What is Digg?107 Comments
- jacquesm, on 01/03/2008, -1/+45if you have to make excuses up front, don't release.
we're not in a race here. - sloppychris, on 01/03/2008, -1/+41I would have personally preferred a "Hey guys, we're sorry. We promised this would be ready a few times, and it turns out we're still not quite ready to release. We know everyone is real excited, and we have already seen delays, but we believe the fairest way is to release this product the way it deserves to be released. So for now, we're going to make available everything we've done as a 'preview edition'."
Or something like that. - Darkhacker, on 01/03/2008, -12/+39I don't care what excuses they come up with. They're releasing alpha quality software as a final product. I know they're excited and want to release, but this is just insane. It's deceiving to the users. It's not ready, plain and simple. I know Aaron Seigo is using this "the libraries are RC quality" line, and that's fine and dandy except for the fact that KDE is an entire desktop environment and not just a series of libraries. Great, the libraries are done, now finish the applications. I honestly wouldn't touch KDE until 4.2 because even 4.1 is being rushed. I certainly wouldn't recommend it to people like my parents and I'd encourage everyone to stick to 3.5 until it really is ready. If I were the Kubuntu people (at Canonical not the volunteer developers because they didn't really have a say), I would have shipped 8.04 as an LTS with KDE 3.5 and wait until the next release (8.10) to ship with KDE 4.
- skyshock1, on 01/03/2008, -2/+29eco2geek had the best comment so far on that blog:
"Pardon me for butting in here. My name's Andrew. I'm not a developer, much less a KDE developer, just a KDE end user (who likes it a whole lot more than GNOME or other WMs) and someone who occasionally writes Linux reviews for fun.
When version 1.0, 2.0, 3.0....x.0 of a piece of software's released, it usually means (to me, at least) that its developers consider it production-quality. Not necessarily bug-free - what is? - but production-quality.
So here you are basically telling us that KDE 4.0, which will be released in 8 days, won't be production-quality, and shouldn't be reviewed as if it were meant to be.
So, the unanswered question is, Why are you releasing it now instead of waiting until it's ready for general consumption? (And its corollary, Why shouldn't we review what you release as KDE 4.0 as if it were meant for general consumption?)" - schestowitz, on 01/03/2008, -12/+33At least they are being honest and upfront about it (as opposed to spending $500 million advertising with deceptive statements). I have 4.0 at home where nothing critical is being done. KDE 4.0 is great for anyone who doesn't mind a little hiccup every now and then. It's cutting-edge.
- Darkhacker, on 01/03/2008, -2/+18I did. They're all excuses. "We're not done, but releasing it anyway, so don't criticize us" is one of those things that makes me go WTF? It's true that software as complex as a DE is never really *finished* but the release they are making is of very poor quality.
Apparently it is you who didn't read the article. The main point they were making was distinguishing between KDE 4 (the series) and KDE 4.0 (initial release). They just want to make it clear that future versions will be improved upon. Super, I'm glad. That doesn't mean that KDE 4.0 doesn't suck for an initial release. - nailer, on 01/03/2008, -14/+29Normal people don't distinguish between '4.0' and '4'. Sounds like KDE has a usability problem before its even installed.
- Giga, on 01/03/2008, -1/+15An official launch counts as a final product in my books.
- keyo, on 01/03/2008, -1/+14I agree somewhat, they could just name the releases properly.
- Rhino2, on 01/03/2008, -1/+13No *****.
They should release it as "KDE 4.0 BETA" - SEJeff, on 01/03/2008, -1/+13I mean seriously, you hype KDE4 for > than a year and THEN make excuses. If it isn't ready, don't release it and no one will fault you.
It would be better to have a 6-8 month late AWESOME release than an early ***** release. KDE 4.0.0 is what people are going to call KDE4. If KDE 4.0.0 sucks then so does KDE4. Period. - TomKarpik, on 01/03/2008, -5/+16This KDE4 release thing is turning into a debacle chock-full of excuses and weak justifications from the devs, and a whole community of confused users.
What the hell is going on, and who's behind the scenes pushing for a release before completion? - sark666, on 01/03/2008, -1/+12KDE devs, you could have avoided all this by called it 3.9 ALPHA or something of the sort until it deserved the name KDE 4.0.
- TehDoctor, on 01/03/2008, -0/+10I really prefer KDE, but the devs definitely jumped the gun. A release candidate should be just that: something you could count on as a release, meaning you couldn't find more bugs or add much more functionality. KDE4's betas were more like alphas (not feature complete), and the RCs more like betas (mostly done, still buggy). 4.0 will be what you really can call an RC, and hopefully if you give them a few more months, 4.1 will be gold. I understand they want to meet the deadlines they set, but when they realized they couldn't make the December deadline, they should have had no shame and pushed it back until April or thereabouts to give themselves plenty of room. You can always release early.
- SirNoobius, on 01/03/2008, -9/+19they're pulling a microsoft on us (well not us, I don't use KDE) but the whole 'it wont be usable until SP1' thing.
- Rhino2, on 01/03/2008, -0/+8I agree... hype it another 3 months then release when it's ready.
- nailer, on 01/03/2008, -4/+11Linux 2.6.0 had all the features that were announced for Linux 2.6. There was no 'here 2.6.0, but you'll have to wait for 2.6' as KDE is weirdly trying to say.
- Mejogid, on 01/03/2008, -0/+6Are we talking about the same OS X that allowed iPhone's to be jailbroken or bricked by visiting a web page?
- oobuntu, on 01/03/2008, -0/+6These reminders have been pretty much the case all along, except some schoolkids on digg got a bit excited that 4.0 might be the full product. People that are being self-righteous about this really haven't an idea about what 4.0. maybe they should compare kde3.0 vs 3.5.8. it's a starting point guys. for a while we will still have 3.5.x > 4.x
The only problem with 4.0 is that they are having a massive launch party at googleplex. Maybe 4.0 should have been a quiet release until the DE is fully featured and stable enough to appear on the desktops of the masses. - audi100quattro, on 01/03/2008, -1/+7The reason Kubuntu 8.04 won't be an LTS is because KDE/Qt 3.x won't be supported for 3 years. If KDE 4.1 is going to be out later this year, 4.2 could well be out by 9.04. Most distro's already have binary packages in repositories.
Off course, a big point made in favor of open source is that "it can be supported for as long as needed." Too bad, welcome to reality, old code is old code, and as long as the transition is smooth (which it has been so far with kgpg > kgpg4 for me) I could care less. - xdvx, on 01/03/2008, -8/+14This is simple to understand KDE 4.0 != KDE4
- estvir, on 01/03/2008, -1/+7The pro-Linux fanboys and Steve Jobs cult members are going to have an epic battle here.
- erzz, on 01/03/2008, -2/+8Also as an outsider this seems beyond ridiculous. Imagine the uproar if this came out of the mouth of a microsoft rep regarding a new Windows release?
I use KDE all day every day, I have tried most recent releases of KDE 4.whatever and found them to be months and months away from even being in a state where I would start to test them in preperation for any kind of production environment.
Sorry KDE, this is just farcial to the sane world, and the whole project really needs some leadership with some balls. - Giga, on 01/03/2008, -1/+7"They need something intuitive, yet powerful. Something that starts out simple, then you can easily make your own and make it fit you, then be able to easily duplicate it across your computers (ie laptop, desktops, etc)."
None of the alternatives successfully accomplish that either, why pick on KDE? - Giga, on 01/03/2008, -1/+7Why is "get a Mac" the only option? I would have thought that Linux enthusiasts would at least consider gnome and XFCE before taking measures as drastic as replacing perfectly functional and expensive hardware to solve a delayed software release problem.
- iofthestorm, on 01/03/2008, -1/+7Sadly, you're about right. KDE4 still looks awesome though.
- slythfox, on 01/03/2008, -2/+8Honestly I haven't tried KDE for a long time, but GNOME is letting me down... Maybe it's just me, but I keep finding bugs and issues with not being able to customize it like I should be able to. It's really nice to be informed of current and future progress with the KDE GUI, because there hasn't been much going on at the GNOME side of the stick.
Both GUIs are too bloated. I additionally like the comment about speed optimizations, regardless of what project it is. I hope the GNOME development team figures this out, too. - Darkhacker, on 01/03/2008, -5/+104.0 refers to the initial release and 4 refers to the series. Much like Linux 2.6 refers to the series while 2.6.0 refers to the initial release.
- MeneerR, on 01/03/2008, -0/+5Dude. The gnome is not configurable thing is just parroting.
Maybe this guy never even used gnome. Maybe he is on OSX. Who knows?
"Guns don't kill people, people kill people."
"Gnome is not configurable"
"KDE and GNOME are bloated, XFCE is much faster"
None of these remarks are
a) truly experienced like that by anyone
b) proven by any simple metric
I think i actually saw a real performance measurement once.
Turns out, on old PC's its the smartest to run KDE.
Because on old PC"s the bottleneck is the _MEMORY_.
XFCE doesn't help, because as soon as you launch a gnome or kde app, all the gnome or kde libraries get loaded. It just doubles the memory use.
Here are the real truths:
- Gnome is configurable. Try running gconf-editor.
- KDE 3 series is the fastest desktop environment out there
- Compiz is so much faster/lightweight compared to Aero because Aero turns BLUR on by default, which is very expensive
- Linux supports more hardware than any other OS out of the box
- There are more websites that don't look OK on internet explorer than on Firefox.
- Google is not evil
- Google is not a saint
- Ron Paul is trust worthy, but likely has a low iq
- Half of the so called 'fair articles' about PCLinuxOS are written by 14 year old fanboys
- Ubuntu bashers are insecure
- Ubuntu fanboys cry at night because they weren't around in the 60-ties when all the free love was going around
- Mac fanboys have no identity
- Windows 'experts' are afraid of linux because the freedom is too much for them: you will never understand all the choices and tweaks you can perform. You will never feel in control.
- My mom likes her damn-small-linux kiosk laptop that only shows a fullscreen browser
- Chocolat is made by slaves
- Most people in IT are crooks - cornflakepirate, on 01/03/2008, -1/+6They could have been a bit more honest - "oops, we tried to change way too much at once, and we couldn't finish it all, so we'll just release what we have cos it's better than nothing". :/
- Narishma, on 01/03/2008, -0/+5Well that's how open source works. Have you been around when KDE 2.0 or Gnome 2.0 were released ? Same thing. The initial releases are always buggy. But if you don't release until it's stable you get E17 (ie: not releasing for more than 5 years).
- Sawta, on 01/03/2008, -0/+5Personally, it bothers me that they would go with a 4.0 rather than something like 3.9.01.1.a or whatever if need be. I'm no expert in the field of Open Source releases, but from what I've been reading, both on the internet as well as in books such as "Just for fun." I got the impression that pivotal number changes were reserved for when a team of programers felt very sure of their application (or os)..followed by the flood of bug reports. Really though, the thing that bothers me is that they just don't seem to have that slightly naive sense of pride that likes to tell them "Maybe this time..you got all the problems. :)" They just give off this image that they are just unhappy with where they are with their software at the moment and feel rushed into releasing it.
All of that said, I've heard many great things about KDE and have seen some marvelous screens of their stuff and (when I feel adventurous enough) I'll consider trying it..perhaps a few months more, when things start to settle down.
I guess there's nothing wrong with a little modesty..wouldn't kill them to have a smidge more pride showing though. :/ - underdog138, on 01/03/2008, -2/+6He's right, kiddos. If you take a gander at the KDE website in the KDE4 RC2 download section, you'll notice that the tarballs are version 3.97.
KDE4 is the name of the new series; the version is still 3.97. Upon official release it will be called 4.0. Gnome has a similar system with their odd-numbered "alpha/beta" releases before the even-numbered official releases. - Mejogid, on 01/03/2008, -0/+4Or Ubuntu 6.06 (which turned out great) or Debian Etch (another solid, fantastic release) or OS X Leopard (a fewsmall teething bugs but nonetheless a very solid release for its extra months in development). Name another example where extra development time didn't help and I'll name three where it did.
- jpfed, on 01/03/2008, -0/+41. KDE 4.0 shouldn't be released until it's ready for end users
2. Because of radical under-the-hood changes, developers need lead time to port their applications to the new APIs in KDE 4.0
3. In the open source world, there is no hard-and-fast distinction between end users and developers.
So... how are those contradictory constraints supposed to be satisfied? The developers of KDE have chosen one possible way of dealing with the situation. The easiest way to react to their choice is just not use KDE 4.0 if you don't intend to do any development work related to it. No one is forcing you to use it right now, and I see no reason for any panties to become wadded over this. - Darkhacker, on 01/03/2008, -1/+5Where do I get final product from? Well, let's see. There's alpha, beta, RC, and what comes after that? Listen, I understand that 4.0 is just one release of many and that future releases will be better. I'm sure that by the time 4.2 rolls around I'll be cumming in my pants at how great it is, but until then it sucks. That's not meant to be rude to the developers and people who worked so hard on it, it really does just suck for end users and it sucks because they aren't finished, yet they are releasing it anyway as 4.0.
Please don't tell me to RTFA when you haven't. Read to me the first bullet and then the last sentence of the article. KDE 4 will be amazing, but KDE 4.0 sucks and they are just making excuses for releasing an unfinished product. - johnnyzero, on 01/03/2008, -3/+7Perhaps they could call this KDE Forever.... or KDE 4Ever... I wonder if Epic would sue for vaporware infringement?
- cornflakepirate, on 01/03/2008, -2/+6You're generalising from 1 example. Every other major free software project supports their releases properly.
The only difference between support KDE4.0 and Vista is that the KDE devs have the honesty to admit that there are still some major problems. - SlimFastForYou, on 01/03/2008, -1/+5Or it reminds the people that they are getting a free ride and the person making the software is giving something for nothing and having to listen to people bitching about it in the meanwhile. Some developers get really pissy over this which does look bad to the users. However, there are some users which get really pissy and make the developers not like their pro-bono job as much. Honestly, if it's for free software, users should either be a little more patient or donate a little to the developers e.g. "Hey this is really good software but X doesn't work right I'll give you $Y if you fix this feature soon". I think it's fair for the KDE team to say sorry we're behind schedule but this is free so please don't whine and if you want contribute some code please do.
- AnthonyA7, on 01/03/2008, -1/+5Do you really have that little to do to where you go trolling on the linux/unix section of digg? Go elsewhere, please.
- sloppychris, on 01/03/2008, -3/+7Possibly with the addition of:
"You know what though, that's life in the big city. If you're that angry about it you can write the code yourself." - roachofdiscord, on 01/03/2008, -1/+5As stated on the kde developer blog..
Those reminders are nice and all, but chances are people are still going to judge kde 4.0 by it's first major release -- which is suppose to be ready for production. I really never understood (and still don't) why it's being released when it's simply not ready. If it takes another month..so be it. I see no reason to rush out an unfinished/un-polished release..especially when it's something so major. Impression really IS important. - falxx, on 01/03/2008, -1/+5"Release often and release early!" -Eric S. Raymond/Cathedral Bazaar
This is a good thing.
http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar ... - morphie, on 01/03/2008, -0/+4And that's exactly what quirky about it. It's not as if there are major commercial losses if the release-team decides to re-estimate the time needed to finish KDE 4.0 properly. Yes there are major problems, no it's not a big shame to not release and postpone the release by 6 months or so.
- reginaldino, on 01/03/2008, -0/+3why don't they just call it rc3? I they don't want it to be seen as KDE4 naming it 4.0 doesn't seem to be a good idea. At least to me it doesn't
- Mejogid, on 01/03/2008, -0/+3Can you give some examples where you were unable to customise things? In the vast majority of cases the defaults work fine, logical alternatives are easy to switch to and anything beyond that can be done with a configuration file or gconf value (admittedly not as accessible unless you're in to reading man pages, but google will get you most answers and it keeps the UI clean).
- oobuntu, on 01/03/2008, -0/+3@cwestpha
KDE has a good UI, which is improving too. maybe you have used the wrong distro ( i use kubuntu with nicer icons, fonts and the sky theme from emerald themer)
Or maybe you are just trolling. But giving you the benefit of the doubt, I see from your comment history that you are a "macolyte" (http://digg.com/apple/Leopard_build_9A321_all_the_ ... so maybe you just prefer having the details hidden from you. - morphie, on 01/03/2008, -0/+3Sure. There is nothing wrong with releasing. The problem is calling a less-than-beta product production-ready! READ.
- Mejogid, on 01/03/2008, -0/+3"There are no plans for a GNOME 3.0 release at this time. The GNOME community believes that regular, reliable, iterative improvements are more important to our users than ground-shaking major releases, and that we can more comfortably deliver major features -- when they're ready -- in our regular, six-monthly releases."
http://live.gnome.org/ThreePointZero - inactive, on 01/03/2008, -0/+3Yeah Windows migrants, eat it! /sarcasm
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