So in the past few years of my using ubuntu, I have sometimes strayed into the KDE version and then back. I am happy with GNOME, and I think it’s brilliant for the way the desktop applications seem all so seamlessly integrated, although i believe it could even be better. Having said that I have not used the Version 4 incarnations of KDE ever since I heard all the horror stories and to be honest the first KDE 4 version was a total fiasco for me so I decided to wait. Having said this I did not drop my favourite music player Amarok, until it just decided not to work anymore, after which I was stuck with Rythmbox and Banshee, both of which are not very high on my preference list.
This decision gave GNOME a firmer foothold on my mountain of preference and basically helped it to climb to the top. Recently I have been quite restless with my laptop, first it was playing with the decision of whether to put Karmic Alpha 6 on my laptop, or to install Jaunty but the Kubuntu version. I have done nothing with these ideas yet but knowing myself I will get very rash in a few days and do something silly.
No here’s the question, do I try to get my hands dirty with the latest incarnation of KDE 4, which i hear is a lot more stable than it was when I first tried it or do I just stick with my GNOME installation. After reading a few more KDE reviews I am not all that convinced that I will enjoy the KDE experience. Ordinarily I would install both environments on the same laptop, but I have the way it morphs my menu items under applications into something else. I like to keep both environments separate and contained. So the question goes… is the latest KDE release worth moving to if I thoroughly enjoyed using KDE 3.5 and hated KDE 4.0?
I am loving KDE4 in Jaunty – There are still a few things that could be better (arent there always), but it is slick, itegrated and fast.
Definitely give it a go – even if it is just a live cd!
To be honest jaunty’s version of kde4 is a lot better but still no as complete as 4.3 in karmic. The only thing is getting reused to the way stuff works.
I like you tried loadsa stuff. What I find it that kde apps tended to be more mature however I’ve noticed that this is slipping from time to time in the 4 evolution as they bring in newer apps to replace older ones.
On the whole kde4.2-ish onwards is a lot more feature complete but if you got used to the workings of gnome I bet you’ll be back there before long
I’d definitely give it a try. Did it myself about 4-6 months ago with Jaunty and I was really surprised how well-integrated and smooth everything worked.
actually, you should laugh at me .. )
However, Karmic (with KDE 4.3) has been a huge step forward – it’s more stable, the Oxygen theme is lighter than the old one and it es in generel more mature (my personal impression).
So if you’d like to test it, I’d either suggest waiting until 9.10 arrives or testing an alpha release (which would have to be installed on another partition anyway). They are already surprisingly stable (I’m using it on a productive system