What's in KDE?

SabreWolfy · 2012-10-06 08:57:04

Part of the reason that I like minimal distributions like #!, is that I know, more or less, what is installed. I strip out some stuff I don't need and add stuff that I do need, so that I'm running, hopefully, a somewhat lean installation.

After posting recently on corenominal's blog about GNOME 3, I mentioned Unity and KDE 4. Every few weeks/months I test one of these again then I feel really impressed by them and feel that I'm missing out on all sorts of cool stuff, so I want to install one, but I never actually do.

LXF 163 has a glowing review of KDE 4.9, saying it is the "best" distro/desktop/whatever. I understand that improvements are made all the time -- Unity and GNOME today are better than they were a year ago.

My question is this -- what's in KDE that makes it so big and heavy? It needs loads of RAM and a good machine. What is in it that other users need? Background services? How can user "A" be functional and happy on #! and user "B" be functional and happy on KDE? What am I missing out on by not running the awesome shiny new KDE 4.9?

Last edited by SabreWolfy (2012-10-06 12:06:29)

beta · 2012-10-06 12:02:45

SabreWolfy wrote:

Why question is this -- what's in KDE that makes it so big and heavy? It needs loads of RAM and a good machine. What is in it that other users need?

kde 4.9 with nepomuk and akonadi turned off is idling at 180mb ram usage on my netbook.
openbox is 155mb ram.

It is a well integrated desktop environement with tremendous tweakability.
Play with is, you may like it - or not.
But neither gnome3 or kde4 use much more ram than openbox after some tweaking - no experience with unity.

SabreWolfy · 2012-10-06 12:08:24

^ Thanks. And performance of KDE on a netbook? I have an Acer Aspire One D250 with 1GB RAM and a little Atom processor. What distro are you running with KDE 4.9?

Iranon · 2012-10-06 12:52:27

I admire the power and sophistication of KDE, but don't like the way all the options are accessed. I'd prefer to banish the inescapable configuration clutter from everyday use and control behaviour via one idiot-readable configuration file.

I still find it easier to get things more or less how I want them in FVWM.

SabreWolfy · 2012-10-06 12:58:41

^ So what are we missing out on then, if anything?

Iranon · 2012-10-06 16:04:22

Depending on what you run...

A very good implementation of tabbed window management
Some dynamic tiling functionality, although I haven't been impressed with it.
Tight integration of very full-featured applications and ridiculously overengineered services.
The Activity concept with little GUI changes for different tasks/moods
More checkboxes than anyone else. MOAR CHECKBOXES.

SabreWolfy · 2012-10-06 16:45:15

^ smile

I run #! on an Acer Aspire 4710 laptop and a Wheezy netinstall with a variety of WM/DEs on an Acer Aspire One netbook. On both these machines, the CPU is chugging away with a load average of around 1.0 with light usage, well over one with heavier usage and between 0.5 and 1 when idling. Not exactly light. I may as well use KDE and let the CPU do something useful with all those cycles it seems to be using anyway...

raken · 2012-10-06 16:56:56

I was a KDE fan boy for the longest time. I like the default programs better than Gnome and how it looks. Try it, you might like it. I have a KDE full install; just use it for the programs.

SabreWolfy · 2012-10-06 17:26:16

^ I used Kubuntu around version 8.04 and I've tried some of the later versions. My impression has always been that there is a lot of "bloat" in KDE. I was wondering what this bloat is? What is all the extra stuff that the minimalists love to hate about KDE? Extra packages installed, or extra stuff running all the time? Dolphin looks cool. So does Gwenview. Which KDE are you running?

raken · 2012-10-06 17:59:39

^ I think it's version 4.5.X. I am not really running it, I am just using it for the programs.

el_koraco · 2012-10-06 18:25:58

SabreWolfy wrote:

My impression has always been that there is a lot of "bloat" in KDE. I was wondering what this bloat is?

You had the impression there was bloat, but then you were wondering what bloat was? Were you having some kind of ontological moment or what?

VastOne · 2012-10-06 18:59:32

SabreWolfy wrote:

My impression has always been that there is a lot of "bloat" in KDE. I was wondering what this bloat is? What is all the extra stuff that the minimalists love to hate about KDE?

I think you said it all in that statement. Like most things, it is either loved or hated and FUD or phanboism take over.

joek · 2012-10-07 13:36:39

My first experience with linux was with KDE on SuSE. As I recall, I liked Dolphin, though I don't think that it was all that much better than pcmanfm, for instance, tbh. I do remember it being noticeably slower than IceWM, which also came on that SuSE install, although as my laptop at the time had but 256Mb RAM, and a 1400Mhz processor, it may or may not be noticeable on modern machines.

SabreWolfy · 2012-10-11 16:51:47

I guess the only way is to take the plunge and actually install it and use it for a week smile There are so many flavours of Debian-based KDE distros around, from Kubuntu to MEPIS to Kantonix to Mint, as well as pure Debian stable/testing too.

lcafiero · 2012-10-11 17:51:58

Not to derail the discussion, but if we made a KDE version of this distro, would we call it . . . KrunchBang . . .?

/me runs

SabreWolfy · 2012-10-11 17:54:30

lcafiero wrote:

Not to derail the discussion, but if we made a KDE version of this distro, would we call it . . . KrunchBang . . .?
/me runs

Someone has to do it now, just because that name is too cool to pass up on smile

Zen:Core · 2012-10-11 18:01:21

I think the best KDE distro is Chakra. It's really snappy, but some of the devs are KDE devs so they may have a leg up in some way.

I've used KDE off and on. I like the apps, but I find I don't need all the features the have. If you want file indexing and search anything from anywhere, a file manager that doubles as web browser and all that then KDE is great. The menu structure is very deep and for me that's a slight turn off.

All the "bloat" is from libraries being pre-loaded at startup and all the indexing gubbins. If you shut all that off and disable most or all compositing then KDE can be pretty quick. However if you want try KDE then I'd do it on a new install. I've had things go awry when installing KDE after gnome3 or XFCE,, but YMMV.

SabreWolfy · 2012-10-11 18:06:13

^ Thanks for the details. I've also heard that Chakra is good and they provide updated KDE versions quite regularly I think. It's not Debian-based though wink

Zen:Core · 2012-10-11 18:29:20

@SabreWolfy I here ya it not being Debian and all, but it's a good Arch based system. However, considering all they do is KDE I'd call that one a top contender. If I wanted a pure KDE experience I'd go there.

I had DE hopping issues with both Debian and Arch, so that's why I recommend a clean install. Something about network manager and video performance always took a good hit when I'd go from, say gnome to KDE.

Worst you could do is try it and not like it.

CrunchBang Linux

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#1 2012-10-06 08:57:04

What's in KDE?

#2 2012-10-06 12:02:45

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