I used to use Gnome all the time but I have to install a bunch of extensions for it to be usable. This one addon, I think it was called window list, is the most important and invaluable one of them all. There is no way I can use Gnome without it and I don’t understand how other people have the patience to deal with not having that. The number of times I updated Gnome and found out window list was so out of date the only way I could get it working was if I download the source code and fix the issue myself, is too damn high. That addon should be part of Gnome by default.
Now I use cinnamon or kde depending on which one works better in that respective distro’s repository. Some installations of your favorite desktop environment come with better configs than others. For example last time I tried KDE on Ubuntu, it was a broken buggy annoying mess to the point it was was less functional than Windows 11’s ui. On Arch, KDE is the epitome optimization and polish. On Arch, cinnamon is respectably borked out of the box. Cinnamon on Ubuntu usually only comes with a few bugs however I rarely end up finding a way to fix said bugs.
LXDE is the same across distros usually but I only use it if running Linux on an absolute potato. That lack of a start menu search is awful, I don’t miss those pre-search bar era uis. I need a search bar dammit.
Is Trinity using… maintained software? I will try it in a moment, but the KDE Plasma people only really maintain what is in Plasma today. There are tons of abandonware like Konqueror (which Trinity supposedly uses?). Falkon is hardly maintained, Amarok was resurrected.
Lots of great software, interesting, unique. But I dont know if I would use it for actual work.
Can you maybe recommend something that is similar but might be still updated? I really like how KDE used to look back then but I missed out on it.
The way most new desktops copy the flat look of Windows and Mac OS annoys me. I want the details back and like my window has sides and shadows.
I agree a lot. Had Vista and XP machines in the past.
Then mainly used Win10 and KDE Plasma was a solid upgrade.
But they really copied the Win10 look which is atrocious. I agree that WinXP and 7 and the era where way better.
There are themes for everything though. Its just theming. I dont know if all apps support it and have never dealt with it, as Breeze works pretty well with Adwaita and Electron apps too.
Tbh I like some of the more modern things, and they are for sure easier to unify. When theming like that, you also need a GTK3 theme, a GTK4 color scheme, a firefox theme etc.
And many of these toolkits dont support big themes anymore, just swapping colors.
I just tried it and it lacks some basic stuff like drag to edge for resizing. The apps are really minimalist though and it should really run everywhere.
On Arch, KDE is the epitome optimization and polish.
Cannot relate. At all.
Last friday I re-installed Arch with KDE this time instead of GNOME for a change, and in these two and a half days I’ve already encountered more bugs and crashes than I did the entire time I was on GNOME. Kinda regretting the decision already. All that with stock applets and widgets and shit that come bundled with the DE. I don’t want to imagine what things would be like if I started to mess around with third party stuff.
Idk man, EndeavourOS on KDE has been amazing to me, even on Wayland. Even the plasma 5 to 6 upgrade has been ridiculously smooth. I have a feeling arch may not be the most unified distro to judge a DE on… Hope stuff stabilizes for you a bit. That’s no fun. :(
If anything it’s getting worse. Today I (unsuccessfully) spent a lot of time trying to figure out why the bottom panel’s state won’t persist between reboots. I don’t even know what state it’s reverting to. I never pinned Google chrome to that panel yet it appears there on every reboot while all my pins are gone. Some time was also wasted on rebuilding another panel that somehow broke and piled all of its widgets on top of each other and made them unclikable. There’s also something seriously wrong with either the window manager or the compositor or both because on two occasions it sorta fused two windows together, producing a garbled mess that forced me to exit both applications and restart them.
I think I’ll call this one a failure and go back to gnome as soon as I can. This really is not a good experience. Maybe in another two years I’ll try KDE again. Last time I tried KDE it was much worse, so they’re clearly getting better.
What in the world… I use KDE everywhere, we even use it many workstations at work and I’ve seen no such thing it’s been smooth sailing. I hope whatever’s causing this is nothing too serious because that’s NOT normal… :(
I used to use Gnome all the time but I have to install a bunch of extensions for it to be usable. This one addon, I think it was called window list, is the most important and invaluable one of them all. There is no way I can use Gnome without it and I don’t understand how other people have the patience to deal with not having that. The number of times I updated Gnome and found out window list was so out of date the only way I could get it working was if I download the source code and fix the issue myself, is too damn high. That addon should be part of Gnome by default.
Now I use cinnamon or kde depending on which one works better in that respective distro’s repository. Some installations of your favorite desktop environment come with better configs than others. For example last time I tried KDE on Ubuntu, it was a broken buggy annoying mess to the point it was was less functional than Windows 11’s ui. On Arch, KDE is the epitome optimization and polish. On Arch, cinnamon is respectably borked out of the box. Cinnamon on Ubuntu usually only comes with a few bugs however I rarely end up finding a way to fix said bugs.
LXDE is the same across distros usually but I only use it if running Linux on an absolute potato. That lack of a start menu search is awful, I don’t miss those pre-search bar era uis. I need a search bar dammit.
Have you tried Trinity instead of LXDE?
With Q4OS for example.
Is Trinity using… maintained software? I will try it in a moment, but the KDE Plasma people only really maintain what is in Plasma today. There are tons of abandonware like Konqueror (which Trinity supposedly uses?). Falkon is hardly maintained, Amarok was resurrected.
Lots of great software, interesting, unique. But I dont know if I would use it for actual work.
I honestly don’t know about that.
Can you maybe recommend something that is similar but might be still updated? I really like how KDE used to look back then but I missed out on it. The way most new desktops copy the flat look of Windows and Mac OS annoys me. I want the details back and like my window has sides and shadows.
I agree a lot. Had Vista and XP machines in the past.
Then mainly used Win10 and KDE Plasma was a solid upgrade.
But they really copied the Win10 look which is atrocious. I agree that WinXP and 7 and the era where way better.
There are themes for everything though. Its just theming. I dont know if all apps support it and have never dealt with it, as Breeze works pretty well with Adwaita and Electron apps too.
I think there are Kvantum themes for this?
Glad to read we are thinking alike about these things.
I see there are some nice themes at the place you’ve linked. If those work with KDE Plasma, that would certainly be interesting to give a try.
I’ll have a look at that.
I looked but couldnt find it.
Tbh I like some of the more modern things, and they are for sure easier to unify. When theming like that, you also need a GTK3 theme, a GTK4 color scheme, a firefox theme etc.
And many of these toolkits dont support big themes anymore, just swapping colors.
Or LXQt which is the variant they switched to mainly. Like, both are maintained but the Qt one is the one getting all the fixes, Wayland support etc.
Thanks for reminding me about LXQt. Back then it didn’t really have all the features that LXDE used to have, but it does seem to have matured a bit.
I just tried it and it lacks some basic stuff like drag to edge for resizing. The apps are really minimalist though and it should really run everywhere.
Cannot relate. At all.
Last friday I re-installed Arch with KDE this time instead of GNOME for a change, and in these two and a half days I’ve already encountered more bugs and crashes than I did the entire time I was on GNOME. Kinda regretting the decision already. All that with stock applets and widgets and shit that come bundled with the DE. I don’t want to imagine what things would be like if I started to mess around with third party stuff.
Idk man, EndeavourOS on KDE has been amazing to me, even on Wayland. Even the plasma 5 to 6 upgrade has been ridiculously smooth. I have a feeling arch may not be the most unified distro to judge a DE on… Hope stuff stabilizes for you a bit. That’s no fun. :(
If anything it’s getting worse. Today I (unsuccessfully) spent a lot of time trying to figure out why the bottom panel’s state won’t persist between reboots. I don’t even know what state it’s reverting to. I never pinned Google chrome to that panel yet it appears there on every reboot while all my pins are gone. Some time was also wasted on rebuilding another panel that somehow broke and piled all of its widgets on top of each other and made them unclikable. There’s also something seriously wrong with either the window manager or the compositor or both because on two occasions it sorta fused two windows together, producing a garbled mess that forced me to exit both applications and restart them.
I think I’ll call this one a failure and go back to gnome as soon as I can. This really is not a good experience. Maybe in another two years I’ll try KDE again. Last time I tried KDE it was much worse, so they’re clearly getting better.
What in the world… I use KDE everywhere, we even use it many workstations at work and I’ve seen no such thing it’s been smooth sailing. I hope whatever’s causing this is nothing too serious because that’s NOT normal… :(