You have already rcvd some good replies . . . my two cents: As has long been generally true - and making allowances for subjectivity - Gnome is a simpler environment; that is by design. KDE is more powerful and flexible but at a cost of more complexity; again, by design. KDE3 is more mature than KDE4, with KDE4 not fully reaching parity (again, this is subjective) until 4.5. It will be interesting to see how Gnome 3 navigates between its traditional focus and its embrace of more advanced technologies. From a UI perspective, KDE 3 is probably closest to XP while KDE 4 is closer to W7. But keep in mind that KDE, both versions 3 and 4, can with a bit of effort be given a look-and-feel pretty much however you want it to (the "desktop folder" and "desktop activities" aka multiple-desktops, are optional and non-issues). For that matter, so can several of the other DE's; see LXDE now supported by openSUSE which (last I looked) has very much an XP flavor. Having said that, IMO what is most important is your brother-in-law's "use case", i.e., how does he interact with the system and in particular, what applications does he use. My wife, who is very non-technical, has moved without problem from Mac to XP to Gnome to KDE3 to KDE4. That's because 99% of the time her use is limited to an email client, a browser, an audio player, a video player, and a word processor. She does occasionally need to use a Windows-only app, which is nicely handled by running XP in a VirtualBox virtual machine in seamless mode. She wouldn't even begin to think about getting into OS utilities or configuration, etc. If your B-i-L is like this "average" user, then which apps and their compatibility and their stability, will be by far most important. On the other hand, if he is an intermediate level hands-on user who manages the OS, installs and configures hardware, etc., then it might be best to just install both DE's and let him have a look. IMO, a huge advantage in openSUSE that goes a long way towards mitigating the differences between Gnome and KDE, is YaST. Over in Ubuntu land, there is still a heckuva lot of sysadmin done at the command line. KDE comes with more configuration utilities, but still far from covering everything. YaST largely fills these gaps regardless of DE. Given that, anyone with a modicum of technical acumen should be able to handle either Gnome or KDE, and so it then comes down to just personal preference - which is what you see reflected on this mailing list, since most here are at least intermediate if not advanced users. Again, just my two cents.
Since a came from a Windows environment, I picked KDE 3 for coming closest.
What comes closest now (XP or win7) - KDE 4 or Gnome ?
I want to, also, upgrade my brother-in-law who used to be on XP - he's now on KDE 3
Thanks, Duaine
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