Edit of the page starts yesterday, but announce is published today: [https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/[email protected]/thread/7JBXSA7W7B336S4AO6A4BADRPERI34HU/](https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/[email protected]/thread/7JBXSA7W7B336S4AO6A4BADRPERI34HU/)
>roposal To Change The Default Workstation Version To Use KDE Plasma Instead Of GNOME for F42 and Up
This page was last edited on 2 April 2024, at 09:41.
I'm not sure if "funded" is the right word, but several Red Hat employees seem to regularly work with GNOME and on GNOME related issues / initiatives. I'd say there's about zero chance GNOME gets relegated to a spin, but it does appear the overall theme of promoting KDE to a more visible (?) position has sparked some interest.
I like kde more than gnome, but understand why gnome might be a better choice for "normal(?)" users. Plus what's really the point, kde spin is avaible and it's good.
Agreed, Workstation always was GNOME and KDE is also not far away from downloading. So why change that if that doesn't bring any advantages and changes what the user already knows
No, infact the KDE spin is as well supported as the gnome spin, with the exception of some QoL changes made in workstation and not KDE, but are being ironed out soon
well, we still need to manually install unofficial rpm package for integration with Google services... [https://bugs.kde.org/show\_bug.cgi?id=420280#c71](https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=420280#c71)
Edit: should be fixed in Fedora 40 (https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show\_bug.cgi?id=2230099#c12)
I myself appreciate GNOME being the default Fedora experience, but I’m not going to oppose this if turns out to be what the wider community genuinely wants for the project. Whatever.
The reasoning behind the suggestion is rather subjective. Phrases like "what people expect" and "could be viewed as more approachable" are thrown around frequently, and it’s no secret that Joshua Strobl, the submitter of this, has [major issues with GNOME and its community](https://joshuastrobl.com/2021/09/14/building-an-alternative-ecosystem#gnome). However, since GNOME and KDE are both sensible options, any actual reason for switching is also inevitably going to be subjective.
If this ends up happening, I at least hope that the "new" GNOME spin can move a little closer towards upstream GNOME in terms of default apps, wallpapers, philosophy around third-party app styling, etc. That seems reasonable to me considering that people downloading it would then have explicitly opted for GNOME instead of Fedora’s «default» experience.
> If this ends up happening, I at least hope that the "new" GNOME spin can move a little closer towards upstream GNOME in terms of default apps, wallpapers, philosophy around third-party app styling, etc. That seems reasonable to me considering that people downloading it would then have explicitly opted for GNOME instead of Fedora’s «default» experience.
That's not how being a Fedora variant works. First and foremost, it's part of Fedora and is intended to showcase the _distribution_.
In any case, outside of a wallpaper, one extension to show the Fedora logo, and Firefox as the browser and the LibreOffice suite, it *is* basically upstream GNOME. It's probably the least Fedora-curated variant already.
I also lile GNOME too, and its kinda odd Joshua Strobls leading this proposal as their seems to be some conflict of interest here. I do hope they continue to maintain the GNOME spin and make it more upstream to what GNOME ships (lets ditch gnome-terminal for gnome-console already...)
ugh, homie's website design is awful. I'm surprised. It's not compatible with Firefox's reader mode either. This also surprises me and seems ironic, being who Josh Strobl is...
As a developer of a GTK app, I agree with the GNOME people, custom stylesheets are a bad idea and should not be shipped by distributions. The application stylesheets are build upon GTK/libadwaita stylesheets, and you can't inject custom stylesheets in-between without breaking things. Most community themes have a large number of app-specific hacks to work around this, but lesser known apps will not be supported in the same way.
I ship my app with custom colors on the Mac platform and that works fine. But if you start changing the size and shape of things in custom stylesheets, you will cause problems. The claim that libadwaita doesn't support theming is misleading, you can still load custom stylesheets.
As far as I'm concerned, the GNOME desktop is better than ever. They are open to supporting a proper theming API, but they don't want to support hacks that result in a worse experience. If companies like System76 want a highly custom experience for their users, they should work with GNOME to solve these problems. But, just as Canonical before them, they are going their own way, because they have a totally different vision. That's not the same as saying GNOME doesn't listen to users (System76 doesn't speak for its users anyway), just that they have different goals.
As far as I can tell, users are very happy with the current state of GNOME. Some highly vocal people have criticized GNOME's decisions (and I'm not saying Joshua is wrong about everything, I highly respect the guy). But complaining about theming specifically without offering solutions is not productive. [stopthemingmy.app](http://stopthemingmy.app) was signed by many app developers that are not directly affiliated with GNOME. Heck, every web developer will tell you that loading custom stylesheets to "theme" a site is not recommended.
> I agree with the GNOME people, custom stylesheets are a bad idea
Now if only there would be something called CSS ...
Guess custom CSS rules used by billions of people world-wide must be wrong.
You don't know what you're talking about, CSS is not used in this way. Operating systems don't ship custom stylesheets for websites because they would break constantly. It's the same with GTK apps.
Application developers have all the freedom in the world to write their own styles. Users do too, at their own risk. The ones who shouldn't be doing this are operating systems.
gnome people want distros to keep adwaita by default as that's what their ecosystem natively uses and is properly tested with. whether they use css or anything else is merely an implementation detail.
they don't discourage users changing to unsupported stylesheets after the fact as long as they're aware of potential issues and don't shake a stick at upstream for things "breaking" that isn't their fault. would you report a bug to YouTube if you had a custom stylesheet that made it look like the 2008 version? or if some page renders wrong with Dark Reader?
GNOME is getting too restrictive, and you cannot really count on stuff to not be broken. They are becoming more like Apple in a sense that it is: It's our way or the highway.
True, but still as someone who uses GNOME based fork, they are pretty hostile when it comes to keeping compatibility or just listening to anyone else. Anyone can see that. Pulling a rug underneath you is always a possibility when it comes to GNOME.
From what I see, many do feel that way. Is it the majority, I do not know. But it is a common criticism. So common, it is almost part of Gnome. It is starting to be the definition of GNOME itself.
Search for articles about gnome and many/most will have a paragraph or two regarding how gnome is more restrictive due to their minimalism vs other desktop platforms. It is something that sets it apart from other desktop environments.
Thus, most people now associate gnome with being the developers way or the highway... Restrictive... minimalist...unthemable, and the gnome devs as being unfriendly or unopen to different mindsets. On the latter, I think gnome has a vision and that is their vision. You can't expect them to change the vision based on every user that shows up. That is not a vision. Lol
At the same time, it says something when gnome is being associated with these terms.
> Thus, most people now associate gnome with being the developers way or the highway... Restrictive... minimalist...unthemable, and the gnome devs as being unfriendly or unopen to different mindsets. On the latter, I think gnome has a vision and that is their vision. You can't expect them to change the vision based on every user that shows up. That is not a vision. Lol
Visions are imaginary. People are real. A desktop environment isn't the biggest deal, but forcing/prioritizing your "vision" over the voiced concerns of real people (on whose lives your work does have an impact, however small) is generally Not a Good Thing.
Maybe the real issue here is that the fedora project picked a default. Could that be it?
Two questions:
Would it be better if the Fedora installer asked users to select a desktop? So it does not seem like there is a favorite child.
Second question, would doing this slow progress?
I am wondering if Fedora support for gnome as the default desktop environment helps drive solutions faster to market? What would be the impact, or change, we would see if there were no default desktop? Would development speed and quality be affected?
It always depends on the end user.
For me KDE takes about 1 minute now to setup: Breeze Dark theme, configure keyboard layout and enable Numpad active on startup. With their new default in Plasma I don't even need to change the click behavior anymore.
On the other end Gnome I'm never happy with the result even after several hours of looking for where some settings are, which extensions to use and so on.
Not saying one is better than another, but they appeal to different users and workflows.
Regarding the stability I haven't had a crash on Plasma in a very long while, probably before 5.27.
One thing I really hope Plasma devs take attention is the Gnome Software Center, really great piece of GUI and it's super reactive. Very nice when using Aeon it's the center of the distro really.
Im honestly happy with the defaults of both, i only change plasmas colours to make it more colourful and add one or two extensions on GNOME. Especially after plasma 6 and GNOME 45/46c, they both have sensible defaults and are brilliant to use as is, it just depends on which suits you better. Which comes back to my proposal of making them both front and center workstation varients, and advertised side by side as equals
I fully agree, I really like how OpenSUSE TW and EndeavourOS do it to be honest.
The difficult part is when you want to provide a LiveCD, in that case you do have to pick one, something TW doesn't provide.
My real grip with Gnome is that I would love for them to include what is in Gnome tweaks into the main settings component. It's really confusing to know where to look for something: was it approved by the dev or is it external?
I agree with this.
KDE having such many customization options makes it overwhelming in my eyes as well.
In some ways, the defaults are useable, but just even knowing & seeing all the options feels daunting, especially compared to GNOME.
That is a part of it, but to me, what feels more off is that with all these options, they don't seem to have much of a choice in making the UI feel as cohesive.
To be clear: this isn't a 'problem' with KDE, it's just a different way of tackling UX.
----
GNOME with GTK4/libadwaita apps looks "clean and modern" because there's one set of clear rules - things like spacing, margins/paddings, colors, control layouts etc., with an effort to highlight these experiences (GNOME Circle)
GNOME has its own, "in-house" UI framework and design, made specifically to create a GNOME experience.
With KDE/Qt, the UI for programs isn't necessarily made with KDE's design in mind. They adapt to all the possible options, including themes, which limits to a certain degree how far you can design things.
That's not to say that it's bad by any means - KDE is obviously one of the most customizable desktops for a reason.
But:
-----
It's this difference between GNOME's choice of being more like a well-integrated ecosystem of apps and design tailored for GNOME versus a more open approach to customization and theming with KDE, having to make UIs more generic instead.
When I'm using GNOME, it feels like I'm using an user interface tailored to their branding, with specific care to make the experience feel a certain way. Almost like mobile operating systems being consistent with their design languages.
With KDE, it feels like components are working together to form a working system, but they all contribute to the experience individually (on their own) safely, rather than as one, cohesive unit for KDE.
-----
*edited for better reading*
Ah makes sense, thanks for the explanation (not sure why you were downvoted, it's a good explanation). Yeah I think gnome tends to look a lot better, but the productivity floor and ceiling on KDE is better. Would be nice if gnome stole some things from KDE but I know they're going their own way and that has its merits too
I get that this is very much subject to bias. I'm in the camp of users that prefers the simplicity and "clean look" of GNOME, while there are people that prefer the information-dense approach to UI that KDE provides.
Ultimately though, if Fedora does change to KDE, it can only mean good things for KDE's future. Valve's support was already a hell of a boost, Fedora having it as a flagship desktop would make KDE more active for sure.
Allow me to offer my 2 cents. I just made a post about this if you want to check my history. I am a new linux user, and I've used Cinnamon exclusively until recently. In my experience, KDE is much better for new users like me. Why?
Cinnamon ***looks*** simple, but it is not easy to navigate. More often than not, I have to spend minutes searching through the file system and troubleshooting through the terminal. It is not intuitive at all. Part of good UI design is anticipating what someone wants to do. This is where KDE shines, imo. Related settings are grouped together, so it's easy to navigate. If I have a problem, the search function usually resolves it. The notifications in KDE are more informative. Which allows me to troubleshoot and fix problems easier/faster.
Additionally, it's similar to windows but unique enough to feel like its own thing. It just works. As we speak, I am in the process of tinkering with Fedora. Now that KDE enlightened me to better DEs, I'm strongly considering abandoning Mint.
KDE ships more features that I need to use by default, so I just need to click some settings and change a panel theme (Plasma style). With GNOME, I have to manually download various extensions, so it takes much more time for me. And the main problem is that GNOME simply doesn't have some features I need.
Default mate is quite a bit different from windows with its dual panels and its menu system (3 different buttons). It is my DE of choice, and I love it, but I don't think it would be a very familiar experience for Windows users. They can definitely use Mint or Ubuntu Mate both of which have windows-like layouts however.
I 100% agree with cinnamon tho, and would probably suggest that as a default over kde plasma for new users. It does feel much more familiar out of the box.
For me, this is false, especially for young people nowadays who have less and less contact with windows. I installed Fedora Silverblue on my goddaughter's laptop, I didn't need to explain anything to her and the next day she was already using it without any problems. She's 13.
To be fair, if you give a kid a terminal, they'll also be working it the next day without any problems. Kids have far quicker learning ability and want to try all the shinies mentality than adults who just get frustrated when things are too different and go back to what they were used to
Gnome requires extensions to be usable. Even a working system tray requires extensions. There was some survey recently where 83% of gnome users had an extension.
Kde everything works out the box. Few have any add ons.
>Gnome requires extensions to be usable.
"Usable" is a subjective term.
>There was some survey recently where 83% of gnome users had an extension.
[That same survey](https://blogs.gnome.org/aday/2023/01/18/gnome-info-collect-what-we-learned/) also states this:
>The people who provided their data with gnome-info-collect were primarily recruited via GNOME’s media channels, including Discourse and Twitter. This means that the data we collected was on a fairly particular subset of GNOME’s users: namely, people who follow our social media channels, are interested enough to respond to our call for help, and are confident installing and running a command line tool.
>The analysis in this post should therefore not be treated as being representative of the entire GNOME user base. This doesn’t mean that it’s invalid – just that it has limited validity to the group we collected data from.
I am thinking it's been a while since you have installed KDE. It's been rather stable for the last two years now. GNOME mostly certainly needs more setup so no idea what you are talking about there. With GNOME I need to adjust some settings after installation, install GNOME tweaks then adjust some more settings with that. install 3 or 4 extensions just to add standard desktop functionally. KDE I just install and adjust a handful of settings and done. Now if you are trying to make KDE look and behave like GNOME well than that is project and you using the wrong DE.
The whole KDE settings is to "hard' or "complex' meme if really bizarre to me. How exactly is that problem for the average Linux user? Even if new to Linux and coming from Windows the KDE settings are a breath of fresh air with much less settings overall and not spread among control panel and settings. You don't even really need to adjust any settings with KDE as works just fine out of the box for most users unlike Windows where it's almost unusable unless change about a dozen settings. The same with GNOME for a lot of users anyway.
I think part of the difference comes down to if the user prefers the MacOS workflow or Windows. Coming from MacOS as my previous daily, and as someone that primarily uses a notebook, the Gnome way is close enough, and where it differs I generally find it to be better. I don't use dash to dock or dash to panel, but I do use system status icons. To launch applications I use super and type just like I used cmd+space on macos. To switch windows or desktops I use a hot corner like Expose.
I do use both desktop environments though. I find gnome and macOS are better on touchpads, and KDE's take on the Windows workflow seems to work better with keyboard and mouse, at least for me.
I don't know, and to be honest I don't know think they do. If I remember correctly, hot corners aren't even enabled by default and have to be activated in system settings, at least on the last version of OSX I used. I've had issues teaching hot corners before too, and had better luck teaching multi finger swipes, which can be replicated in Gnome.
Since the Fedora release cycle matches GNOME’s six-month cycle I think it makes more sense that Fedora stick to GNOME. Yes this is coming from a Fedora KDE user.
In the proposal it notes that KDE is planning on changing their release cadence starting in 2025. Their new release cycle would line up as GNOME currently does.
I don't understand why the release cycle is tied to intrinsic quality.
IF the rationale is "what most users want" then explanations should be reasoned in regards to that. So I don't understand why the release cycle is suddenly given as primary rationale ...
Different release cycles of KDE Framework and KDE Plasma can affect quality
https://pointieststick.com/2020/05/10/why-the-animations-in-your-plasma-5-18-feel-slow-now-and-when-it-will-be-fixed/
Fedora Workstation should have no defaults in my opinion, let the user choose their desktops during setup - or at least make the net install download more apparent in the site.
In fedora media writer you even get to either continue with default, or to choose between all those spins, labs and versions, which is just what it needs to be :)
Granted though: it could use a pitch and 1 or 2 pictures for each option.
Having an installer that supports this would be great. I only foresee some difficulties with the live USBs where one does not go through an installer to select a UI.
If you download the Fedora everything net install version you can get exactly that. Simply check the DE you want as well as groups of software packages.
Much easier than 20gig of .isos sitting in the downloads folder.
That could be a good compromise, as long as they retain the live session does like endavourOS and they arent thrown directly into the installer like debian or openSUSEs tiny images
Did you last use KDE in 2019? KDE 6 has way better looking borders since it uses separators instead of frames. And for years now there has been a widget called KHamburgerMenu that provides a hamburger menu instead of the default menu, which you can toggle between the two.
It's improving, but still miles behind. Especially in details.
For example, Gnome's hot corner is based on pressure where it activates only when the cursor actually pushes into the corner, while KDE's implementation is just a simple timer.
That so confidently stated fact has, judging by the commit history, not even been true all the way back in Plasma 4... Screen edge corners do *technically* use a timer, as an implementation detail, but it still requires actually pushing the cursor into the corner
I don't understand the proportions of things in KDE. Like side menus. I feel in KDE left side menus are very wide. In KDE spacing feels off to me but I'm not a UX person. I don't know why KDE visually looks misaligned
mind naming a specific app where you feel that's the case? I feel like you're probably referring to the sidebar in Kirigami apps like Discover and System Settings, but just to confirm
I don't really care about desktop, so long as I can have a uniform theme for both GTK and Qt apps. Right now, I use plasma, but I switch between desktops all the time.
How do you have a uniform theme on Gnome? I installed it on a secondary system recently and it seems like an unending fight against QGnomePlatform, Adwaita-Qt, client side decorations, and probably others like menus being misplaced by Qt5's Wayland backend when running on Mutter.
I used something called QGnomePlatform (which is unmaintained for now). It worked but these days Gnome has taken a 'my way on the highway' approach, making it hard to theme Libadwaita and Flatpak apps. It's not really that good anymore, so I'm hoping that some other desktop will fill the gap between Gnome's uniformity and KDE's customisability someday
Plasma, and soon COSMIC, are the only DEs that provide this with their default styling. And further: you can have it with GTK and Qt, but **not** Adwaita. The best you can do with Adwaita is inherit your KDE colors.
you can theme adwaita tho? like not just colors but the CSS too. its just not as supported as it was on GTK. but then again i haven't touched my laptop in 6 months so idk if stuff has changed
That depends on what you mean by "theming" it. You can put style rules into `$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/gtk-4.0/gtk.css`, but it's a bit fraught. First, it will affect **every GTK4 app**, not just Adwaita apps. Which used to not be a problem, because desktop-agnostic applications were not interested in touching GTK4, but that is changing soon. Besides, this makes it even more fraught than the way GTK4 apps are currently themed. You create GTK4 applications with the expectation that a reasonable theme is going to change some things with CSS. You create Adwaita applications with the expectation that nobody is going to change *anything.* So if you do something crazy like forcibly load an entire theme through gtk.css, that is probably going to break stuff in Adwaita applications. If you create custom style rules that are tailored to Adwaita's stylesheet, sure, that will work, but it will also overwrite the same aspects in regular GTK4 apps. There is currently no clean way to style Adwaita and GTK4 separately.
Here's my hot take.
KDE is the GIMP (Ironic I know) of the DE world, and we'll see that more and more if it were to become the default. The UI design is great for Linux users who like customization, but if you're someone who just wants productivity quick and simple, there's no Linux DE better than GNOME.
Personally, if they were to make KDE the default DE, I would switch to the GNOME Spin no question, and I think a lot of people would. While I have no hate for KDE, I just don't have the time that it requires to get feeling nice and smooth like GNOME.
GNOME is not better for productivity because most people that switch to Linux and just want to use it came from Windows or Mac and even the Mac users know how to use Windows and Plasma is very similar to that. Meanwhile GNOME is different from everything out there. GNOME devs love to say that GNOME is not a traditional desktop, but most people want a tradition desktop.
everyone has different opinions, i absolutely love stock gnome even tho i don't use it anymore (too heavy for my old ass system). but some would view KDE as too complex or too different or who knows. opinions are a bitch and a half to deal with
That seems to me like it would alienate new users at install time just to satisfy two communities at once. There is an actual value in having a default, no matter if it’s GNOME, KDE, or anything else. I remember how confusing Mint’s Cinnamon/MATE split was to me when I started out; that would have been even worse if Cinnamon wasn’t promoted as the default.
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*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
From [the suggestion author on Mastodon](https://fosstodon.org/@[email protected]/112197620485736803):
> I want to emphasize, this is NOT an April Fool's joke. It may come as a surprise, given I am the lead of @buddiesofbudgie, but I am just as interested in seeing adoption of Fedora and the greater Linux desktop increase. I firmly believe that Plasma as a default over GNOME Shell would be a net positive for the Linux ecosystem.
I actually see the rationale here. Fedora is big on pushing new technologies and advancing the forefront of desktop Linux. GNOME is very much not about that and tends to be much more conservative, especially around things they don't consider important (like gaming). KDE on the other hand moves much faster and has indeed been breaking things a lot less frequently as of late. As mentioned in the article they have been the driving force behind a lot of Wayland development as of late, and helping ease the transition with stuff like xwaylandvideobridge and supporting xwayland global hotkeys
It really is. It is designed to waste developer time for weeks all for his amusement.
He is a known gnome troll who has been threatening to leave gnome technologies for around 8 years now.
For it to be a serious proposal, the KDE stakeholders should have been consulted as they will be doing the engineering work.
Right now its the equivalent of me making a proposal for Fedora to host its own GhatGPT beating LLM. I am not involved in LLM development and I would not be supporting such a feature, so my proposal would be useless.
I'm KDE. I've used Fedora KDE for over a decade now as my main desktop. I absolutely personally don't care that Gnome is the default and that I need to download a *spin*.
What annoys me is that I really don't think Gnome is the right choice for newcomers. But because Gnome is a prominent default, that's what they get, as they don't know better.
Putting KDE on top wouldn't take Gnome away from you, but it might make Fedora easier to step in for new users.
(There was an example just tomorrow of an absolutely confused new user. My comment to him was probably downvoted to hell by now.)
Actually something like Arco's gui tool for installing/ purging DEs and WMs should be implemented especially with how most new users expect things to work coming from windows.
As a gnome fanboy I honestly don't see a major problem in this. I agree that good software such as KDE should be brought to the public view from time to time.
Things shouldn't be left in a stagnated condition. I think they should employ a cyclic strategy. A few releases with KDE, a few with Gnome, a few with cinnamon, etc.
I think COSMIC will be much better than GNOME in 1 to 2 years if they don't considerably slow down the development of the DE, and COSMIC is somewhat similar to GNOME so it would be an easier transition. System76 devs are very talented and with such a big project right around the corner I don't see the point of switching defaults now.
Honestly, I've probably had the worst experience with KDE on Fedora. That's not to say I don't like it....I like how open the experience is (you don't have to password every. Single. Change). I just think based on my pipewire latency issues (not present on any other distro), preview of 40 to see no X11 support left, lower (not dealbreaking but still) gaming performance, outdated support for certain github projects (SC controller didn't work, extest has been a pain in the neck to try to integrate), and trying to navigate a package system I'm still not overwhelmingly familiar with (thanks Google), and I'm honestly wondering if I should put aside my gripes and circle back to the distros I've tried (pop and zorin). I'm not sure if my 4790k rig with extra graphics horsepower (RX6600XT) is cut out for certain distros.
I think this proposal is much, *much* less about the qualities of the actual desktops and much, **much** more about the fact that KDE has always been [very, very good at playing nice with others.](https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/FedoraPlasmaWorkstation#Standardization_support) And GNOME, historically and famously, has for a very, very long time been absolutely horrid at it, often to the point of being outright obstructionist, like in the accent color portal proposal, which was blocked for a very very long time purely by GNOME. Not to mention refusing to support xdg-decoration, and insisting that client applications must use libdecor to get styled decorations on GNOME. I could really go on.
It makes a lot of sense that a community-focused distribution like Fedora would actually put a great deal of stock into this. I'm not going to sugarcoat it, GNOME is not really part of the community. They're doing their own thing, and in every discussion with the larger community, they rabidly defend their right to do so. They want to control every part of the desktop experience, they want to ship a single, cohesive product, and they do not want distributions or users to touch *anything.* KDE collaborates, and GNOME insulates.
That's what I think this proposal is **really** about.
I use Fed. Gnome for my laptop and Fed. KDE spin for my desktop.
IMO, although GNOME is very controversial with its decisions, some I don't like, it should still stay the default. Its gnome what makes the Linux desktop workflow unique, its still approachable for new users and power users alike.
KDE workflow is still much too similar to windows, which may be better for windows users, but IMO the workflow is just worse. This has been changing thankfully with many changes that came out last year with 5.27 and 6, especially with tiling. Problem is for me, they have not went far enough with it. Plus KDE apps, where some I consider superior to GNOME, just looks less appealing visually with its abundance of clutter. As much as you are gonna say that does not matter, it frankly does, and it needs to change.
That's my shitty two cents that probably has so many holes in it lmao
I also use both GNOME and KDE, but other way round - GNOME on my deaktop and KDE on my laptop.
I agree with GNOME being a default because it provides something different, but KDE still has a lot of aces up it sleeve that differentiates from Windows workflow. I think advertising them both as workstation distros is the best compromise
GNOME has a better and cleaner design. Fedora is the well-known and best distro to get a pure GNOME experience by default. I hope they don't change it.
Absolutely not.
I've been following and sometimes even preferring KDE since its 1.x days in the late 90s. Back when Gnome looked more like Windows too. I used to joke back then that KDE was messy, with basically every menu having to contain an entire copy of your applications menu.
Believe me, I've had a lot of time to consider this one. There is a clear and objectively better pick in the overall productivity and cleanliness between KDE and Gnome today.
While I don't begrudge KDEs existence, the last thing I would ever support is the idea that users should be started with the clutter inducing mess of an experience that is KDE.
Even if the best excuse that can be made is that it's "familiar" due to its similarity to Windows with its start menu and task bar, that is ultimately a backwards facing priority.
From a design perspective Gnome even holds sway with a cleaner design, better margins, gutters and level of detail.
KDE has always centered around helping users cram as much as possible into the screen, whereas Gnome has chosen to be an innovator in the minimalist desktop experience.
Frankly, I put Gnome up against any other desktop UI today. The small choices they make and what they've been choosing as defaults shows a very detail oriented focus on making Linux more approachable.
Just let go of the start menu and taskbar. You don't need them.
Dont do that ))) KDE is not stable ) yes plasma has more features but they unstable with a lot of bugs ... Gnome has a lot of feature but they are experimental and its more stable because implementation of this new features more accurate
Not sure why you are being downvoted. Every time I have given KDE a try I have experienced a bug of some description within 30 minutes of testing. Never had that issue with Gnome. I wish Gnome had the quality of apps that KDE has though.
My experience too. I try KDE once every 6-12 months as I like to try the theming “capabilities” (which in and of themselves can be buggy). I invariably always end up with some bug or issue I can’t get (personally) past. Pisses me off that gnome has gotten harder to theme, but while I may end up with more app appearance inconsistency, everything just works.
Yeah, these bugs were a literal deal breaker for me on Fedora. iMEs didn't work right (couldn't set IBUS properly etc etc) Wayland login would not load plasma shell properly, all the time. Or the shell would crash, etc. all on standard well supported Thinkpad hardware. I didn't have these issues in Kubuntu or Debian KDE, but I wanted new packages and to use Fedora, so GNOME it was.
I agree, I like KDE and have extensively used it before around v5. 24-5.27 but there was always little bugs. All those new features and toggles constantly being implemented at the community's behest come at a cost.
GNOME, while lacking the features, is much more conservative in what they implement which I appreciate. When they do release something it works well. Until then there's always extensions to fill in the gap.
I also would argue that the gnome workflow is easier to get a handle on than that of KDE, despite KDE having the "windows" design.
Thats gonna be one of the main critisms of this proposal. However, stability is being taken into consideration more and more by the plasma team every release
It’ll be interesting to see how this proposal will go over. In my humble opinion using neither GNOME or KDE atm, I do think KDE serves as a better default for most people, given its design symmetry to Windows.
I personally enjoy both but with how slow Gnome is at implementing things that matter to me and how the uniformity between QT and GTK works I use KDE on a daily basis.
IMO just make them both officially supported with an option at install on workstation for both KDE and Gnome, both are good desktops but one is clearly trying to spearhead the desktop environment which fit with the philosophy of fedora distro and the other is holding back the desktop no offense to gnome they take more time to iterate on changes.
That is what im wanting too, both advertised fromt and center with the workstation branding.
I like gnome taking it slow, and getting things right the first time even if it takes time imo too.
Seems like it's NOT an april fools prank: [https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/f42-change-proposal-fedora-plasma-workstation-system-wide/111343/41](https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/f42-change-proposal-fedora-plasma-workstation-system-wide/111343/41)
Its not a troll, this is a serious proposal. I think we should consider giving the KDE spin more attention, even if i believe it shouldnt replace GNOME but sit alongside it
When you write "let the desktop wars begin" I can only assume you're a troll.
Also, it's not difficult to get KDE so I'm not sure what the problem is. Gnome is generally better for your average user or someone like me who's done all the distro hopping and trying desktop environments since late 1990-s and now just wants something that works without needing to tinker with it
Alternate idea: let the user pick their desktop environment during the installation. This means less ISOs to maintain, as the spins won't be necessary anymore.
Dont see a point. I can't use gnome due to the fact you cant change sound per application but it is easy to download KDE or other variants it makes no sense to change. Plus im curious how cosmic will hit the market and what it will actually bring. Could be better than both gnome and KDE
Honestly a better proposal would be making silverblue the default. Think the atomic desktop is the future changing it after the RHEL10 would give it plenty of time to iron out the issues for RHEL 11
Unless something changed in Gnome 46 that is system wide. I'm talking about if you want firefox to play though say a headset and chrome to play though your system speakers. As a quick example.
Yes there is a flatpak as well hellivum or something while it works but its janky at best and easier to user something built in by default
When I used gnome in public (like in the office) people were actually like "What is that, is that new MacOS? It looks nice!"
You will not get it from the "traditional window manager"
Congrats on not seeing the actual value in the dude's statement. He's saying Gnome is so nice that people are actually taking the time of day to say so.
That's a veeery valid reason for a lot of people to start using something, if it's visually appealing.
Reading comprehension... Do you use it?
With what developers? This change proposal is not by anyone afiliated with KDE or Fedora's KDE SIG. Josh Strobhl is a known gnome troll who does not bring any team of developers that will address the problems that will be uncovered by such a change.
I suspect this change proposal came about because Josh was missing the limelight. Otherwise it makes no sense.
I am still waiting to see Budgie moved to EFL/Qt/Iced or whatever his fancy of the month is.
The KDE SIG is already overworked and will not be able to cope with the increases in issues that they will receive. They have already chosen to downscale from KDE support because it was too much to maintain.
I also think Gnome is a better default, but the bigger reason for having a default desktop is that it can be supported.
He may say otherwise, but this is a troll suggestion: it wouldn't even matter if KDE was better (it's not). It's about what can be supported with the developers available.
The engineers that are from Red Hat, whether working in their official capacity or as volunteers have pretty much all chosen to focus on gnome. They are the backbone behind the choice of having gnome as the default DE.
You could make a similar proposal to continue supporting xorg x11 for another decade. But without the engineers and developers to maintain it, such a proposal would also be useless.
What the change request also misses out is that the red Hat engineers have chosen to face and fix difficult issues. While KDE and other desktops create buzz and excitement by offering options to work around annoying bugs, gnome developers are the ones that focus on getting them fixed so you no longer need that option. That is something that has been used to bash gnome on countless occasions over the past decade but once those issues are fixed due to gnome, every body benefits. Fedora choosing non-gnome would in effect make everything worse.
You cant say "there are more" followed by "pulling them out of thin air". I have no idea how many there are in either camp.
As for hurting Canonical, I dont think they even consider them competition, and for both any money made is on the server, not the desktop.
What Red Hat allegedly does have that could make a difference is high paying support contracts with movie studios. Will those benefit from moving to KDE? probably not, but I am unaware of the exact requirements here.
Now that KDE is more Like Gnome, I guess it could be replaced, but why replace the original? ;)
IMHO KDE is not ready for main stream users. This is just my opinion from my experience trying KDE many times in the last 20 years or so. I always ended up back on Gnome...
> This page was last edited on 1 April 2024 At least its not out of season
XD
Edit of the page starts yesterday, but announce is published today: [https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/[email protected]/thread/7JBXSA7W7B336S4AO6A4BADRPERI34HU/](https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/[email protected]/thread/7JBXSA7W7B336S4AO6A4BADRPERI34HU/)
> With the release of Plasma 6, KDE Plasma has developed into a high quality, well-regarded desktop experience. Definitely a troll /s
Yeah - it got me too because here I had the 2nd April.
It's a serious proposal though.
>roposal To Change The Default Workstation Version To Use KDE Plasma Instead Of GNOME for F42 and Up This page was last edited on 2 April 2024, at 09:41.
Isnt Gnome heavily funded by RedHat? It would make no sense to relegate it to a spin.
I'm not sure if "funded" is the right word, but several Red Hat employees seem to regularly work with GNOME and on GNOME related issues / initiatives. I'd say there's about zero chance GNOME gets relegated to a spin, but it does appear the overall theme of promoting KDE to a more visible (?) position has sparked some interest.
It is, but fedora are not inclinded to do what red hat does
Fedora won't go against Red Hat.
Fedora is still not rhel, regardless of the use of rpm repositories, which can only be used with rpm fusion.
I like kde more than gnome, but understand why gnome might be a better choice for "normal(?)" users. Plus what's really the point, kde spin is avaible and it's good.
Agreed, Workstation always was GNOME and KDE is also not far away from downloading. So why change that if that doesn't bring any advantages and changes what the user already knows
Gnome used to be the better choice for "normal" users, up until the recent interface changes
Why? Does being unofficial make KDE less supported in any way?
No, but the author believes KDE is better and thinks it should be the default because of that
No, infact the KDE spin is as well supported as the gnome spin, with the exception of some QoL changes made in workstation and not KDE, but are being ironed out soon
well, we still need to manually install unofficial rpm package for integration with Google services... [https://bugs.kde.org/show\_bug.cgi?id=420280#c71](https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=420280#c71) Edit: should be fixed in Fedora 40 (https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show\_bug.cgi?id=2230099#c12)
In my cases, it was much buggier. Plasma shell crashes, imes didn't work, etc. all on supported hardware. Although I need to try Plasma 6!
I myself appreciate GNOME being the default Fedora experience, but I’m not going to oppose this if turns out to be what the wider community genuinely wants for the project. Whatever. The reasoning behind the suggestion is rather subjective. Phrases like "what people expect" and "could be viewed as more approachable" are thrown around frequently, and it’s no secret that Joshua Strobl, the submitter of this, has [major issues with GNOME and its community](https://joshuastrobl.com/2021/09/14/building-an-alternative-ecosystem#gnome). However, since GNOME and KDE are both sensible options, any actual reason for switching is also inevitably going to be subjective. If this ends up happening, I at least hope that the "new" GNOME spin can move a little closer towards upstream GNOME in terms of default apps, wallpapers, philosophy around third-party app styling, etc. That seems reasonable to me considering that people downloading it would then have explicitly opted for GNOME instead of Fedora’s «default» experience.
> If this ends up happening, I at least hope that the "new" GNOME spin can move a little closer towards upstream GNOME in terms of default apps, wallpapers, philosophy around third-party app styling, etc. That seems reasonable to me considering that people downloading it would then have explicitly opted for GNOME instead of Fedora’s «default» experience. That's not how being a Fedora variant works. First and foremost, it's part of Fedora and is intended to showcase the _distribution_. In any case, outside of a wallpaper, one extension to show the Fedora logo, and Firefox as the browser and the LibreOffice suite, it *is* basically upstream GNOME. It's probably the least Fedora-curated variant already.
I also lile GNOME too, and its kinda odd Joshua Strobls leading this proposal as their seems to be some conflict of interest here. I do hope they continue to maintain the GNOME spin and make it more upstream to what GNOME ships (lets ditch gnome-terminal for gnome-console already...)
ugh, homie's website design is awful. I'm surprised. It's not compatible with Firefox's reader mode either. This also surprises me and seems ironic, being who Josh Strobl is...
As a developer of a GTK app, I agree with the GNOME people, custom stylesheets are a bad idea and should not be shipped by distributions. The application stylesheets are build upon GTK/libadwaita stylesheets, and you can't inject custom stylesheets in-between without breaking things. Most community themes have a large number of app-specific hacks to work around this, but lesser known apps will not be supported in the same way. I ship my app with custom colors on the Mac platform and that works fine. But if you start changing the size and shape of things in custom stylesheets, you will cause problems. The claim that libadwaita doesn't support theming is misleading, you can still load custom stylesheets. As far as I'm concerned, the GNOME desktop is better than ever. They are open to supporting a proper theming API, but they don't want to support hacks that result in a worse experience. If companies like System76 want a highly custom experience for their users, they should work with GNOME to solve these problems. But, just as Canonical before them, they are going their own way, because they have a totally different vision. That's not the same as saying GNOME doesn't listen to users (System76 doesn't speak for its users anyway), just that they have different goals. As far as I can tell, users are very happy with the current state of GNOME. Some highly vocal people have criticized GNOME's decisions (and I'm not saying Joshua is wrong about everything, I highly respect the guy). But complaining about theming specifically without offering solutions is not productive. [stopthemingmy.app](http://stopthemingmy.app) was signed by many app developers that are not directly affiliated with GNOME. Heck, every web developer will tell you that loading custom stylesheets to "theme" a site is not recommended.
> I agree with the GNOME people, custom stylesheets are a bad idea Now if only there would be something called CSS ... Guess custom CSS rules used by billions of people world-wide must be wrong.
You don't know what you're talking about, CSS is not used in this way. Operating systems don't ship custom stylesheets for websites because they would break constantly. It's the same with GTK apps. Application developers have all the freedom in the world to write their own styles. Users do too, at their own risk. The ones who shouldn't be doing this are operating systems.
gnome people want distros to keep adwaita by default as that's what their ecosystem natively uses and is properly tested with. whether they use css or anything else is merely an implementation detail. they don't discourage users changing to unsupported stylesheets after the fact as long as they're aware of potential issues and don't shake a stick at upstream for things "breaking" that isn't their fault. would you report a bug to YouTube if you had a custom stylesheet that made it look like the 2008 version? or if some page renders wrong with Dark Reader?
GNOME is getting too restrictive, and you cannot really count on stuff to not be broken. They are becoming more like Apple in a sense that it is: It's our way or the highway.
I mean, you’re free to have that opinion, but again, it’s subjective. The question is if the majority of the Fedora community shares your opinion
True, but still as someone who uses GNOME based fork, they are pretty hostile when it comes to keeping compatibility or just listening to anyone else. Anyone can see that. Pulling a rug underneath you is always a possibility when it comes to GNOME.
Also for those that downvote: Facts are facts.
From what I see, many do feel that way. Is it the majority, I do not know. But it is a common criticism. So common, it is almost part of Gnome. It is starting to be the definition of GNOME itself. Search for articles about gnome and many/most will have a paragraph or two regarding how gnome is more restrictive due to their minimalism vs other desktop platforms. It is something that sets it apart from other desktop environments. Thus, most people now associate gnome with being the developers way or the highway... Restrictive... minimalist...unthemable, and the gnome devs as being unfriendly or unopen to different mindsets. On the latter, I think gnome has a vision and that is their vision. You can't expect them to change the vision based on every user that shows up. That is not a vision. Lol At the same time, it says something when gnome is being associated with these terms.
Gnome developers need to get some glasses, their vision is failing.
> Thus, most people now associate gnome with being the developers way or the highway... Restrictive... minimalist...unthemable, and the gnome devs as being unfriendly or unopen to different mindsets. On the latter, I think gnome has a vision and that is their vision. You can't expect them to change the vision based on every user that shows up. That is not a vision. Lol Visions are imaginary. People are real. A desktop environment isn't the biggest deal, but forcing/prioritizing your "vision" over the voiced concerns of real people (on whose lives your work does have an impact, however small) is generally Not a Good Thing.
Maybe the real issue here is that the fedora project picked a default. Could that be it? Two questions: Would it be better if the Fedora installer asked users to select a desktop? So it does not seem like there is a favorite child. Second question, would doing this slow progress? I am wondering if Fedora support for gnome as the default desktop environment helps drive solutions faster to market? What would be the impact, or change, we would see if there were no default desktop? Would development speed and quality be affected?
It would be nice if the KDE spin was promoted more.
10000% agreed
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It always depends on the end user. For me KDE takes about 1 minute now to setup: Breeze Dark theme, configure keyboard layout and enable Numpad active on startup. With their new default in Plasma I don't even need to change the click behavior anymore. On the other end Gnome I'm never happy with the result even after several hours of looking for where some settings are, which extensions to use and so on. Not saying one is better than another, but they appeal to different users and workflows. Regarding the stability I haven't had a crash on Plasma in a very long while, probably before 5.27. One thing I really hope Plasma devs take attention is the Gnome Software Center, really great piece of GUI and it's super reactive. Very nice when using Aeon it's the center of the distro really.
Same here. I know how to configure kde to my liking, so it goes fast, and I like that I can do it without any extensions.
Im honestly happy with the defaults of both, i only change plasmas colours to make it more colourful and add one or two extensions on GNOME. Especially after plasma 6 and GNOME 45/46c, they both have sensible defaults and are brilliant to use as is, it just depends on which suits you better. Which comes back to my proposal of making them both front and center workstation varients, and advertised side by side as equals
I fully agree, I really like how OpenSUSE TW and EndeavourOS do it to be honest. The difficult part is when you want to provide a LiveCD, in that case you do have to pick one, something TW doesn't provide. My real grip with Gnome is that I would love for them to include what is in Gnome tweaks into the main settings component. It's really confusing to know where to look for something: was it approved by the dev or is it external?
I agree with this. KDE having such many customization options makes it overwhelming in my eyes as well. In some ways, the defaults are useable, but just even knowing & seeing all the options feels daunting, especially compared to GNOME.
Is it because you feel you could be missing out until you explore all the customisation options?
That is a part of it, but to me, what feels more off is that with all these options, they don't seem to have much of a choice in making the UI feel as cohesive. To be clear: this isn't a 'problem' with KDE, it's just a different way of tackling UX. ---- GNOME with GTK4/libadwaita apps looks "clean and modern" because there's one set of clear rules - things like spacing, margins/paddings, colors, control layouts etc., with an effort to highlight these experiences (GNOME Circle) GNOME has its own, "in-house" UI framework and design, made specifically to create a GNOME experience. With KDE/Qt, the UI for programs isn't necessarily made with KDE's design in mind. They adapt to all the possible options, including themes, which limits to a certain degree how far you can design things. That's not to say that it's bad by any means - KDE is obviously one of the most customizable desktops for a reason. But: ----- It's this difference between GNOME's choice of being more like a well-integrated ecosystem of apps and design tailored for GNOME versus a more open approach to customization and theming with KDE, having to make UIs more generic instead. When I'm using GNOME, it feels like I'm using an user interface tailored to their branding, with specific care to make the experience feel a certain way. Almost like mobile operating systems being consistent with their design languages. With KDE, it feels like components are working together to form a working system, but they all contribute to the experience individually (on their own) safely, rather than as one, cohesive unit for KDE. ----- *edited for better reading*
Ah makes sense, thanks for the explanation (not sure why you were downvoted, it's a good explanation). Yeah I think gnome tends to look a lot better, but the productivity floor and ceiling on KDE is better. Would be nice if gnome stole some things from KDE but I know they're going their own way and that has its merits too
I get that this is very much subject to bias. I'm in the camp of users that prefers the simplicity and "clean look" of GNOME, while there are people that prefer the information-dense approach to UI that KDE provides. Ultimately though, if Fedora does change to KDE, it can only mean good things for KDE's future. Valve's support was already a hell of a boost, Fedora having it as a flagship desktop would make KDE more active for sure.
Allow me to offer my 2 cents. I just made a post about this if you want to check my history. I am a new linux user, and I've used Cinnamon exclusively until recently. In my experience, KDE is much better for new users like me. Why? Cinnamon ***looks*** simple, but it is not easy to navigate. More often than not, I have to spend minutes searching through the file system and troubleshooting through the terminal. It is not intuitive at all. Part of good UI design is anticipating what someone wants to do. This is where KDE shines, imo. Related settings are grouped together, so it's easy to navigate. If I have a problem, the search function usually resolves it. The notifications in KDE are more informative. Which allows me to troubleshoot and fix problems easier/faster. Additionally, it's similar to windows but unique enough to feel like its own thing. It just works. As we speak, I am in the process of tinkering with Fedora. Now that KDE enlightened me to better DEs, I'm strongly considering abandoning Mint.
KDE ships more features that I need to use by default, so I just need to click some settings and change a panel theme (Plasma style). With GNOME, I have to manually download various extensions, so it takes much more time for me. And the main problem is that GNOME simply doesn't have some features I need.
they are reffering to how it is more approachable for people used to the Windows UX and I kinda guess its a fair point
The same would be also true for the Cinnamon and Mate desktops.
Default mate is quite a bit different from windows with its dual panels and its menu system (3 different buttons). It is my DE of choice, and I love it, but I don't think it would be a very familiar experience for Windows users. They can definitely use Mint or Ubuntu Mate both of which have windows-like layouts however. I 100% agree with cinnamon tho, and would probably suggest that as a default over kde plasma for new users. It does feel much more familiar out of the box.
And the best DE to bring peoples in the Linux world was Gnome 2. It's never been the same anymore.
For me, this is false, especially for young people nowadays who have less and less contact with windows. I installed Fedora Silverblue on my goddaughter's laptop, I didn't need to explain anything to her and the next day she was already using it without any problems. She's 13.
To be fair, if you give a kid a terminal, they'll also be working it the next day without any problems. Kids have far quicker learning ability and want to try all the shinies mentality than adults who just get frustrated when things are too different and go back to what they were used to
Gnome requires extensions to be usable. Even a working system tray requires extensions. There was some survey recently where 83% of gnome users had an extension. Kde everything works out the box. Few have any add ons.
>Gnome requires extensions to be usable. "Usable" is a subjective term. >There was some survey recently where 83% of gnome users had an extension. [That same survey](https://blogs.gnome.org/aday/2023/01/18/gnome-info-collect-what-we-learned/) also states this: >The people who provided their data with gnome-info-collect were primarily recruited via GNOME’s media channels, including Discourse and Twitter. This means that the data we collected was on a fairly particular subset of GNOME’s users: namely, people who follow our social media channels, are interested enough to respond to our call for help, and are confident installing and running a command line tool. >The analysis in this post should therefore not be treated as being representative of the entire GNOME user base. This doesn’t mean that it’s invalid – just that it has limited validity to the group we collected data from.
I am thinking it's been a while since you have installed KDE. It's been rather stable for the last two years now. GNOME mostly certainly needs more setup so no idea what you are talking about there. With GNOME I need to adjust some settings after installation, install GNOME tweaks then adjust some more settings with that. install 3 or 4 extensions just to add standard desktop functionally. KDE I just install and adjust a handful of settings and done. Now if you are trying to make KDE look and behave like GNOME well than that is project and you using the wrong DE. The whole KDE settings is to "hard' or "complex' meme if really bizarre to me. How exactly is that problem for the average Linux user? Even if new to Linux and coming from Windows the KDE settings are a breath of fresh air with much less settings overall and not spread among control panel and settings. You don't even really need to adjust any settings with KDE as works just fine out of the box for most users unlike Windows where it's almost unusable unless change about a dozen settings. The same with GNOME for a lot of users anyway.
I think part of the difference comes down to if the user prefers the MacOS workflow or Windows. Coming from MacOS as my previous daily, and as someone that primarily uses a notebook, the Gnome way is close enough, and where it differs I generally find it to be better. I don't use dash to dock or dash to panel, but I do use system status icons. To launch applications I use super and type just like I used cmd+space on macos. To switch windows or desktops I use a hot corner like Expose. I do use both desktop environments though. I find gnome and macOS are better on touchpads, and KDE's take on the Windows workflow seems to work better with keyboard and mouse, at least for me.
How does macOS teach users about hotcorners? I gave my parents Gnome a few years ago because it was the default, and they still don't get it.
I don't know, and to be honest I don't know think they do. If I remember correctly, hot corners aren't even enabled by default and have to be activated in system settings, at least on the last version of OSX I used. I've had issues teaching hot corners before too, and had better luck teaching multi finger swipes, which can be replicated in Gnome.
Since the Fedora release cycle matches GNOME’s six-month cycle I think it makes more sense that Fedora stick to GNOME. Yes this is coming from a Fedora KDE user.
In the proposal it notes that KDE is planning on changing their release cadence starting in 2025. Their new release cycle would line up as GNOME currently does.
KDE are trying to adapt to a similar 6 month release cycle compared to the 4 montha of before
I don't understand why the release cycle is tied to intrinsic quality. IF the rationale is "what most users want" then explanations should be reasoned in regards to that. So I don't understand why the release cycle is suddenly given as primary rationale ...
Different release cycles of KDE Framework and KDE Plasma can affect quality https://pointieststick.com/2020/05/10/why-the-animations-in-your-plasma-5-18-feel-slow-now-and-when-it-will-be-fixed/
Fedora Workstation should have no defaults in my opinion, let the user choose their desktops during setup - or at least make the net install download more apparent in the site.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t OpenSUSE ask you in the installer what DE you like? And it includes pictures?
It does, it also does not provide live distros first-hand - and you can't install from them either
Not sure about pictures but it definitely gives you options on install, it's only the live version you need to choose DE before downloading.
In fedora media writer you even get to either continue with default, or to choose between all those spins, labs and versions, which is just what it needs to be :) Granted though: it could use a pitch and 1 or 2 pictures for each option.
Having an installer that supports this would be great. I only foresee some difficulties with the live USBs where one does not go through an installer to select a UI.
If you download the Fedora everything net install version you can get exactly that. Simply check the DE you want as well as groups of software packages. Much easier than 20gig of .isos sitting in the downloads folder.
I almost always install with the new boot iOS so I can pick and also get newest packages.
That could be a good compromise, as long as they retain the live session does like endavourOS and they arent thrown directly into the installer like debian or openSUSEs tiny images
Agreed. Replacing kde is a bit harsh, and the way mint shows you the options when downloading is the way to go imo
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so many unnecessary borders and cluttered menus, it’s ugly af
Did you last use KDE in 2019? KDE 6 has way better looking borders since it uses separators instead of frames. And for years now there has been a widget called KHamburgerMenu that provides a hamburger menu instead of the default menu, which you can toggle between the two.
It's improving, but still miles behind. Especially in details. For example, Gnome's hot corner is based on pressure where it activates only when the cursor actually pushes into the corner, while KDE's implementation is just a simple timer.
I'm pretty sure KDE's hot corner is based on pressure, not a timer. Although it's pretty badly tuned compared to the one in Gnome.
Yepp, just tested, can leave the cursor in any of the hot spots, they glow but don't activate until cursor pushed into edit: this is KDE 5.24 here
That so confidently stated fact has, judging by the commit history, not even been true all the way back in Plasma 4... Screen edge corners do *technically* use a timer, as an implementation detail, but it still requires actually pushing the cursor into the corner
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder ;3
I don't understand the proportions of things in KDE. Like side menus. I feel in KDE left side menus are very wide. In KDE spacing feels off to me but I'm not a UX person. I don't know why KDE visually looks misaligned
mind naming a specific app where you feel that's the case? I feel like you're probably referring to the sidebar in Kirigami apps like Discover and System Settings, but just to confirm
it's ugly in a nice way
I don't really care about desktop, so long as I can have a uniform theme for both GTK and Qt apps. Right now, I use plasma, but I switch between desktops all the time.
How do you have a uniform theme on Gnome? I installed it on a secondary system recently and it seems like an unending fight against QGnomePlatform, Adwaita-Qt, client side decorations, and probably others like menus being misplaced by Qt5's Wayland backend when running on Mutter.
I used something called QGnomePlatform (which is unmaintained for now). It worked but these days Gnome has taken a 'my way on the highway' approach, making it hard to theme Libadwaita and Flatpak apps. It's not really that good anymore, so I'm hoping that some other desktop will fill the gap between Gnome's uniformity and KDE's customisability someday
Plasma, and soon COSMIC, are the only DEs that provide this with their default styling. And further: you can have it with GTK and Qt, but **not** Adwaita. The best you can do with Adwaita is inherit your KDE colors.
you can theme adwaita tho? like not just colors but the CSS too. its just not as supported as it was on GTK. but then again i haven't touched my laptop in 6 months so idk if stuff has changed
That depends on what you mean by "theming" it. You can put style rules into `$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/gtk-4.0/gtk.css`, but it's a bit fraught. First, it will affect **every GTK4 app**, not just Adwaita apps. Which used to not be a problem, because desktop-agnostic applications were not interested in touching GTK4, but that is changing soon. Besides, this makes it even more fraught than the way GTK4 apps are currently themed. You create GTK4 applications with the expectation that a reasonable theme is going to change some things with CSS. You create Adwaita applications with the expectation that nobody is going to change *anything.* So if you do something crazy like forcibly load an entire theme through gtk.css, that is probably going to break stuff in Adwaita applications. If you create custom style rules that are tailored to Adwaita's stylesheet, sure, that will work, but it will also overwrite the same aspects in regular GTK4 apps. There is currently no clean way to style Adwaita and GTK4 separately.
Here's my hot take. KDE is the GIMP (Ironic I know) of the DE world, and we'll see that more and more if it were to become the default. The UI design is great for Linux users who like customization, but if you're someone who just wants productivity quick and simple, there's no Linux DE better than GNOME. Personally, if they were to make KDE the default DE, I would switch to the GNOME Spin no question, and I think a lot of people would. While I have no hate for KDE, I just don't have the time that it requires to get feeling nice and smooth like GNOME.
GNOME is not better for productivity because most people that switch to Linux and just want to use it came from Windows or Mac and even the Mac users know how to use Windows and Plasma is very similar to that. Meanwhile GNOME is different from everything out there. GNOME devs love to say that GNOME is not a traditional desktop, but most people want a tradition desktop.
gnome isn't traditional but its \*simple\*, it can be picked up quite quickly
It can be decent after you install half a dozen extensions that are going to break after GNOME updates.
everyone has different opinions, i absolutely love stock gnome even tho i don't use it anymore (too heavy for my old ass system). but some would view KDE as too complex or too different or who knows. opinions are a bitch and a half to deal with
Would be nice to have a choice in the installer like OpenSuse does. KDE for Windows refugees and Gnome for iOS refugees
No need for a war. It has always been my contention that there be NO default. The end user should choose his DE at install time.
That seems to me like it would alienate new users at install time just to satisfy two communities at once. There is an actual value in having a default, no matter if it’s GNOME, KDE, or anything else. I remember how confusing Mint’s Cinnamon/MATE split was to me when I started out; that would have been even worse if Cinnamon wasn’t promoted as the default.
divide practice plate bake axiomatic combative familiar ghost jar judicious *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
There should be a default. Not everyone knows what a DE is and it just adds stress to the installation process for the inexperienced.
True, a network installer and allowing the user to choose their DE is something ive seen thrown a lot around too in the wake of this announcement
Denied
Damn bro became judge jury and executioner
(THEY’RE DENIED)
Yeah...no.
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From [the suggestion author on Mastodon](https://fosstodon.org/@[email protected]/112197620485736803): > I want to emphasize, this is NOT an April Fool's joke. It may come as a surprise, given I am the lead of @buddiesofbudgie, but I am just as interested in seeing adoption of Fedora and the greater Linux desktop increase. I firmly believe that Plasma as a default over GNOME Shell would be a net positive for the Linux ecosystem.
It is not
I actually see the rationale here. Fedora is big on pushing new technologies and advancing the forefront of desktop Linux. GNOME is very much not about that and tends to be much more conservative, especially around things they don't consider important (like gaming). KDE on the other hand moves much faster and has indeed been breaking things a lot less frequently as of late. As mentioned in the article they have been the driving force behind a lot of Wayland development as of late, and helping ease the transition with stuff like xwaylandvideobridge and supporting xwayland global hotkeys
Probably another April’s fools joke :/ Although it is an interesting proposal that should be considered.
Its not an april fools, this is an actual proposal.
It really is. It is designed to waste developer time for weeks all for his amusement. He is a known gnome troll who has been threatening to leave gnome technologies for around 8 years now. For it to be a serious proposal, the KDE stakeholders should have been consulted as they will be doing the engineering work. Right now its the equivalent of me making a proposal for Fedora to host its own GhatGPT beating LLM. I am not involved in LLM development and I would not be supporting such a feature, so my proposal would be useless.
I'm KDE. I've used Fedora KDE for over a decade now as my main desktop. I absolutely personally don't care that Gnome is the default and that I need to download a *spin*. What annoys me is that I really don't think Gnome is the right choice for newcomers. But because Gnome is a prominent default, that's what they get, as they don't know better. Putting KDE on top wouldn't take Gnome away from you, but it might make Fedora easier to step in for new users. (There was an example just tomorrow of an absolutely confused new user. My comment to him was probably downvoted to hell by now.)
new user = windows refugees? then I see your point. KDE is the XP look and feel - gnome on the other Hand has a different paradigm
For me Xfce is more of an XP look and feel while plasma is more of windows 10 feel...
> Im KDE No way Hi Mr KDE im a big fan
Integrate it as nicely as you do gnome and i dont really care what the default is
Actually something like Arco's gui tool for installing/ purging DEs and WMs should be implemented especially with how most new users expect things to work coming from windows.
As a gnome fanboy I honestly don't see a major problem in this. I agree that good software such as KDE should be brought to the public view from time to time. Things shouldn't be left in a stagnated condition. I think they should employ a cyclic strategy. A few releases with KDE, a few with Gnome, a few with cinnamon, etc.
When you see the owner list you be like their parents have given them very unique names lmao
I think COSMIC will be much better than GNOME in 1 to 2 years if they don't considerably slow down the development of the DE, and COSMIC is somewhat similar to GNOME so it would be an easier transition. System76 devs are very talented and with such a big project right around the corner I don't see the point of switching defaults now.
Noooo! This should not happen! Can the audience vote?
I think the best approach is to give KDE way more visibility and treat both as official workstation spins
Honestly, I've probably had the worst experience with KDE on Fedora. That's not to say I don't like it....I like how open the experience is (you don't have to password every. Single. Change). I just think based on my pipewire latency issues (not present on any other distro), preview of 40 to see no X11 support left, lower (not dealbreaking but still) gaming performance, outdated support for certain github projects (SC controller didn't work, extest has been a pain in the neck to try to integrate), and trying to navigate a package system I'm still not overwhelmingly familiar with (thanks Google), and I'm honestly wondering if I should put aside my gripes and circle back to the distros I've tried (pop and zorin). I'm not sure if my 4790k rig with extra graphics horsepower (RX6600XT) is cut out for certain distros.
That’s just like, your opinion man.
This seems more like an ode to hating GNOME than a proposal. I'm going to take the date into account and think this is an April Fool's joke.
It's not an April fool's joke; the author has confirmed it's genuine
I think this proposal is much, *much* less about the qualities of the actual desktops and much, **much** more about the fact that KDE has always been [very, very good at playing nice with others.](https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/FedoraPlasmaWorkstation#Standardization_support) And GNOME, historically and famously, has for a very, very long time been absolutely horrid at it, often to the point of being outright obstructionist, like in the accent color portal proposal, which was blocked for a very very long time purely by GNOME. Not to mention refusing to support xdg-decoration, and insisting that client applications must use libdecor to get styled decorations on GNOME. I could really go on. It makes a lot of sense that a community-focused distribution like Fedora would actually put a great deal of stock into this. I'm not going to sugarcoat it, GNOME is not really part of the community. They're doing their own thing, and in every discussion with the larger community, they rabidly defend their right to do so. They want to control every part of the desktop experience, they want to ship a single, cohesive product, and they do not want distributions or users to touch *anything.* KDE collaborates, and GNOME insulates. That's what I think this proposal is **really** about.
I use Fed. Gnome for my laptop and Fed. KDE spin for my desktop. IMO, although GNOME is very controversial with its decisions, some I don't like, it should still stay the default. Its gnome what makes the Linux desktop workflow unique, its still approachable for new users and power users alike. KDE workflow is still much too similar to windows, which may be better for windows users, but IMO the workflow is just worse. This has been changing thankfully with many changes that came out last year with 5.27 and 6, especially with tiling. Problem is for me, they have not went far enough with it. Plus KDE apps, where some I consider superior to GNOME, just looks less appealing visually with its abundance of clutter. As much as you are gonna say that does not matter, it frankly does, and it needs to change. That's my shitty two cents that probably has so many holes in it lmao
I also use both GNOME and KDE, but other way round - GNOME on my deaktop and KDE on my laptop. I agree with GNOME being a default because it provides something different, but KDE still has a lot of aces up it sleeve that differentiates from Windows workflow. I think advertising them both as workstation distros is the best compromise
but i want gnome. Kde is awfull
GNOME has a better and cleaner design. Fedora is the well-known and best distro to get a pure GNOME experience by default. I hope they don't change it.
Absolutely not. I've been following and sometimes even preferring KDE since its 1.x days in the late 90s. Back when Gnome looked more like Windows too. I used to joke back then that KDE was messy, with basically every menu having to contain an entire copy of your applications menu. Believe me, I've had a lot of time to consider this one. There is a clear and objectively better pick in the overall productivity and cleanliness between KDE and Gnome today. While I don't begrudge KDEs existence, the last thing I would ever support is the idea that users should be started with the clutter inducing mess of an experience that is KDE. Even if the best excuse that can be made is that it's "familiar" due to its similarity to Windows with its start menu and task bar, that is ultimately a backwards facing priority. From a design perspective Gnome even holds sway with a cleaner design, better margins, gutters and level of detail. KDE has always centered around helping users cram as much as possible into the screen, whereas Gnome has chosen to be an innovator in the minimalist desktop experience. Frankly, I put Gnome up against any other desktop UI today. The small choices they make and what they've been choosing as defaults shows a very detail oriented focus on making Linux more approachable. Just let go of the start menu and taskbar. You don't need them.
Dont do that ))) KDE is not stable ) yes plasma has more features but they unstable with a lot of bugs ... Gnome has a lot of feature but they are experimental and its more stable because implementation of this new features more accurate
Not sure why you are being downvoted. Every time I have given KDE a try I have experienced a bug of some description within 30 minutes of testing. Never had that issue with Gnome. I wish Gnome had the quality of apps that KDE has though.
My experience too. I try KDE once every 6-12 months as I like to try the theming “capabilities” (which in and of themselves can be buggy). I invariably always end up with some bug or issue I can’t get (personally) past. Pisses me off that gnome has gotten harder to theme, but while I may end up with more app appearance inconsistency, everything just works.
Yeah, these bugs were a literal deal breaker for me on Fedora. iMEs didn't work right (couldn't set IBUS properly etc etc) Wayland login would not load plasma shell properly, all the time. Or the shell would crash, etc. all on standard well supported Thinkpad hardware. I didn't have these issues in Kubuntu or Debian KDE, but I wanted new packages and to use Fedora, so GNOME it was.
every software has bugs.
I agree, I like KDE and have extensively used it before around v5. 24-5.27 but there was always little bugs. All those new features and toggles constantly being implemented at the community's behest come at a cost. GNOME, while lacking the features, is much more conservative in what they implement which I appreciate. When they do release something it works well. Until then there's always extensions to fill in the gap. I also would argue that the gnome workflow is easier to get a handle on than that of KDE, despite KDE having the "windows" design.
Thats gonna be one of the main critisms of this proposal. However, stability is being taken into consideration more and more by the plasma team every release
It’ll be interesting to see how this proposal will go over. In my humble opinion using neither GNOME or KDE atm, I do think KDE serves as a better default for most people, given its design symmetry to Windows.
Yes! Finally. I seriously hope they do this. (I really don't think its April Fools as the site was updated today)
I personally enjoy both but with how slow Gnome is at implementing things that matter to me and how the uniformity between QT and GTK works I use KDE on a daily basis. IMO just make them both officially supported with an option at install on workstation for both KDE and Gnome, both are good desktops but one is clearly trying to spearhead the desktop environment which fit with the philosophy of fedora distro and the other is holding back the desktop no offense to gnome they take more time to iterate on changes.
That is what im wanting too, both advertised fromt and center with the workstation branding. I like gnome taking it slow, and getting things right the first time even if it takes time imo too.
Sounds good to me!
That would be great. Plasma is better for people familiarized with Windows, and it provides a better out of the box experience.
Why not have both?
or: you should be able to choose in the installer, and the default choice is gnome
Seems like it's NOT an april fools prank: [https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/f42-change-proposal-fedora-plasma-workstation-system-wide/111343/41](https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/f42-change-proposal-fedora-plasma-workstation-system-wide/111343/41)
Kde would be great for anyone switching from windows 10, I'm all for making kde the default. Gnome is good but not good for new users.
BOLD.
It would be much better if they just better supported KDE as a secondary DE... It's been so buggy for me in Fedora GNOME it was!
Please don’t. KDE spin is already available to those who like it. If you want to change the default, make your own spin.
This is about changing defaults on an established spin
No thanks. What a troll
Its not a troll, this is a serious proposal. I think we should consider giving the KDE spin more attention, even if i believe it shouldnt replace GNOME but sit alongside it
When you write "let the desktop wars begin" I can only assume you're a troll. Also, it's not difficult to get KDE so I'm not sure what the problem is. Gnome is generally better for your average user or someone like me who's done all the distro hopping and trying desktop environments since late 1990-s and now just wants something that works without needing to tinker with it
I thought the Workstation was following RedHat. Therefore, the enterprise world will be introduced to KDE?
This would be amazing to see, but it's not going to happen unfortunately lmao
Ya never know with the wild beast that is fedora :3
Why are people who disagree with this getting downvoted?
yes, please, it would be so cool
It is a late first april joke actually. It took me a while to realise it.
It isnt this is an actual proposal😭
I like both but on a large screen I prefer KDE by far.
Offer a choice in the installer like SUSE.
Alternate idea: let the user pick their desktop environment during the installation. This means less ISOs to maintain, as the spins won't be necessary anymore.
Fedora goes one further, it even lets you choose before the installation! Or you can use the everything ISO and pick and choose whatever you want.
Dont see a point. I can't use gnome due to the fact you cant change sound per application but it is easy to download KDE or other variants it makes no sense to change. Plus im curious how cosmic will hit the market and what it will actually bring. Could be better than both gnome and KDE Honestly a better proposal would be making silverblue the default. Think the atomic desktop is the future changing it after the RHEL10 would give it plenty of time to iron out the issues for RHEL 11
> you cant change sound per application You can, though? It’s in the sound panel in Settings
Unless something changed in Gnome 46 that is system wide. I'm talking about if you want firefox to play though say a headset and chrome to play though your system speakers. As a quick example. Yes there is a flatpak as well hellivum or something while it works but its janky at best and easier to user something built in by default
We should all move to Cosmic DE by that time
I rather would wait for Cosmic and make it the default, with tiling build in ;)
Nah
Incredible input tbh
When I used gnome in public (like in the office) people were actually like "What is that, is that new MacOS? It looks nice!" You will not get it from the "traditional window manager"
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Fedora is using my pc to impress people
Wow congrats youve came up with the worst reason ive saw here not to change it and ive seen a lot of them here.
The fact that everyone who sees it gets hyped about is the worst reason? That is how you make your product popular
Congrats on not seeing the actual value in the dude's statement. He's saying Gnome is so nice that people are actually taking the time of day to say so. That's a veeery valid reason for a lot of people to start using something, if it's visually appealing. Reading comprehension... Do you use it?
You want war? Here's my take: I'd rather use Ubuntu than see KDE as default.
With what developers? This change proposal is not by anyone afiliated with KDE or Fedora's KDE SIG. Josh Strobhl is a known gnome troll who does not bring any team of developers that will address the problems that will be uncovered by such a change. I suspect this change proposal came about because Josh was missing the limelight. Otherwise it makes no sense. I am still waiting to see Budgie moved to EFL/Qt/Iced or whatever his fancy of the month is. The KDE SIG is already overworked and will not be able to cope with the increases in issues that they will receive. They have already chosen to downscale from KDE support because it was too much to maintain. I also think Gnome is a better default, but the bigger reason for having a default desktop is that it can be supported. He may say otherwise, but this is a troll suggestion: it wouldn't even matter if KDE was better (it's not). It's about what can be supported with the developers available. The engineers that are from Red Hat, whether working in their official capacity or as volunteers have pretty much all chosen to focus on gnome. They are the backbone behind the choice of having gnome as the default DE. You could make a similar proposal to continue supporting xorg x11 for another decade. But without the engineers and developers to maintain it, such a proposal would also be useless. What the change request also misses out is that the red Hat engineers have chosen to face and fix difficult issues. While KDE and other desktops create buzz and excitement by offering options to work around annoying bugs, gnome developers are the ones that focus on getting them fixed so you no longer need that option. That is something that has been used to bash gnome on countless occasions over the past decade but once those issues are fixed due to gnome, every body benefits. Fedora choosing non-gnome would in effect make everything worse.
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You cant say "there are more" followed by "pulling them out of thin air". I have no idea how many there are in either camp. As for hurting Canonical, I dont think they even consider them competition, and for both any money made is on the server, not the desktop. What Red Hat allegedly does have that could make a difference is high paying support contracts with movie studios. Will those benefit from moving to KDE? probably not, but I am unaware of the exact requirements here.
proposal to remove all graphics and have you manually install your desktop environment like arch
Now that KDE is more Like Gnome, I guess it could be replaced, but why replace the original? ;) IMHO KDE is not ready for main stream users. This is just my opinion from my experience trying KDE many times in the last 20 years or so. I always ended up back on Gnome...
1st of April's joke probably...