

"Who sends them?" LOL Ive already stated I come here because I like KDE. Whats really sad is you have bought so deeply into a nonexistent conspiracy you actually believe some one "sent" me here.

Just because I only comment on the worst displays of childish behavior or biggotry, doesnt mean I dont read the rest of the site.

ps. Dear anon, prove that you know the first thing about computer programming before you accuse others of "architecture fud".

Sheesh,
Ryan