KDE Ships First Beta of Next Generation Plasma Workspace

Re:KDE Ships First Beta of Next Generation Plasma Workspace by samyxp17 on Wednesday May 14, 2014 @02:21PM (#7745278)

Pretty hard to believe that this is the best that the KDE Visual Design Team - http://vdesign.kde.org/index.html could come up with. Are they even trying hard enough ? This is 2014, the post PC era and they are delivering something that looks like windows 95. UX innovation == O. Boring, lame.

Window 8 was clearly a mess but at least Microsoft is trying something.

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Re:KDE Ships First Beta of Next Generation Plasma Workspace by Spittie on Wednesday May 14, 2014 @02:41PM (#7745391)

Ignore everything that's not the wallpaper or the taskbar, those are the only items that got touched by the KDE VDT for now. The Windows are still using the old Oxygen theme.

You can see some of the work going on in the widget/decorator theme in some blog posts of the VDT: http://wheeldesign.blogspot.se/2014/05/monday-report-14-lazy... http://wheeldesign.blogspot.se/2014/04/monday-report-12-amaz... http://wheeldesign.blogspot.se/2014/04/monday-report-11-go-t...

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Re:KDE Ships First Beta of Next Generation Plasma Workspace by dvirsky on Wednesday May 14, 2014 @05:08PM (#7746450)

Awesome! That theme looks like a huge step forward. Overall KDE still feels a bit cluttered to me, but at least that clutter won't be so ugly anymore soon!

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Re:KDE Ships First Beta of Next Generation Plasma Workspace by pestaa on Wednesday May 14, 2014 @04:31PM (#7746213)

Do they have an ETA on these upgrades? Seems I can't find it in these reports.

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Re:KDE Ships First Beta of Next Generation Plasma Workspace by Spittie on Wednesday May 14, 2014 @05:15PM (#7746492)

No ETA, as far as I know. I think the plan is to ship it with the second release of KDE5, but it's information gathered from the forum, not official words.

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Re:KDE Ships First Beta of Next Generation Plasma Workspace by JasonFruit on Wednesday May 14, 2014 @02:44PM (#7745407)

Do we need UX innovation? Whenever I hear about something lacking "UX innovation", the specifics just point out where it's ugly. I'd like to know what the problems are that you'd like to have solved; I've been using KDE for the last several months, and my experience as a user has been excellent.

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Re:KDE Ships First Beta of Next Generation Plasma Workspace by pbhjpbhj on Wednesday May 14, 2014 @05:12PM (#7746480)

It's a bit like using GIMP. (Despite still not being able to promote it in most social situations because the name sounds offensive in polite conversation) I've got used to GIMP, I find it comfortable and logical enough to get things done. Similarly with KDE, I've been using it well over a decade - I don't want the interface or UX to alter drastically. It's a DE, it needs to show me system data, enable config and otherwise tie the ends together whilst keeping out of the way of the applications being run.

I don't really care if it's ugly in default. I'll add an icon pack and a theme a few seconds after a new install anyway. It's not like a console is exactly beautiful - except in a minimalist tech aesthetic sort of way - but I still use it and it does the necessary.

This is one of the great things about open source, the choice. If you want fancy-schmanzy UX innovation go with Ubu' default mainstream offering.

That said KDE is innovating - eg with Activities, and with PIM integration - but in ways I can thankfully ignore.

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Re:KDE Ships First Beta of Next Generation Plasma Workspace by mindcrime on Wednesday May 14, 2014 @06:15PM (#7746781)

UX innovation == O. Boring, lame.

That may well be a Good Thing. Not all "innovations" are useful or desirable. Sometimes something that "just works" is all that's needed.

Me, I like KDE just fine the way it is. shrug

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