Kinda weird that they’re calling it an OS, but ig they’re just trying to cater to the windows audience
I’d just like to interject for a moment. What you’re referring to as Linux is in fact KDE/Linux, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, KDE plus Linux.
I’d just like to interject for a moment. What you’re refering to as Windows, is in fact, Adware/NT, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, Adware plus NT.
deleted by creator
It’s time to write free software and defend rapists, and I’m all out of programming talent
I don’t :(
deleted by creator
You can’t say that without explaining the reference. How can they be one of the lucky 10 000 when they still don’t get it?
deleted by creator
deleted by creator
What if you’re running KDE stuff on *BSD. Or on Windows, for that matter…
(eg: I use Kate on windows as my primary text editor on my work computer…)
KDE neon is what they’re selling
Selling as in advertising, I might add. Neon is free
Neon is more of a testbed than a proper distro (they don’t actually even use that word).
Is this “the KDE distro”?
Nope. KDE believes it is important to work with many distributions, as each brings unique value and expertise for their respective users. This is one project out of hundreds from KDE.
It’s a proper distro, that’s just saying it’s not THE official one
Uhm
Is it a distro?
Not quite, it’s a package archive with the latest KDE software on top of a stable base. While we have installable images, unlike full Linux distributions we’re only interested in KDE software.
Oh ok
Which is…still not an OS. It’s a distribution. Specifically, it’s a fork of Ubuntu. To reiterate what the OP was saying, they’re catering to the Windows audience, who understand the concept of a “new Windows version,” but who wouldn’t understand the concept of a distribution.
What exactly is an OS to you? All distros are operating systems because they ship all the tools and utilities need for the system to function (on top of a package manager).
The fact that the KDE devs didn’t write that code themselves doesn’t disqualify it from being an OS.
An OS is the interface layer between hardware and software. It’s the first code that runs after the boot loader, and it exposes an API for syscalls that allow user processes to allocate typically restricted resources, while also tracking and maintaining those allocated resources, doing process scheduling, and a bunch of other critical tasks.
All distros are operating systems because they ship all the tools and utilities need for the system to function
All distros contain operating systems (or, more accurately, kernels), or, rather, are built on top of them. A distribution is a collection of curated software, along with an init system and, for linux, package manager, and, frequently, a particular desktop environment. These pieces of software are, on some level, superfluous. You can have an OS without them. They don’t comprise the OS as a distinct conceptual layer of a computer system, of which there is the hardware, operating system, application, and user layers. The operating system is just Linux - because that is the interface layer between the hardware and software.
Saying “all distros are operating systems” is like saying “all cars are engines.” It’s just wrong. And I don’t care what wikipedia has to say about it.
It’s actually not even a distro, according to their own description at least
Is it a distro?
Not quite, it’s a package archive with the latest KDE software on top of a stable base. While we have installable images, unlike full Linux distributions we’re only interested in KDE software.
Sounds like a distribution that they don’t want to call a linux distribution.
They probably feel like the name distribution means more than just slapping a DE on it and basically a PPA. Then again, haven’t stopped loads of distros from doing that hah.
Could be another way to discourage people using it as a beginner distro or something.
I mean, there’s over a thousand linux distributions already and it feels like they just don’t want it to be another drop of water in the ocean.
I feel like they intended to mention KDE neon (which is the official KDE distro).
“But can Linux install things via a single .exe file? HAHAH EAT IT NERD!”
- 10’ish years ago past me, before discovering the magical wonders of the package manager
I found since people are used to app stores, I’ve had a much easier time convincing people to try out Linux. My mom even said that she always wished her windows PC had a proper app store.
I think it’s still important to explain the key difference between an “app store” and a package repository: the latter isn’t a “store” because everything is free.
True but it helps get the concept across so much.
Thst might change with Flathub’s ambitions to become an actual app store though
Did I just heard that right? Flathub wants to charge for software?
Yes. Flathub wants to become a platform where people and companies can sell their software
Well hey, as long as these participating devs maintain that their software remains FOSS, I’d pay up. They do a lot of good work, can’t do it all for free.
But Windows does have an app store, and has for ages now.
Yeah but it’s awful, and can only install UWP apps which are just plain bad
When is the last time you’ve used it? Microsoft opened it up and now you can find all types of non UWP apps in it.
Still ass though.
Just install/update App Installer and use winget.
Most of them are, but there are non UWP apps on there too.
Sure, but pretty much every common application most people use is available, which is fine for the majority of people such as OPs mom.
deleted by creator
deleted by creator
What crap machine are you running? I can open the store on my Surface 3 I’ve had for nearly a decade.
I don’t think getting instagram, or photoshop off the microsoft store is giving anyone a virus. And I’ve never gotten a virus from it in the few times I’ve used it.
deleted by creator
It’s not that good. It’s ok (especially now that it’s been unshackled from the hell of UWP), but it’s not as good as most Linux options.
For someone like OPs mom it would be more than good enough is my point. She’s saying she wished something existed that does indeed exist.
Windows has also had a variety of freeware since before there was never an app store
Of course, and much of it is on the app store now (which I rarely use myself), but for someone like OPs mom who just wants an easy app store, well there is one.
Not to mention Flatpaks.
Windows 11 takes your money, gives you ads, sells your information and ignores your bug reports and feature requests
KDE is free, ad-free and open to contribution
I think we have a clear winner here
But can it run proprietary software used in the industry? From Excel to Photoshop, if you are in a collaborative professional environment, you can’t run away from those, and don’t tell me you can use the alternatives in Linux, because no, you can’t. This is not linux fault, but it’s still an issue you can’t handwave.
I love linux, but you can’t expect people to adopt it just because it’s objectively better than windows.
Wine can run most of those, not all. You can still dual boot Windows if you need to (VMs are an option, but they aren’t always the best).
I mean, that’s what I do. Will I be able to convince my 60 yo colleague that had been using the same workflow for decades? No, not a chance.
But you understand that’s a massive Ballache to deal with on top of your normal workload?
I haven’t tried running anything new, but the stuff I have run in wine has worked easily, without any tweaking
@desconectado @glibg10b Wine exists… And that’s all I have to say. There is a good installer in lutris for creative cloud that works pretty good if you own it. And if you have a NVIDIA graphics card, it works even better, almost like on windows. It’s not 1:1 but we’re getting close. For excel you have wine again or a great free alternative is WPS or softmaker if you want to buy it.
I wish Wine worked well enough to use Excel. We are not talking about adding up numbers in a cell. Once you include macros, or a reference manager in Word, Wine is not good enough. The same can be said about propietary software, like autocad, or software used to control equipment. Also, good luck convincing a regular user to get familiar with wine.
WPS is great for simple files. Again, not good enough for complex files, especially if it is a corporate collaboration environment. I have lost count on the amount of ppt files that didn’t display well when it used WPS.
Every other year I try all the alternatives you mention, hoping they got better, and I always come back to use a dual boot or a virtual machine, which is not a thing your regular user wants to do.
You just gotta make an effort. The one who are too lazy will never be free of Microsoft’s clutches. Which probably just means pretty much everyone will stick to windows.
That’s my point, I use linux as much as I can, but if 80% of your colleagues use Windows… You don’t have much choice.
It depends on your industry. I’m in an agile development team, working in AWS in Java. I’m not a dev, so my work is in spreadsheets, word processor documents, web utilities like Azure Dev Ops
All that is platform independent, though we have to work on the organisation’s computers, so we work in the office on windows PCs or from home on whatever, remoted into a windows machine or VM
The devs work in VMs which are variously windows or GNU/Linux depending on what the person’s previous project was.
Sounds like you need better colleagues.
I use linux 50% of my time, I’m not going to ditch my job so I can use it 100%, lol. What kind of advice is that for someone who wants to use linux.
If you want real change you have to change for real.
There are enough web based office instances running for Linux to be functional in that regard.
Photoshop on the other hand…
GIMP will be great once it no longer needs to dodge patents
Audio players work great now MP3 is out of patent (before that MP3 was really only available if you were willing to ignore the patent)
I love linux, but you can’t expect people to adopt it just because it’s objectively better than windows.
Excel o,O
Meh I had a dual boot machine ages ago. Still here collecting dust. Basically I only switched to use the Linux for down time, movies, and study, most day to day tasks from engineering software to anything I considered important enough that you do not want the results hacked or broken I would use Windows.
I think of modern machines kind of like a hammer. These days almost nobody actually remembers the guy who made the first hammer, or who discovered fire, but there’s a price tag for the bow, the paper and the hammer, not so much the making of the hammer, because the actual skill involved or required to learn about it has become challenged if not cheapened to the degree that there are now multiple paths to obtain or create a hammer, yet the benchmark quality of the hammer as well as the process for creation itself as a whole is now more of an authority than the actual original statue or monolith of “hammer man” himself.
This is why I think the many flavours of Ubuntu including the many esoteric Linux distros are still interesting but still lack the diversity of use and specialization. The fact that whole blockchains are built for XYZ while sitting around pumped then dumped to trading at cents with no use goes to show how cloud computing systems and lower level computing is still very disconnected and becoming further thrown aside to uphold ponzi schemes.
I’ll give you an example, more money is wasted on onlyfans per year than for people trying to use system XYZ for solving problem A, or curing cancer. Consider that to be one of the “good” reasons many men and women are so misogynistic, even without looking down on sex workers.
I… what? What does Ubuntu have to do with misogyny?
This post reminded me to take my meds.
Get a life and stop trying to diagnose people via any observable behaviour. One day you’ll understand child lol
Look. Everything is like a hammer, in terms of specialization. From Linux distros to gender roles, if you want to understand the world, just look at the hammer. We live in the Hammer Age. It is hammer time.
No but yes it’s a useful analogy
Because plot twists and funny 🤣 nobody cares
And anytime you mention that anywhere when somebody is being fucked again by windows, people find you annoying
So basically ever since I first tried Windows 7 I held it as the “Gold standard” for desktop OS’s. Half my tweaks to Windows 10 were trying to get it as close to Win7 as I possibly could.
When I finally start experimenting with Linux early this year KDE quickly got me to reconsider my “Gold standard” and finally switch my main machine fully to Linux.
No regrets and certainly ain’t switching back even if Microsoft gave me updated Windows 7 with every extra feature I wanted back then.
I’ve been on Linux for ages and ages… back when I had to order CDs for new copies of Ubuntu.
Kde is the first desktop experience that I feel is the gold standard.
Every iteration of Linux I’ve used, solus, fedora, Ubuntu, Manjaro the DE I use is KDE.
I’m not sure why… but it makes sense to me and is my gold standard experience.
You can make KDE do pretty much whatever you want
Almost all my desktop gets used for anymore is gaming. The windows only anti cheat shit leaves me not messing with splitting what I boot up for.
I set my KDE up to look as much like Windows 7 as possible.
I think that was peak desktop design before designers started changing shit just to stay relevant.
Plasma is not a system, but I see how they didnt want to confuse people here
In the newest windows, it is even possible to hover the volume icon and change it with the mouse wheel!!!
KDE had that pretty much since the invention of the mouse wheel.
Still not going back to Windows!
LOL!
But you still need to get at the audio settings to tell it that it should use your microphone for a microphone, not the USB camera
Microsoft will probably never truly catch up with KDE
Plasma 6 is approaching fast
So is Windows 12… /s
Approaching at $9.99/month.
Is this sarcasm? I’m out of the loop.
To be fair, forcing a bunch of software on the machine users own was never a good move, and in my opinion, not a new normal.
It was a good move when people had no idea what they were doing and needed defaults to get started.
You mean the defaults that were against anti trust laws?
KDE is the best desktop environment.
not a kde user but huge respect to them
What’s the current reliable KDE Distro? I’ve been rolling with Kububtu for a while now, but Ubuntu’s Snap mandate has been getting annoying.
I have been enjoying OpenSUSE Tumbleweed. It’s a rolling distro unlike the Ubuntu and Debian derivatives, but the updates hardly ever cause problems and it’s very easy to roll them back if they do. It also gives you a choice between X11 and Wayland, and Wayland is working well for me on Intel graphics.
Tumbleweed is pretty much the “official” kde distro
Not KDE Neon?
KDE Neon gets the latest package updates regarding KDE first but it is not official in any sense, as listed on their website. In fact, Neon is just a package archive built on top of Ubuntu that offers more up to date KDE stuff.
I have used the distro as a daily driver in the past. It uses it’s own pkgcon package management system.
Fedora KDE Spin works pretty well
Debian or MX.
I’m using Kubuntu as my main OS and it has been very stable for me. You can remove snapd and install the deb Firefox repository. You should look up tutorials on how to do it, I did it and nothing broke
Most likely the best distro for KDE is KDE neon, but that doesn’t mean that much.
I use it on Debian testing and am very satisfied with it, KDE has never been so stable.
I for one hope to move from kubuntu to debian with KDE, I assume that won’t have snap shit or systemd shit, but I might be painfully mistaken right there, I haven’t checked it out yet.
Debian does use systemd, but what’s so bad about it? I’m just curious, I’m using Arch with KDE, and that also uses systemd. Never had any issues with it. Debian doesn’t use snap by default though.
MX does not use systemd by default
Fedoras flavor with KDE. Fedora never caused an issue for me.
Manjaro is pretty good.
I came back to KDE after a long absence because I never liked it back in the day (I found it ugly and bloated). I was really surprised by how good it has become. It’s now my favourite desktop environment on Linux, and I’m looking forward to version 6. So to any other oldies still avoiding KDE because of how it used to be, it’s worth another look.
I second your experience. It was not so impressive back then and 2indo2s was much nicer, but not anymore. I’m feeling it, this year Linux will be on top!
Edit: I tried to write Windows 🤷♂️
Here I am thinking there’s some obscure Linux project using a name that’s somehow a sequel to Windows, like a Windows 2, but also a play on the 2__4me meme.
Third. KDE is really amazing now.
Oh, this is good news for me. I remember trying KDE years ago and feeling that it was just way too heavy. My goto is usually Cinnamon, but the lack of Wayland support has made me hesitant to go all in with out on my gaming PC. Def gonna give KDE a try, thanks!
Cinnamon was where I had ended up too. So now I have a couple of Linux Mint/Cinnamon machines and a Tumbleweed/KDE machine. It surprised me that I like KDE more.
Fully based
KDE nerds: Is there a way to get a normal app launch indicator (cursor with a loading icon/hourglass) instead of either nothing or the little hopping icons that don’t animate right?
System Settings → Appearance → Cursor Theme → Configure Launch Feedback
That only has nothing, static (icon), blinking (icon) or bouncing (icon) though. I find anything involving the icon jarring, especially because it keeps lagging behind the cursor. And yes, this is incredibly minor.
Seems to be some cursor themes that do it that way, like this one for example: https://store.kde.org/p/2103612
I think you mean different. I find the bouncing very normal after all these years. The spinning wheel and hourglass is there but they are used to indicate system waits, rather than launches.
Of course you can shut the bouncing launch off if you dont like it.
No. Some people wanted to change it to that for Plasma 6, but on Xorg there’s apparently no way to make that happen, as the cursor is always decided on by the window you’re hovering over…
Oh, I see, thank you! Never noticed the cursor changing back when I put it over another window in XFCE, but I also never looked for that. I really just want that brief feedback, especially when I’m using a touchpad.
deleted by creator
