Happy Christmas

[Comet Friend]

Ralf Mardorf schrieb:
> On Fri, 2013-12-27 at 10:26 +0100, Genghis Khan wrote:
>> I have migrated to Xfce in 2008, before GMONE3 was released; unlike
>> GNOME2, Xfce is a modular desktop environment project which makes it
>> far better than GNOME2 by not forcing users to use tools they do not
>> need, and most of Xfce tools are also lightweight which is good too.
> I agree, OTOH if you compiled and build packages yourself, or simply
> build empty dummy packages, this was easy to solve for GNOME 2 too.
>
>> Concerning to GNOME2 which is today known as MATE, it is planned to
>> make various parts of MATE modular, something that may bring about a
>> collaboration between, and, maybe, even merging of, MATE and Xfce.
> This or something similar is what I seriously fear.
>
> Mate is a PITA and absolutely not a successor of GNOME 2. I installed
> Cinnamon and Mate parallel to Xfce for my Arch Linux install and I'm
> using Xfce only. For my needs Cinnamon and Mate are completely unusable.

You mention an important aspect of Xfce: A friendly community. I am 
using KDE and Xfce in parallel, and I do so, because I like it. But I 
wouldn't use it anymore, if the community wasn't as friendly and helpful 
as it is.
I see a lot of potential for Razor-Qt, but I have big doubts, that LXDE 
will survive the switch to Qt, as this is a major shift not only 
regarding technology, but also for the community. I guess, LXDE-Qt will 
be so much different from LXDE-Gtk, that the existing user base may 
quickly erode. Some of the LXDE users nowadays use it just, because they 
use everything that look goods in a Phoronix benchmark. They use it, 
because they think it's the lightest desktop, while Xfce is ranked 
second (like E17). If Xfce would have claimed the top spot, these users 
would blame LXDE to be totally inefficient etc...
What I found here at Xfce is a much less aggressive, very helpful 
community, that offers smart advice with a lot of patience to novice and 
expert users alike. And IMHO, this counts even more than technology. 
Some of the other projects will yet have to build such a community, and 
a disruptive shift like the one that LXDE is taking may well mean, that 
they have to start from scratch in building a community. I am not 
saying, that their arguments for going Qt are nonsense, just that they 
will probably face some drop in popularity.
And, BTW, why should one use LXDE, when there's already Razor-Qt?
In general I am not happy about the growing fragmentation of the Linux 
desktop world. In its current extent it's a waste of valuable 
(development) resources. From my point of view as an end-user it would 
be much better to join forces and write new, innovative applications 
regardless of the preferred widget set of the developer. There are great 
applications based on Gtk+, such as Darktable, as well as fantastic 
stuff for KDE, such as Kaffeine. And there are great Qt-only, Fox, 
Tcl/Tk, etc. applications. More than yet another desktop solving the 
same problems slightly differently we need more applications.
And, of course, the established desktops and window managers need to be 
maintained and improved, yes. And here stability of a community counts.

My prediction is that Xfce will survive for a very long time, just like 
KDE and Enlightenment. Like some of the long-grown window manager 
projects, such as TWM, FVWM, Fluxbox and some others, these have the 
potential to survive even a withdrawal of their original founders, if 
that should happen some distant time in the future. For the others I am 
not so sure...

So thanks for the great support I received here, and a Happy New Year 
once more to everyone!

Alex
>
> Btw. when I asked Mate folks why GVFS "is" (perhaps nowadays "was") a
> hard dependency, I was called names.
>
> To not pollute my Arch Linux with additional WMs/DEs I now test some
> others on Debian/*buntu installs.
>
> Thank you for the KDE links, but issues I experience with KDE aren't Qt
> related, but I e.g. need to know what's the Green drive killer for KDE,
> however this is OT for this list. For Xfce I simply didn't install
> GVFS ;), so nothing will damage my Green drive.
>
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