[CS-FSLUG] Kubuntu, You're Killing KDE!

[Nathan T.]

http://celerate.blogspot.com/2007/05/kubuntu-youre-killing-kde.html

If there's one thing that's always saddened me about Linux, it's how  
very little effort some distributions put into making sure KDE works,  
and how much trouble they go to in the never ending effort to peddle  
Gnome. Of course it shouldn't be a surprise that a distribution which  
started off with Gnome would be guilty of that, but by calling a  
derivation of it Kubuntu and claiming that it's delivering a working  
KDE desktop is only doing KDE a disservice. I can come up with three  
bugs right now which couldn't possibly have been missed during any  
competent testing process.

First when I try to move a file to the trash, the buttons read  
"_trash_verb" or "cancel". Second, the majority of the time when I  
have files in the trash is spend wondering why the "empty trash"  
option is still grayed out. Third there are no icons to a single  
location in the the file system either on the desktop or in the  
kicker menu where users can easily click and drag, instead Kubuntu  
uses desktop applets to provide these shortcuts in such a fashion  
that the icons cannot be copied. Finally, the trash icon in the tray  
is in the bottom right of the screen as an applet, thus again you  
have problems again where it work work with click and drag and or  
shortcuts to it as a location. Why do the Kubuntu developers alienate  
long standing KDE users like myself by changing the natural order of  
things to make them unintuitive, only then to so inadequately test  
the product before release, that such blatant bugs make it through to  
the users computer.

I can't tell you how much it crushes me to see software I really  
loved back in the days of version 2 get this kind of disrespect from  
the people who claim to be evangelizing it. Don't even begin to tell  
me that it's partly my fault for not submitting bugs, I went through  
the same thing with Mandrake and it's just not reasonable to expect  
people to create a new account and then use software as painfully  
unintuitive as bugzilla, only to be told that it's a duplicate report  
and even if it's a small problem it won't be addressed for another  
two to six months. Now someone has to come up and tell me there's a  
simple e-mail address where I can send my bug reports, right? Well  
then why isn't it easy to find, I've already looked for it. I know  
there's a mailing list, but my experience with those is usually being  
given the bugtrack/bugzilla URL for their project. Sorry, but if such  
obvious bugs as I've mentioned above have been missed in a production  
"stable" product, then either I'd be the only one submitting bug  
reports anyway, or nobody cares.

If I'm still looking for a Linux distribution to use by the time  
Kubuntu gets a major upgrade then maybe I'll try it again. For now  
I'm going to keep looking for that ever elusive distribution which  
puts KDE ahead of a 6 month release cycle or a pro-Gnome agenda.

Microsoft eat your heart out, myself and 90% of the world population  
will forever be stuck on your operating system as long as there isn't  
a company out there that listens to what customers want and delivers.  
Apple can't make a reasonably priced upgradeable computer that  
doesn't include a monitor, Linux distributors can't take one of  
Linux's greatest software assets (KDE) seriously, and every other  
alternative out there has yet to be a blip on the radar. If only I  
had stuck with XP instead of wasting money on Vista *sigh*.