A KDE Developers Response Videos To LTT's Linux Challenge

[Uttamattamakin]

Summary

 

Niccolò Ve KDE developer has been making response videos to the Linux Daily Driver challenge videos by Linus Tech Tips.  His videos fly under the radar because he has 3500 subscribers.   As one of the people who makes the GUI he is the person who makes what people see as being Linux.  The daily average joe user experience.    These are his thoughts. 

 

Quotes

Responding to Linus on the show desktop and using Pamac and on if they should make Linux look and act more like Windows. 

Quote

Ok we keep hearing this.  I think it is the Manjaroverse that want this.  You can easily change to that one (how show desktop works)....

If you had been using Discover (KDE's app store) you would've been happier..

He's right that's not a reason we should copy windows..

 

Clearly he's gone to the Linus school of how to mug for a thumbnail. 

 

 

My thoughts

This is precisely who needs to be reached by the videos Linus is making.  He is who the conversation needs to be with since people like Niccolo will be the ones that can directly effect the user experience.  For 99% of task 99% of the time for 99% of users the GUI must be able to do everything.  More and more the CLI is for developers and power users.   There are certainly people who like having Linux be their special hard to use thing.  They can go use Qubes.  

I share the bias of this dev has in thinking that the best way to go for a mostly consistent experience is to go full on into KDE.   If I knew Linus and he had asked me.  I'd've said Boss.  Look at the distros that Nvidia recommends for using CUDA.  Go with standard Ubuntu but the Kubuntu flavor of it.  Then just don't mess with the command line or listed to any fool who tells you to.   Other than KDE NEON which is Ubuntu LTS with the latest stable KDE Plasma as the only GUI ... Kubuntu is the most solid linux experience. 

Arch is for experts who want to tinker with their computer the way someone works on a junky old car instead of just getting a new one. 

It's funny to me that he pronounces Linus like he's talking about the other Linus ... Linux Linus...you know the old one.

 

Sources

The youtube videos of a known KDE developer.  Akademy/2021/AllBoF - KDE Community Wiki

Edited December 8, 2021 by Uttamattamakin
Removed Template text

[8tg]

All this stuff is dumb and it’s a reason Linux will never be mainstream, it’s too segmented apart and everyone has different views on how it should work. 
 

Hey, you want the ideal Linux software 

management experience? Use flatpaks, wait no use snaps, wait no use appimages, wait no just use the Ubuntu software center, wait no use kde discover, wait no use mx software because it’s all of those things, wait no just manually add repositories and install software from them, wait no just buy your copy of libreoffice on a CD off of eBay and install it like that.

 

Its dumb, it’s why I stopped using Linux as much as I used to, it’s delegated to the meme lenowovo dankpad sex220 at this point because I straight up don’t trust it’s inconsistent and nonstandardized software.

 

I don’t care what a developer for KDE says, primarily because the only good thing to come out of the kde projects is Krita and that’s only because it’s furry bait and it’s better than gimp, which is a pretty low bar.

Plasma looks like windows 11 except there’s still traces of 2007 hiding in there like rounded bump shapes in and on everything.

This whole Linux challenge they’re doing isn’t going to help Linux by showing weak points to developers, Linux developers have 2-3 brain cells to share between them, they’ll just argue that their system is better and you’re not using it right.

What it’s going to do is show off flaws in Linux to the general public and all the years and years of white lies on its ease of use go out the window.

 

/rant

 

[8tg]

Because every time it goes in a damn circle with 

“hey guys I’m having problems with X”

”you should’ve used Y, Y is so much better and has features X can’t even think of”

”no, you should be using Z, Z has features that x and y don’t and makes them even easier to use”

 

You just did it yourself, Linus is having problems with his distro, you pulled up KDE and suggested he use something entirely different for reasons nobody cares about.

Here’s my suggestion, use MX Linux, it’s Debian with all that nonsensical shit you occasionally need preinstalled. Why? Who cares why, just don’t use X, Y is better!

[Lightwreather]

4 minutes ago, 8tg said:

it’s too segmented apart and everyone has different views on how it should work. 

I mean that is what you'll get with a "Fork it if you don't like" thing that is pretty common with open-source software.

On one hand it can mean that everyone can sort of get something that is suited to them

On the other hand, it can mean fragmentation.

[RejZoR]

I personally like KDE the most. It's one of the oldest frontends and it mimics Windows environment pretty closely.

 

Whole forking just creates even more fragmentation and not everyone is a coder or is willing to spend time redesigning stuff. And yeah, this is an issue and one of biggest burdens of Linux. Windows 11 may be stupid, but it's equally stupid for everyone. It's even standardized in stupidity. Linux doesn't even have that. You have 500 versions of stupidity. Then you can pick one that's less stupid and possibly spend days in Terminal copy & pasting noodles of code you don't even understand and ultimately break everything to a point it won't be usable anymore. That's the biggest issue frankly.

[Fasterthannothing]

I'm going to throw out something highly controversial. Linux isn't meant for every day users and it's not supposed to be mainstream in that sense. There I said it. Linux was literally built around the idea of making it your own not having a cookie cutter OS made for your Grandma who can barely log into your email. Honestly Linus is disgracing the Linux OS when he can't even see the dang zip compression loading bar in the bottom right of the screen and then rants about zipping a file. 

[tikker]

37 minutes ago, 8tg said:

All this stuff is dumb and it’s a reason Linux will never be mainstream, it’s too segmented apart and everyone has different views on how it should work. 

As much as we like to complain about stuff Microsoft, Apple or any other developer does wrong in our eyes, this is one of the reasons why a "dictatorship" to a large extent is good. Apple's ecosystem is tightly controlled, for some too tightly, but that does help make their generally seemless integration between devices a lot. Windows is a lot buggier with all its drivers because there are thousands of arbitrary devices to support and even more combinations of various hardware out there. And then you have Linux, where every distro has its own take on an operating system and, well, that shows.

52 minutes ago, 8tg said:

nonstandardized software

There are ( low-level) standards that are adhered to. Otherwise it'd be even more of a mess and nothing would be compatible between distros.

7 minutes ago, SlidewaysZ said:

when he can't even see the dang zip compression loading bar in the bottom right of the screen and then rants about zipping a file. 

This is why I like smaller screens. No pop up goes unnoticed In fairness though corner pop ups are unhelpful for important notifications like this and I don't particularly like the stealthiness by which these operations are done either. GNOME does it similarly, where you only get this small pie chart in the explorer window showing progress. I'm down for allowing the user to minimise it to the background, but for GUI copying, zipping or whatever needs a progress bar I do prefer an in-your-face pop up so you know something is actually happening.

[Justaphysicsnerd]

1 hour ago, Uttamattamakin said:

Arch is for experts who want to tinker with their computer the way someone works on a junky old car instead of just getting a new one

Couldn't agree more, when I first tried Manjaro KDE, I was so f*cking confused. Even though by that point, I was daily driving POP OS for like 1.5 years because like there is two of everything for anything you wanana do, two apps which are for settings, two package managers/ app stores etc. these really confused me

[Lightwreather]

1 hour ago, SlidewaysZ said:

I'm going to throw out something highly controversial. Linux isn't meant for every day users

I doubt that's controversial

[Paul Thexton]

2 hours ago, tikker said:

This is why I like smaller screens. No pop up goes unnoticed In fairness though corner pop ups are unhelpful for important notifications like this and I don't particularly like the stealthiness by which these operations are done either. GNOME does it similarly, where you only get this small pie chart in the explorer window showing progress. I'm down for allowing the user to minimise it to the background, but for GUI copying, zipping or whatever needs a progress bar I do prefer an in-your-face pop up so you know something is actually happening.

Agreed. For an operation I explicitly started that’s going to take some time, I want a modal dialog (which I can dismiss/minimise as I see fit) displayed within the rough region of the screen that I was working in at the time. Increasingly large number of people have very large screens, Linus’ display may be an extreme example but even on my 27” 4k monitor having something leap to a corner relevant to what I’m doing elsewhere is kind of jarring.

[Uttamattamakin]

4 hours ago, 8tg said:

You just did it yourself, Linus is having problems with his distro, you pulled up KDE and suggested he use something entirely different for reasons nobody cares about.

Pretty much everything he mentioned in the last video was related to KDE.  The normal desktop productivity part of the challenge Linus was using all KDE apps for most of that. 

 

Yes everyone has an opinion about what is better.  One could say that about people saying "Don't us windows for that us linux".  Then "don't use Linux just use mac".  Then "Just use Windows".    Don't drive a gas car drive an EV.  

3 hours ago, SlidewaysZ said:

I'm going to throw out something highly controversial. Linux isn't meant for every day users and it's not supposed to be mainstream in that sense. There I said it. Linux was literally built around the idea of making it your own not having a cookie cutter OS made for your Grandma who can barely log into your email. Honestly Linus is disgracing the Linux OS when he can't even see the dang zip compression loading bar in the bottom right of the screen and then rants about zipping a file. 

This is true but one could argue the same of every OS when you really get down to their roots.  Everyone of them started as something used by niche people who worked on the microcomputers of the past.  

Linux is much more like DOS before it and Windows became one thing.  KDE is like Windows 3.1 or 9x was too.  Linux needs that one GUI and system via which one can do 99% of things any normal person would need.  KDE and Gnome get 95% of the way there.  Which is the problem.  There are two, basically 2 really good GUI's for Linux.  SO which one does one write a HOWTO article for?   See what I mean?  

 

 

32 minutes ago, Paul Thexton said:

Agreed. For an operation I explicitly started that’s going to take some time, I want a modal dialog (which I can dismiss/minimise as I see fit) displayed within the rough region of the screen that I was working in at the time. Increasingly large number of people have very large screens, Linus’ display may be an extreme example but even on my 27” 4k monitor having something leap to a corner relevant to what I’m doing elsewhere is kind of jarring.

I use Dual 4k monitors connected to a 5700g APU via a TB 4 dock.   I have this same problem.  With larger monitors, or dual monitors or ultrawide monitors this can be an issue.  

However KDE has a solution.  Did you know you can  have more than one notification area and can put it wherever you want? If like  @LinusTech  if you are still having big screen problems one nice thing about KDE is you can put those notifications in a place that is good for you.  Maybe even set up an area of a second or third screen that would just have the notifications you want.  Might do that myself. 

 

[D-reaper]

4 hours ago, 8tg said:

All this stuff is dumb and it’s a reason Linux will never be mainstream, it’s too segmented apart and everyone has different views on how it should work. 

So? Chromebook managed to take off; and that was derived from Gentoo. Why can't a single distro just be chosen and be mainstream? I mean, there are manufacturers that use Ubuntu on their devices. Look at Dell. You see, no one has actually put in the effort in choosing a distro and advertising it. The reason why Windows, Mac and Chromebook took off is because they were backed by big companies with lots of money to shamelessly advertise their products.

 

4 hours ago, 8tg said:

I don’t care what a developer for KDE says, primarily because the only good thing to come out of the kde projects is Krita and that’s only because it’s furry bait and it’s better than gimp, which is a pretty low bar.

Plasma looks like windows 11 except there’s still traces of 2007 hiding in there like rounded bump shapes in and on everything.

KDE Plasma definitely helped with the transition to Linux for me. Then again, Windows 8 and then 10 at the time were huge motivators; because the UI in Windows went to shit after 7. KDE was, to me, more traditional compared to all the 'touch' crap that MS deployed. So 7 was the last one for me back in 2016. And I love Krita. In fact, using KDE is what introduced me to Krita. Before, I only used Gimp. Now I use the two in a combination. Krita for digital drawings. Gimp for extra effects.

 

4 hours ago, 8tg said:

Hey, you want the ideal Linux software 

management experience? Use flatpaks, wait no use snaps, wait no use appimages, wait no just use the Ubuntu software center, wait no use kde discover, wait no use mx software because it’s all of those things, wait no just manually add repositories and install software from them, wait no just buy your copy of libreoffice on a CD off of eBay and install it like that.

 

I just mostly stuck to the apt/software center way of doing things and adding PPAs for extra repos (when I needed them). I haven't had to do more than that. But I've found that the Discover package manager integrates snaps and flatpaks all rather well too. So I don't see what the problem is.

 

4 hours ago, 8tg said:

This whole Linux challenge they’re doing isn’t going to help Linux by showing weak points to developers, Linux developers have 2-3 brain cells to share between them, they’ll just argue that their system is better and you’re not using it right.

What it’s going to do is show off flaws in Linux to the general public and all the years and years of white lies on its ease of use go out the window.

 

It's called getting used to the new platform, people. We all learned how to use Windows as kids after all. We weren't born knowing Windows by default. Also, people need to realize that certain applications from Windows will not work on Linux. So if you're stuck on things like Adobe products, you'll have to go the extra mile if you want to use Linux full time; which generally involves a VM running Windows with GPU pass through on top of Linux.

 

For more advanced users, if they want to use Linux, they have to get away from the Windows way of doing things. And they have to accept that some applications will not work natively on Linux. It would be the same if they used a Mac. There is no way around it. I still don't know why people put all this pressure for Linux to be like Windows. They know that Mac can't be just like Windows, so why can't they see Linux in the same light? It's like expecting iOS to be like Android and vise versa.

 

It's clear here that Linus and Luke will not want to use Linux full time as they are used to Windows. So for people like this, they will never succeed. But I will also admit that until hardware manufacturers like Nvidia take that stick out of their ass, a lot of hardware will not be supported on Linux (New flash; Windows may support most hardware, but it doesn't support everything!) The same can be said of software companies not supporting Linux (Example, Adobe). But hopefully we see a huge change for gaming with Steam Deck on the way; which runs Linux.

 

I know I had to get used to using Linux. What helped a lot is that I was a poor kid. And I still wouldn't be able to afford expensive software subscriptions today. So, I was using open source software long before switching to Linux.

 

I would say that it's better for certain people. Ask my mom, nephew and sister. All they do is web browse and stream. So they don't care as long as they can find that Firefox icon. So their needs are met. And their Linux setup with KDE Neon makes their computers work like new and saves us money. So what's not to love there?

[8tg]

4 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

So? Chromebook managed to take off; and that was derived from Gentoo.

ChromeOS is to gentoo as Windows 10 is to Windows NT

6 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

Why can't a single distro just be chosen and be mainstream?

Because there are too many, they all compete with eachother, and the distro as a whole is only a small part of the separation of different linux stuff. There is no standard choice for any software, any core feature, its all variable and changes all the time across every distro.

If you use windows 10, you get the exact same environment, same file manager, same stock media software, same basic set of drivers, same everything as everyone else whos using windows 10. Across any version of windows 10, it all works the same. If you talk to someone about an issue in windows 10, and they use windows 10, both of you can reference eachother and know whats going on.

Throw 20 linux users in a room together and id bet at most a quarter of them use something vaguely similar, enough where they could talk about the same stuff. Theres gonna be guys in there on slackware, debian, arch, probably gonna be some idiot in there on openSUSE leap or something. Everyone will have a different DE/WM, at least one guy is using GNUstep, everyone in there has some variety of browsers outside of Chrome/Firefox, could be using thunar, could be using pcman, dolphin, one guy is using mc of course, probably the same guy using gnustep.

You cant provide any IT support for that, theres no documentation that standardises across a whole operating system for that. Because everyones configuration is slightly different, even further than just the distro itself, people wont develop software to work for that many different competing standards, and nobody is going to want to solve problems for something like "this works in LXDE but not XFCE" theyre just gonna go "who the hell cares about XFCE, you shouldve used LXDE"

[WhitetailAni]

5 hours ago, Uttamattamakin said:

This template is a guide for the Tech News Posting Guidelines. Please read the guidelines in the pinned topic before posting, otherwise your post may be removed without warning. If you prefer, you can clear the editor to use your own layout by clicking the trash can icon above, but make sure you incorporate all of these sections and follow the Posting Guidelines.

 

Remove all of the italicised text before posting.

Ahem...

[D-reaper]

3 minutes ago, 8tg said:

Because there are too many, they all compete with eachother, and the distro as a whole is only a small part of the separation of different linux stuff. There is no standard choice for any software, any core feature, its all variable and changes all the time across every distro.

If you use windows 10, you get the exact same environment, same file manager, same stock media software, same basic set of drivers, same everything as everyone else whos using windows 10. Across any version of windows 10, it all works the same. If you talk to someone about an issue in windows 10, and they use windows 10, both of you can reference eachother and know whats going on.

Throw 20 linux users in a room together and id bet at most a quarter of them use something vaguely similar, enough where they could talk about the same stuff. Theres gonna be guys in there on slackware, debian, arch, probably gonna be some idiot in there on openSUSE leap or something. Everyone will have a different DE/WM, at least one guy is using GNUstep, everyone in there has some variety of browsers outside of Chrome/Firefox, could be using thunar, could be using pcman, dolphin, one guy is using mc of course, probably the same guy using gnustep.

You cant provide any IT support for that, theres no documentation that standardises across a whole operating system for that. Because everyones configuration is slightly different, even further than just the distro itself, people wont develop software to work for that many different competing standards, and nobody is going to want to solve problems for something like "this works in LXDE but not XFCE" theyre just gonna go "who the hell cares about XFCE, you shouldve used LXDE"

You clearly didn't read the rest of the paragraph I typed. I was talking about taking a single distro and advertising it.

[WhitetailAni]

24 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

So? Chromebook managed to take off; and that was derived from Gentoo.

4 minutes ago, 8tg said:

ChromeOS is to gentoo as Windows 10 is to Windows NT

This, and Chrome OS/Chromebooks had Google backing them. Linux doesn't have a giant megacorp backing and promoting it like Chrome OS/Chromebooks do.

[8tg]

2 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

You clearly didn't read the rest of the paragraph I typed.

Because the rest of what you typed out was basically "well this specific option worked for me"

Thats not the point, i nor anyone else really cares at all what works for you, the problem is that there are dozens of options and tons of people who would argue that a different specific option worked great for them.

Until there is a single standard, linux will never see any popular like windows or OSX. Its too segmented to be supported as a whole, and without larger scale support you will not see software, without software you will not see users.

 

[D-reaper]

Just now, FakeKGB said:

This, and Chrome OS/Chromebooks had Google backing them. Linux doesn't have a giant megacorp backing and promoting it like Chrome OS/Chromebooks do.

Like I was saying; The reason why Windows, Mac and Chromebook took off is because they were backed by big companies with lots of money to shamelessly advertise their products.

[D-reaper]

5 minutes ago, 8tg said:

Because the rest of what you typed out was basically "well this specific option worked for me"

Thats not the point, i nor anyone else really cares at all what works for you, the problem is that there are dozens of options and tons of people who would argue that a different specific option worked great for them.

Until there is a single standard, linux will never see any popular like windows or OSX. Its too segmented to be supported as a whole, and without larger scale support you will not see software, without software you will not see users.

 

Then you, and those people are free to move on. This is no different than if Apple works for some and others it doesn't.

 

And I was talking about this paragraph alone if you read it fully:

32 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

So? Chromebook managed to take off; and that was derived from Gentoo. Why can't a single distro just be chosen and be mainstream? I mean, there are manufacturers that use Ubuntu on their devices. Look at Dell. You see, no one has actually put in the effort in choosing a distro and advertising it. The reason why Windows, Mac and Chromebook took off is because they were backed by big companies with lots of money to shamelessly advertise their products.

 

[Forbidden Wafer]

13 minutes ago, 8tg said:

Because there are too many, they all compete with eachother, and the distro as a whole is only a small part of the separation of different linux stuff. There is no standard choice for any software, any core feature, its all variable and changes all the time across every distro.

[...]

You cant provide any IT support for that, theres no documentation that standardises across a whole operating system for that. Because everyones configuration is slightly different, even further than just the distro itself, people wont develop software to work for that many different competing standards, and nobody is going to want to solve problems for something like "this works in LXDE but not XFCE" theyre just gonna go "who the hell cares about XFCE, you shouldve used LXDE"

Yup, pretty accurate.

 

There needs to be joint decision, or some very compelling implementation of something, to build something more higher-level than the kernel itself that is shared among everything.
systemd defintely is one of these. Pretty much everyone is using it, whether they like it or not.
Xorg seems to be getting replaced with Wayland by most distros too, with XWayland serving as a stop-gap to make sure stuff will continue to work normally.

The next battle is settling the GUI framework. Is it Gnome? Kde? Pantheon? etc, etc

[D-reaper]

8 minutes ago, Forbidden Wafer said:

Yup, pretty accurate.

 

There needs to be joint decision, or some very compelling implementation of something, to build something more higher-level than the kernel itself that is shared among everything.
systemd defintely is one of these. Pretty much everyone is using it, whether they like it or not.
Xorg seems to be getting replaced with Wayland by most distros too, with XWayland serving as a stop-gap to make sure stuff will continue to work normally.

Like I said over and over, a corporation with resources needs to take a single distro and advertise it to the masses; that hasn't been done at all. Linux would be more recognized if this was done.

 

Chromebook, Windows and Mac all have that advantage. Whereas, a single true Linux distro doesn't.

[Spindel]

Except only chumps use KDE for GUI. 
 

Gnome is the only way to go if you use Linux. 

[8tg]

2 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

Like I said over and over, a company with resources needs to take a single distro and advertise it to the masses; that hasn't been done at all.

 

corporate backing is not the sole factor in making an operating system popular

google is doing the same thing microsoft did in the 90's with windows, "heres money to only ship your machines with our operating system"

 

But the thing with microsoft is they already had a massive market share backing from the PCDOS/MSDOS years prior, and with IBM alongside them were basically solo'ing the entire enterprise market for 2 decades. If you were in an office, a store, a factory, a library, whatever, you had something running MS-DOS. That wasnt a result of the original scenario for windows either, that wasnt microsoft being the only option or a cheaper option for an OS, its the foundation of IBM's PC-DOS that MS-DOS was based off of, and that market to begin with grew and grew.

I can get into literally days worth of reading about the history of microsoft and windows, but the reason windows took off as a standard is because they already had the install-base of most home computers at the time, since they all ran MS-DOS, and the reason they all ran MS-DOS is because IBM set a standard a decade prior with PC-DOS.

 

tldr on mac, closed ecosystem, same thing as today, they also find their specific market to sit inside of and aim to be the only option there, hence why commodore died

[Forbidden Wafer]

3 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

Like I said over and over, a company with resources needs to take a single distro and advertise it to the masses; that hasn't been done at all.

If this helped, everyone would be copying stuff from ChromeOS, but nobody gives a shit about anything coming from them. Not even A/B partitioning/system updates, which is probably the best thing to copy out of the entire thing.

[D-reaper]

4 minutes ago, 8tg said:

 

corporate backing is not the sole factor in making an operating system popular

google is doing the same thing microsoft did in the 90's with windows, "heres money to only ship your machines with our operating system"

 

But the thing with microsoft is they already had a massive market share backing from the PCDOS/MSDOS years prior, and with IBM alongside them were basically solo'ing the entire enterprise market for 2 decades. If you were in an office, a store, a factory, a library, whatever, you had something running MS-DOS. That wasnt a result of the original scenario for windows either, that wasnt microsoft being the only option or a cheaper option for an OS, its the foundation of IBM's PC-DOS that MS-DOS was based off of, and that market to begin with grew and grew.

I can get into literally days worth of reading about the history of microsoft and windows, but the reason windows took off as a standard is because they already had the install-base of most home computers at the time, since they all ran MS-DOS, and the reason they all ran MS-DOS is because IBM set a standard a decade prior with PC-DOS.

 

tldr on mac, closed ecosystem, same thing as today, they also find their specific market to sit inside of and aim to be the only option there, hence why commodore died

Sure. But it didn't take that long for Chromebook to be a success. Did it? At least it got its limelight on television and it sold some.