Are We There Yet?
I received an interesting comment from a KDE4 user the other day:
When I read blog entries and see screenshots of KDE4 on people’s blogs like Aarons’, I find myself thinking “Wow, KDE4 looks pretty cool”. But when I try to make my desktop look like that, I can’t. There is nowhere in the UI to do what he’s done to his desktop, at least from what I could find. The average user can’t get what he’s got.
To the Marketing Team: What is this doing to KDE4’s image? It can’t be helping, but is it hurting? How do users feel when they see these beautiful screenshots of KDE4, but can’t recreate them at home? The more mature KDE4 becomes, the more users are going to try it. Is it still too soon?
KDE4 started out targeted at developers and early adopters — those who like to run bleeding edge technology. But when will KDE4 be ready for the rest of the world? Doing something as simple as configuring your desktop is still a major project, with costs in both time and frustration. Kubuntu Intrepid Ibex is planning on shipping 4.1.3 this fall, which makes me a little nervous. How many Kubuntu users will be afraid to upgrade and leave their safe KDE 3.5 behind? How many Kubuntu users are we going to lose because they can’t make the KDE4 transition?
[Edit June 23 2008 18:55 EST]
OK, so I probably shouldn’t have marked this post under usability (bad habit since 90% of my posts are about design/usability). It’s really about product marketing and business.
The post was written because I was curious to know what effect reading about and seeing developer screenshots has on our user base; expecially after they try the latest beta release and realize they can’t do what they see. When 4.0 was released, I didn’t have this concern because 4.0 was marketed as a developer release and not recommended for production use. But 4.1 is supposed to be The Big One. This is where everyone switches to KDE4 and the world is a better place. I know a lot of what are featured in dev screenshots will be done eventually, the question is when? 4.1? 4.1.1? 4.1.3? We’ve got a month to go, will what we see now in blog posts be there at the end of July? Or is this future-Future they are talking about? What effect is the future-Future going to have on a release that hasn’t yet been released? What will stop users from thinking we haven’t delivered on our promises?
More and more users are trying KDE4, but they’re still finding it unready 6 months after release. Yes, there have been great improvements since 4.0 and people who have been using it consistently tell me how much it is shaping up. These are the developers and early adopters saying this, not current 3.5 users who don’t fit that category and are the majority of Kubuntu’s user base. The problem is that KDE4 still doesn’t compete with the stability and features 3.5. I don’t care about the evolved experience from 4.0 to 4.1. I care about the changed experience from 3.5 to 4.1 (particularly 4.1.3). That changed experience is what we’re selling in October, and I want to know if I should begin worrying early if we’re risking the Kubuntu brand.
The 4.1 beta preview will obviously have bug crashes, but there still seems to be a lot of content/configuration missing. Are there really going to be that many content changes between now and the July RC candidate that will address all of these issues? If so, then I’m too early to worry about anything. But what vital pieces are still going to be missing?
the question could also be posed as: when kubuntu ibex ships, how many users are we going to win, and how many users are happily embracing the efforts done.
Why not let the ppl try an alternative? Since when do you have to deal with the feelings of anxious newbs? i think free software doesnt need any marketing.. especially not for anxious newbs..
to be honest i think *buntu-users are lost users anyway (from kde perspective).. sooner or later they ll pick the “original”.. it isnt much different in OPENsuse nor now in fedora…
2c of a newb
the question could also be posed as: when kubuntu ibex ships, how many users are we going to win, and how many users are happily embracing the efforts done.
the question could be just as well: when kubuntu ibex ships, how many users are we going to win? and how many users will happily embrace the efforts that have been done?
Absolutly right!
And I hate some dialogs in kde4 too. I think all dialogs or user inferface should be review by a user interface team before it goes public!
well , i have been using kde trunk for a long time. since kde 4.0.81 , it has been both stable and very usefull and very pretty.
its still nowhere configurable like kde3 , but i think its ready for generall usage.
its my main and only desktop currently installed on opensuse 11 ( kde 4.0.82 ) and its already prettier (although not as funcional ) than kde3.
i often find myself thinking … just fix the bugs and release , kde 4 from trunk ( kde4.1) is already the best desktop there is !
main problems to me : systray , no menu applet like in kde3 ( a la macosx) and kwin not working with “keep minimized windows updated”.
Hi, this was indeed an issue for me: the screenshots allways looked better than what I could accomplish on my desktop.
I’ve installed opensuse 11, and “upgraded” to kde 4.1 right away with no effort.
(tried to do the same in kubuntu before, didn’t work out for me tough I’m not new to linux)
I must say I’m very pleased with KDE4.1 in opensuse! I have had only 1 plasma-crash on logout once, in my experience despite being brand-new it is very stable.
It looks _very_pretty_, and has all of the features that were teasing me in blogs and screenshots.
I’m very happy with it!
I agree with the statement. I get really excited to see people’s desktops running KDE4, especially that one version that Arch has, but when I try to re-create it I get frustrated and switch back to GNOME or Xfce. I used to be a KDE nut but switched to GNOME after getting fed up with the way KDE does things. I hope KDE can win me back in the future.
Ok! Back to the quoted comment. I don’t think any user should expect to be able to configure anything the same way they just saw in a blog unless they are running five-minuts-ago-trunk. It would be like just having submited an article to a magazine and imediately go looking for it in the previous issue. It makes no sense.
That said, I completely agree with the need to keep the configurability standards we all got used to with KDE3. Rock on KDE4 and usability!
i am using kde4.1 beta2, thanks for project neo, and it is damn slick and fast and beautiful on only 256 mb of ram, as for helping newbie, make a good default, use another plasma theme, if you don’t like the default one. pick another wallpapers, just impress us, the first contact is important.
Well, in a way I can understand this guy who commented on this. It is often hard to find plasma widgets that i.e. Aaron shows on his desktop. Some are in playground, others probably scrambled in other packages. It gives new users a hard time to figure out where to get them.
WHAT? Developer blogs show features not yet available? How could that be?
In my opinion, KDE 3.5 was made for developers and people who like to tinker. It’s quite popular with them.
KDE4 was when some artists / design people came along and tried to make it for everybody. They didn’t quite work out everything, hence why KDE 4.0 was still for developers and people who like to tinker. I do hope the artists / design people get better control of KDE to accomplish their vision.
I know two good points:
1. Developers are showing new features what they have because they are used development version of KDE4. So do not expect to get same kind if you dont get your hands dirty by turning to development version!
2. KDE4 still lacks lots of features what we have use to have on KDE3. Even GNOME has more configuration options! But, KDE4 is still on development state and it’s not just 3 > 4 version numbering. I feel it’s more like 0.1 > 1.0 because so much has to be codec again to allow better future for KDE.
So, I say two fix here!
1. Say on every screenshot post that it’s from current SVN/GIT etc etc…
and for 2. Add more features, lots of configurations and test them and if it does not work, drop off on next version by default but allow it to be get back by someway.
Default Desktop should be easy and simple, but it does not mean that desktop should be easy and simple so user can not configure it!
Defaults, defaults, defaults, defaults! We need to think why do those developer-screenshots look so good, and why doesn’t KDE look like that by default. Why doesn’t it?If kde could be more beautiful with little effort, why isn’t it done?
I totally understand your fears. I recently tried fedora 9 and was left with kde 4.0.4. The gnome desktop shined, while the kde desktop was almost unusable for me. I then heard about project neon and switched to kubuntu, and I am now running neon nightlies.
I can say that kde4.1 won’t leave people disappointed. The only thing missing are the small kicker utilities that made peoples lifes easier, but that will change. Plasmoids are more than easy to write, and I am absolutely certain that some high quality plasmoids will arrive soon (anyone into porting knemo? :)
The only thing I am worried about is not featurewise - it is stability. There are som crashes that are really non-cool - but since I am using svn I can see some MAJOR progress - so I am really not that worried.
I remember the 3.0 switch, and I also remembered how much better the 3.1 version was. I can say that 4.1 from just a few days ago is ahead of 3.1 - and I prefer it to the 3.5.9 already. 4.0 sucked balls - 4.1 is slick! (I know that 4.0 wasn’t intended as a stable release. The “sucked balls” part was just to be a little bit sensational).
I run about 3 kubuntu systems. I rely on two of them to do my day to day job. The third one I can mess about with, and that one has KDE4. I will test KDE4.1 when it comes out, but the performance and reliability will have to increase a lot.
KDE4.0 is very promissing, but also very sluggish, hardly configurable (where’s the printer dialog people, not everyone knows how to get to the cups web interface), and hangs at least once every day. I’m skilled enough to pull through, don’t lose data and get stuff done. Your average user can’t do that.
I also don’t trust it for anything that’s really critical. My two other systems still run 3.5, and are rocksolid. I’ve also put kubuntu on the pc of my parents and girlfriend. They run kde3.5 and are very happy, but we’re very annoyed by the hickups in KDE4.
When the new kubuntu arrives, I will check it out and reevaluate KDE4, but it will have to improve a lot before I’ll do any critical stuff on it, or place it on the computer of not-geeks.
“KDE4 still lacks lots of features what we have use to have on KDE3. Even GNOME has more configuration options!”
Configuration-options and features are not the same thing. You can have lots of features while having little configuration-options.
The difference between the two is that features are the things you can actually do with the system, while configuration-options are the ways you can modify the system.
“Default Desktop should be easy and simple, but it does not mean that desktop should be easy and simple so user can not configure it!”
IMO, configuration-options are not needed if the desktop already “just works”. Those options are needed if the desktop does not work the way the user wants it to work. But if it does, those are not needed.
This touches the subject of “paradox of choice”. If users are given ways if changing everything, users will always be wonrrying if their system is “all that it could be”, thus making the use of the system less enjoyable. No, I’m not advocating the removal of choice if that’s what you are wondering :).
For those interested: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Paradox_of_Choice
@Janne “Those options are needed if the desktop does not work the way the user wants it to work. But if it does, those are not needed.”
Almost everyone can do basic things with default settings. But default settings do not fit to every situation, or every person.
That’s why we have hundreds of different GNU/Linux distributions, because one can not fit to supercomputers and to handheld sametime. We need to have configuration options so allow users to customize desktop as they want to use it.
Example with mouse, 95% are right handed, so why there would be need to have option to change it as left handed? They can work with right handed settings if wanted…
The answer is, they can but it’s not nice or enjoyable, that’s why we have config to change it. And you are about the config isn’t same thing as feature, but I didn’t mean it is. Because we can have feature what automatically detects wich button does user press when access files or trying to open things, and it would automatically change configs to left handed set, without that we have configuration option for it!
We can have desktop full of features, but zero (0) config options, but it wouldn’t be so nice.
I think that automatic feature what change options automatically for user, is better than feature what you need to config your self, but because there is too great possibility that automatic feature does not work, we need configs to override it! ;-)
What exactly ARE the things that are in the screenshots but can’t be set up by users? I’m running KDE4.1 Beta1, and I tend to watch planetkde.org and can’t really think of anything I can’t do right now that I’d like.
Examples?
>IMO, configuration-options are not needed if the desktop already “just works”. Those options are needed if the desktop does not work the way the user wants it to work. But if it does, those are not needed.
That’s what GNOME are saying in many cases (not in those words, they tend to claim it will complicate it or confuse people if they let users have choice), and a lot of people hate them for it, I’d much prefer that KDE leaves it easily configurable than goes the route GNOME is going. I was attracted to KDE because of it’s configurability being much greater than GNOME’s, and hopefully that won’t change.
“Almost everyone can do basic things with default settings. But default settings do not fit to every situation, or every person.”
Maybe, maybe not. But still, we have millions of people who are happily using systems that, when compared to KDE, are not configurable at all. Point is that those options are not absolutely required to have a system that is usable and enjoyable to use.
“The answer is, they can but it’s not nice or enjoyable, that’s why we have config to change it.”
Well, Mac-users have VERY little configuration-options, and they are absolutely in love with their systems and they are very productive with them. Point is that if the system is well-designed and it works well, the need to have tons of options is not that acute anymore. Why change something that works?
“That’s what GNOME are saying in many cases (not in those words, they tend to claim it will complicate it or confuse people if they let users have choice), and a lot of people hate them for it”
And lots of people love them for it. I have used both KDE and Gnome (and OS X for that matter), so I can see both sides of the argument. And when I used Gnome (and OS X), there was that feeling of “serenity” that I didn’t have with KDE. What I mean is that when I used KDE, I tweaked it to moon and back. And I loved it because of that. But I always had this feeling that “could I configure this desktop to work even better?”, and when I did change settings, it took a lot of time, since there were so many things to try out. In Gnome (and OS X) I did not have that anxiety, since the options were more limited, and they therefore felt more manageable. They did not overwhelm me with their multitude. And even though I had less things to tweak, the system felt enjoyable to use.
It was only later when I heard of the “paradox of choice” and it mirrored my experiences 1:1.
My wife mirrored that feeling. She found KDE tio be overwhelming and confusing, while Gnome (and OS X) seemed more welcoming and manageable to her.
“I’d much prefer that KDE leaves it easily configurable than goes the route GNOME is going.”
I’m not saying that KDE should not be configurable. What I AM saying is that the defaults should “just work” and they should be drop-dead gorgerous, that way the need to change things diminishes. Configurability should be there, but it should be such that it doesn’t overwhelm the user. if it overwhelms the user, the end-result is the same as if there were no options at all. If the user gets overwhelmed, he will be afraid of making any changes. But if the options seem manageable, the user is more confident in changing things.
I do not understand your fears. The things I’ve seen in screenshots are all reproducable through the GUI. Infact, I’ve never edited a config file for kde4. I can assure you that when kde 4.1 is released it will be exactly what the users want. I have never seen a screenshot that I could not reproduce without the GUI.
I have used kde 4.1 exclusively, (now, with the help of the neon project), and I can say that it is everything I need in a desktop.
I’m going to make sure to tell some of my friends etc not to upgrade.
Its a huge jump and definately not ready for most users!
I’ll be keen to have a Kubuntu polished kde4 version though but for most users I wouldn’t recommend it.
Hopefully it’ll improve lots by then. :)
TO noname of comment 2,
I can tell you that Kubuntu users are definitely *not* a lost cause.
I started on Ubuntu, tried Kubuntu not too long after and was immediately sold by the better usability and looks. Since then once a year or so I’ve tried to use Ubuntu, but every time have consistently been driven back to Kubuntu within 20 minutes each time. I know how to use Gnome. It’s just that while I’m thrilled it serves the needs of others well, for me it’s:
a. very feature limited and
b. without major customisation, it looks incredibly ugly and
c. other than firefox and openoffice almost all of the apps I love are KDE ones (mainly KDE4). Have you noticed how most of the amaziong “new” features on Banshee 1.0 have been on Amarok for how long?
Thus I am a happy Kubuntu user (for lovers of “The Exorcist” … “Out Gnome! The power of KDE4 compells you!”). Even the myriad of Gnome first/only improvements by Canonical have not managed to sway this variety loving user. As the name of my blog (”Kubuntulover”) confirms, Kubuntu has managed to hold my preference firmly all the way since Dapper.
Hail KDE!
Hi Celeste,
I know you are a usability person, one that I admire even. The problem here is a traditional one; to a carpenter everything is a nail.
I think in your blog you thought the issue would be a usability issue, luckely for us its actually a technical issue.
The (usable) UI-elements required to mold plasma into what people want are new, so new that early adaptors would indeed have the problems you describe.
The good thing is; just waiting will fix this problem.
This totally addresses your concerns. But, naturally, nobody is going to claim the UI of plasma (or KDE4 in general) is perfect. But to have fears that it will be impossible to use is IMOHO misplaced. The devs are not that wet behind the ears ;)
Please at minimum check a webcast or two, or run a live-CD before blogging such doubts ;)
As far as I can tell, the only thing that can’t be done in the GUI that Aaron has demonstrated is setting the folderview as the default containment. Not a big deal I think since few people will want to do that before wallpaper rendering is fixed, and for those that do, Aaron showed how to do it in his screencast.
Without specific issues, this post doesn’t really have much of a point.
I think KDE4 looks beautiful as shipped in Kubuntu and fairly easy to twiddle the eye candy. I do hope that the final 4.1 release will fix many of the problems such as plasma crashing at the drop of a hat etc. However I think I will be one of the people who will stop using kubuntu (well KDE) for my main work if it is only available with KDE4.1 in Intrepid. I have been using KDE since version 1, found it the most productive, customisable and easy to use desktop that has just got better with time. Unfortunately KDE4 does not work for me. A desktop for me is just that, I chuck files there that I am working on, it becomes a total mess during work sessions, but, like my real desktop, stuff is close at hand, I know where everything is and I clean it up occasionally. Trying to use the Folder View Widget on 4.1 beta is not a substitute (and it crashes plasma for me). I want to be able to right click on a desktop icon and manipulate it quickly and simply with a right click option or pick it up and chuck it somewhere else. I will be keeping KDE4 installed on some computer, but I am sad that it will become something to play about with now and then, rather than a (for me) usable environment. For me a desktop environment should be fully customisable to my liking and allow me to work as I want, not what others think is good practise (as should an OS as well).
I am aware that I am using Beta and kde4.0 is a ‘review’ version so expect things to break (hey my home server runs Debian Sid). There are many excellent features in KDE4 that I can see being stolen, erm, copied by certain other commercial operating systems, but I am hoping that the 3.x series will be supported for a good wee while to come and usability for me will once again come back to KDE4
Great post and a very good question.
Having used KDE4 since the RCs, I guess I count as an “early adopter”, so my opinion might be positively biased:). Nonetheless, I find 4.1 (”KDE4 unstable” in openSUSE 11) pretty much OK for day to day work - I switch to KDE3 or Gnome mainly for experimentation (and then I immediately miss bits and pieces from 4), and can really find nothing that would force me to regress to the previous version or switch to another environment.
That doesn’t mean I can’t find things lacking in KDE4; the thing is, I know those gaps are gonna be filled in the end, and none of them is a showstopper.
I’d strongly oppose the view that “newbs/*buntu users” (why the equality sign between them anyway?) “are lost cause”. If Linux is going to triumph - and I’m sure it will sooner or later - it is going to take every user we can get. We, as Linux users generally, and KDE users specifically, won’t extend our user base by triyng to convert the already convinced. Getting new people, many or most of them Windows users, is the key to success; therefore, making it as user-friendly as possible is really a priority. It won’t be “desktop-ready” until my mother/any long-time Windows user can install and use it without (my) supervision. Of course much of this is kernel work, or distro work, but it applies to KDE and other destkop environments as well.
On a final note, KDE3 may not be an appropriate yardstick for 4.x after all; 4.x does not have to mimick its predecessor. If it does it job sufficiently enough, in terms of usability and configurability, it is a valid alternative (but of course the prettier, more robust, and more fun it gets, the better the chance of conversion). If we want to compete with commercial products, we have to think commercially just a little bit.
Your concerns are spot on — an ordinary user, i.e., me, finds the lack of useability in KDE 4.0.X quite daunting, very frustrating and in the end disappointing.
Click on HELP and there isn’t any, or what is there is for some long forgotten version 3.x from back in 2004.
Try to figure out how to add your favorite application to what used to be known as a desktop — you can’t: none of the plasmoids provided by the thing in the upper right corner allow you to do that.
How about a simple way to change the way the font looks which appears under the plasmoids — nope, can’t be found.
Someone, somewhere needs to sit down and figure out what the average user might reasonably be expected to want to do. Once that has been done then the developers, artists, coders, authors, proof readers, etc. all need to be convinced that a general release should provide that level of functionality first before the cool stuff is added. None of this, if done correctly, will interfere with or compromise in any way the vision of those involved in the creation of KDE 4.X.
cheers…jack
What I think everyone here is missing is the fact that the configuration options that they are complaining about are stupid.
Who in the hell really needs to change what the font in an obscure section of the desktop looks like? Can we do that on Windows? No we can’t.
All blog posts like this are doing is feeding the resentment that the community feels. If the users see people involved with the project being negative towards it, than they start to get worried and resentful.
KDE 4.1 is beautiful, functional, and yes a learning curve compared to kde 3. But I can assure anybody having doubts about it will learn to love it.
Am I really preaching to a group of people who can’t put up with a little change? In that case, why switch to linux?
KDE4 has made me pretty sad, especially for something I was initially excited about. Seriously, when you login to kde4…do you feel that is something usable? And I don’t mean developer usable, I mean mom and pop usable, or even enterprise desktop usable.
If using an even number as the beginning of development for a future platform was the idea here, it was a huge mistake. This is the problem with people not being able to recreate the images. No one knows what the heck version to use because each distro is using some wild version, and each of which are not the same because the whole environment is not complete.
The current usability and feature set is just not what people expect from an even number release. Sure the developers get the idea about 4 being a platform to build the future on, but do users? The answer is no! Users want something fast stable and usable (and not usable in the sense “it kinda works!”).
I believe KDE should be concerned because as fanboys and developers may consider this a success so far, users surely wont.
I’m one of the people who’re going to switch to KDE 4.1 definitely, when it’s released. I truly admire what you guys (and girls, too ;)) are capable of doing. Plasma is doing the work for me. FolderView is amazingly practical for me. I have a real desktop, not a desktop folder. And my gripes are about 2 minor bugs that, I know, will be squashed when KDE 4.1 gets released (not being able to move applets in panel, and NEPOMUK performance)
I was a KDE user, until I realized how limited were the Qt 3 libraries for the work you were trying to do with them. Qt 3 was designed for a presentation system (XFree86 4) that didn’t even had proper support for scalable fonts (FreeType 2 was young and slow, FreeType 1 was quirky, and XFS and the like were… no comments). To be fair, to design a desktop designed to look beautifully in a presentation system inferior than Windows’ 3.1 GDI, it’s simply amazing. XFree86 became X.Org, and the presentation system jumped in almost no time to an almost Vista-feature-parity. KDE 3 was outdated.
I jumped to a not-outdated, but ugly GNOME desktop, only to be chased by stupid decisions about usability. Did I want to change colours for my apps? GNOME made it IMPOSSIBLE (well, unless you think that programming a .gtkrc is a practical way to do it) until 2.18, and that’s a shame. KDE had that feature since I can remember (the first KDE I used was KDE 1, running in SuSE Linux 5.2), Windows had that feature since Windows 1.0 and MacOS had it since the Macs had a screen that supported more than 2 colors. I don’t like GNOME. Definitely. And you gave me the final reason to switch.
KDE 4.0.83 has been a breathe of fresh air. I like my desktop, and it’s as stable as I can get for a beta. I’m only waiting for Amarok, the rest is there to play with! Thank you, all of you.
“KDE4 has made me pretty sad, especially for something I was initially excited about. Seriously, when you login to kde4…do you feel that is something usable? And I don’t mean developer usable, I mean mom and pop usable, or even enterprise desktop usable.”
The problem with the above comment is that it confuses “KDE4″ with “KDE4.0″. KDE that we have right now, KDE4.0 is the FIRST version of KDE4. KDE4 will be with us for years to come, and it will expand in features and usability. We should NOT judge KDE4 by looking at KDE4.0. Hell, go ahead and compare KDE3.0 and KDE3.5.9. Huge difference, isn’t it? KDE4.1 alone is a huge improvement over KDE4.0, and KDE4.2 will be even better.
“I believe KDE should be concerned because as fanboys and developers may consider this a success so far, users surely wont.”
The everyday-users are still using KDE3.5.
“Unfortunately KDE4 does not work for me. A desktop for me is just that, I chuck files there that I am working on”
Um, you can do that in 4. Yes, you say that volderview crashes on you. Well, folderview is part on 4.1, and 4.1 is still in beta, is it not?
“I want to be able to right click on a desktop icon and manipulate it quickly and simply with a right click option or pick it up and chuck it somewhere else.”
Folderview has context-menu, and you can right-click on the icons as much as you want. Am I missing something here?
I for one REALLY don’t understand the noise the “icons on the desktop”-thingy has caused. The old system was replaced with something that offers A LOT more features than the old system did, and some people are simply incapable of adjusting to that change. Old and archaic system was replaced with new, flexible and featurefull system. And people complain. And they complaina bout things that they could do with the new system just fine, so their complaints are baseless.
This must be one of the great mysteries of our lifetime.
Unless we get to know what exactly the problem is, we cannot do anything about it, I’m afraid.
The possible solutions to this are just too many:
- Better documentation is needed (we know that)
- Patient users are rare (How do I know the guy who emailed you even tried more than 10 seconds?)
- Buggy packages (Maybe the distro changed things, that wouldn’t be the first time)
- Maybe the user in question is running an old version
- …
Those reasons are spread all over the place, and it’s not a single instance that can do anything about it.
Reports in the form of:
- “I’m trying to accomplish x-y-z, but I cannot find the y option”
- “How exactly do you get a-b-c to show up in d-e-f?”
- “It crashes when I do $this”
Along with sufficient meta information (version, backtrace, exact steps to reproduce, it’s cumbersome to deal with this).
I don’t agree that it has to do with marketing, though. First, it’s a single user’s opinion, so we shouldn’t generalise his opinion (without further knowledge, see above). Then, most probably it can (and should) be fixed by fixing the underlying problem.
So after all, blogging about this doesn’t help much, except that it gives people a place to dump all their whining in the same, unhelpful manner.
It was nail in the head post, at least for me. I usually jump between using KDE and GNOME as my primary desktop, and mostly this happens either when I get bored of one or during a new release. So, I was planning to jump back to KDE with Hardy release, rather thought of trying KDE4 one. But, I ended up staying with GNOME for another release cycle, as KDE4 was above my heads even for someone who loves KDE more and I couldn’t do simple things I could do with KDE3.5. I have been hearing that things have improved then, but do not want to move to Kubuntu (with KDE4) until Intrepid is out. Hope I will become a K (user) back again ;) but I have similar fears as you have expressed in your post.
@Technofreak: What were the things you had problems with? We’d *like* to fix them, but there’s obviously no fix for “it’s above my heads” …
“This is where everyone switches to KDE4 and the world is a better place.”
Use less drugs. Seriously. KDE’s HIG has got so many utter usability failures that it is not touchable even with a long stick. The amount of candy you have just added did not fix the most basic problems, too crowded and all around you. Horrible, just plain sad that someone actually even enjoys using that. I’d rather use Vista as my main de to be honest.
I don’t think KDE 4 HIG is even finished.
“But what vital pieces are still going to be missing?”
Well, for example… proxy-support: http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=155707
ATM you can’t use KDE4 behind a proxy. And unfortunately in almost every company and university you are behind a proxy.
@troll: 1) sarcasm, 2) the HIG finished and hasn’t been published to the community. The whole point is to try and make KDE4 better, not to try and sell it as something that it’s not.
Actually, I think what is mostly missing right now is a set of stable applications for KDE 4. I am really looking forward to the new koffice (flakes are cool!) and the new kdepim applications. But they aren’t even close to being stable yet. Mixing KDE 3 apps with a KDE 4 desktop also doesn’t work well (at least for me). I’ve tried KDE 4 on Fedora (at work), openSuse (on my laptop), and Arch (on my wife’s laptop), but even kde 4.1 beta 2 isn’t a comfortable working environment. I have to switch back to 3.5.9 to get anything done.
We’re getting there, though. Once kword and kontact stabilize, I think we’ll attract a LOT of users.