First off, cheers to Jonathan for his great work with Kubuntu and KDE. Everyone should go read his reasons why Kubuntu is good for KDE. I’d also like to share some of my own comments about Kubuntu and KDE.

  • Ubuntu has a huge following, and is gaining market share via commercial distribution (e.g. Ubuntu on Dell) and respect as a user-friendly operating system. This reflects well on Kubuntu which reflects well on KDE.
  • There isn’t much I can say about second class citizenship, it would be comparing apples to oranges. Ubuntu is a product, Kubuntu is a project. Canonical has every right to look after their business investments before community-based interests. Canonical is pushing Linux in to the main stream computer market and supporting two very different desktop environments doesn’t make business sense. It is too bad they chose to base their product off of Gnome instead of KDE (hehe, Gubuntu anyone?) but they are opening doors which KDE will eventually benefit from and are supporting Kubuntu on the way.
  • KDE4.0 is not ready for the primary user groups Kubuntu focuses on so I’m not really surprised that LTS was not considered. Without knowing what shape 4.1 will be in, it is difficult to know when future KDE4 releases will be mature enough to offer support. A lot of people aren’t happy about this, but it’s hard to support bleeding edge technology when it’s still bleeding.
  • Ubuntu’s product philosophy is focused on being human. Although both Gnome and KDE have room for improving usability, Ubuntu is commited to the user. This philosophy makes K/Ubuntu an attractive project for a designer/usability engineer to participant in.
  • Canonical has repeatedly sponsored developer and non-developer contributors (e.g. artists, community leaders, usability engineers), many of whom are also active in the KDE community. Even though Ubuntu is their commercial interest, Canonical’s support for KDE/Kubuntu reaches even the fringe of contributions.
  • Open source is my hobby, not my job. People complain about upstream contributions, including usability. The Kubuntu project has been one of the most enjoyable projects I have worked with. When most of my work gets moved upstream anyway, why would I want to stop working with Kubuntu?

seele :: Feb.03.2008 :: Design, General, KDE/Kubuntu :: 13 Comments »