Bruce Byfield: KDE5 Plasma is the best desktop
Everyone knows opinions are like noses: everyone has one. But Bruce Byfield has been at it longer than most, and his opinion often reflects the industry. And he loves KDE5.
[Ed. note: Actually, opinions are like something else. But Pipedot is a family-friendly site.]
At a time when the Linux desktop offers six main alternatives (Cinnamon, GNOME, KDE Plasma, LXDE, Mate, Unity and Xfce), KDE Plasma consistently tops reader polls with an average of 35-40 percent. In such a diverse market, these figures indicate a broad appeal that other Linux desktop alternatives can't match.Read the rest of his thoughtful and insightful review here.
I believe that one of the main reasons for this appeal is the KDE design philosophy. GNOME and Unity may offer a more aesthetic-looking default, but only at the cost of simplifying both the desktop and the utilities in the name of reducing clutter.
By contrast, KDE goes to the opposite extreme. KDE applications typically include every function you can imagine. Sometimes, they can take a version or two to organize the menus in a meaningful way, but applications like Amarok, K3B, or digiKam go far beyond the most common use cases. When you run into problems with them, they usually offer solutions.
[Ed. note: Actually, opinions are like something else. But Pipedot is a family-friendly site.]
Fo' real though, I actually kind of dislike how cluttered most KDE apps are. I don't consider it a good thing to include everything and the kitchen sink into a program. I'd rather be given options for realistic use cases. So that's why I tend to prefer the Gnome stuff (that and the fact that they pull less libraries; have they fixed that?). If a piece of software doesn't do enough for me, I'll look XFCE's way or try to find a GTK non-gnome app that has what I need. So for example, they made nautilius pretty useless, so I'm running thunar. But when it comes to music players, I really just want a play button and a slider.... So the gnome player is fine by me.
I'd prefer if KDE programes were more extendable, rather than being cluttered by default.