[arch-general] We have lost the desktop war. The reason? Windows 7.

[Stefan Erik Wilkens]

2009/10/26 RedShift <redshift at pandora.be>:
> This thread will probably erupt in a massive flamewar, yet I decided to post
> my
> story anyway. I am talking about the desktop experience in general, not the
> technical details behind it. Keep that in mind.
>
>
> I've been working these past few months with KDE 4.3 and it feels very
> sluggish
> and incomplete. I can't enable the desktop effects because that makes things
> even slower. I'm doing this on a fairly decent setup, an AMD Sempron 2 Ghz
> with
> an nVidia FX5500. My laptop suffers from this sluggishness as well. On top
> of
> that, lots of things annoy me in KDE 4.3, see the end of this post for my
> top
> annoyances. Yesterday I had to reboot to my Windows XP installation on this
> computer and I was shocked when I arrived in XP's userland. Everything was
> ridiculously fast. When returning to my linux desktop everything felt even
> more
> sluggish. That's when I decided to go back to KDE 3.5. I restored my old KDE
> 3.5
> profile, installed the necessary packages and logged back in. WOOOOOF,
> everything is fast again. Opening new windows is instantaneous, hell even
> bringing up context menus is faster. If Linux is that much better, why does
> the
> current Linux desktop (KDE 4.3) still suck compared to an operating system
> that's 8 years old?
>
> Last week I also had the chance to check out Windows 7, and I was stumped. I
> was
> genuinly impressed by Windows 7's GUI. It feels fast, works fluently, it has
> nice effects which just work and work FAST. When browsing around it felt
> like a
> very solid desktop environment. I am jealous. I really am. The thought of
> using Windows 7 in favor of KDE 4.3 has occured to me much more than I like.
> And
> it's little things like dragging the windows to the top of the screen makes
> them
> maximized, dragging them to the left makes the take exactly 50% of the
> screen.
> How many times have you been manually resizing windows to fit next to each
> other? I have, too many times. These are things that really improve your
> productivity.
>
>
> So when should we have started working at a better desktop environment for
> Linux?
>
> When Mac OS X came out. When was that again? 2001. Yes, it really was that
> long
> ago. It already had awesome desktop effects that just work on (compared to
> these
> days) VERY modest hardware. And it worked fast as well. It was and still is
> a
> solid desktop environment. From that point on the Linux community should
> have
> recognized the threat Mac OS X was for the desktop environment.
> Unfortunately
> nobody did and we went on creating a big mess, fighting over implementations
> and
> technical details instead of attempting to create a solid desktop
> environment.
>
> Yet we did have a second chance in 2007. Microsoft obviously screwed up with
> Windows Vista, we had the chance to win back alot of terrain here until the
> release of Windows 7. So what did we come up with? KDE 4. Yes, a big
> dissapointment. We still don't have something that's comparable.
>
>
> So basically, where are we at?
> KDE 3.5 is Windows XP
> KDE 4.3 is Windows Vista
> ??? is Windows 7
>
>
> When are we getting to the Windows 7 stage?
>
> Microsoft didn't do a big advertising campaign for the launch of Windows 7,
> nevertheless they delivered a big slap in the face to the Linux desktop
> environments. The numbers speak for themselves, Windows 7 has already sold
> more
> copies in its first week than Windows Vista did in its first month. And with
> good riddance, Windows 7 really is better than Windows Vista. Microsoft
> recognized the problems with Windows Vista and dealt with them. And dealt
> with
> them swiftly if you ask me, doing it in less then 3 years.
>
>
> Conclusion
>
> We are losing ground. We are losing it fast. Our competitors recognize what
> the
> user wants and delivered.
>
> If we are comparing enterprise desktops, there's no going around Red Hat.
> The
> current Red Hat desktop (5.4) ships with KDE 3.5, while its succesor RHEL 6
> will
> be, if looking what Fedora brings now, shipped with KDE 4.2 or 4.3. That
> means
> KDE 4.2/4.3 will be the main desktop for enterprises for at least the next 3
> years. A disgrace if you ask me. Users will be comparing desktop
> environments
> and they will find Windows 7 or Mac OS X to be better. After the damage RHEL
> 6
> will have done to the reputation of the Linux desktop, it will take again as
> many years to rectify the damage done. Granted if we will have a solid
> desktop
> environment comparable to Windows 7 by the time RHEL 7 gets released. Which
> I
> can't help but doubt.
>
>
>
> My top KDE 4.3 annoyances:
> * Slooooowwww. Logging in takes a multifold of times it did under KDE 3.5,
> repainting windows takes up a lot of time
> * The battery status applet is buggy, it only shows the actual percentage
> after
> you've hovered it with the mouse, even when you've set it to always display.
> The
> scale it uses is also difficult to interpret. These bugs have been reported
> a
> long time ago and are still not fixed.
> * The run dialog is useless. The reason is the history function. It can't
> display a full history when you start typing, you have to type alot more.
> Having
> a pull down menu and using the arrow keys to select the entry you want is
> alot
> faster. Even Microsoft knows they shouldn't touch that dialog, it still
> works
> like a charm in windows 7.
> * Double clicking the system icon in the titlebar doesn't always work to
> close
> an application (the system icon is the left-most icon in the titlebar). This
> bug
> has also been reported a long time ago and still not fixed.
> * I get a full 10 minutes of extra runtime on my laptop when I switched back
> to
> 3.5
> * Power management is buggy in KDE 4.3 and sometimes powerdevil just loses
> its settings
> * Some settings KDE 3.5 used to have aren't there anymore in KDE 4.3.
> * Where's my "home" icon!!!??? :-(
>

A general rule in life is that nothing is ever free. Perhaps a bold
remark to use in an open-source mailing list, but cost doesn't have to
be defined by money.

We simply pay for using Linux by coping with slightly lower
performance in some (certainly not all) areas of the desktop
experience, furthermore by dealing with a lack of certain features and
compatabillity with the rest of the world (office and other indistry
standard applications not being available to us, the open source
counterparts not being up to par with the standard due to
closed-source or licencing).

Though we try to stay on par, I think determining that we have lost
implies that we must outperform other operating systems in every way
to be considered a real alternative.

KDE 4.x is in active developement, GNOME is renewing the desktop
experience (albeit slowly). Things are moving along in the open source
desktop world. Thankfully, linux != just desktop

> However, for me, the negatives unfortunatly outweigh the positives. For the most part, because they don't really enhance my productivity

Behind != different?

-- 
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