On Friday 31 July 2009 15:23:17 Lubos Lunak wrote:

[...] It could. I have already heard from people how SUSE used to be a great KDE distro and then Novell pushed GNOME and whatever and they went elsewhere. And SUSE used to be an outstanding KDE distribution and I think it still is, it's just that we ourselves (=SUSE) don't seem to point that out recently.

But openSUSE is also a great GNOME distribution - how can we point out properly that openSUSE has both? Andreas -- Andreas Jaeger, aj@{novell.com,opensuse.org} SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, GF: Markus Rex, HRB 16746 (AG Nürnberg) Maxfeldstr. 5, 90409 Nürnberg, Germany GPG fingerprint = 93A3 365E CE47 B889 DF7F FED1 389A 563C C272 A126

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 9:52 AM, Will Stephenson wrote:

...

But openSUSE is also a great GNOME distribution - how can we point out properly that openSUSE has both?

I'm sure we now do a better job of promoting that than Canonical do for Kubuntu and that would not change.

For me this feature is about 2 things -

First, the project taking the obvious step to recognise what the majority of our users want and give them that.  This would go a long way to undoing the 'Novell is evil' smell that we can't shake off.

What is it, exactly, that "the majority of our users want," here? A default? That doesn't seem likely, as our users already know how to get KDE and having an additional click isn't exactly a major impediment to this. Or is it the political statement?

Secondly, giving openSUSE a very strong distinctive feature as a first- rank distribution that says 'We offer KDE by default because it's what our users want' compared to other first-rank distributions.  Kubuntu and Pardus aren't in that category and our current "The distro that offers great KDE and GNOME desktops" position isn't perceived by many people outside our close circle of contributors - they take Ubuntu because it's highly successful, or Kubuntu because it's related to Ubuntu.

How is this a "feature" exactly? It doesn't make our KDE any better, easier to use, etc. It just means we've said "we recommend this over that." GNOME by default for Ubuntu means that Canonical has chosen to focus most of its efforts on GNOME, and the community can work on KDE and they'll support that a bit. If you're wanting the inverse of this, this feature doesn't get that -- it only means that the project will recommend one over the other.

This should not weaken our support for GNOME, XFCE or anything else. Look at Kubuntu, which has become a successful project in its own right despite initial hostility and neglect from Canonical, or Fedora-kde, which has a contributor community that is of the about the same size as the openSUSE-kde community.

Then the feature is pointless -- if you're trying to achieve the inverse of what Ubuntu and Fedora have with GNOME, it would require an actual *focus on KDE. And that's not on the table, so what we'll have is a political statement just to say "lots of our users use KDE and want us to make a political statement that we'll wave the KDE flag a bit higher than the GNOME flag." I've always liked that openSUSE is the "big tent" distro that supports both. I've gone back and forth between KDE, GNOME, Xfce and other desktops over the years and found that it doesn't suit me to be with a distro that alienates the other major desktops. Best, Zonker -- Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier openSUSE Community Manager: http://zonker.opensuse.org Blogs: http://blogs.zdnet.com/community | http://www.dissociatedpress.net Twitter: jzb | Identica: jzb http://identi.ca/group/opensuse/members -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 10:41 AM, Will Stephenson wrote:

I have never suggested an inverse Canonical+GNOME.  I am talking about a political statement, but those terms are loaded with plenty of negative connotations.  Call it a marketing direction.  We market to the clear preferences of our existing users (in most places a 70/30 split is pretty clear - look at the enterprise Linux market).  We market to a large and vibrant developer community - it's clear that the majority of future innovation in openSUSE is going to come from the community.  And a largely untapped community rather than one already aligned with our two largest competitors.  So call it a strategic shift, call it a marketing move, call it a political statement, but recognise the benefits.

I cede that there are possible benefits, but there are also consequences -- and I think that the negative consequences outweigh the potential benefits. Pro: * We may invigorate our KDE users to become contributors * We may encourage some KDE contributors to choose openSUSE * We demonstrate that openSUSE Project is truly open enough to make decisions independent of Novell Don't think for a second that I don't support the last point heavily. I just don't think this is the right decision. Con: * We may alienate our GNOME users -- while a smaller percentage than our KDE users, ~30% of the community is still important to me. * We may alienate our GNOME contributors * We will not encourage any GNOME contributors to choose openSUSE if they're not already here * We probably wind up having further conversations about "defaults" with future releases, such as burying GNOME to "other" with 11.3, or worse.

...

...

This should not weaken our support for GNOME, XFCE or anything else. Look at Kubuntu, which has become a successful project in its own right despite initial hostility and neglect from Canonical, or Fedora-kde, which has a contributor community that is of the about the same size as the openSUSE-kde community.

Then the feature is pointless -- if you're trying to achieve the inverse of what Ubuntu and Fedora have with GNOME, it would require an actual *focus on KDE. And that's not on the table, so what we'll have is a political statement just to say "lots of our users use KDE and want us to make a political statement that we'll wave the KDE flag a bit higher than the GNOME flag."

You're putting words in my mouth there - I am quite aware what's on the table.

Political statements can have 0 direct relevance to openSUSE but a large negative effect on us as a distribution, take the Microsoft deal.  This one would have a net positive effect.

That's where we disagree - I feel it would be net negative. Only time would tell, of course, but my tally differs from yours. Best, Zonker -- Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier openSUSE Community Manager: http://zonker.opensuse.org Blogs: http://blogs.zdnet.com/community | http://www.dissociatedpress.net Twitter: jzb | Identica: jzb http://identi.ca/group/opensuse/members -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Fredag den 31. juli 2009 17:10:47 skrev Will Stephenson:

On Friday 31 July 2009 16:49:10 Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier wrote:

...

Con:

* We may alienate our GNOME users -- while a smaller percentage than our KDE users, ~30% of the community is still important to me. * We may alienate our GNOME contributors * We will not encourage any GNOME contributors to choose openSUSE if they're not already here

A default desktop decision in favour of KDE won't please our GNOME users or contributors, but it will actually stimulate and catalyse the openSUSE GNOME community and those around XFCE and other WMs. I've already mentioned Kubuntu and fedora-kde as examples of this effect - both of them flourish as a mirror image of their distributions' stated defaults. Call it the red rag to a bull effect.

Maybe it should be added that Fedora (~40% KDE) and *buntu (~33% KDE) both have a considerably higher percentage of KDE users, than the openSUSE percentage of GNOME users (22-25%). As KDE4 starts to mature and gain momentum I don't see that changing. So while the current no-default situation has alienated a lot of KDE users, it hasn't really succeeded in attracting GNOME users. It's a complete failure, and it would be best to correct the mistake that was made. I believe Debian uses as default whatever is most often installed. Maybe we should figure out a way to do the same. Then we wouldn't need to discuss, and noone could claim it was a political statement. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Le vendredi 31 juillet 2009, à 17:35 +0200, Martin Schlander a écrit :

Maybe it should be added that Fedora (~40% KDE) and *buntu (~33% KDE) both have a considerably higher percentage of KDE users, than the openSUSE percentage of GNOME users (22-25%).

Just wondering: where did you get those figures? Vincent -- Les gens heureux ne sont pas pressés. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

From my perspective oS won't be the biggest/greatest KDE distribution because of an additional radio button but because of its technical implementation as well as the awesome support provided by the OBS to both stable and developer editions of oS - that's a real strength we have compared to e.g. Ubuntu or Fedora or Mandriva or whatever. Another point to differentiate from other projects is care - oS's KDE implementation reflects care imho - something one couldn't say about e.g. Kubuntu. Let me raise another question here: Are we the greatest KDE distribution already? I think we are, just due to other (much more important) reasons. Just remember how much work have been put into backporting KDE4.2 features in 11.1's KDE4.1 implementation or the

Fellow community members, I have to admit that I haven't read all your comments yet, but I'd like to take the opportunity to share my very personal point of view. Frank Karlitschek's arguments for an additional radio button, i.e. a default selection of KDE, doesn't make too much sense to me. Neither would a default selection of GNOME do btw - here's why... Confusion to new users? Honestly, whatever distribution you choose, you need to inform yourself beforehand about the desktop selection. oS LiveCDs are available for test-driving and we always have the opportunity to higher knowledge about desktop environments to new users - that's what we should concentrate on in that context from my perspective. oS being the only big KDE distribution? maintenance of even two KDE editions for a rather long time. KDE developers need a nice distribution to develop on? Don't they have one already - oS? What does a default selection of KDE contributes to it? Honestly I simply can't see your point here. increase the popularity of openSUSE in the KDE user community? This is the major issue I'd like to comment on. From my perspective our BIG strength is, that we support choice - I mean a REAL choice. We have excellent implementations of both GNOME and KDE, that's something we really differentiate from other projects. Frank Karlitschek outlines a potentially positive effect within the KDE community and if he proves right, imho it's not the best argument for the objectiveness of this community - with due respect. Shouldn't the actual implementation of KDE and the care of the oS project for the KDE community be the actual reason KDE community members should use oS? Is a radio button really a better argument? I don't know - I can't see this point. What I see as a MUCH bigger issue is the influence to the GNOME community. A decision to select KDE as the default just sets them apart - much more than to express an appreciation to the KDE community imho. GNOME definitely is the "little sister" of KDE in our distribution (no question) but I explicitly use the word "sister" here - KDE folks, i.e. Frank Karlitschek, think about the bad impact such a decision would have for GNOME. Shouldn't we think as "the oS community" rather then a KDE and a GNOME "battleline"? Think about it - I hope you feel my thoughts helpful. Best, Rupert (long-time oS GNOME user) -- Rupert Horstkötter, openSUSE community http://en.opensuse.org/User:Rhorstkoetter Email: rhorstkoetter@opensuse.org -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Fri, 31 Jul 2009 18:37:49 +0200, Rupert Horstkötter wrote:

What I see as a MUCH bigger issue is the influence to the GNOME community. A decision to select KDE as the default just sets them apart - much more than to express an appreciation to the KDE community imho. GNOME definitely is the "little sister" of KDE in our distribution (no question) but I explicitly use the word "sister" here - KDE folks, i.e. Frank Karlitschek, think about the bad impact such a decision would have for GNOME. Shouldn't we think as "the oS community" rather then a KDE and a GNOME "battleline"?

Very well stated, and I agree with this 100%. Jim (a fellow long-time openSUSE GNOME user) -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Am Freitag, 31. Juli 2009 16:49:10 schrieb Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier:

Con:

* We may alienate our GNOME users -- while a smaller percentage than our KDE users, ~30% of the community is still important to me. * We may alienate our GNOME contributors * We will not encourage any GNOME contributors to choose openSUSE if they're not already here * We probably wind up having further conversations about "defaults" with future releases, such as burying GNOME to "other" with 11.3, or worse.

What I do not understand from a user's point of view is the following. In this thread it is argumented that having a default or even having a pre-selection on that installation page would send a message which could offend, insult, disappoint etc. Gnome users. Fair enough, let's say I agree with that, i.e. pre-selecting and even more so defaulting to a DE offends, insults, disappoints. Then there are a) a lot of distros that do so and still have more users than openSUSE and b) and far more importantly, since who cares about other distros?, Novell and those managing SLE have to admit that they send that exact message to the KDE world/users. Do they acknowledge that? I think that if one does not, one applies double standards. Even if there are reasons that might justify the defaulting, the message is sent. If I take your Cons, then SLE alienates KDE users, contributors and does not encourage KDE contributors to choose SLE. Sounds pretty harsh to me. Would all those claiming that there is an alleged "anti-Gnome message" in pre-selecting KDE agree that SLE sends and even clearer "anti-KDE message"? Further, and I stole this from somebody else ;), the argument that having a default or at least a pre-selection is useful, e.g. because it would make it easier for new users, is denied by some. If one denies the need for a default even for openSUSE which is aimed at all users from newbies to experts, then one surely has to agree that a default makes even less sense if a product is aimed mostly at experts. Or does it make sense to anyone that one has to take the decision off the shoulders of an expert but not of those of a newbie or normal user? Yet for the SLE products which are mostly installed by admins, which clearly have a clue of what DE they want, get a default. So those need a default while openSUSE users don't? What's the justification for that default? Most SLE users want Gnome? Easing the installation process? Proposing the better technology? I fail to see what argument could be offered that would not apply for openSUSE as well. Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Am Freitag, 7. August 2009 00:45:27 schrieb Jim Henderson:

On Thu, 06 Aug 2009 21:57:40 +0200, Sven Burmeister wrote:

...

What I do not understand from a user's point of view is the following. In this thread it is argumented that having a default or even having a pre-selection on that installation page would send a message which could offend, insult, disappoint etc. Gnome users.

Considering the claim from some in the KDE community that they're offended, insulted, disappointed, etc because KDE isn't a preferred/ default/first selection, it seems reasonable to apply that metric evenly across the memberships of both groups of users, no?

At least it would be a consistent line of argumentation for all subjective points, such as wich DE is better etc. Not so for objectively measurable points like user numbers.

...

If I take your Cons, then SLE alienates KDE users, contributors and does not encourage KDE contributors to choose SLE. Sounds pretty harsh to me. Would all those claiming that there is an alleged "anti-Gnome message" in pre-selecting KDE agree that SLE sends and even clearer "anti-KDE message"?

No moreso than Kubuntu sends an anti-GNOME message to Ubuntu users. SLE is a derivation of openSUSE. That it prefers GNOME over KDE isn't IMHO any more significant than any other distro having a derived distribution that uses a different package set or desktop environment.

Why would the "treat them equally" stop there? Your argumentation is not valid in my opinion since there is no KDE derivation like SLE, hence there is a negative message sent to KDE from the SLE people. If there was, I would agree with you. There is a KDE Live CD, yet there is a Gnome Live CD as well, so they cancel each other out. Yet there is only one SLE and it gets extra resources. So how come this is not prefering one over the other? Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

One thing that I have come to see over the past couple of days is that there is enough disagreement in the community on this issue to say "let's just leave it like we have it". No matter what option we choose it will have ramifications in the community. If it were only a few people in disagreement with each other then I would say the choice might not be that big of an issue. But haven't we seen enough disagreement on this issue to know that a move to anything other than the current default behavior will have a dramatic affect on the openSUSE community? Joe -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Fri, 07 Aug 2009 10:11:57 -0600, Joe Harmon wrote:

But haven't we seen enough disagreement on this issue to know that a move to anything other than the current default behavior will have a dramatic affect on the openSUSE community?

Well, I think there's room for compromise, which is what the proposal I put forth a few days ago was an attempt at. The compromise being that since the selection on that screen doesn't really affect a lot of users' choice, go ahead and make the default KDE as long as there's a clear understanding that GNOME is presented as an obvious option (to borrow Matt's phrasing). As long as the KDE camp is willing to concede that GNOME is and should be presented as an obvious choice, the GNOME camp should be willing to conceded that KDE is the preferred choice by most members of the community and is reasonable to list as a default choice. That option provides (I feel) sufficient balance and both sides come away with something, and both sides have to give up something. That seems a good way to compromise. It's arguable whether the gains/losses are 100% equal, but in compromise, not everything is necessarily 100% equal. Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

One thing that I have come to see over the past couple of days is that there is enough disagreement in the community on this issue to say "let's just leave it like we have it". No matter what option we choose it will have ramifications in the community. If it were only a few people in disagreement with each other then I would say the choice might not be that big of an issue. But haven't we seen enough disagreement on this issue to know that a move to anything other than the current default behavior will have a dramatic affect on the openSUSE community?

From my reading of the exchanges, there are only a very small number of people who are complaining loudly. Some people are putting forward proposals for compromises. Most people are staying out of the ruckus.

I don't see any harm to either group or the openSuSE community here, apart from the very divisive statements being made by a small number of individuals. David -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Am Freitag, 7. August 2009 17:00:11 schrieb Jim Henderson:

...

At least it would be a consistent line of argumentation for all subjective points, such as wich DE is better etc. Not so for objectively measurable points like user numbers.

I don't understand what you're trying to say. It seems to me that what you're trying to say is that it's OK for the KDE camp to use this argument to get their way, but not OK for the GNOME camp to use this as a defense against the change.

Absolutely not, and it's hard to read that into it. If one claims that pre-selecting one or the other hurts that community, it is valid for both or none in any situation. Pick your side and stay with it. However, if one wants to have a pre-selected desktop, which is a completely different question, one has to make a choice. that choice cannot be based on subjective arguments, such as "which desktop is better" but only on objective ones.

That seems inherently unfair, but so does this whole idea that giving KDE equal treatment isn't fair, but giving KDE preferential treatment (in the form of a default selection in the installer) somehow is. "Fair" in and of itself implies a form of equality, so calling an equal situation "unfair" and an unequal situation "fair" doesn't parse for me.

Indeed, yet further down...

...

...

No moreso than Kubuntu sends an anti-GNOME message to Ubuntu users. SLE is a derivation of openSUSE. That it prefers GNOME over KDE isn't IMHO any more significant than any other distro having a derived distribution that uses a different package set or desktop environment.

Why would the "treat them equally" stop there? Your argumentation is not valid in my opinion since there is no KDE derivation like SLE, hence there is a negative message sent to KDE from the SLE people. If there was, I would agree with you.

Of course someone who wants to see this go through would see my point as invalid - because it invalidates the desire to have the choice pre-made that you want. That is hardly surprising to me. ;-)

There's no GNOME derivation of Ubuntu like Kubuntu, so obviously it's invalid to look at Ubuntu in that way either, right?

...you try to get away from your own argument. If there is a derivation that defaults to Gnome there has to be a derivation that defaults to KDE. Anything else is not equal and hence unfair. Yet here you suddenly come up with an exception to the rule to justify SLE. If neither SLE nor openSUSE would have any defaults, it would also be equal and hence fair. Yet that is not the case. It's simple maths. Ubuntu is a Gnome default, Kubuntu is a KDE default, Xubuntu is a XFCE default, all treated equally. All get one default. SLE is a Gnome default, openSUSE has no default, KDE Live CD is a KDE default, Gnome Live CD is a Gnome default. Two defaults for Gnome and one for KDE. And SLE gets extra resources, so it's not like SLE would simply be a second Gnome Live CD. But hey, maths is invalid and 2 == 1.

...

There is a KDE Live CD, yet there is a Gnome Live CD as well, so they cancel each other out. Yet there is only one SLE and it gets extra resources. So how come this is not prefering one over the other?

SLE is a derived distribution. There are two possible views of this:

1. SLE's userbase is important here, in which case we have to consider the install base of SLE when comparing GNOME to KDE installations for openSUSE

2. SLE's userbase isn't important here and the fact that Novell made a corporate decision on the DE for its derived distribution based on openSUSE is irrelevant

Ah, I see. There had to be a decision for SLE, an extra product which gets extra resources. the decision was to default to Gnome. That decision, to prefer one of them is yet irrelevant and does not send a message? Come on, that's too obvious. If that was true, making a decision for opensuse would not send a message either, because both are products, claiming that SLE is less important is really lame, but I'll get to that later on. It's exactly what I mean. Arguments and consequences of making a decision that are valid for openSUSE are denied for SLE and vice versa, that is not consistent.

#1 in my mind is patently ridiculous, because SLE is a derivation of openSUSE.

I guess derivation is the argument you need to hold your claim, since without it you could not make 2 == 1. If SLE was not a derivation the decision would suddenly be more important and sending a message? So what makes the derivation that much less important?, actually equalling zero, since anything else would not sum up to 1 = 1, i.e. equality and fairness. So how can we measure importance? I guess in a business world and Novell is about business, money, i.e. resources, is a good measurement for what you think it important to you. Pre-selecting KDE in openSUSE does not take any money from Gnome and it does not add any money to KDE. Yet according to you it would send a message. Producing a Gnome defaulting derivation and investing extra resources into that project does however not send a message. Because putting money into something, e.g. a derivation, does not really mean anything and is irrelevant...

But if you want to apply that "bias" from SLE, then you also have to include those installations in the analysis of which desktop is the most popular for openSUSE. You can't cherry-pick the elements of #1 and #2 above that favour your position and ignore the implications of those cherry-picked statistics.

This is really lame, honestly. But thanks for showing the message that obviously. Adding the numbers of a product that defaults to x to the numbers of a product that does not default to anything ─ no there is no bias in that, perfectly valid it is! I guess I give up, since it's hopeless to discuss as long as people apply double standards and make excuses to justify that what is valid for product A does not apply to product B, not even the tiniest bit. Sven -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Sven Burmeister wrote:

What I do not understand from a user's point of view is the following. In this thread it is argumented that having a default or even having a pre-selection on that installation page would send a message which could offend, insult, disappoint etc. Gnome users.

Fair enough, let's say I agree with that, i.e. pre-selecting and even more so defaulting to a DE offends, insults, disappoints. Then there are a) a lot of distros that do so and still have more users than openSUSE and b) and far more importantly, since who cares about other distros?, Novell and those managing SLE have to admit that they send that exact message to the KDE world/users. Do they acknowledge that? I think that if one does not, one applies double standards. Even if there are reasons that might justify the defaulting, the message is sent.

If I take your Cons, then SLE alienates KDE users, contributors and does not encourage KDE contributors to choose SLE. Sounds pretty harsh to me. Would all those claiming that there is an alleged "anti-Gnome message" in pre-selecting KDE agree that SLE sends and even clearer "anti-KDE message"?

Further, and I stole this from somebody else ;), the argument that having a default or at least a pre-selection is useful, e.g. because it would make it easier for new users, is denied by some. If one denies the need for a default even for openSUSE which is aimed at all users from newbies to experts, then one surely has to agree that a default makes even less sense if a product is aimed mostly at experts. Or does it make sense to anyone that one has to take the decision off the shoulders of an expert but not of those of a newbie or normal user?

Yet for the SLE products which are mostly installed by admins, which clearly have a clue of what DE they want, get a default. So those need a default while openSUSE users don't? What's the justification for that default? Most SLE users want Gnome? Easing the installation process? Proposing the better technology? I fail to see what argument could be offered that would not apply for openSUSE as well.

Sven

+1 -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Friday 31 July 2009 15:52:58 Will Stephenson wrote:

On Friday 31 July 2009 15:27:15 Andreas Jaeger wrote:

...

...

[...] But openSUSE is also a great GNOME distribution - how can we point out

On Friday 31 July 2009 15:23:17 Lubos Lunak wrote: properly that openSUSE has both?

I'm sure we now do a better job of promoting that than Canonical do for Kubuntu and that would not change.

For me this feature is about 2 things -

First, the project taking the obvious step to recognise what the majority of our users want and give them that. This would go a long way to undoing the 'Novell is evil' smell that we can't shake off.

Secondly, giving openSUSE a very strong distinctive feature as a first- rank distribution that says 'We offer KDE by default because it's what our users want' compared to other first-rank distributions. Kubuntu and Pardus aren't in that category and our current "The distro that offers great KDE and GNOME desktops" position isn't perceived by many people outside our close circle of contributors - they take Ubuntu because it's highly successful, or Kubuntu because it's related to Ubuntu.

This should not weaken our support for GNOME, XFCE or anything else. Look at Kubuntu, which has become a successful project in its own right despite initial hostility and neglect from Canonical, or Fedora-kde, which has a contributor community that is of the about the same size as the openSUSE-kde community.

To me a switch to KDE default looks like putting GNOME one row to the back. Can we find a better solution than we currently have without giving out this message? Or is this no great alternative? I'm just brainstorming loud below, perhaps somebody else gets a great idea: For example, we can also change the wording on the desktop selection dialog. * Saying "openSUSE strives to have the best GNOME and KDE desktops" doesn't sound helpful. * We say right now "As desktop selection is a matter of taste, we do not give a recommendation.". What about "Desktop selection is a matter of taste - and GNOME and KDE are both first-class desktops in openSUSE. Right now two thirds of our users prefer KDE and a quarter GNOME"? Andreas -- Andreas Jaeger, aj@{novell.com,opensuse.org} Twitter: jaegerandi | Identica: jaegerandi SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, GF: Markus Rex, HRB 16746 (AG Nürnberg) Maxfeldstr. 5, 90409 Nürnberg, Germany GPG fingerprint = 93A3 365E CE47 B889 DF7F FED1 389A 563C C272 A126

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 11:11 AM, Lubos Lunak wrote:

 Option 1) is tempting, as I think there would be a lot to gain, but even option 2) is an improvement, purely for the user experience.

 So, first of all, can we all make sure we are discussing the same thing?

If we were only discussing option 2, I wouldn't really be against it. But I don't think for a second that if we go the route of having a selected default that it won't be seen as a political statement. Maybe not an "official project statement" but it will certainly be discussed as such. As Will said earlier "I am talking about a political statement" -- and that's where the proposal loses me. This *isn't really about simplifying user choice, it's about making a political statement and the rest of the reasons seem tacked on to me as reasons to support doing it. Best, Zonker -- Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier openSUSE Community Manager: http://zonker.opensuse.org Blogs: http://blogs.zdnet.com/community | http://www.dissociatedpress.net Twitter: jzb | Identica: jzb http://identi.ca/group/opensuse/members -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Friday 31 of July 2009, Lubos Lunak wrote:

Especially if this was done without the fuss, but I guess it may be too late for that.

Definitely, now that I see it has also reached Planet SUSE. Whatever we do now, it will be a political statement, even if we do not do anything, in which case it will be a political statement that won't be liked by the KDE community. "openSUSE does not want to aknowledge that KDE has always been the desktop used by the majority of its users" is no worse to upset KDE people than "openSUSE has the KDE radiobutton selected by default because GNOME has only 1/3 of KDE users" is for GNOME people. Keeping current enforced status quo and denying our userbase is a message too. -- Lubos Lunak KDE developer -------------------------------------------------------------- SUSE LINUX, s.r.o. e-mail: l.lunak@suse.cz , l.lunak@kde.org Lihovarska 1060/12 tel: +420 284 028 972 190 00 Prague 9 fax: +420 284 028 951 Czech Republic http://www.suse.cz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

2009/7/31 Lubos Lunak :

On Friday 31 of July 2009, Andreas Jaeger wrote:

...

To me a switch to KDE default looks like putting GNOME one row to the back. Can we find a better solution than we currently have without giving out this message?  Or is this no great alternative?

 There are really 2 ways to look at feature #306967:

1) Make KDE the default, and make it a political statement. That is what the openFATE proposal looks like, that we should say "openSUSE is primarily a KDE distribution".

2) Make KDE the default, and try to not make it look like a political statement. This is what the proposal on this mailing list looks like, to preselect the KDE radio button in the installation page, and that's it, don't make a fuss of it.

 Option 1) is tempting, as I think there would be a lot to gain, but even option 2) is an improvement, purely for the user experience.

 So, first of all, can we all make sure we are discussing the same thing?

IMHO any of them will have more effect in Gnome than in KDE... and the Gnome effect will not be a good one. If you want - KDE devs: talk about how great openSUSE KDE is in planetkde.org. - Gnome users to switch: a default will not make them switch. - New users: they will change to another distro to avoid making a desktop selection... you expect them to be able to create an useful bug report? Before they will be "useful users" they will try both desktops at some point anyway. If we really want to help the "next-next user", giving him a default, and we want to be representative of the user base... make the default random, adjusting the probability of each option from http://files.opensuse.org/opensuse/en/e/ec/Survey_openSUSE110.pdf or whatever source of this info we have. But I would keep the no default... at most make the sort order random. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Saturday, 2009-08-01 at 01:03 +0200, Susanne Oberhauser wrote:

I hate to say it but: to those familiar with the gnome-kde discussions, a preselection of eitehr of them always will be recieved and understood as a statement about the other one, too.

It's like setting emacs as the default editor (or vi): it's a statement about the 'others'.

And I wonder wheter the luxury of having one click less is worth tenderly and inadvertently yet unavoidably stepping on the toes of 1/3 of our users?

Absolutely :-( - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkpzgksACgkQtTMYHG2NR9V+gQCgmDy9HM3YH3HePxeV2vlmUUSO on4Aniu7KLTD6bE1KaRhmzUKQkeyZxU8 =CgyD -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Hello, 2009-08-01 01:03 keltezéssel, Susanne Oberhauser írta:

It's like setting emacs as the default editor (or vi): it's a statement about the 'others'.

Well, I don't recall, that it was ever discussed here, or on the factory list...

And I wonder wheter the luxury of having one click less is worth tenderly and inadvertently yet unavoidably stepping on the toes of 1/3 of our users?

That huge step on toes was done already when KDE was not default any more. Many of my friends left openSUSE to Kubuntu, Mandriva and even PCBSD. For different reasons, but I switched from KDE to openSUSE XFCE (started to use low power machines, and there XFCE fits better, than figured out, that is is also a hell lot faster on workstations :-). Still, I'd recommend KDE for strictly practical reasons: - there a lot more KDE users, so one can get KDE help easier, also Packman supports it better from my experience (yes, I try GNOME from time to time) - it is confusing for new users, that there is no default. And contrary to what was already said, new users don't research, they download and try. I already got a couple of phone calls asking what to choose, and always recommended KDE for the above reasons. Bye, CzP -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Carlos E. R. a écrit :

To me, I have always felt that KDE was, and is, top boy in openSUSE.

I remember a moment where we feared kde could be dropped in favor of Gnome. I'm glad it never happenned jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://valerie.dodin.org http://news.opensuse.org/2009/04/13/people-of-opensuse-jean-daniel-dodin/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Friday 31 of July 2009, Lubos Lunak wrote:

On Friday 31 of July 2009, Andreas Jaeger wrote:

...

To me a switch to KDE default looks like putting GNOME one row to the back. Can we find a better solution than we currently have without giving out this message? Or is this no great alternative?

There are really 2 ways to look at feature #306967:

1) Make KDE the default, and make it a political statement. That is what the openFATE proposal looks like, that we should say "openSUSE is primarily a KDE distribution".

2) Make KDE the default, and try to not make it look like a political statement. This is what the proposal on this mailing list looks like, to preselect the KDE radio button in the installation page, and that's it, don't make a fuss of it.

Actually, I take this back, as I think I completely misinterpreted feature #306967 here. After careful reading again and thinking about it, I see it now like this: - the only request there is "make KDE the default desktop". It is nowhere asked that openSUSE focuses primarily on KDE or that GNOME is neglected. In fact, it explicitly states that GNOME should remain supported as a choice. - this can be achieved by preselecting the KDE radiobutton during installation and nothing more - everything else in the feature is a description of benefits of doing so (and only doing so, without expressing any explicit focus on KDE or anything similar) This is actually not asking to make KDE special in any way or to grant KDE any additional priviledge. It is the common practice in openSUSE to select the technically best solution, and in case that is not feasible for whatever reason, the most popular solution. Therefore GNOME has the special priviledge of being presented completely equally (or actually with a slight advantage by being first) with what in all other cases would be the presented default selection in a choice or would be used without a choice at all. The feature asks for applying the common practice to the desktop selection, in other words, the feature actually asks for removal of the priviledge that GNOME currently has. There is no further request related to KDE or GNOME other than this. As for political messages, we currently do have a political message. The current existing priviledge for GNOME, despite trying to look like treating choices equal, actually makes GNOME special by what is described above, thus not treating everything in openSUSE equally. This creates a message towards other openSUSE communities, primarily the major KDE community, that they are only 2nd class citizens in openSUSE and that the GNOME community is valued more in openSUSE. Also, openSUSE got asked by the community using openFATE to change this. Therefore even not doing anything is stressing the existing political message. Since openSUSE positions now itself as an open community distribution, this may be jeopardized by refusing what appears to be a reasonable request from the majority of our community. I also believe the pros/cons conclusions in the original mail of this thread are somewhat wrong, mainly since they miss the analysis of what happens when the current situation stays. For the case when the feature is refused, it is sufficient to take all argument against it and look at them from the other side. So far all reasons supporting keeping the GNOME exception, as presented here, appear to make either equal or worse harm than when turned around and viewed as reasons for making KDE the default desktop. Finally, as a member of the KDE team I would like to say that I believe that just doing the radiobutton change, without anything else, has the potentional to achieve what the feature suggests. Compared to other potential users and contributors it should be simpler to gain back portion of the ones that have been driven away by the existing anti-KDE messaging from openSUSE but would have otherwise stayed. If openSUSE stops suggesting that GNOME is more important for openSUSE, and removal of the GNOME exception might be sufficient for that, those might be willing to give openSUSE a try again. KDE people also now do not have a major distribution they could consider a distribution supporting KDE, since that was us and our current position discourages KDE involvement in openSUSE. If the perception that openSUSE favours GNOME was removed, again these potentional users and contributors could be easier to convert from their distribution that sees KDE as something minor to us, if they could be convinced that openSUSE would treat them at least equally. That is not the case currently however, for reasons explained above. -- Lubos Lunak KDE developer -------------------------------------------------------------- SUSE LINUX, s.r.o. e-mail: l.lunak@suse.cz , l.lunak@kde.org Lihovarska 1060/12 tel: +420 284 028 972 190 00 Prague 9 fax: +420 284 028 951 Czech Republic http://www.suse.cz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Søndag den 2. august 2009 20:44:13 skrev Jim Henderson:

On Sun, 02 Aug 2009 19:51:24 +0200, Lubos Lunak wrote:

...

Actually, I take this back, as I think I completely misinterpreted feature #306967 here. After careful reading again and thinking about it, I see it now like this:

- the only request there is "make KDE the default desktop". It is nowhere asked that openSUSE focuses primarily on KDE or that GNOME is neglected. In fact, it explicitly states that GNOME should remain supported as a choice.

- this can be achieved by preselecting the KDE radiobutton during installation and nothing more

- everything else in the feature is a description of benefits of doing so (and only doing so, without expressing any explicit focus on KDE or anything similar)

Setting the radiobutton to pre-select KDE does specify a preference of the project.

Yes. The preference of 70% of our users. And stop trying to pretend that the current non-default with GNOME on top isn't seen as specification of a preference by everybody.

How about instead incorporating a suggestion made elsewhere in the discussion:

- Change the radiobuttons to checkboxes - Pre-select *both* KDE and GNOME

This option would put both on equal footing and shouldn't alienate anyone

I can't believe this idea still lives. It doesn't solve *any* of the problems that the feature request tries to address (confusion for new users, alienating the vast majority of our community etc.). Instead it'd make matters much worse than the status quo and creates a ton of new problems - bloat, waste of disk space, menu clutter, alienating KDE *and* GNOME fanboys, what to (auto)login to on first boot.. etc. It's a horrible idea. The idea of randomized sort order is a bit better - but still a non-solution to the actual problems. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Monday 03 August 2009 03:11:44 Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier wrote:

Just because it was written "Lennon & McCartney" didn't mean that John was getting "top" billing. :-)

No, but it did irk McCartney enough about songs that he individually wrote, that when he released a live album he changed the credits to McCartney/Lennon. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/2588347.stm According to the article, the Lennon/McCartney order had been made by Epstein and Lennon before McCartney turned up one day, and an agreement was made that it could be reversed later on. :-) -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Søndag den 2. august 2009 21:33:57 skrev Jim Henderson:

I again have to state that I don't understand what it is that this vocal minority of KDE users is so afraid of when it comes to having GNOME available as a selection or installed alongside KDE.

You keep saying that, even though it's not the case. Noone has ever suggested not having GNOME available. What's being discussed is moving KDE on top and preselecting the radiobutton - GNOME wouldn't be hidden and it wouldn't require a single additional click to select a GNOME desktop compared to the status quo - so what you're saying is completely wrong. A small change that - as has been argued over and over - would bring a ton of benefits for the project - with very minor damage to the GNOME sub-community as the only downside. And we may be vocal - but we're just saying what everybody's thinking - including a great deal of users who have left. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sun, Aug 2, 2009 at 1:15 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:

You don't want to know my opinion of people who would leave a major project like openSUSE over such a trivial part of the overall system.

FINALLY! someone said it ( ... and you used 'kerfuffle'. bonus points!). amen! i can't help but wonder aloud which does more "damage" to the community -- choosing, or not choosing, a given button -- or the perception a 'new user' gets from reading a thread like this, debating commitment to, or lack thereof, a given bunch of "fanboys". mgmt by committee. sigh. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Monday 03 of August 2009, Carlos E. R. wrote:

I would be very disappointed, and would stop being proud of being a member of this community. I would no longer feel a part of this project and welcomed. :-/

Welcome to the world of feeling like a KDE openSUSE user. -- Lubos Lunak KDE developer -------------------------------------------------------------- SUSE LINUX, s.r.o. e-mail: l.lunak@suse.cz , l.lunak@kde.org Lihovarska 1060/12 tel: +420 284 028 972 190 00 Prague 9 fax: +420 284 028 951 Czech Republic http://www.suse.cz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA256 Martin Schlander escribió:

And we may be vocal - but we're just saying what everybody's thinking - including a great deal of users who have left.

If users left is not because KDE was 2nd, but because you (the kde devs) force an unstable KDE4 when nobody wants it. The reason of this request if very, very simple, you are afraid to lose market, and want to force new users to use your DE. The reasons of the proposal are just bs. Besides that, you are clamming, "if you don't approve our request, the kde community will be very upset"... come on!!! Want to put kde on top? if so important to you, do it. But no DE selected as default. - -- Kind regards. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEAREIAAYFAkp2BwcACgkQNHr4BkRe3pLN0gCgs2YUAGSy2ZXXTC0nu0eX5/9Q bWUAn0iHfz0IwDCY/8u3XhHdtXVH8QNn =Ks76 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 02 of August 2009, Alberto Passalacqua wrote:

The actual problems have *nothing* to do with the default desktop.

They *do*. We keep sending our largest user base a signal that there are others that are considered more important for openSUSE.

but do not pretend that choosing a default desktop will fix automatically increase the number of users and contributors as someone in the KDE team is suggesting. It is simply an unfounded statement.

I didn't say it will automatically do that. What I said was that it has a good potential of doing that, better than keeping the current way. However, what I also said was that not choosing the default desktop will decrease the number. Been there, tried that, it worked. And this statement is founded, by this very distribution. We can try to show it again by confirming the current status, but I thought the point was making openSUSE grow, not shrink. -- Lubos Lunak KDE developer -------------------------------------------------------------- SUSE LINUX, s.r.o. e-mail: l.lunak@suse.cz , l.lunak@kde.org Lihovarska 1060/12 tel: +420 284 028 972 190 00 Prague 9 fax: +420 284 028 951 Czech Republic http://www.suse.cz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sun, 2 Aug 2009, Jim Henderson wrote:

Lubos, you keep saying this, but how does an equal selection imply one is more important than the other? I really don't follow your logic here.

The desktop environment selection in the installer is the sole and very prominent case where we don't provide a default choice of technology (or, in fact, where we highlight technology options at that level). We do not have this for postfix vs sendmail vs exim, vi vs Emacs vs Xemacs, nor many others. And while this is not the topic of the present discussion, it can and has been argued that skipping the entire dialog by default like we do in all those other cases would simplify installation, especially for non-expert users. To be clear, I am not suggesting such a more drastic change though it would make sense from a usability point of view. Sometimes community trumps usability. Gerald -- Dr. Gerald Pfeifer E gp@novell.com SUSE Linux Products GmbH Director Product Management F +49(911)74053-483 HRB 16746 (AG Nuremberg) SUSE Linux Enterprise, openSUSE, Appliances GF Markus Rex -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 02 August 2009 18:38, Jim Henderson wrote:

So now we get an additional level of complexity.  Do we go with the shiny new KDE4 so openSUSE is perceived as cutting edge, or do we go with the stable/established KDE3 release because it better meets the needs of KDE users? KDE3, no question, hands down..... & gnome. -- Kind regards,

M Harris <>< -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 02 August 2009 04:42:49 pm Gabriel wrote:

Lubos Lunak escribió:

...

They *do*. We keep sending our largest user base a signal that there are others that are considered more important for openSUSE.

Where the hell are you getting that impression???? We all know kde is the openSUSE's 'spoiled child'

KDE is SUSE - that is what made SUSE distinct and good distro. If SUSE would use GNOME, I would be using something else now. I was first complaining when KDE was set as default, but, just as it happened recently with KDE4, KDE was very fast a very good and usable desktop, while GNOME was broken in many details, for a while. Using GNOME distro like Red Hat, didn't help much to make me feel good. Nice graphics, some changes instantly applied without need to press a single key, was impressive, but missing many configuration tools that were available in KDE wasn't any help. Even smooth availability of Windows shares, comparing to SUSE somewhat complicated ways, wasn't enough to convince me to stay with Red Hat learning GNOME. On the other hand, smooth GNOME comparing to KDE4 was for sure feature that saved some users from wandering off the openSUSE camp in the last few releases, so we do need both. Taking that GNOME can't procrastinate changes, and is somewhat late to the fest, it can happen that in the near future we will see KDE4 rescuing openSUSE, this time from the GNOME rebirth problems. I guess that KDE default might be a good choice for next few releases, like having GNOME default for past few releases would help to have more users. This world is competitive place and there is many companies fighting for user attention. Throwing experimental software on non suspecting people without warning, will not help to gain followers. (It didn't in the past, and that will not change.) -- Regards, Rajko -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sun, 02 Aug 2009 14:46:24 -0500, Alberto Passalacqua wrote:

I was among those who pushed to have a clean GNOME installation without any trace of KDE for what possible.

The suggestion of installing both does not preclude a clean installation that includes no elements of either GNOME or KDE.

I don't see how installing two DE's by default can help.

By giving users who don't know which they would prefer the opportunity to try them both out and make an informed decision based on how they work. How is that a BAD thing? Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Mon, 03 Aug 2009 00:51:05 -0500, Alberto Passalacqua wrote:

If users want to try, they can try both DE's, but doing that by default seems wrong to me. You would almost double the installation size, increase the installation time and so on.

Except that it's only by default. Users who want to try both out can. Users who don't want both can deselect the one they don't want. Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Søndag den 2. august 2009 22:03:31 skrev Jim Henderson:

Let me put this question to those who want a KDE default selection: Is there ANY room for a compromise, or is it "our way or the highway"?

The only (remotely sane) alternative I see is keeping the current mess. Possibly with random sort order. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 20:19 -0000, Jim Henderson wrote:

...

The only (remotely sane) alternative I see is keeping the current mess. Possibly with random sort order.

Well, personally, I don't see the current situation as a "mess", but if a random sort order would make some of the "alienated" KDE users happy, I'm fine with that.

Me too. - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkp2HHgACgkQtTMYHG2NR9V1EQCfdKreGrh8r37zKNkYKBU4wI0V PDUAniRo5rkitI6iZzbN6DesY0FpTaR3 =Mxjs -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Martin Schlander a écrit :

Yes. The preference of 70% of our users.

did somebody notice than *gnome* is the first choice, then *kde* is the most popular choice. So the list order is not so important, after all... jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://valerie.dodin.org http://news.opensuse.org/2009/04/13/people-of-opensuse-jean-daniel-dodin/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sun, 02 Aug 2009 22:46:55 +0200, jdd (kim2) wrote:

Martin Schlander a écrit :

...

Yes. The preference of 70% of our users.

did somebody notice than *gnome* is the first choice, then *kde* is the most popular choice.

So the list order is not so important, after all...

Well observed. GNOME came first and KDE is still preferred by 70%, definitely demonstrates that the order really doesn't matter that much. So as I wrote elsewhere, if moving KDE to first position on that list makes the KDE community happy, by all means, do it. Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 02 August 2009 05:56:26 pm Carlos E. R. wrote:

On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 21:05 +0200, Martin Schlander wrote:

...

And stop trying to pretend that the current non-default with GNOME on top isn't seen as specification of a preference by everybody.

That's absolutely false.

By some KDE zealots, sure. >:-P

It is seen as that, by many more then few loud here. In every other place, or any other situation, whoever wins hearts of majority is listed as No. 1, only in openSUSE desktop selection it is No. 2. On the other hand, how do you explain vigorous resistance to give up on a first place, even the numbers of users doesn't support that position. Isn't that somewhat off balance. -- Regards, Rajko -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 02 August 2009 07:54:50 pm Jim Henderson wrote:

If that's all the discussion is about, then put KDE at the top of the list and leave it set as no default selection.

The whole discussion is about user perception of KDE status within openSUSE. It is not who will win place No. 1. KDE is the most used solution within openSUSE, so it is defacto No. 1. Current status is political rubbish that doesn't help anyone to feel good, as this whole thread shows. IMHO, good solution is to set one release KDE as default, the other GNOME. That would be equal status, and nobody will feel endangered. The message that sent to users will be clear, provided that . Not using any default is not helping new users at all, as it pushes our inability to make decision in this simple matter to the user.

I'm absolutely exhausted with this discussion.

:) -- Regards, Rajko -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 02 August 2009 11:16:00 pm Jim Henderson wrote:

Unless your proposal is to alternate the default selection with each release - odd releases get GNOME as the default, even get KDE as the default. That would set 11.2 with a default selection of KDE and 11.3 with a default selection of GNOME. That might work.

That is exactly what I meant.

But I do think the installer should make it clear that both can be installed at the same time and provide that option,

Sure. I've got chance to explain to few new users on IRC #suse channel that they can have both at the same time. IMHO, having radio buttons that allow only one choice is kind of counter productive in distro as openSUSE. It sends wrong message to the new users. Much better would be to have check boxes, that imply possibility of multiple choices. While one can run both at the same time, in 2 Xorg sessions, installer is asking to select only one. Why? To speed up installation? All, we have to do is put sentence on that page that tells that more desktops (software) you select, installation will last longer.

and certainly let the person doing the installation override any default set

That is requirement, for fairness to function. I really don't want to do another installation right after one is finished, which is not that bad, and removal of components that I don't use, which is currently a lot of manual work.

(if it's absolutely necessary that one be set, still not convinced that one needs to be set as the default).

It has to be.

...

Not using any default is not helping new users at all, as it pushes our inability to make decision in this simple matter to the user.

It belongs to the user, though. Providing the user with the information to make an informed decision (such as the liveCDs) is the right thing to do IMO.

Sincerely, DE is just another piece of software, and due to its size, requires serious introduction. Expecting user to read lengthy written introduction, when majority don't want to read manuals, is like expecting Godota :) Though, having a bit more sophisticated CD, that can be loaded in RAM, can be right thing. Today 2 GB RAM is very standard configuration, and CD image that lives in RAM can be configuration that many users would prefer, due to its speed. -- Regards, Rajko http://news.opensuse.org/category/people-of-opensuse/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 02 August 2009 20:44:13 Jim Henderson wrote:

On Sun, 02 Aug 2009 19:51:24 +0200, Lubos Lunak wrote:

...

Actually, I take this back, as I think I completely misinterpreted feature #306967 here. After careful reading again and thinking about it, I see it now like this:

- the only request there is "make KDE the default desktop". It is nowhere asked that openSUSE focuses primarily on KDE or that GNOME is neglected. In fact, it explicitly states that GNOME should remain supported as a choice.

- this can be achieved by preselecting the KDE radiobutton during installation and nothing more

- everything else in the feature is a description of benefits of doing so (and only doing so, without expressing any explicit focus on KDE or anything similar)

Setting the radiobutton to pre-select KDE does specify a preference of the project.

How about instead incorporating a suggestion made elsewhere in the discussion:

- Change the radiobuttons to checkboxes - Pre-select *both* KDE and GNOME

This option would put both on equal footing and shouldn't alienate anyone - additionally, it overrides the perception that because GNOME is listed first there's some sort of special preference (personally I've never seen it that way but understand why some people think that an alphabetical sort does provide a preference - unfortunately something always has to come first).

You just postpone the decision, this will not help: Then we would continue to discuss whether GDM or KDM is started by default, whether a new user that does no changes gets a GNOME or KDE desktop etc... Andreas -- Andreas Jaeger, aj@{novell.com,opensuse.org} SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, GF: Markus Rex, HRB 16746 (AG Nürnberg) Maxfeldstr. 5, 90409 Nürnberg, Germany GPG fingerprint = 93A3 365E CE47 B889 DF7F FED1 389A 563C C272 A126

...

You just postpone the decision, this will not help: Then we would continue to discuss whether GDM or KDM is started by default, whether a new user that does no changes gets a GNOME or KDE desktop etc...

Fair point. OK, so what's wrong with forcing the user to make a decision? Why is there an aversion to making the user make the determination for themselves?

We don't provide the user with enough information to make a rational choice, so the choice is random (based on name, appearance of desktop, sequence in the list, etc.) David -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Mon, 03 Aug 2009 12:18:23 -0400, Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier wrote:

If I were trying to introduce a *completely new user, I'd rather have them try a live CD anyway that just whips on a totally pre-selected set of applications after they've had a chance to boot it and see if it works with their hardware. So I'd push one of the live CDs rather than the DVD...

Makes sense to me. Logically, by the time a user gets to an installation, they should have an idea if the distro will install for them and which desktop they want. That perhaps means that a default choice doesn't make sense - since they'll have made their choice during their evaluation with the LiveCD, either the default selection will be what they want or it won't be. Or I suppose one could look at it that a default choice makes no difference (rather than "doesn't make sense") as long as a choice is presented. It's not about saving time (assume KDE is preselected as a default, hitting "Next" takes .1 seconds; for GNOME users selecting the GNOME option and hitting "Next" takes .25 seconds. Big deal). it's about politics. So, from my point of view, go ahead, make KDE the default selection if it'll make the KDE users feel loved. If the KDE "camp" will commit to not pushing to remove the option for GNOME (or lower its prominence in the selection screen by moving it to "other" or doing anything other than presenting it alongside the KDE options - heck, go ahead and list KDE first if it's that important to them) down the road, then fine. As an individual GNOME user, give me the option and support it equally and I'm a happy camper. Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

...

...

On 8/3/2009 at 10:34 AM, "Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier" wrote: How do other GNOME users / contributors feel about this?

To me if they are an experienced user they will already have made their choice as to whether they want gnome or kde. If they are a new user, why not show them a screen shot when they choose gnome or kde so they have a rough idea of what they are going to receive. I think this would do more for saying what is truly wanted rather than one or the other being listed first. Joe -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 9:49 AM, Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier wrote:

This has been suggested and rejected.

It's hard from a screenshot or two for the user to truly know what they're getting into with either desktop. You could make a "hey, this looks nifty/niftier" decision, but a screenshot doesn't really tell you a whole lot.

hear, hear! if a user can't be expected to make a choice (even to DL & try-out a LiveCD, as zonker suggested ...), about a desktop env, what does _anyone_ think is going to happen to that user's "experience" of _either_ DE when they come across an issue like "Okular insists on printing only to A4" issue? Dive into *bug reports*? this is like a bunch of politicians trying to legislate individual's responsibilities & choices. i'm simply astonished that Googling &/or directly visiting the KDE & Gnome sites seems such an unreasonable expectation of a user. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

2009/8/3 Karsten König :

Am Montag, 3. August 2009 19:18:21 schrieb PGNet Dev:

...

i'm simply astonished that Googling &/or directly visiting the KDE & Gnome sites seems such an unreasonable expectation of a user.

Do we really need to tell everybody stepping through the door to go back out and read the sign about how to enter properly? And KDE or GNOME would result in a pretty big sign...

We should focus on inviting the user to discover his choices and reminding long term users about them sure can't hurt either.

and how might they "discover" their choices? by preselcting a given radio box? by changing the order of presentation? by adding a couple of screenshots? do you really believe that that can & should be accomplished in the _installer_? if it's such a big issue, put a link/discussion/screenshot/whatever prominently "inviting a user to discover his choices" at the opensuse website where they likely got the installer DVD in the first place ... -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

...

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On 8/3/2009 at 11:43 AM, PGNet Dev wrote: and how might they "discover" their choices? by preselcting a given radio box? by changing the order of presentation? by adding a couple of screenshots?

And how are they discovering that choice right now by just selecting the radio button? I am not saying it is a good choice, it was just an idea. But it is more than what they have right now. Maybe we install both and leave the choice to when the desktop is first launched and have it change on the fly. I don't know, just some more thoughts. Joe -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

...

We don't provide the user with enough information to make a rational choice, so the choice is random (based on name, appearance of desktop, sequence in the list, etc.)

This is a fair point -- if someone is coming in *completely new.

The question is, how many users are coming in *completely new?

Anybody who's used Linux before will have a desktop they're familiar with or like, so the default selection is not an issue - they will choose what they want. The only people for whom it makes a difference are those with no previous experience of Linux or the sensitive souls who feel slighted if their preference isn't pre-selected. David -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Monday 03 August 2009 17:27:51 Jim Henderson wrote:

Fair point. OK, so what's wrong with forcing the user to make a decision? Why is there an aversion to making the user make the determination for themselves?

If you talk to Ubuntu users, one of the key points of their success was the focus on a very easy installation without decision making in the process. From a newbie point of view, choosing a desktop environment is an obstacle. They usually sit in front of their only computer, booted from the DVD and now they have no idea what KDE or Gnome are, nor do they know anything about the differences. And they don't have a computer available to search the internet. With Ubuntu's strong focus on Gnome, we see a certain type of users in the forums who made the switch to openSUSE because they want to try KDE (apparently Ubuntu's KDE integration still sucks). I don't know if this means we should set KDE as a default. But IMHO setting a default has its merits for a certain type of user. The advanced user definitely needs a choice. What if the automated install (not sure what it is called, the option where you don't have to configure much; I never use it <G>) would default to KDE, whereas the detailed installation has all the choices? Uwe -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Friday 31 of July 2009, jdd (kim2) wrote:

Andreas Jaeger a écrit :

...

Can we find a better solution than we currently have without giving out this message? Or is this no great alternative?

Yes, we should find one.

The real question is : what are the real difference between kde, gnome and xfce (and server or minimal install). If we could summarize this, we could add a sentence in front of the choice and let the user decide.

However, I think this is easy...

I'm afraid it is not. Let's see.

but for kde/gnome (for me). Let's try:

* KDE: the richer desktop, most loaded with options and wigdgets, preferably used on high end computers, more Windows 7 like.

* Gnome: rich desktop, many options, great look, but lighter than Kde and so able to run on less powerfull computers. Still very Windows like and comfortable

This doesn't really tell much in practice. Either the user knows the difference and then this isn't useful, or the user doesn't know, and then this is not something to decide based on information in one installation page. If they user doesn't know, all they really want to know is usually only "so which one should I use?", and there the easier way is to preselect something.

* xfce: very pretty desktop aimed to less powerfull, low RAM, computers, gorgious on the past years computers

This doesn't tell the user that only a small minority of openSUSE users know Xfce and the consequences (not many people being able to help with problems, etc.). It just supports what I wrote above. -- Lubos Lunak KDE developer -------------------------------------------------------------- SUSE LINUX, s.r.o. e-mail: l.lunak@suse.cz , l.lunak@kde.org Lihovarska 1060/12 tel: +420 284 084 672 190 00 Prague 9 fax: +420 284 028 951 Czech Republic http://www.suse.cz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Fredag den 31. juli 2009 17:21:39 skrev jdd (kim2):

Andreas Jaeger a écrit :

...

Can we find a better solution than we currently have without giving out this message? Or is this no great alternative?

Yes, we should find one.

The real question is : what are the real difference between kde, gnome and xfce (and server or minimal install). If we could summarize this, we could add a sentence in front of the choice and let the user decide.

However, I think this is easy... but for kde/gnome (for me). Let's try:

* KDE: the richer desktop, most loaded with options and wigdgets, preferably used on high end computers, more Windows 7 like.

* Gnome: rich desktop, many options, great look, but lighter than Kde and so able to run on less powerfull computers. Still very Windows like and comfortable

It can't be done. You already made some highly controversial statements comparing KDE to MS Windows and claiming GNOME is (significantly) more light weight than KDE. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Carlos E. R. a écrit :

...

You already made some highly controversial statements comparing KDE to MS Windows and claiming GNOME is (significantly) more light weight than KDE.

It is a fact that gnome is lighter.

I don't mind what is different between Gnome and Kde, but I think there is more difference than look and feel, so may be to be not controversial Gnome users should define they desktop and kde users they one? I only ask for something helping the users choice jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://valerie.dodin.org http://news.opensuse.org/2009/04/13/people-of-opensuse-jean-daniel-dodin/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Carlos E. R. a écrit :

To me, the wording should encourage testing of all the environments.

we could have a option "install both" to try

The installation could even put a 10 question quiz to help the choice :-)

quiz a surprisingly difficult to build (I had to do) jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://valerie.dodin.org http://news.opensuse.org/2009/04/13/people-of-opensuse-jean-daniel-dodin/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Carlos E. R. a écrit :

...

we could have a option "install both" to try

Yes, but why only both?

because I think xfce or minimal have a clear goal, when Kde/Gnome can challenge each other, have these two makes it easy to test them and most first commer can't know it's possible to have both (in fact, usually, there is always at least fvwm :-) *i* have at present fvwm, gnome, kde 3 / 4, metacity (??), xfce and even mythtv (??) any here knows it's possible, but many new people don't jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://valerie.dodin.org http://news.opensuse.org/2009/04/13/people-of-opensuse-jean-daniel-dodin/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

...

You already made some highly controversial statements comparing KDE to MS Windows and claiming GNOME is (significantly) more light weight than KDE.

It is a fact that gnome is lighter. No, it isn't. GNOME has a simpler and more consistent UI than KDE, but both XFCE and KDE are faster and lighter on resources. I ran KDE4 on a 400Mhz PPC machine where it was slow, but worked, while GNOME swapped

Hello, 2009-08-01 01:31 keltezéssel, Carlos E. R. írta: the machine to death. Bye, CzP -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Carlos E. R. a écrit :

through optimization of C++ in the compiler. Now KDE is nimbler in resources than it was, but it still feels a bit heavier, at least on modest machines like mine.

I could try it on a 6 years old machine, PIII 1000/384Mo ram and it was surprisingly fast (kde 3.5) jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://valerie.dodin.org http://news.opensuse.org/2009/04/13/people-of-opensuse-jean-daniel-dodin/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Saturday 01 of August 2009, Carlos E. R. wrote:

My machines are slow. I use both. My previous machine had only 32 MiB of ram, and there KDE was noticiably slower, it swapped way more. That was the main reason I started to use Gnome 10 years ago, even though KDE was more complete and had a better finish in SuSE.

The KDE team has done a lot recently to improve this; a good part through optimization of C++ in the compiler. Now KDE is nimbler in resources than it was, but it still feels a bit heavier, at least on modest machines like mine.

Some other time I'll time KDE and Gnome starting.

Ok. But you can please keep your performance bikeshedding out of this discussion? It is not important here that sometimes KDE performs better and sometimes GNOME (which is actually the fact, not the persisting myth). -- Lubos Lunak KDE developer -------------------------------------------------------------- SUSE LINUX, s.r.o. e-mail: l.lunak@suse.cz , l.lunak@kde.org Lihovarska 1060/12 tel: +420 284 028 972 190 00 Prague 9 fax: +420 284 028 951 Czech Republic http://www.suse.cz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

I think we need to look at reasonable Hardware Expectations, let alone the system requirement, printed in text in both the user guide and commercial box containing a paper user guide and software. With only 32Mg of RAM you would be luck to run Windows 2000, you wont be able to install and run Windows XP, yet you think that both desktops should run on 32Mb of RAM. Software that has been released post the year 1997, cannot be expected to perform and be backwardly compatible. With only 32Mb of RAM, and I take it no RAM on Video Card, just about any O/S is going to trash its VM at the expense of the application/OS calls for disk IO's Time to get at a bare minimum of 2GIG of RAM on a Bare Minimum of a new socketed Intel P4 3.2 HT or better still start at current technology with a X_64 Quad Core 2.8 with 8 GIG and 1GIG Video PCIe. Wanting a PC with only 32Mb of RAM to function and be usable with ANY O/S is just not going to happen - I am sorry. Scott Carlos E. R. wrote:

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On Saturday, 2009-08-01 at 11:20 +0200, Peter Czanik wrote:

...

...

...

You already made some highly controversial statements comparing KDE to MS Windows and claiming GNOME is (significantly) more light weight than KDE.

It is a fact that gnome is lighter. No, it isn't. GNOME has a simpler and more consistent UI than KDE, but both XFCE and KDE are faster and lighter on resources. I ran KDE4 on a 400Mhz PPC machine where it was slow, but worked, while GNOME swapped

2009-08-01 01:31 keltezéssel, Carlos E. R. írta: the machine to death.

My machines are slow. I use both. My previous machine had only 32 MiB of ram, and there KDE was noticiably slower, it swapped way more. That was the main reason I started to use Gnome 10 years ago, even though KDE was more complete and had a better finish in SuSE.

The KDE team has done a lot recently to improve this; a good part through optimization of C++ in the compiler. Now KDE is nimbler in resources than it was, but it still feels a bit heavier, at least on modest machines like mine.

Some other time I'll time KDE and Gnome starting.

- -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux)

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No I did not miss the point - I will slow the conversation down a little for you. You were discussing which desktop was more light weight, Gnome or KDE. As previously mentioned your VM is going to get thrashed, so any testing of either desktop will solely rely on your HDD IO's Speed. The speed will invariably decline with more use of the PC as the Kernel will try to keep as much of past application loaded in cache. In your case the cashed files will probably sit on VM. So with very limited resources the slow-down of either desktop, once loaded will increase exponentially after you open or use any application until its runs out of VM and all cache buffers will get flushed. There is no value in timing either desktop in an environment that is dependant on VM as you cannot make any real comparisons. There are far too many variables and you are not starting with a level playing or test field in the first instance. I mentioned MS because I don't know what O/S your were running prior to Suse, but what ever your were running probably would have been a very ancient version of any MS offering. Yet you expect a brand new version of Suse to run and do what cannot be done with other O/S. It appears that rather that updating very old technology you are searching for an O/S that will buy you more time for your hardware. This is not going to happen for you. Rather than discussing different desktops I think you need to seriously thing about how obsolete your technology is. and you want the impossible from either desktop. Measuring start-up is irrelevant, and any other time/performance indications on each desktop will depend on the speed of you HDD IO's Carlos E. R. wrote:

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On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 21:00 +1000, alpha096@virginbroadband.com.au wrote:

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With only 32Mg of RAM you would be luck to run Windows 2000, you wont be

Please stop talking about windows.

...

Wanting a PC with only 32Mb of RAM to function and be usable with ANY O/S is just not going to happen - I am sorry.

You missed the point of what I said.

- -- Cheers, Carlos E. R.

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Am Freitag 31 Juli 2009 schrieb Stefan Kunze:

But I'm against forcing the decision for 11.2 in the next few weeks - i think it is to late for that and as the feeling of being a little bit sneaky. Lets have an open discussion for 11.3 . A decision taken would also not mean that it is forever ... Circumstances change and in open Community there should always be a way to revisit a decision taken.

I'm not going to argue in this thread - and I did vote neutral on the feature :) But let me say: this change is "just" about a radio button and if I'm reading right this is mainly on how to communicate the change _if_ we do it. And we still have 3 _months_ to release - I think it's enough time to discuss. Preselecting a radio button isn't that much of a problem technically and even if we change the wording on that page, we can still change the translation pretty late in the cycle. So don't limit the 11.2 discussion, we will just earn frustration if we cancel that discussion with a "we just have 3 months left" argument. Greetings, Stephan -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 11:26 AM, Will Stephenson wrote:

I think we can make the message "we recognise and respond to what our users want".  We're not hiding GNOME as is the case with KDE on SLED nor are we reducing Novell's investment in it.

Our users want us to check the radio button, or our users want us to make a "marketing statement" that KDE is the preferred desktop? Or, is it beyond that? Our users want us to focus more on KDE? That's the sentiment that I seem to be getting so far that underlies the feature. Not trying to put words in your mouth here - just saying that what I see in the discussions on openFATE, on my blog, and in this list, the real "ask" is this: "SUSE used to be KDE-centric. I miss this. I want the old SUSE. I want a distro that is KDE-centric that I can use to promote KDE." Nothing wrong with that -- but I don't think this feature gets us there. It may be what many people think is the first step on the road to getting there, but it doesn't get us there, and I don't see a plan to get us there beyond this first step. I see a lot of speculation that *if* we make this choice, we *may* gain users and contributors on the KDE side and we *probably will lose users and contributors for GNOME and will have trouble attracting new GNOME users and contributors.

I'm not a marketeer, but I am married to one.  And I've heard from a couple of places that good marketing orthodoxy is to focus on your biggest market and give them what they want, and look for untapped markets.

Really this gets back to the thing that comes up over and over again -- we haven't decided what markets we want to focus on. So we have two different things there: * The KDE community, some of which already prefer openSUSE, some don't -- but I think we can all agree that this is smaller than the second choice: * The untapped market -- i.e., Windows and Mac users. If openSUSE had *all of the existing KDE users in the world, we still wouldn't approach 2% of the untapped market. Choosing this feature alone won't do a lot to address the untapped market. There are ways we could address the "untapped market" with KDE, but I haven't seen that, so far I just see: * Make KDE the default * Stuff happens * World domination, yay! (Yes, I'm being a bit sarcastic. It's Friday and it's been a long week. But truly - I think we're speculating heavily here.) Best, Zonker -- Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier openSUSE Community Manager: http://zonker.opensuse.org Blogs: http://blogs.zdnet.com/community | http://www.dissociatedpress.net Twitter: jzb | Identica: jzb http://identi.ca/group/opensuse/members -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Saturday 01 August 2009 02:02:56 Carlos E. R wrote:

My feeling is that KDE users and devs (@novell) want to push KDE as the primary desktop, but that they will not stop there. Next they will want resources dedicated to Gnome development and integration diminished, till finally Gnome is just a bare vestigial desktop, almost useless.

That is what to me means this political statement. :-/

Yes, I have read testimonies that show almost hatred of gnome and its users... :-/

You're scaremongering and trying to polarize the debate. Stop it. Nobody involved in this discussion has made such claims.

What other distro can boast of such good integration between different desktops, as we have now in oS? Do you want to lose that?

Without meaning to do ourselves down, what integration are you talking about? Will -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

This issue is highly politicised by many messages through this debate - You yourself quoted a political statement from a high thread. O.K lets call this a highly passionate issue for most. The transparency issues with CD/DVD media I am taking about is having a DVD media in the drive, opening Dolphin or any other file manager and copy from HDD to DVD/CD media via a file manager. 'Select, copy, paste.' Its a simple issues that gnome actually handles very well but KDE is light years away from having such simplicity. As far as usability goes, we sacrifice it time and time again with technical perspectives. A simple example is the Yast and the Cancel and Abort buttons. Once a user executes say a network service, and for some reason it cannot complete the task, the Cancel and Abort buttons have no effect - you may as well blank them out after you execute a change to any service and it either cannot or is taking forever to complete. See https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=489077 where all parties were content to waste huge amounts of time in argument. Why the Cancel or Abort buttons cannot be changed to kill the PIN, in the same way ANY KDE4 Application can do, if you close it from a right click on the Task Manager Tray. I opened an Enhancement Bug in Gnome for a "Super User/Root" File Manager on the menu system - It was sent back as Invalid. I open an Enhancement request to permit a users right click on the desktop to add either an application or object - It was sent back as invalid. Work that one out? With the Introduction of 4.x KDE developers removed functionality from the user. This is the hugest error in development that I have ever seen. Its Computer Science Year 1 lesson 2. You don't remove functional aspects of anything with there being a significant technical reason to do so and then its a hard push! These are all in Bugzilla... Yast and Gnome development are closed shops, and it does not take rocket science to see that with a simple search for enhancement or bugs raised since 10.3 We also have a situation that most all developers at Suse.de, don't even use the default KDE/Gnome desktops!!! and its very seldom each person does an install on their own PC with new versions. Try to get the developers to use the default desktop AND remove the command prompt and see how they go. This is exactly what the user experiences. It took me 4 years to give up a line editor, and another 3 to give up a non-GUI text Editor, another 6 years to convince me to use a GUI File Manager, and all up 8 years to give up a Terminal emulator in favour of a GUI fill-in the-box. Generation Y will NOT use anything but a GUI Interface, and History is punctuated with what the general user can cop with. Do you recall when Windows 95 came out! M.S committed huge resources and invested huge amounts of money to provide only 2 very small but hugely significant issues the world had. It provided a GUI Interface that did not require a user to set-up and edit 2 files on every PC. They also bastardised the limitations of memory managers and committed to use XMS memory as the ONLY way to address RAM above 1024 - EMS LIM4 was tossed away for eternity. Do you re-call NetWare 3.x to NetWare 4.x - My God, we had to create a GUI Interface just to Install the Server software and Maintain its Management. Everything about the server interface had to be object orientated on a GUI AND demanded a mouse be present! NetAdmins would never cope now, if we gave them NetWare 2.15 where we had to generate server.exe and disk drivers on the actual server, and if we game them 3.15 that made the quantum leap to an "Install" Module. Microsoft's First use of NTFS Advanced Server that gave the Netadmin a GUI to manage the Server had the world hooked and when NetWare 4.x came out with objects and NetWare 5.n came with a GUI/IP comms, it was far too late. The world was already hooked on the GUI of NTFS Server and never looked back! Personally, I would love to go back to command line entries in a millisecond, but I can be a dinosaur in today's environment. Within 3-5years Gen Y will soon be making decisions on software Industry buys and if we are there with a complete alternate better or equal offer - its bye bye birdy. Generation Y will NOT use a NON-GUI anything, and unless they have a mouse they cannot use the Interface. - Its very very very simple. Technical excellence behind the GUI, as long as it works, is completely wasted on a general user. Usability is King and Historically starkly evident. So we either rewrite history to suit ourselves or disappear off the earth. alpha096@virginbroadband.com.au wrote:

I love the Gnome Desktop because its so stable. I cant wait for them to get rid of the Blocky type feeling it has with its multiple menus that go round in circles. I love the cd/dvd transparency for the user - something KDE has yet to do - BUT have you ever tried to open a BUG or an Enhancement using Bugzilla and the classification of Gnome. Until you have tried to log an enhancement or bug against gnome and experienced the replies; I'd keep a very quiet mindset about political statements. Mind you, have you every tried to open an enhancement against YasT and experienced the reply? Scott

Will Stephenson wrote:

...

On Saturday 01 August 2009 02:02:56 Carlos E. R wrote:

...

My feeling is that KDE users and devs (@novell) want to push KDE as the primary desktop, but that they will not stop there. Next they will want resources dedicated to Gnome development and integration diminished, till finally Gnome is just a bare vestigial desktop, almost useless.

That is what to me means this political statement. :-/

Yes, I have read testimonies that show almost hatred of gnome and its users... :-/

You're scaremongering and trying to polarize the debate. Stop it. Nobody involved in this discussion has made such claims.

...

What other distro can boast of such good integration between different desktops, as we have now in oS? Do you want to lose that?

Without meaning to do ourselves down, what integration are you talking about?

Will

Sorry I stuffed up the thread...but will now correct my reply posting This issue is highly politicised by many messages through this debate - You yourself quoted a political statement from a high thread. O.K lets call this a highly passionate issue for most. The transparency issues with CD/DVD media I am taking about is having a DVD media in the drive, opening Dolphin or any other file manager and copy from HDD to DVD/CD media via a file manager. 'Select, copy, paste.' Its a simple issues that gnome actually handles very well but KDE is light years away from having such simplicity. As far as usability goes, we sacrifice it time and time again with technical perspectives. A simple example is the Yast and the Cancel and Abort buttons. Once a user executes say a network service, and for some reason it cannot complete the task, the Cancel and Abort buttons have no effect - you may as well blank them out after you execute a change to any service and it either cannot or is taking forever to complete. See https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=489077 where all parties were content to waste huge amounts of time in argument. Why the Cancel or Abort buttons cannot be changed to kill the PIN, in the same way ANY KDE4 Application can do, if you close it from a right click on the Task Manager Tray. I opened an Enhancement Bug in Gnome for a "Super User/Root" File Manager on the menu system - It was sent back as Invalid. I open an Enhancement request to permit a users right click on the desktop to add either an application or object - It was sent back as invalid. Work that one out? With the Introduction of 4.x KDE developers removed functionality from the user. This is the hugest error in development that I have ever seen. Its Computer Science Year 1 lesson 2. You don't remove functional aspects of anything with there being a significant technical reason to do so and then its a hard push! These are all in Bugzilla... Yast and Gnome development are closed shops, and it does not take rocket science to see that with a simple search for enhancement or bugs raised since 10.3 We also have a situation that most all developers at Suse.de, don't even use the default KDE/Gnome desktops!!! and its very seldom each person does an install on their own PC with new versions. Try to get the developers to use the default desktop AND remove the command prompt and see how they go. This is exactly what the user experiences. It took me 4 years to give up a line editor, and another 3 to give up a non-GUI text Editor, another 6 years to convince me to use a GUI File Manager, and all up 8 years to give up a Terminal emulator in favour of a GUI fill-in the-box. Generation Y will NOT use anything but a GUI Interface, and History is punctuated with what the general user can cop with. Do you recall when Windows 95 came out! M.S committed huge resources and invested huge amounts of money to provide only 2 very small but hugely significant issues the world had. It provided a GUI Interface that did not require a user to set-up and edit 2 files on every PC. They also bastardised the limitations of memory managers and committed to use XMS memory as the ONLY way to address RAM above 1024 - EMS LIM4 was tossed away for eternity. Do you re-call NetWare 3.x to NetWare 4.x - My God, we had to create a GUI Interface just to Install the Server software and Maintain its Management. Everything about the server interface had to be object orientated on a GUI AND demanded a mouse be present! NetAdmins would never cope now, if we gave them NetWare 2.15 where we had to generate server.exe and disk drivers on the actual server, and if we game them 3.15 that made the quantum leap to an "Install" Module. Microsoft's First use of NTFS Advanced Server that gave the Netadmin a GUI to manage the Server had the world hooked and when NetWare 4.x came out with objects and NetWare 5.n came with a GUI/IP comms, it was far too late. The world was already hooked on the GUI of NTFS Server and never looked back! Personally, I would love to go back to command line entries in a millisecond, but I can be a dinosaur in today's environment. Within 3-5years Gen Y will soon be making decisions on software Industry buys and if we are there with a complete alternate better or equal offer - its bye bye birdy. Generation Y will NOT use a NON-GUI anything, and unless they have a mouse they cannot use the Interface. - Its very very very simple. Technical excellence behind the GUI, as long as it works, is completely wasted on a general user. Usability is King and Historically starkly evident. So we either rewrite history to suit ourselves or disappear off the earth. Carlos E. R. wrote:

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On Saturday, 2009-08-01 at 08:04 +0200, Will Stephenson wrote:

...

On Saturday 01 August 2009 02:02:56 Carlos E. R wrote:

...

My feeling is that KDE users and devs (@novell) want to push KDE as the primary desktop, but that they will not stop there. Next they will want resources dedicated to Gnome development and integration diminished, till finally Gnome is just a bare vestigial desktop, almost useless.

That is what to me means this political statement. :-/

Yes, I have read testimonies that show almost hatred of gnome and its users... :-/

You're scaremongering and trying to polarize the debate. Stop it. Nobody involved in this discussion has made such claims.

I'm sorry, but that is the message I'm getting from you guys.

This is not the only place where opinions are getting printed, you know.

...

...

What other distro can boast of such good integration between different desktops, as we have now in oS? Do you want to lose that?

Without meaning to do ourselves down, what integration are you talking about?

Currently I use a gnome desktop with kde tools. I call that integration.

- -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux)

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Yes it was a long Post but very much about which desktop and more so why History cannot be ignored. Many say that the KDE should be the default and others Gnome and much discussion is politicised. Writing about software, especially within the framework of KDE OR Gnome is totally political in its expectations. Why did people only buy Microsoft products and just about all other vendors collapse in the late 80s-90s. Microsoft does not enjoy its position because of technical excellence, far from it, they got there because they built a desktop that was 100% usable. In essence we are motivated to choose either KDE or Gnome based on usability. I don't here anyone saying we must only present a KDE desktop because of its technical excellence. The thought of software winning popularity has nothing to do with technical Excellence, as if that was the case, we would not all be using MS. The argument raging on preference of desktop, KDE OR Gnome, is all about who feels one desktop is more usable than the other...or am I going too fast? We love things that we can use and understand the easiest, and a lot of that is feel and look stuff. We are highly motivated with a passionate leaning toward one or the other because of how we see each desktop behaves when we use it. We either love the way it works and behaves and looks or we hate it because it cannot do things almost everyone takes for granted. The point in History have shown how important look and feel and usability is. Back in the mid 90's people said, they hate DOS and wont use it the only use Windows. That single issue centred on usability wrote history for decades to come. When Windows 95 came out I recall one CEO of a very large company saying, "When I see staff at an Airport using Windows, then I'll put in through my entire business Interests" We either love KDE and want to make it the standard desktop or hate is because of the ease of use and understanding of the user. Is that what we are not discussing? This conflict is nothing more than another DOS v Windows fight, with slightly different players; but in essence we evoke the same passion with either KDE or Gnome. Gen Y is going to want to use the most easy to use or the most usable desktop and love it, because it presents ever task as being simple, easy and they can click on it.... I am sure you can see the parallels in the posting above now but perhaps I jumped or digressed without explanation, in the expectation the reader understood the linkage. jdd (kim2) wrote:

alpha096@virginbroadband.com.au a écrit :

...

Generation Y will NOT use anything but a GUI Interface,

very long mail, but sorry to say not convincing. First you drop Apple Mc Intosh interface importance, then everybody will use GUI when fiber links, 100 Mb symetrical will be for anybody, but this is not to be seen before at least 10 years.

And this have nothing to do with defaulting to Kde.

To go back to the subject, that is making install easier to newcommer, may be we could add an option "All default install" with *no* other questions.

We just have to define such defaults: no user passwd, direct login, kde with windows like skin, sudo without pass for the first user...

We could name it "install like Windows". But do we want to go so far? Do we want to support users wanting to do so?

I doubt it

jdd

alpha096@virginbroadband.com.au a écrit :

I am very sorry Will, but the "we recognise and respond........." is in reality another motherhood statement,

could you, please, answer just under the sentence you answer to (as I do)? it makes reading the thread much easier, thanks.

Bugzilla is full of small common sense requests that are flagged wontfix or are yet to be marked

this i why feature have been created. Devs are simply too short in time to see all and the vote system of bugzilla is recent (or only recently made visible) I'm not a dev at all and report bugs from time to time, with reasonable success, including for yast so could we go back to the subject of this already very long thread? thanks again jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://valerie.dodin.org http://news.opensuse.org/2009/04/13/people-of-opensuse-jean-daniel-dodin/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 20:32 +1000, alpha096@virginbroadband.com.au wrote:

The preference to type text above is mine as I think it more helpful.

It is against these lists culture and preference. - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkp1bisACgkQtTMYHG2NR9WB9wCeOseMp2fWCFMnsrvWyE/MouU9 2s0An2fq1nX4t5Igznwu0TAx6+mNGvmH =fIVM -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Fri, 31 Jul 2009, Boyd Lynn Gerber wrote:

OpenSUSE provides two polished first-class desktops. Desktop selection is a matter of taste, so try them and decided what your prefer.

Or OpenSUSE all about choice, we provide first-class desktops. Desktop selection is a matter of taste. Try them and decide what you prefer. -- Boyd Gerber 801 849-0213 ZENEZ 1042 East Fort Union #135, Midvale Utah 84047 -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Fri, 31 Jul 2009, Luis Medinas wrote:

On Fri, 2009-07-31 at 11:19 -0600, Boyd Lynn Gerber wrote:

...

On Fri, 31 Jul 2009, Boyd Lynn Gerber wrote:

...

OpenSUSE provides two polished first-class desktops. Desktop selection is a matter of taste, so try them and decided what your prefer.

Or

OpenSUSE all about choice, we provide first-class desktops. Desktop selection is a matter of taste. Try them and decide what you prefer.

As a GNOME developer and openSUSE user/member this is my opinion. If we have the two major desktop's supported by 2 big teams why make kde or gnome the default ? There's no sense because the two desktops are threated as first class citizen.

Will opensuse gain more developers if it will make kde default ? I don't think so, because SUSE for all this years has lot's of developers working on kde upstream so simply make it default won't bring more developers. What will happen in 1 year ? Well GNOME 3.0 will be released next year and it will gain his momentum again. So in one year will we change the default desktop again when GNOME gains more users !?

I think one of the main problems for what gnome developers don't pick opensuse it's because opensuse isn't really a developers friendly distro. I think for 11.2 this will change a bit since OBS is rocking and the GNOME Team is trying to give more developer tools and documentation (i.e. i wrote a howto on the GNOME wiki about building GNOME from git).

Please stop with this "supposed features" because this will only separate the community and start non sense flame wars like emacs vs vim, banshee vs amarok etc...

I tend to agree with this totally. I like having the choice. I hate having to have a default. I think the OBS really rocks and will really make a difference to openSUSE. I was only suggesting the wording change as a way to highlight "We value choice and have great Desktops." That is why I like this text as a possible change to what is there now. This does not put any desktop above an other. OpenSUSE all about choice, we provide first-class desktops. Desktop selection is a matter of taste. Try them and decide what you prefer. This allows for all desktops, not just the major two. Even though some maybe a bit hidden. I guess, the reason I suggested the change of which desktop was listed first was a small conssesion. Having to based on some facts that are know. Would then stop this happening all the time. I like the choices the way they are. Maybe swapping the listing being the only change. -- Boyd Gerber 801 849-0213 ZENEZ 1042 East Fort Union #135, Midvale Utah 84047 -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Friday 31 July 2009 21:07:45 Stephan Binner wrote:

Just for the record and reminder: there have been two decisions/changes in the past. One was before/at 10.0 to have no desktop pre-selected and a second po- litical decision pushed KDE in 10.1 (so min. one release later) to the back.

10.0: http://i26.tinypic.com/2igghox.png 10.1: http://i28.tinypic.com/30skhf5.png

Besides that, GNOME's description was associated with a well-known, though not GNOME-app and yet available since ever on the KDE desktop (now even default webbrowser) - Firefox. Users would very likely pick GNOME instead, no doubts. -- Regards, Carlos Goncalves -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Friday, 2009-07-31 at 22:58 +0200, Stephan Binner wrote:

My point is rather what did the second change/decision improve? Did GNOME numbers jump to the sky? Or did it rather alienate majority of KDE users?

Alphabetical order is what is normally used everywhere to display no preferences for any side. List of countries, politicians, sportmen... - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkpzi5gACgkQtTMYHG2NR9XdkgCfdE9Z9+xyT8W2fb84R55dvBPX 080An0pSfyhdtJwLtGlXoWP8y73BMvCd =5yvA -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Saturday, 2009-08-01 at 08:32 +0200, jdd (kim2) wrote:

Carlos E. R. a écrit :

...

Alphabetical order is what is normally used everywhere to display no preferences for any side. List of countries, politicians, sportmen... so why I know of AAA companies...

Good point :-( In Spanish we say "hecha la ley, hecha la trampa" (a law was made, the cheat was also made). Then, use a random order. It is a computer, the order can be selected randomly on the spot.

we have to help choice.

openSUSE IS a great distro, so of course any change for good can only be a small change :-)

What could be said is that it's possible for little cost to install both - may be we could make install both the default? This makes testing the two of them easy!!

I install and use both. Actually, I install all of them. I like to use a gnome desktop with kde tools... I will suffer if gnome or kde is pushed away. However, some people I know think that having both desktops is problematic (!), and do full separated installs of each on the same computer. - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkp0CPcACgkQtTMYHG2NR9UyyQCcDSj/JuEJzBIgygpaeMC2Ly+E lQ0AoIZm2Oqrk4eww9UCcCAyFdbB8mpe =9j3e -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Saturday, 2009-08-01 at 20:16 +0200, Gerald Pfeifer wrote:

On Sat, 1 Aug 2009, jdd (kim2) wrote:

...

What could be said is that it's possible for little cost to install both - may be we could make install both the default? This makes testing the two of them easy!!

Which login manager would be used then, gdm or kdm?

And which environment would be started by default, GNOME or KDE?

Whatever the administrator of each machine decides.

...

on modern computer this is not a problem

I'm having both installed even on my not-so-modern notebook, alas the proposal does not really address the problem, just pushes it back.

On Sat, 1 Aug 2009, Carlos E. R. wrote:

...

Then, use a random order. It is a computer, the order can be selected randomly on the spot.

Sounds like a support and usability nightmare; and which variant is going to appear in the manual?

I don't see why, but I suppose you know more of those things. - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkp0mFQACgkQtTMYHG2NR9WLBQCePkl0BxrD8cZYDZsa3dIp4ZxU 00AAn2pmMtYgoY4ye8cnyS7K+2BiCa2R =7KdD -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Fri, 31 Jul 2009 22:58:04 +0200, Stephan Binner wrote:

My point is rather what did the second change/decision improve? Did GNOME numbers jump to the sky? Or did it rather alienate majority of KDE users?

I would suggest that if the ordering of the options (or the inclusion of GNOME in the main selection list) alienated some KDE users, then those users who were alienated need to get a thicker skin and stop worrying about the fact that the installation screen provides a *choice*. As a GNOME user, I'm not bothered by the inclusion of KDE 3.5 and KDE 4.0 in the installation. People want to use one of those releases, that's cool, it's not my preference, so I'm not inclined to select it as the primary interface at installation time. What I'm really curious about is what it is that those who *are* threatened by the inclusion of a GNOME option (clearly not all KDE users are threatened by this, so we're talking about what I sincerely hope is a small group of vocal people) are so afraid of with the inclusion of GNOME or the lack of a pre-selection being made for KDE. Are they afraid that users might decide to use something other than KDE and that will somehow cause resource allocation to the KDE project (which is not controlled by Novell *or* openSUSE) to be diminished? If you don't want GNOME as a choice (or want a pre-selected KDE installation), then there's an answer to that: Use SUSE Studio to create your own installation media that has what you want in it. I would far rather see the project's focus not be diverted by what is essentially a religious debate about which desktop is better, because neither is better in an absolute manner, because users have different needs. "Better" for me is not "better" for other users. Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sat, 01 Aug 2009 20:52:56 -0500, M Harris wrote:

No. its basically more human than any of that. Some people are simply afraid of those who are different... not like them. Most of this preference stuff is just that simple---difference fear.

Ironic to find this in the OSS community, where one of the hallmarks is choice. Perhaps not unexpected, but certainly ironic.

Diviersity is a good thing. Choice is a good thing. Diversity and choice strengthen the suse product. Customers like choice, and suse users are fundamentally drawn to customer choice and customer freedom.

I agree. Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 09:10 +0200, Lubos Lunak wrote:

Your mail is quite easy to answer by turning all your arguments around, just see:

On Sunday 02 of August 2009, Jim Henderson wrote:

the majority of users do select that option anyway? It's ok to ask the KDE majority to get thicker skin, but it's not ok to ask the same of the GNOME

...

or the lack of a pre-selection being made for KDE. Are they afraid that users might decide to use something other than KDE and that will somehow cause resource allocation to the KDE project (which is not controlled by Novell *or* openSUSE) to be diminished?

Sending repeated messages "you are welcome, but not really as much as others" in the KDE direction is something that has negative impact on KDE contributors. And this is controlled by openSUSE or Novell.

But this proposal intends to say, that someone is more welcomed than others, instead of all are welcomed equally. Thats bad and ugly. - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkp1WOcACgkQtTMYHG2NR9WcbwCgk9VA02TIfpGbwGBAgedzPTv8 uVsAn2W3+pt+GB6WeCXy9TPHOgOOZS3V =av42 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 11:18 +0200, jdd (kim2) wrote:

Carlos E. R. a écrit :

...

But this proposal intends to say, that someone is more welcomed than others, instead of all are welcomed equally. Thats bad and ugly.

this thread is so long I don't know exacltly at what question you try to answer :-)

That's easy to know, just use a threaded mail program ;-)

However, supposing it's to the main thread subject, I think openSUSE should have a default GUI, whathever you want (I don't bother it being Gnome or Kde), of course retaining all the present options.

we should be able to know what somebody say when he say "I installed all by default" on phone call or mail

No, I don't think so. One of the main points of Linux is having choices, and the sooner the new user realizes that, the better. And anyway, even if someone says that he installed all by default, he will soon enough depart from that. Will then gnome users, which would not be the default install, be pushed back from support as second citizens, because they didn't install the default? Same as if you open a box voiding the warranty? - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkp1W/QACgkQtTMYHG2NR9U9vACfbZu5WPQ0WjYUQFliFZgf8Bs9 GUkAoIJmyT4y2UHN5e1QuLl5/YAMNOEd =M0uf -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

On Sunday 02 Aug 2009, Carlos E. R. wrote:

On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 11:18 +0200, jdd (kim2) wrote:

...

Carlos E. R. a écrit : However, supposing it's to the main thread subject, I think openSUSE should have a default GUI, whathever you want (I don't bother it being Gnome or Kde), of course retaining all the present options.

we should be able to know what somebody say when he say "I installed all by default" on phone call or mail

No, I don't think so. One of the main points of Linux is having choices, and the sooner the new user realizes that, the better.

The key to sensible choices is relevant information. We (the Linux community) don't provide the kind of information people need to choose between the various desktop offerings. Presenting a choice in these circumstances is the same as making a random selection for them. The statements about "this (or that) desktop is better" are incomplete and misleading. They are better for particular purposes. KDE is "better" because it is more similar to Windows is a sensible statement which can be both verified and understood. xfce is "better" because it is lightweight and runs faster on machines with fewer resources (i.e. older machines) is also a useful (and verifiable) statement. I don't know much about Gnome so can't make similar statements about it. Lets get away from personal preferences and start saying things which help others, especially naive users. David -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 02 of August 2009, Carlos E. R. wrote:

On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 09:10 +0200, Lubos Lunak wrote:

...

Sending repeated messages "you are welcome, but not really as much as others" in the KDE direction is something that has negative impact on KDE contributors. And this is controlled by openSUSE or Novell.

But this proposal intends to say, that someone is more welcomed than others, instead of all are welcomed equally. Thats bad and ugly.

I can again just turn it around to show you that you are wrong. Since in that case we would already say that the following are not welcome in openSUSE: Xfce users, Emacs users, Thunderbird users, SELinux users, Compiz users, Epiphany users, Konqueror users, Mutt users and I could go on and on like this until it would be absolutely ridiculous. Besides, right now someone is more welcomed than others. Can you guess who it is that currently has a special treatment in openSUSE that no other community has? How are we to tell new potentional contributors that everybody is welcomed equally in openSUSE when it is clearly not the case? That's bad and ugly. -- Lubos Lunak KDE developer -------------------------------------------------------------- SUSE LINUX, s.r.o. e-mail: l.lunak@suse.cz , l.lunak@kde.org Lihovarska 1060/12 tel: +420 284 028 972 190 00 Prague 9 fax: +420 284 028 951 Czech Republic http://www.suse.cz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 02 of August 2009, Carlos E. R. wrote:

On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 11:38 +0200, Lubos Lunak wrote:

...

On Sunday 02 of August 2009, Carlos E. R. wrote:

...

But this proposal intends to say, that someone is more welcomed than others, instead of all are welcomed equally. Thats bad and ugly.

I can again just turn it around to show you that you are wrong. Since in that case we would already say that the following are not welcome in openSUSE: Xfce users, Emacs users, Thunderbird users, SELinux users, Compiz users, Epiphany users, Konqueror users, Mutt users and I could go on and on like this until it would be absolutely ridiculous.

I use some of that list and I don't feel unwelcomed.

Very well. Then we can preselect the most used desktop, like we preselect the most used browser, editor, mailer, etc. ; and you can choose to use GNOME and not feel unwelcomed either. There does not seem to be any difference.

...

Besides, right now someone is more welcomed than others. Can you guess who it is that currently has a special treatment in openSUSE that no other community has? How are we to tell new potentional contributors that everybody is welcomed equally in openSUSE when it is clearly not the case? That's bad and ugly.

No, I don't see that. Or I didn't: now the message I get is that gnome is not welcomed, by majority vote.

By the same logic, you should get the message that all those things in the list above are not welcomed, by the majority vote. Yet you've just said that you do not. So again, do you have any other reason to propose that openSUSE treats GNOME specially (that is, unequally, which is what you claim to be against) or are you just pushing your personal agenda and you don't want to admit it? -- Lubos Lunak KDE developer -------------------------------------------------------------- SUSE LINUX, s.r.o. e-mail: l.lunak@suse.cz , l.lunak@kde.org Lihovarska 1060/12 tel: +420 284 028 972 190 00 Prague 9 fax: +420 284 028 951 Czech Republic http://www.suse.cz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 02 of August 2009, Carlos E. R. wrote:

On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 12:25 +0200, Lubos Lunak wrote:

...

By the same logic, you should get the message that all those things in the list above are not welcomed, by the majority vote. Yet you've just said that you do not. So again, do you have any other reason to propose that openSUSE treats GNOME specially (that is, unequally, which is what you claim to be against) or are you just pushing your personal agenda and you don't want to admit it?

What? What on earth are you talking about?

I have not seen an openfate voting to select thunderbird as the preferred mailer, for instance. What I'm seeing a vote (F 306967) against gnome, to push kde to the primary role, officially. You call that equal terms?

First, since KDE is used by majority of users, KDE already is in the primary role in openSUSE in practice, it is just that for political reasons this is not admitted. Second, it is your interpretation that I am doing anything against GNOME other than trying to make it treated equally with others, instead of it having special priviledges. And, third, equal terms means no special priviledges.

Oh, common!

You are trying to increase the number of users that "choose" kde by preselecting for them "kde".

Whereas you are trying to increase the number of users that "choose" GNOME by not preselecting anything and having "GNOME" first? This issue still goes both ways.

Instead of fair competition, you are creating prewriten votes with the vote you want.

I'm afraid I don't comprehend what this sentence is supposed to mean. But, again, you argue with "fair", yet you are fine with GNOME having special priviledges that others don't have. -- Lubos Lunak KDE developer -------------------------------------------------------------- SUSE LINUX, s.r.o. e-mail: l.lunak@suse.cz , l.lunak@kde.org Lihovarska 1060/12 tel: +420 284 028 972 190 00 Prague 9 fax: +420 284 028 951 Czech Republic http://www.suse.cz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Søndag den 2. august 2009 13:31:38 skrev Carlos E. R.:

On Sunday, 2009-08-02 at 13:13 +0200, Lubos Lunak wrote:

...

Whereas you are trying to increase the number of users that "choose" GNOME by not preselecting anything and having "GNOME" first? This issue still goes both ways.

And you want to put KDE first, instead of the standard practice of using alphabetical order.

Get real. You don't really believe that BS.

...

...

Instead of fair competition, you are creating prewriten votes with the vote you want.

I'm afraid I don't comprehend what this sentence is supposed to mean.

But, again, you argue with "fair", yet you are fine with GNOME having special priviledges that others don't have.

What special privileges? I don't see any.

How about being listed first in the desktop selection screen despite being used only by a small minority. Don't you know your history? You sound like the current situation was always so. The reality is that some invisible monster forced the current messy situation upon us, against the wishes of the vast majority of the community, when historically KDE was the default. And 3-4 years later, the only thing that has been achieved is chasing away a lot of KDE users - without attracting a great many GNOME users. If this horrible injustice was corrected it might also relieve some of the animosity openSUSE KDE users feel against GNOME users - apart from all the other benefits to the project of coming correct. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Søndag den 2. august 2009 14:26:35 skrev jdd (kim2):

Martin Schlander a écrit :

...

And 3-4 years later, the only thing that has been achieved is chasing away a lot of KDE users - without attracting a great many GNOME users.

do you really think so? what is the kde distro users could join going away from openSUSE?

Where do you think Kubuntu got all their users from? ;-) Canonical may not have invested much in KDE in the past - but at least Mark Shuttleworth has the intelligence to publicly express appreciation for the KDE community every chance he gets and appear wearing a KDE t-shirt at strategically convenient times and such. Whereas the "message" from Novell towards KDE users in recent years have been: "We'd like to replace our existing users and contributors with new ones, thank you, goodbye". Which is of course a very poor strategy - and not succesful either. Everybody should know that keeping existing "customers" is much easier than getting new ones.

Trueth is this default problem is minor, despite the lenght of the thread :-)

Nope, it's a major problem. It's a constant reminder to a majority of our community that they're not really appreciated - only just barely tolerated - and that important decisions are not made based on common sense or what's good for openSUSE, but on the whims and political agendas of some invisble managers somewhere. Which of course creates some animosity against the minority that abuses it's position to force it's will on openSUSE against the best interest of the project. It's a "usability" problem because new users are forced to make a decision during install (or download of livecds) they're likely not equipped to make. And if they make the wrong decision they'll have a harder time getting help online later, finding documentation, suffer inferior Packman support etc. It's a marketing problem because openSUSE lacks an identity and more often than not, the press is confused and reviews a minority desktop instead of reviewing what ~70% of openSUSE users use. It also makes It's a support problem, because when trying to help a new user you have no way to estimate the outcome of the desktop lottery. The current situation is simply a mess. But it might be the best we may have... -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sun, 02 Aug 2009 15:28:59 +0200, Martin Schlander wrote:

Whereas the "message" from Novell towards KDE users in recent years have been: "We'd like to replace our existing users and contributors with new ones, thank you, goodbye".

Well, I for one don't see it that way. I don't develop for GNOME or KDE nor do I use KDE extensively (there are two KDE apps I do use so I have libraries for both installed), but I don't see Novell's actions in any way saying "we don't want KDE developers to be involved". Those who interpret Novell's actions as such would seem to be saying that *any* GNOME development in openSUSE is a signal that Novell doesn't want KDE developers involved, and clearly that's a ridiculous assertion.

...

Trueth is this default problem is minor, despite the lenght of the thread

Nope, it's a major problem.

It's a constant reminder to a majority of our community that they're not really appreciated - only just barely tolerated - and that important decisions are not made based on common sense or what's good for openSUSE, but on the whims and political agendas of some invisble managers somewhere. Which of course creates some animosity against the minority that abuses it's position to force it's will on openSUSE against the best interest of the project.

Are you seriously suggesting that the addition of *choices* to the installation menu (and the lack of preferring any one over the other) is such a dire situation that it rises to the level of "yeah, you're there, and we don't want you developing KDE stuff, but we'll put up with it"? If that's truly the case, then nothing short of the total removal of GNOME, XFCE, and the other possible installation options is truly going to make those people happy. Otherwise, the inclusion of other choices is just a reminder that they're not the only kids in the sandbox. Jim -- Jim Henderson Please keep on-topic replies on the list so everyone benefits -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Søndag den 9. august 2009 19:53:31 skrev Gerald Pfeifer:

On Sun, 2 Aug 2009, Martin Schlander wrote:

...

Which of course creates some animosity against the minority that abuses it's position to force it's will on openSUSE against the best interest of the project.

There is no such minority, neither behind closed doors nor out in the open. Adrian, AJ, Coolo, Henne, Michl, myself, Zonker (in alphabetical order) and many more all strive to make the openSUSE project as successful as possible.

I was probably a bit unclear on this point. I meant anti-GNOME sentiments might be fed by the strange and unhelpful GNOME favouritism. And noone in openSUSE management is under suspicion by me, for being responsible for this mess. If openSUSE management had decided it wouldn't be abuse, just poor decision making ;-) -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Am Sonntag, den 09.08.2009, 15:57 -0500 schrieb Bryen M Yunashko:

On Sun, 2009-08-09 at 22:50 +0200, Martin Schlander wrote:

...

I meant anti-GNOME sentiments might be fed by the strange and unhelpful GNOME favouritism.

I'm asking this question as objectively and impartially as I can, because personally, I perceive a fairly equal amount of attention between KDE and GNOME. What do you feel lends to an unhelpful favouritism?