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KDE SC 4
The Good
Innovative features and unique solutions.
The Bad
Questionable fundamental design decisions.
The Broken
Longstanding and often-reported bugs.
What is KDE SC 4
SC: Software Collection
The KDE Community's main product. It includes
all software created by the community.
Plasma Desktop
The core environment including the workspace
and panels.
Key Applications
Software suites and programs which provide
key functionality.
KDE 4: The Good
Innovative features and unique solutions
Plasma Desktop
Configurable widgets on the panel and on the
desktop.
Dolphin File Manager
Simple, powerful, configurable. Includes split
view, sorting and preview options, and a
built-in terminal emulator.
Okular Document Viewer
Supports many innovative features to redefine
how we interact with electronic documents.
KDE 4: The Bad
Questionable fundamental design decisions
Disregard for feature stability and
users' needs
Seemingly no regression testing is performed
for either Plasma or key applications.
Experimental and incomplete
software in major releases
Core features of key applications are removed
between "x.N" releases.
Misleading versioning scheme
Hijacking of the "x.0" paradigm to release
developer-preview software.
KDE 4: The Broken
Longstanding and often-reported bugs
Wrong timestamp on files copied
to fish protocol
Reported in 2003 as bug #55804.
"System Settings" does not
change the system's settings
Several bugs dating to 2004 (bug #82009) and
possibly earlier.
Proxy settings are not followed
Introduced in KDE 4.0 as bug #155707.
The Good: Okular Document Viewer
Simple to use, yet many innovative features
Trim Margins
Fit more content onto the page without
horizontal scrollbars.
Continuous pan
Files continue to pan even when the mouse
leaves the screen edge.
Accessibility options
Convert to black & white, change background
colour.
The Bad: Misleading versioning
Ignoring FOSS versioning conventions misleads packagers
Usage of "x.0" version numbers
The "x.0" moniker is an accepted and long-
standing convention for a stable software
release. Hijacking that convention and
appending a "Developer Preview" subtitle does
not change the implied stability of such a
release.
KDE SC Software which has
used "x.0" version numbers for
incomplete software
* KDE
* Amarok
* Koffice
The Broken: "System Settings" simply isn't
The misleading name is a common source of user frustration
Despite the name, "System
Settings" affects only KDE
settings.
This causes confusion when non-KDE apps do
not behave as expected.
Even when the app was called
Kcontrol there were requests to
write configuration changes as
system-wide
Bug #82009 was opened in 2004, other bugs
requesting similar functionality may have been
filed even earlier.
More Information
KDE SC Users
http://kde.org
http://userbase.kde.org
http://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/kde
KDE SC Developers
http://kde.org
http://bugs.kde.org
http://techbase.kde.org
http://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/kde-devel
This slideshow
http://dotancohen.com
License
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/