[kde-linux] Opinion: KDE4 is very great, but does not deserve the version number



Hi,

there is no doubt: the developers did not a great, but a giant work. KDE 4 is
really a kind of wonder, although it is hardly more than a preview about what
KDE 4 will becomein former times.

Apart from that, the version KDE 4.0.1 which is going to be distributed by
openSuSE 11.0 is still a beta version of the upcoming new desktop and
therefore it does not deserve its version number. The announced release of
KDE 4.1 this summer (which I cannot rely on, I must admit) will perhaps be
the *real* major release.

For now it turns out that especially konqueror is *very* unstable and
definetly not ready. E.g. if a site requires shockwave flash, it is not
important which button you will going to click in the popup window: konqueror
will crash with reliability. After starting it again, nothing of the previous
site is restored. Konqueror still lacks this well known feature of Opera.

After adding some widgets, such as KGet, the whole panel can vanish and a new
background picture as well. The only thing you can do to get back a
functional desktop seems to be a killing of the plasma process. The open a
terminal (ALT F2), delete the local settings of plasma and start the process
again, and repeat your configuration..

Although the work of the KDE 4 developers cannot be overestimated, I wonder
why they call this beta version KDE 4.0.1. It does not match with a kind of
netiquette and shoots the bullet much too high in the air. KDE 4.0.1 is
*heavily* lacking the reliability of the former KDE 2.0, which was tested
very hard (many betas and RCs) . In this stage the new KDE is still use-less
(in the basical meaning of the word). The developers attitude towards the
meaning of a major release and Release Candidates (which indeed were
developer releases and by no means versions for fixing the *last bugs* before
the release of the final versions) is the only poor thing about KDE 4.

You may ask why this seems to me worth discussing. It is because that version
numbers RCs and beta stage have a specific meaning not only for developers,
but for users as well. To release a *major version* by adding the information
that it should not be regarded as a *real* major version is a contradiction
and not the use of other development groups.

Heiko Schroeder

P.S.: For good software no time is too long to be worth waiting.
--
Heiko Schroeder
Praha, Ceska Republika
___________________________________________________
This message is from the kde-linux mailing list.
Account management: https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/kde-linux.
Archives: http://lists.kde.org/.
More info: http://www.kde.org/faq.html.



Relevant Pages

  • Re: [kde] Why KDE4 is called KDE?
    ... Unfortunately there is nothing "the Linux world" can do about VB not being ... Python or Perl on Windows you'd come to a similar conclusion. ... being ignored by Delphi based developers. ... I think the printer configuration tool for KDE is written using PyKDE, ...
    (KDE)
  • Re: [kde-linux] Opinion: KDE4 is very great, but does not deserve the version number
    ... the developers did not a great, but a giant work. ... what KDE 4 will becomein former times. ... Although the work of the KDE 4 developers cannot be overestimated, ... why they call this beta version KDE 4.0.1. ...
    (KDE)
  • Re: [opensuse] Re: Why Not Fix the Easy Bugs??
    ... Packages and softwares that are in KDE 3.5.x and i do mean ALL packages ... their developers and bring back kaboodle and noatun, as an example, because ... But I am a former KDE 3.5 user who tried and then abandoned KDE4, ...
    (SuSE)
  • Re: [opensuse] Do I dare .... yes, you can do that
    ... Yes, I have interest to hear, discuss, search for bugs in bugzillas (kde, ... I object to "ALL" bugs, features, handling, name it, definiton. ... The very same reaction you can see by developers. ... our frustration, are the cause of the majority of the frustration that ...
    (SuSE)
  • [kde] Re: KDEPIM 4.6 prob^Wimpressions
    ... were so many, and I thought filing them would not be necessary, as the KDE ... I know KDE developers who run their git master checkout as their main ... Akonadi) downloaded everything from my IMAP server, ... Account type "Disconnected IMAP" basically works by two-way synchronizing a ...
    (KDE)