If you have to pick only one Desktop Environment and use it till your computer breaks, what would you choose?
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I know Gnome is the default on popular distros: Fedora, Ubuntu, Rhel, Pop OS (it's Cosmic Desktop yes but it is still based on Gnome)...etc. But Gnome just doesnt work for me. I would pick XFCE - stable and no BS.
Before Manjaro and their cetificate shenanigan, I used to use their XFCE version. At the time, it was marketed as the "Flagship Manjaro version". I went 4 years without any problems and I did tinker a lot, just couldnt get their XFCE to break.
After a tough Arch or Gentoo installs, I just want to put XFCE on and call it a day.
What about you guys?
There is nothing better than Xfce, if you dont like the desktop, at least Xfce allows you to customize.
KDE seems interesting, but the last time i tried it, 10 years ago more or less, it was a bit buggy. -
Lol, yep. It's always funny to see xfce as being light weight.
Is this where I continue the meme and say I use arch by the way?
I was just joking around, I hope you didn't take it too personally. I've been hearing a lot of KDE enthusiasm lately.
And xfce is great, but it has its pitfalls.
I also get excited about projects, I'm no different.
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There is nothing better than Xfce, if you dont like the desktop, at least Xfce allows you to customize.
KDE seems interesting, but the last time i tried it, 10 years ago more or less, it was a bit buggy. -
It's not though.
The most popular de is no good
Baffling
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It's not though.
The most popular de is no good
Baffling
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I miss old Gnome. I wish they'd stuck with the old Gnome 2 design philosophy but breathed new modern design principals into it, instead of trying to go the Ubuntu Unity route.
Use Mate. It is based on the old Gnome 2
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KDE is one of the main reasons for me to use Linux. I immensely like the performance, silence and battery lifetime of MacBooks. But if I have to work with anything but KDE, it's not worth it for me. The only thing OSX does better than basically any other desktop out there, is the ability to drag whole virtual screen between monitors.
I'm running XFCE (but you could do KDE) on my intel Mac, you can get best of both worlds. I heard silicon is more difficult with Linux tho.
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i have no idea not even sure what a netbook is
Small laptop. Think n 3000 intel
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I know Gnome is the default on popular distros: Fedora, Ubuntu, Rhel, Pop OS (it's Cosmic Desktop yes but it is still based on Gnome)...etc. But Gnome just doesnt work for me. I would pick XFCE - stable and no BS.
Before Manjaro and their cetificate shenanigan, I used to use their XFCE version. At the time, it was marketed as the "Flagship Manjaro version". I went 4 years without any problems and I did tinker a lot, just couldnt get their XFCE to break.
After a tough Arch or Gentoo installs, I just want to put XFCE on and call it a day.
What about you guys?
I thought KDE was the popular choice to be honest. I feel like all the toolp newish OS are using KDE and the top old OS are using Gnome.
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i have no idea not even sure what a netbook is
No optical drive type thing
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I know Gnome is the default on popular distros: Fedora, Ubuntu, Rhel, Pop OS (it's Cosmic Desktop yes but it is still based on Gnome)...etc. But Gnome just doesnt work for me. I would pick XFCE - stable and no BS.
Before Manjaro and their cetificate shenanigan, I used to use their XFCE version. At the time, it was marketed as the "Flagship Manjaro version". I went 4 years without any problems and I did tinker a lot, just couldnt get their XFCE to break.
After a tough Arch or Gentoo installs, I just want to put XFCE on and call it a day.
What about you guys?
KDE for sure. The modern versions look exactly like how I want a desktop environment to look out of the box, and they keep the full range of customizability that a desktop should, IMO, allow it's users to have. Which is something Windows just kept slowly getting rid of over the years.
I also prefer to have a taskbar that is ever present with a traditional start menu that's cleanly organized by category rather than the current full screen pop up "activities" search thing gnome does nowadays.
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The most popular de is no good
Baffling
Much like Windows.
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Use Mate. It is based on the old Gnome 2
I was waiting for someone to say that.
I like that Mate is a thing, but like I said, I'm looking for something thats based on it but as if its had the same 20 years of enhancements everything else got.
The closest thing to that I've found is quite literally KDE. So I use KDE.
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I know Gnome is the default on popular distros: Fedora, Ubuntu, Rhel, Pop OS (it's Cosmic Desktop yes but it is still based on Gnome)...etc. But Gnome just doesnt work for me. I would pick XFCE - stable and no BS.
Before Manjaro and their cetificate shenanigan, I used to use their XFCE version. At the time, it was marketed as the "Flagship Manjaro version". I went 4 years without any problems and I did tinker a lot, just couldnt get their XFCE to break.
After a tough Arch or Gentoo installs, I just want to put XFCE on and call it a day.
What about you guys?
I currently use GNOME and would continue to but if it were a low spec machine, probably icewm or jwm.
y'all sure like KDE though
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Much like Windows.
Except people are forced to use windows. Not so with gnome
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Except people are forced to use windows. Not so with gnome
If you say so
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Isn’t sway based on i3? i3 is a WM not a DE. But as sway is not X11, I’m not sure if it’s just a WM
Sway still primarily counts as a WM + Compositor, but considering it has keymaps, autostart, and libinput config mechanisms embedded in it, I would say it borders a desktop environment.
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SteamOS is the arch Linux off shoot they made specifically for the steam deck. It's great for integrated graphics gaming.
had no idea you could use it on not a deck!
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That's not too hard a question for me, I've been using the same DE for years: KDE
Has KDE improved since 2010-ish? I gave up KDE because gnome was just a better DE at the time. Gnome sucks now, but I found i3/sway. Haven’t given KDE a second chance yet
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For those of us that expect room to breathe and make our machine work for us rather than the other way around, we feel like Gnome takes a lot of liberties away for the sake of "simplicity." There is so much missing from Gnome that is present in most other DEs and even custom WM setups.
The primary contributors who work under The Gnome Foundation also come off as controlling and arrogant in a lot of cases, and refuse to take community feedback to heart, whereas KDE has literal summits to get user feedback on major core features we want to see which then later get added to their backlogs and sprints as Epics. Gnome acts a lot like Apple in the sense that they're very much "we know what's best for you better than you do."
Now, the singular area I can give Gnome true props in is their accessibility functionality, but that's primarily it. KDE's accessibility is fairly behind by about a decade in comparison.
That's just my take, take it as you will.
There is so much missing from Gnome that is present in most other DEs and even custom WM setups.
There are also plenty of features that gnome has that kde and other desktops and wms don't have. It's all about tradeoffs and what's acceptable or necessary for you.
