Tbh I am fully behind KDE as flagship desktop. Dealing with GNOME users problems all day in the forum, KDE is just better for usability?
GNOME is reduced over the amount that makes sense. KDE could use a bit of reduction, but not as much as GNOMEs. People need the Terminal or random extensions for basic things, this is not a good experience.
On the other hand, GNOME and KDE both have really nice features, GNOME with their Microsoft integrations being particularly powerful (their account system works at all, unlike KDEs which I think nobody uses. But when using Thunderbird, which has standalone Exchange support, you dont use that account system anyways so it doesnt matter again).
Also GNOME has like all their apps on Flathub. GNOME Boxes is particularly crazy, having sandboxed virtualization. This means you can mix match GNOME Flatpaks on a KDE desktop without any problems, KDE even handles the theming for you. On GNOME on the other hand… it actively breaks Qt apps, its insane.
So I think GNOME has some great apps (snapshot, decoder, simplescan, carburetor, celluloid …) but you can install them anywhere.
GNOME looks better out of the box and configuring KDE can be very tricky. There are also a lot of outdated “addons” for KDE and you need some in order to get what you want. extensions are better integrsted in KDE but it’s not like KDE has everything out of the box.
I’d love to see more KDE support.
This is what people dont get. Different DEs best serve different people. We should always push to have a better experience but sniping between DEs makes no sense
True. KDEs virtual desktops are also basically unusable for me, idk I just dont see them so they are not used.
There are pros and cons. Its simply a tie, I stay with KDE because the lack of some things (like close buttons with the hitbox in the very edge) would annoy me.
This is my issue with KDE. Virtual Desktops are too unnecessarily convoluted to use. Even Alt-Tabbing is a pain if you have anything over 1 single workspace. I decided to daily drive KDE for a few months to give it a good chance, because before I would usually just go back to Gnome after a few days. It’s been 2 months now, and I don’t think I can take much more of it.
I actually tweaked it to be more “gnome-like”, but the desktops are a hot mess. At the end of the day, it’s a matter of taste, and I’m a huge fan of Gnome’s simplicity.
I don’t really get this but I’m going to assume it’s that my workflow is just different than yours.
I have keyboard shortcuts I’m happy with that let me navigate my virtual desktops as desired and place widows on them. If I wasn’t happy with those shortcuts I could change them. I can see having different preferences, or etc, but what makes it a hot mess exactly?
When I Alt-tab it always goes to the apps open on the next desktop, and never shows the apps on the current desktop. So, say I have Vivaldi and KWrite on desktop 1, and Brave and LibreOffice Calc on desktop 2.
If I’m on desktop 1 on Vivaldi and Alt-tab, it’ll move to Desktop 2 and move between Brave and Calc, and but will never show anything from Desktop 1, until I release the Alt key and Alt-tab again.
Now, for me it’s even worse since I have 3 Desktops instead of 2.
Tbh I am fully behind KDE as flagship desktop. Dealing with GNOME users problems all day in the forum, KDE is just better for usability?
GNOME is reduced over the amount that makes sense. KDE could use a bit of reduction, but not as much as GNOMEs. People need the Terminal or random extensions for basic things, this is not a good experience.
On the other hand, GNOME and KDE both have really nice features, GNOME with their Microsoft integrations being particularly powerful (their account system works at all, unlike KDEs which I think nobody uses. But when using Thunderbird, which has standalone Exchange support, you dont use that account system anyways so it doesnt matter again).
Also GNOME has like all their apps on Flathub. GNOME Boxes is particularly crazy, having sandboxed virtualization. This means you can mix match GNOME Flatpaks on a KDE desktop without any problems, KDE even handles the theming for you. On GNOME on the other hand… it actively breaks Qt apps, its insane.
So I think GNOME has some great apps (snapshot, decoder, simplescan, carburetor, celluloid …) but you can install them anywhere.
GNOME looks better out of the box and configuring KDE can be very tricky. There are also a lot of outdated “addons” for KDE and you need some in order to get what you want. extensions are better integrsted in KDE but it’s not like KDE has everything out of the box. I’d love to see more KDE support.
I think KDE looks great out of the box, includes all the extensions I want, and is easy to configure.
This is what people dont get. Different DEs best serve different people. We should always push to have a better experience but sniping between DEs makes no sense
That’s good :)
True. KDEs virtual desktops are also basically unusable for me, idk I just dont see them so they are not used.
There are pros and cons. Its simply a tie, I stay with KDE because the lack of some things (like close buttons with the hitbox in the very edge) would annoy me.
This is my issue with KDE. Virtual Desktops are too unnecessarily convoluted to use. Even Alt-Tabbing is a pain if you have anything over 1 single workspace. I decided to daily drive KDE for a few months to give it a good chance, because before I would usually just go back to Gnome after a few days. It’s been 2 months now, and I don’t think I can take much more of it.
Their Plasma 6 overview is great, just needs the panel displayed or even an app menu and it could be similar to GNOME.
I actually tweaked it to be more “gnome-like”, but the desktops are a hot mess. At the end of the day, it’s a matter of taste, and I’m a huge fan of Gnome’s simplicity.
I don’t really get this but I’m going to assume it’s that my workflow is just different than yours.
I have keyboard shortcuts I’m happy with that let me navigate my virtual desktops as desired and place widows on them. If I wasn’t happy with those shortcuts I could change them. I can see having different preferences, or etc, but what makes it a hot mess exactly?
When I Alt-tab it always goes to the apps open on the next desktop, and never shows the apps on the current desktop. So, say I have Vivaldi and KWrite on desktop 1, and Brave and LibreOffice Calc on desktop 2.
If I’m on desktop 1 on Vivaldi and Alt-tab, it’ll move to Desktop 2 and move between Brave and Calc, and but will never show anything from Desktop 1, until I release the Alt key and Alt-tab again.
Now, for me it’s even worse since I have 3 Desktops instead of 2.
Have you dug into the options at all? If I’m visualizing what you are describing correctly, I think spending some time here should solve your issues.
edit - specifically the options in the lower right