Like always when asking for help some more hints on what really went wrong would have been nice.
Stating the machine wasn't usable doesn't help us helping you at all.
And when giving us the needed hints, please open a new thread for that.

Of course KDE4 looks different. And as you probably have seen on this forum there are already some threads out here which describe that and some workarounds.

Other than that, no, KDE3 will not look different anymore.

wfdudley wrote:I think I've averted that by having her install xfce, but you sure lost two long time KDE users today.

I don't understand this mentality. At this very moment KDE4 is not (for some reason) not suitable for you and your wife. And because of that, you will never, ever use KDE4, no matter how good it ends up being in the future versions?

What exactly are the issues with KDE4 that you and your wife faced? "it looks different" isn't really valid, since you can change the appearance.

but the application ("Start") menu is really non-intuitive if you've been running KDE3 or XP recently.

And OS X is strange if you have only used Windows (OS X has NO start-menu at all, by default!). And Windows is strange if you have only used Macs. Different OS'es and GUI's are different, and I for one am glad for that fact. It would be very boring and lame if everything looked and behaved the same.

That said, you can change the menu. Right click on the Kmenu and select "Classic Menu" (or something like that). Then iot would look just like it looked in KDE3.

she was pretty mystified and I couldn't understand why -- NOW I understand.

You still haven't given any tangible examples as to what exactly is wrong with KDE4.

Another person who will be able to tell her friends "Linux is hard to use".

Could you give some tangible examples as to what makes KDE4 hard to use? Things that in KDE3 are apparently easier to do.

but I was so dismayed by this new interface that I felt it was worth the hour to create an account and write this message

What exactly is wrong with the interface? Seriously? Could we get some tangible examples? It's hard to discuss things like these if the only information we have is "it sucks".

There's really little point in this discussion. The developers have created
their magnum opus and love it. Some users love KDE4. My beef is really
with Kubuntu for changing "Kubuntu" so that the UI is drastically different,
without a BIG button that says "push this to make it look like it used to look"
so all of us who just want to work can get on with it. So now we'll move to
Gnome or Xfce so we can get back to work. We don't WANT to learn a whole
new UI. The whole point of computers for us is to do work, not play with a new
UI.

KDE3 and Gnome were sufficiently similar to XP that a potential Winders
convert wouldn't get scared away. The brave (or desperate) ones will be able
to handle KDE4, the rest will just give up and go back to Windows.

OK, so now for the specifics you have been asking for. YOU WON'T LIKE THIS.

Here's what I didn't like. WARNING: This is a *rant*, unlike my previous posting,
which aimed to be calm and reasoned. I have NOT researched these points, because
I've given up on KDE4, since it's obvious that the developers are interested in
different things from their computers than I am from mine.

In general, everything is different just to be different, as far as I can tell.

Specifically,
moving the "title bar" to the side? So now the title text has to be either sideways
or written on the application window itself? The title bar disappears when it "isn't
needed" - which makes it hard to move overlapping windows about since you can't
tell where a "dead" spot on the title bar will be when placing another window.

The start menu. Usable once you get the hang of it, but initially confusing to
us (we've been using computers since there *were* computers, and using FreeBSD
and later, Linux, since 1995 or so.) Clicking the "shutdown" button makes an
unexpectedly subtle change, so that if you're focused on the button you just
clicked on, you may miss the fact that "favorites" changes into seven (seven?)
choices for logout/shutdown/sleep/whatever, because the change is subtle.
Silly us, we were expecting the old behaviour, where BIG icons appeared in the
center of the screen. So I found myself clicking the shutdown button several
times, wondering when the shutdown options would appear.

Despite the previous poster's claims, I never found any "right click" that
offered the "classic KDE" interface, but then I didn't spend all day at it. I found,
after playing around for a while, that you could create a Widget, that seems to
have to have to sit on the Desktop, that acts like the old KDE3 start menu.
I don't think most people will have the patience to find it, unless they're just
**** around, and not actually trying to work against a deadline, on the clock,
etc.

Since we like to run xterm (or rxvt) but not the bloated bozo-term that is the
default in the menus (because we don't need a terminal where 30% of the screen
real-estate is taken up with menus, tabs, dancing girls, etc etc), we wanted to
create a button on the tool bar to start an xterm. Again, different for different's
sake. Click the little "gnome foot thingy" in the upper right corner to create a
widget? How non-obvious. Discoverable, yes, but expected? No.

Konqueror's file browser function is now moved to Dolphin (or whatever). Fine,
can we *kill* Konqueror now and just supply Firefox? When you give a Windows or
Mac user a Kubuntu installation, and they want to run a browser, they get sucked
into running Konqueror, and then they are *massively unhappy* because Konqueror
doesn't work with a huge number of web sites. It won't play youtube videos, it
doesn't do flash, it's generally worthless unless you're looking at html from 5
years ago. Nothing personal against the Konqueror developers, and we use
it when we want a light weight browser (something just a little better than lynx),
but we don't expect to actually visit any commercial web site successfully with it.

Obviously, all this is just due to major philosophical differences. The developers
are in it for the glory of a cutting-edge, avant-garde, "better than Vista" user
interface.

We just want it to work, to not change drastically from version to version of
Ubuntu, and to stay the hell out of the way while we do our jobs, which are
writer and programmer, and not user-interface tester.

Oh yeah, one more thing. Should you go to the kde web site and try to read the
documentation, you find that the links to both the HTML user guide and the HTML
faq are broken. Note, however, that I tried. I really did try, I just ran out of time
to waste on this.

wfdudley wrote:There's really little point in this discussion. The developers have created
their magnum opus and love it. Some users love KDE4. My beef is really
with Kubuntu for changing "Kubuntu" so that the UI is drastically different,
without a BIG button that says "push this to make it look like it used to look"
so all of us who just want to work can get on with it. So now we'll move to
Gnome or Xfce so we can get back to work. We don't WANT to learn a whole
new UI. The whole point of computers for us is to do work, not play with a new
UI.

I didn't count how often it now was said (only on this forum): KDE3 is still alive
Some distros decided to stick only to KDE4, but the choice is still out there.

KDE3 and Gnome were sufficiently similar to XP that a potential Winders
convert wouldn't get scared away. The brave (or desperate) ones will be able
to handle KDE4, the rest will just give up and go back to Windows.

OK, so now for the specifics you have been asking for. YOU WON'T LIKE THIS.

Here's what I didn't like. WARNING: This is a *rant*, unlike my previous posting,
which aimed to be calm and reasoned. I have NOT researched these points, because
I've given up on KDE4, since it's obvious that the developers are interested in
different things from their computers than I am from mine.

In general, everything is different just to be different, as far as I can tell.

Specifically,
moving the "title bar" to the side? So now the title text has to be either sideways
or written on the application window itself? The title bar disappears when it "isn't
needed" - which makes it hard to move overlapping windows about since you can't
tell where a "dead" spot on the title bar will be when placing another window.

Just a guess, you are talking about the widget handles. They appear on whichever side you decide to move the mouse on.

The start menu. Usable once you get the hang of it, but initially confusing to
us (we've been using computers since there *were* computers, and using FreeBSD
and later, Linux, since 1995 or so.) Clicking the "shutdown" button makes an
unexpectedly subtle change, so that if you're focused on the button you just
clicked on, you may miss the fact that "favorites" changes into seven (seven?)
choices for logout/shutdown/sleep/whatever, because the change is subtle.
Silly us, we were expecting the old behaviour, where BIG icons appeared in the
center of the screen. So I found myself clicking the shutdown button several
times, wondering when the shutdown options would appear.

You simply need to right-click on the K-Menu and choose "switch to classic menu style".

Despite the previous poster's claims, I never found any "right click" that
offered the "classic KDE" interface, but then I didn't spend all day at it. I found,
after playing around for a while, that you could create a Widget, that seems to
have to have to sit on the Desktop, that acts like the old KDE3 start menu.
I don't think most people will have the patience to find it, unless they're just
**** around, and not actually trying to work against a deadline, on the clock,
etc.

You can also drag it over to the panel, if you like to add it this way. Though it is a bit hard in 4.1, it will be very easy in 4.2

Since we like to run xterm (or rxvt) but not the bloated bozo-term that is the
default in the menus (because we don't need a terminal where 30% of the screen
real-estate is taken up with menus, tabs, dancing girls, etc etc), we wanted to
create a button on the tool bar to start an xterm. Again, different for different's
sake. Click the little "gnome foot thingy" in the upper right corner to create a
widget? How non-obvious. Discoverable, yes, but expected? No.

You can add every menu item you have in the menu to the panel. right-click on it and use "add to panel".

Konqueror's file browser function is now moved to Dolphin (or whatever).

Not whatever, it IS Dolphin.

Fine,
can we *kill* Konqueror now and just supply Firefox? When you give a Windows or
Mac user a Kubuntu installation, and they want to run a browser, they get sucked
into running Konqueror, and then they are *massively unhappy* because Konqueror
doesn't work with a huge number of web sites. It won't play youtube videos, it
doesn't do flash, it's generally worthless unless you're looking at html from 5
years ago. Nothing personal against the Konqueror developers, and we use
it when we want a light weight browser (something just a little better than lynx),
but we don't expect to actually visit any commercial web site successfully with it.

That sounds more like a general konqueror problem and has nothing to do with this topic.

Obviously, all this is just due to major philosophical differences. The developers
are in it for the glory of a cutting-edge, avant-garde, "better than Vista" user
interface.

We just want it to work, to not change drastically from version to version of
Ubuntu, and to stay the hell out of the way while we do our jobs, which are
writer and programmer, and not user-interface tester.

Oh yeah, one more thing. Should you go to the kde web site and try to read the
documentation, you find that the links to both the HTML user guide and the HTML
faq are broken. Note, however, that I tried. I really did try, I just ran out of time
to waste on this.

If you mean , it is there. And then we also have http://userbase.kde.org

But overall, you seem to be settled with your opinion, so no need for further discussion.

I didn't count how often it now was said (only on this forum): KDE3 is still alive
Some distros decided to stick only to KDE4, but the choice is still out there.

Kubuntu dropped KDE3, so that's it for us. [K]ubuntu is such a good distribution,
I'm loath to try to improve on that experience. But you are right, I could switch
distributions. A lot more work than apt-get update/apt-get upgrade though.

Just a guess, you are talking about the widget handles. They appear on whichever side you decide to move the mouse on.

I don't care what they're called, I just want them to stay put so I can find them when
I need them.

You simply need to right-click on the K-Menu and choose "switch to classic menu style".

Of course, I just didn't read the source code. How inept of me.

You can also drag it over to the panel, if you like to add it this way. Though it is a bit hard in 4.1, it will be very easy in 4.2

I couldn't drag it into the panel. Other widgets, yes, but not that one.

Konqueror's file browser function is now moved to Dolphin (or whatever).

I meant "or whatever it's called" since I didn't have a running system in front of me to check the name/spelling, and "Dolphin" is non-obvious as a name for a file browser.

That sounds more like a general konqueror problem and has nothing to do with this topic.

Yeah, I know, but I was on a roll.

If you mean , it is there.

Well, the LINK, "http://docs.kde.org/development/en/kdebase-runtime/faq/index.html",
was broken yesterday. It's working today, but tragically, I don't need it
anymore. Other non-documented links are nice, but not particularly
discoverable by the end-user.

But overall, you seem to be settled with your opinion, so no need for further discussion.

Yes, pretty much, though I do think you've missed the point. KDE4 seems to
be aimed at someone who's never used a computer before, and hence doesn't
have any preconceived notions as to how a UI ought to work. Or perhaps the
audience is people who just like to play with the UI, fiddle with the settings,
enjoy the animations and transparencies and all of that stuff, but not do any
actual "work".

Consider how youtube or google or ebay release a new user interface: They either
leave the old interface in place and give you a button that says "try the new UI",
or they spring the new UI on you, and give you a button that says "revert to old UI".
In either case, the user can get used to the new UI at his own rate, and not be thrown
into the deep end all at once.

Keeping KDE3 and KDE4 on the same machine is black-belt stuff that basically
nobody is going to do. So that means it's incumbent on the KDE4 developers to
create a BIG BRIGHT button that says "revert to more-or-less KDE3 UI".

Anyway, thanks for your time. I know I'm not going to change anybody's mind, but
it would be nice if you (developers) thought of these things before you spring KDE5
on unsuspecting KDE4 users in a couple of years. Personally, I shudder to think what
*that* will be like.

Bill Dudley[hr]
Oh yeah, I almost let this go:

You can add every menu item you have in the menu to the panel. right-click on it and use "add to panel".

Except that xterm *isn't in* the menu, so this advice is worthless. The point is
that the method for creating tool-bar buttons is needlessly arcane and hard to
discover.

Bill Dudley

wfdudley wrote:
Yes, pretty much, though I do think you've missed the point. KDE4 seems to
be aimed at someone who's never used a computer before, and hence doesn't
have any preconceived notions as to how a UI ought to work. Or perhaps the
audience is people who just like to play with the UI, fiddle with the settings,
enjoy the animations and transparencies and all of that stuff, but not do any
actual "work".

I didn't miss the point. And like you, i am using computers since early ages. I need to finish work, too. Nevertheless am i now running KDE4 since 4.1 fulltime.

And i don't play with the interface, the default is very fine for me. Of course after some time to get used to it.

Consider how youtube or google or ebay release a new user interface: They either
leave the old interface in place and give you a button that says "try the new UI",
or they spring the new UI on you, and give you a button that says "revert to old UI".
In either case, the user can get used to the new UI at his own rate, and not be thrown
into the deep end all at once.

Sad to say, we don't have this button... but let me repeat myself: KDE3 is still out there.

Seriously, KDE4 is a full replacement, do you really expect a button to change the UI??

We are not talking about a website, we are talking about a complete Desktop Environment. Not even WinXP has that to change back to Win98... (okay, this somehow working compatibility mode, but it's not for the UI).

Keeping KDE3 and KDE4 on the same machine is black-belt stuff that basically
nobody is going to do. So that means it's incumbent on the KDE4 developers to
create a BIG BRIGHT button that says "revert to more-or-less KDE3 UI".

Anyway, thanks for your time. I know I'm not going to change anybody's mind, but
it would be nice if you (developers) thought of these things before you spring KDE5
on unsuspecting KDE4 users in a couple of years. Personally, I shudder to think what
*that* will be like.

Bill Dudley

wfdudley wrote:There's really little point in this discussion. The developers have created
their magnum opus and love it. Some users love KDE4. My beef is really
with Kubuntu for changing "Kubuntu" so that the UI is drastically different,
without a BIG button that says "push this to make it look like it used to look"
so all of us who just want to work can get on with it. So now we'll move to
Gnome or Xfce so we can get back to work. We don't WANT to learn a whole
new UI. The whole point of computers for us is to do work, not play with a new
UI.

Another one that doesn't want to learn the little different config options in kde4, but is willing to learn xcfe our gnome that are totaly different then kde3

kde4 is ready to do your work on, klick kmenu start your application and work, nothing different then before. You can choose to use plasmoids but you don't have to.

wfdudley wrote:There's really little point in this discussion.

If you think that, why did you post here?

My beef is really
with Kubuntu for changing "Kubuntu"

Maybe you should complain to Kubuntu, and not KDE?

so that the UI is drastically different

It's not THAT different. Besides, lots of people have no problems moving from Windows to the Mac. And somehow the multitude of DOS-users managed to move over to WIndows.

We don't WANT to learn a whole
new UI.

You are in for a rough ride. Do you seriously think that computer UI's will stay unchanged for all eternity?

KDE3 and Gnome were sufficiently similar to XP

If you want something that looks and feels like XP, why not use XP?

that a potential Winders
convert wouldn't get scared away.

Windows-converts are managing OS X just fine....

OK, so now for the specifics you have been asking for. YOU WON'T LIKE THIS.

If your complaints are valid, I WILL like it. Tangible examples mean that we can discuss the actual problems and maybe fix them.

moving the "title bar" to the side? So now the title text has to be either sideways
or written on the application window itself?

Titlebar? You mean on app-windows? Um, it's still at the top of the windows, and the text is horizontal....

Despite the previous poster's claims, I never found any "right click" that
offered the "classic KDE" interface, but then I didn't spend all day at it.

I was talking about the K-menu. Right click on it, and select "switch to classic menu style". you then get the same Kmenu (or "start-menu) that you had in KDE3.

I found,
after playing around for a while, that you could create a Widget, that seems to
have to have to sit on the Desktop, that acts like the old KDE3 start menu.
I don't think most people will have the patience to find it, unless they're just
**** around, and not actually trying to work against a deadline, on the clock,
etc.

Right-click on the Kmenu on the panel, like I said above....

Konqueror's file browser function is now moved to Dolphin (or whatever). Fine,
can we *kill* Konqueror now and just supply Firefox?

Firefox doesn't integrate that well with rest of KDE, but it is usually supplied by the distro.

We just want it to work, to not change drastically from version to version of
Ubuntu, and to stay the hell out of the way while we do our jobs, which are
writer and programmer, and not user-interface tester.

Things change. That indludes UI's. If you think that desktop-GUI's will stay static for all eternity, you are in for a rough wakeup-call.[hr]

wfdudley wrote:

You simply need to right-click on the K-Menu and choose "switch to classic menu style".

Of course, I just didn't read the source code. How inept of me.

you don't need to read the source. All it takes is to right-click on the Kmenu and select the classic menu. It really is not rocket-science.

Yes, pretty much, though I do think you've missed the point. KDE4 seems to
be aimed at someone who's never used a computer before, and hence doesn't
have any preconceived notions as to how a UI ought to work.

By and large, KDE4 works in similar way as every other computer GUI works. Could you mention any of the major differences between KDE4 and some other desktop? they all follow the WIMP-paradigm.

Or perhaps the
audience is people who just like to play with the UI, fiddle with the settings,
enjoy the animations and transparencies and all of that stuff, but not do any
actual "work".

How does KDE4 prevent you from doing your work? The apps (OO.org etc.) you use are probably still the same as they were before.

You keep on complaining how KDE4 is "too different".... Well, Windows was order of magnitude more different when compared to DOS, and people managed. OS X was quite different when compared to OS 9, and people managed. OS X is quite different when compared to Windows, and switchers seem to be managing just fine.

Some of these complaints almost remind me of the Vista haters; they complain about Vista this and Vista that, but never actually used it.

67GTA wrote:I voted no, but I am still waiting for some of the features to start coming back before I completely switch. Maybe 4.2 will be that version. I installed Opensuse 11.1 beta three on a test partition on my desktop, and am pleased with their desktop hack to let the folderview cover the entire desktop so you can actually feel like your getting to use your desktop like in KDE3. That was one of the reasons I couldn't use KDE4 everyday.

that was no hack. that was a backport of code i wrote for 4.2.

you can say "thanks" whenever.[hr]

alukin wrote:KDE team raised all the noise about greatest ever beautiful new release

alukin wrote:May be it is really something wrong with KDE false advertising and cheated user expectations?

you really, really need to learn how to read and comprehend. those two actions go hand in hand. we were VERY clear about what 4.0 was, what the vision for KDE4 was and what the difference between "4.0" and "KDE4" was. over and over and over we said these things. now, apparently you paid enough attention to pick up on the KDE4 vision, something we are being quite successful in achieving, btw, but you didn't pick up on the "what to expect in 4.0".

makes one wonder.[hr]

mensch wrote:I agree that the KDE team should have made it clear that the 4.0 release was alpha quality software and that KDE 4 is still progressing towards a stable working environment.

we did.

mensch wrote:After that things have been significantly toned down.

which is rather unfortunate. because now we're back at boring, hum-drum and people SCARED to try to do new things. congratulations on finding one more way to screw over open source. :'([hr]

alukin wrote:Well, this is the root of problem. Look at Apache Tomcat or Netbeans. They release often. But not so EARLY. I think that some guys took this damned stupid "early" too close and decided to call "release" things that are pre-alpha.

... or we could look at projects like the linux kernel and get a very different baseline. you can cherry pick projects that show just about any release strategy.

alukin wrote:What you've got as result? You scared and droved mad a whole community of KDE users.That's all you've got with this strategy.

what we've gotten with this strategy is a KDE 4 series that is making regular releases with huge amounts of productivity going into it in terms of code written, features added and bugs squashed.

we would not have 4.2 in the shape it is without that 4.0 release in january.
we would not have applications such as amarok 2 or digikam ready to roll at this point either.
we would not have kwin compositing in such good shape, nor would we have nepomuk, solid or phonon anywhere near where they are now.

iow, we have a basis to compete going forward with the proprietary platforms .. all because we had the balls to make the right move back in january, even if it was a hard one.

as the fruits of this continue to roll in over the next few years, you and those who are standing with you right now are going to look more and more ridiculous in retrospect.

as for your fear and anger, use kde3 and find something better to do with your energy.

alukin wrote: Personally I even do not want to fill bug reports anymore. I do not have time to fill hundreds of bug reports.

anymore? hundreds? heh. assuming you are Alex Lukin, you haven't even filed ONE report on bugs.kde.org. against ANY version of kde. i just checked.

alukin wrote:Look, If you have so massive negative feedback then something goes completely wrong. I guess the cause is "release early" paradigm.

most people in my country believe in angels. that doesn't mean they exist.[hr]

admoore wrote:

Hans wrote:Eh. Greatest ever KDE 4.0? Where did you get that from? I thought it had been stressed that the oh release was only for developer.

Nothing personal, but when people say this it really yanks my chain.
At this point we all understand that it was a development release, but as to it being advertised as such I'd like to submit as evidence to the contrary:

i'll see your one link with the official keynote address at the 4.0 launch where i stated what 4.0 was about *quite* clearly, with many subsequent press releases that were very clear on these matters.

so were you paying really great attention when that one announcement was made but completely missed everything else around it?

so if you want to speak about yanking chains .. :undecided:

i completely grant you that there was too much excitement in that one announcement. sorry, we happened to be excited. you know, after working on something for 2 years that can happen.

we were quite clear elsewhere during that time (e.g. my keynote address, as mentioned, among other places) and yet our "community" keeps rubbing our nose in that one announcement piece? with friends like these ...[hr]

Brandybuck wrote:The KDE 4.x marketing was abysmal. 4.0.0 was really a technology preview, with 4.1. being the beta. I'm vainly hoping 4.2. will be the end user release. If it still doesn't have the feature parity of 3.2, I'm going to raise an unholy ruckus.

if it comes to that, instead of raising an "unholy ruckus" why don't you just go away and use something else? wouldn't that be nicer for everyone involved? i mean, i'd have one less self-entitled prick to deal with and you'd get to go out and explore for something you actually like.

seriously, i don't get your point.[hr]

Brandybuck wrote:One example: network management. For most laptop users this is a necessity. They shouldn't have to resort to a KDE3 tool, or a GNOME tool, or commandline iwconfig. I realize that KNetworkManager wasn't standard KDE until very late in KDE3, but removing Network Interfaces as well really put a lot of people in a bind. Of course, this is free software, and no one is obligated to provide this feature parity.

KNetworkManager was never part of "standard KDE". it was an add on available separate from the kde releases. and yes, for the first 8 (9?) years of KDE we didn't have any such tool around. so you're being a little revisionist here.

Brandybuck wrote:But I just don't recall a "we're going to drop all network management stuff unless someone steps up" call for help in the pre-4.0.0 days.

so, i've been using knetworkmanager all year. yes, it's a kde3 app. it works just fine.

moreover, right now in svn we've got a network manager interface that is not only working with the new networkmanager but will be ready around the time of 4.2.0. we've been working in concert with distributions to arrange it such that many of them will ship it with their 4.2 packages. this new plasmoid, a very non-trivial bit of software (some 11,000+ lines of code atm!), that has more features and better usability than the kde3 knetworkmanager did, will be a part of the KDE 4.3 release. something knetworkmanager never achieved.

so you are rather mischaracterizing the situation.

i also don't see you talking about full featured power management, integration with PackageKit or ConnsolKit or any of the other things we're doing right now in KDE4 that KDE3 never really got started on.[hr]

alukin wrote:KDE panel. It is significant part of DE and it is still ugly. It can't resize vertically, it can't change color, it can't even correctly draw itself or applet icons.

in 4.1 it can resize vertially, it can change colour, and it can correctly draw both itself and icons. what planet are you on?

want to talk about features kicker didn't have? how about true translucency, full theming capability (not just a "background" pixmap for the interior of the panel), the ability to have zero panels if you wish, the ability to easily swap in a different application launcher and still have the keyboard shortcuts work, ... and on and on.

alukin wrote: Is panel important for users? Is it to hard to make it a little bit user-friendly?

yes, it's important. that's why we've spent so much time on it. perhaps you could show us how easy it is with some code of your own?

alukin wrote:That's what I'm saying. They just spit on users saying incantations that it is developer release. But this release is default at least in 2 major distributions.

if you think we're spitting on you, i'd suggest you have a very odd definition of that, but more importantly that you are free (and indeed, welcome) to go elsewhere.[hr]

wfdudley wrote:Personally, I'm going to move my wife's and my computers to Xubuntu (xfce), and
if *that* gets "enhanced" like KDE4, then I'll go back to fvwm like the "good old
days".

Suggestions on how to improve the usability of KDE4 by making it less avant-garde
are welcomed.

right click on the desktop, select Appearance Settings. for Activity Type select "Folder View".

right click on the K menu button and select "Switch to Classic Menu".

voila.

in the meantime, enjoy xfce.

wfdudley wrote:

Just a guess, you are talking about the widget handles. They appear on whichever side you decide to move the mouse on.

I don't care what they're called, I just want them to stay put so I can find them when
I need them.

they aren't windows. they are little objects on the desktop and panel called "widgets". the rest of the world has moved on and provides them, too. we had SuperKaramba in kde3 that was very similar.

window title bars are, of course, exactly as they always were.

so you're getting all bent out of shape over a feature you don't grok. that's ok, it takes time to learn new things. but ranting ignorantly about them isn't going to help you, is it?

wfdudley wrote:

That sounds more like a general konqueror problem and has nothing to do with this topic.

Yeah, I know, but I was on a roll.

great attitude.

wfdudley wrote:Keeping KDE3 and KDE4 on the same machine is black-belt stuff that basically
nobody is going to do.

blackbelt as is "picking kde3 and kde4 as options from the installation menu"? or blackbelt as in "picking kde3 or kde4 from the options at the log in screen"?

wfdudley wrote:So that means it's incumbent on the KDE4 developers to
create a BIG BRIGHT button that says "revert to more-or-less KDE3 UI".

we did something even better. we kept making releases of kde3. we also kept improving kde4 at the same time.

wfdudley wrote:it would be nice if you (developers) thought of these things before you spring KDE5
on unsuspecting KDE4 users in a couple of years.

KDE5 won't be coming out in a couple of years. KDE4 has got probably at least 5 years ahead of it yet.

wfdudley wrote:

You can add every menu item you have in the menu to the panel. right-click on it and use "add to panel".

Except that xterm *isn't in* the menu, so this advice is worthless. The point is
that the method for creating tool-bar buttons is needlessly arcane and hard to
discover.

so your distribution sucks. personally, i just typed "xterm" into kickoff's search, got an "xterm" entry *right there* and then dragged that into the panel. *shrug*

and seriously, use aterm or something that's at least a little more respectable than xterm. yeesh.

aseigo wrote:

mensch wrote:I agree that the KDE team should have made it clear that the 4.0 release was alpha quality software and that KDE 4 is still progressing towards a stable working environment.

we did.

I'm not going to argue with you on this one, especially since you're a KDE developer and were undoubtedly on top of things at the time of the release. But a lot of negativity stems from the original release of the 4.0 branch. It might very well be that one enthusiastic announcement and the way various media have picked up on that. As you say, you can't be blamed for being enthusiastic and 4.0 showed the great things, which have now become stable and matured in 4.1 and the coming 4.2. I think it must have been an combination of excitement and hopes for a stable KDE 3 wrapped under a 4.0 skin and the fact that terms like "beta" are heavily inflated. [size=x-small]That's not your fault of course, but rather Google's (for sticking beta on nearly every service they launch, except for search) or any Web 2.0 outlet in the past years.[/size]

A lot of the negativity one sees now still blame the original launch, which isn't really valid anymore, and target early adopter distributions or are just uninformed rants.

aseigo wrote:

mensch wrote:After that things have been significantly toned down.

which is rather unfortunate. because now we're back at boring, hum-drum and people SCARED to try to do new things. congratulations on finding one more way to screw over open source. :'(

I do hope it isn't that bad. The fact that Planet KDE is regularly graced with developers announcing cool new stuff speaks against the hum-drum. I believe 4.1 was still marketed as being not ready for general production use, right? I'm not sure how you're going to announce 4.2 in January, but
the 4.1 branch has been very stable for me the past few months, so that disclaimer about not being ready for production use can safely be removed in January, I think.

As for scared people, the overall reaction to KDE 4 is very positive - apart from the rocky start, although the review of KDE 4.0 by Ars Technica was very positive if I remember correctly. Other people, like a lot of the ranters on the KDE forums for example, got KDE with popular, early adopter distributions like Kubuntu and Fedora. I'm going to generalise here, but a lot of those ranting Kubuntu users didn't choose their distribution because of its philosophy, but because they wanted a free (or rather gratis) alternative to Windows XP/Vista/Whatever and Ubuntu happened to be the most visible distribution in the world of GNU/Linux. Now those users don't want bleeding edge stuff, they want stability. I know people who don't update their systems (they don't even install security updates), I even know people who continue working on their machines even though they're infected with all kinds of malware and viruses. The common answer in this case is: "Why update something which isn't broken.", or "isn't broken that much", in the case of the virus infested variety.

The point I'm trying to make is that for those people switching from something safe like KDE 3 to the Great Unknown that is KDE 4 is too much of a change and they will be scared. But it's something that will always happen, whether you tone down the release announcements or not. The people who made the conscious choice to install and run KDE 4 are undoubtedly less scared and more positive to the work that has been done, or take a more nuanced [size=x-small](we can all agree "omg kde4 should die!" isn't part of that category)[/size] to describing their possible problems at any rate.

mensch wrote:
But a lot of negativity stems from the original release of the 4.0 branch.

That was almost two releases ago. Isn't it time to move on?

I think it must have been an combination of excitement and hopes for a stable KDE 3 wrapped under a 4.0 skin and the fact that terms like "beta" are heavily inflated.

Anyone who thought that KDE4 is going to be "KDE3 with a new theme" is seriously living under a rock in Siberia....

I guess people lost all perspective on thing because before KDE4, there has been no really major KDE-release in years. KDE 3.1, 3.2 3.3 etc, all built on the versions that preceded them, they weren't rewrites. What about KDE3.0? That was based mostly on KDE2, it wasn't THAT big of a release either.

The last huge release KDE-project has made in similar scale as KDE4 was/is, is back when KDE2 was released. It brought to us all that cool technology we now take for granted (KIO, DCOP, Kparts etc.). KDE3 brought no new technology like that to the table.

And KDE2 was quite rocky release as well. But people don't remember that because it was eons ago.

I do hope it isn't that bad. The fact that Planet KDE is regularly graced with developers announcing cool new stuff speaks against the hum-drum.

They announce cool stuff, yes. Just imagine what they might have released by now if they didn't have to waste their times talking to people who cry because "I can't have icons on the desktop!"....

I believe 4.1 was still marketed as being not ready for general production use, right?

It was mentioned that it might not be 100% suitable for all users. But that doesn't mean that it's not suitable for anyone.

The point I'm trying to make is that for those people switching from something safe like KDE 3 to the Great Unknown that is KDE 4 is too much of a change and they will be scared.

It will only bite once. And the change is not THAT big. Move from DOS to Windows was even bigger. Move from Windows to OS X is bigger. And in both cases, people seem to be managing.

I don't want KDE to turn in to GNOME where new version of the desktop is 99.9% identical to the previous version. It makes the desktop seem stagnant. I'm not flaming GNONE as such, it has many positive qualities, and I would be happy running it, but it doesn't seem to be moving anywhere. New releases seem to be about moving few pixels around than really pushing the desktop forward.

If you want the UI to stay the same, that's one alternative. But I see that as stagnation.

Janne wrote:

mensch wrote:
But a lot of negativity stems from the original release of the 4.0 branch.

That was almost two releases ago. Isn't it time to move on?

It sure is and let me make it clear I'm not one of the users whining about KDE 4 not being KDE 3 or complaining about KDE 4 not including feature X because the developers are lazy elitists who spit on their audience.

Janne wrote:

mensch wrote:I think it must have been an combination of excitement and hopes for a stable KDE 3 wrapped under a 4.0 skin and the fact that terms like "beta" are heavily inflated.

Anyone who thought that KDE4 is going to be "KDE3 with a new theme" is seriously living under a rock in Siberia....

For some reason people still think it should be or it is. I don't know why, probably a lack of interest combined with not being tapped into the official information KDE canals.

I guess people lost all perspective on thing because before KDE4, there has been no really major KDE-release in years. KDE 3.1, 3.2 3.3 etc, all built on the versions that preceded them, they weren't rewrites. What about KDE3.0? That was based mostly on KDE2, it wasn't THAT big of a release either.

That could be the case. A lot of users are accustomed to getting bleeding edge stuff quite easily by way of experimental repositories. Compiling is still quite a step for those users, but it's another matter when offered in convenient packages. Around the time Apple announced Time Machine in their new OS some FLOSS developers started working on free alternatives, which were in turn promptly downloaded and used by many users, who then of course suffered from data loss in some cases - despite all the disclaimers. From that moment it's easier to point at the developers for making beta software available "too early", instead of personally taking responsibility for installing the software. A lot of users do take that responsibility, but a very vocal minority doesn't, which results in the characteristic "I KNOW A LOT ABOUT COMPUTERS AND THIS SOFTWARE SUCKS MAJORLY!!!" threads on forums.

I'm not sure how one gets around that situation, it's probably something which can't be helped. Not releasing early and often as some people suggested earlier is not the solution at any rate.

It will only bite once. And the change is not THAT big. Move from DOS to Windows was even bigger. Move from Windows to OS X is bigger. And in both cases, people seem to be managing.

No the change isn't that big. I came from OS X and happily used both GNOME and KDE (I've been using the latter still). There are some hurdles to take, because it's different, but indeed not that different. But for a lot of users any changes is clearly too much and the abundance of choice - which is a good thing in my mind - is quite scary to them as well.

what really hate, is that users want a kde4 that looks and feels in the same way that kde3, want the "same" options, in the same place. Why dont understand that kde4 is not kde3, i prefer that the devs waste they time creating new things, than porting from kde3.