Re(1): A video tour of openSUSE 11 (with KDE 4 desktop)
Posted by: Anonymous
[ip: 192.168.40.186]
on August 26, 2008 11:44 PM
Ahh, thanks. I'll try changing to the "classic" menu. It was the inability to find the KDE Control Panel which was frustrating (or more that I had high hopes in installing this for a family members PC and simply could not imagine them navigating through this menu easily without getting utterly and completely lost).
Luckily SuSE comes with XFCE4, which in my opinion has come out on top as a desktop environment. The first basic rule, is the ease of use comes with consistency, and the more the environment stays the same, the easier it becomes over time. Redesigns, even smallish ones which change the functions of the program, should be as forked, seperate projects rather than just as a new version. As a desktop environment provides a means for starting software and managing the windows these programs display in, a change in it's operation (such as changing the way that programs are launched throught the "start" menu) effectively makes it a difference piece of software. MS does this because they know their users have no choice, Linux should be different, be able to provide consistency and predictability so "KDE" or "GNOME" mean something very specific and portable. Software developers constantly shoot themselves in the foot by changing the usage parameters to try and by more user friendly, when all that most users (non techies, non developers) want is familiarity and consistency.
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Re(1): A video tour of openSUSE 11 (with KDE 4 desktop)
Posted by: Anonymous [ip: 192.168.40.186] on August 26, 2008 11:44 PMLuckily SuSE comes with XFCE4, which in my opinion has come out on top as a desktop environment. The first basic rule, is the ease of use comes with consistency, and the more the environment stays the same, the easier it becomes over time. Redesigns, even smallish ones which change the functions of the program, should be as forked, seperate projects rather than just as a new version. As a desktop environment provides a means for starting software and managing the windows these programs display in, a change in it's operation (such as changing the way that programs are launched throught the "start" menu) effectively makes it a difference piece of software. MS does this because they know their users have no choice, Linux should be different, be able to provide consistency and predictability so "KDE" or "GNOME" mean something very specific and portable. Software developers constantly shoot themselves in the foot by changing the usage parameters to try and by more user friendly, when all that most users (non techies, non developers) want is familiarity and consistency.
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