I've gotta second kde. I went through a bunch of different DE's and window managers and stuff. KDE was the one I eventually settled on and haven't looked back. It's easy to customize and setup everything just the way you want it and after that it stays out of your way. The default qt apps like you say are all great pieces od software. Going back to windows explorer after using dolphin is like jumping back in time 20 years. Kate's been my favourite text editor for years. It's got just the right balance of being light, but full of useful things.

I wanna throw in KDE connect too, honestly, the best and easiest way to work with an android device from a PC hands down.

I personally use KDE and XFCE every day. While KDE is very nice, it reflects the spirit of the Linux very well. Extremely customizable, extremely extensible. When everything settles down, it's a productivity monster, and I love it.

On the other hand, XFCE is much more approachable and usable for a newcomer. It's not intimidating. It's not infinite. It's more resource friendly and straightforward. For a newcomer I recommend GNOME or XFCE. When they're seasoned enough, they automatically gravitate towards KDE most of the time.

> XFCE ... It's more resource friendly

Not any more since the switch to GTK3. Plasma is more lightweight since than.

Why do you use both every day?

My office laptop and personal desktop runs KDE while my office desktop runs XFCE.

I like to use different things. Keeps my mind open.

I agree with you that all the apps you named have no counterpart in Gnome land which is as polished and usablle as the once you mentioned.

For those still burning plastics I would add K3b to the list.

I am using Gnome since 2018 btw.

Historical reasons due to Qt's original license and the whole C vs C++ on the Linux world (both are anyway Bell Labs languages designed for UNIX).

So C camp went with GNOME, and C++ camp with KDE.

Naturally then GNOME got bindings for C++ (actually quite good), however it is a big difference being the main language or one that always needs someone to write bindings.

KDE does have some nice applications but it's a bit of a usability nightmare. Fine for power users or people who want 238 separate screens in their control panel.

Nate is blogging each week about all the usability improvements KDE is getting: https://pointieststick.com/.

Can you please explain why it seems obviously superior to GNOME? I'm in the market for a new DE after using i3 for a while and would be interested in your reasoning.

KDE is an extremely integrated and batteries included DE. File manager can manage SVN/Git/Mercurial repositories and connect to anything. Akonadi can handle your mail and calendars at the background. Included apps (Gwenview and Okular) are very powerful.

Desktop effects are not gimmicky but useful (e.g: dim inactive windows). Power management makes sense and is reliable.

KDE can behave like anything you like and doesn't bury power-user related features somewhere. It's all visible. Multi-speaker & multi sound card management is also better, more obvious.

I used KDE for a while and liked it, but KDE 4.0 burned me and I never looked back. I've heard it's much better now, but haven't tried it. Okular, and gwenview were always nice, even during 4.0 days. Amarok used to be great, though I've not tried Clementine and I'm no longer a user of that sort of music library software. The reason I don't recommend KDE today is because I'm just not very familiar with it.

> I've heard it's much better now, but haven't tried it.

I'm using KDE since 3.5.x including 4.0 release train. Its infinitely better. Stable, fast, extensible and infinitely useful (esp. Dolphin's services).

I'm not using too many widgets and/or activities, but it's better than anything I use (incl. macOS, albeit they're close).

It's safe to come back. The bad old days are long past; KDE is a great DE and you should revisit now. Kubuntu 20.04 LTS is an excellent choice and will serve you for many years.

It always had the best technology but looked like a cluttered ass. :D

KDE is an unstable, bloated and buggy mess. I give it a shot about once a year and uninstall it when the DE crashes; it doesn't matter what hardware I use, it never lasts longer than a few hours.

Are you trying nightly builds? Or some suspicious distri (Like KDE Neon)?

KDE is rock stable in my experience. Runs for weeks or sometimes even month (between kernel update reboots) without any crash or this like.

I'm running Debian Testing. So it's usually not the newest release of the desktop. I guess this makes it so rock solid for me.

Anecdotical story regarding stability of a DE: I had to use Windows 10 lately. I think the compositor crashes quite often if one has to may open windows. :-D

Debian testing or Kubuntu, usually; lately Manjaro.