Novell will (continue to) support KDE after all

[Christopher Browne]

On 11/15/05, ted leslie <tleslie-RBVUpeUoHUc at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> I love it if they tried to bring the two together.

I hate to say this, but that's the classic clueless response.

They are implemented in different languages, with very different
designs, and even attempting to "fold them together" is certain to be
fruitless.

At the very simplest level:
 - The KDE folk are fans of C++; they *like* the features it provides them;
 - Miguel de Icarza's distaste for C++ is pretty much the "stuff of legend"

They have *extremely different* design positions.

I have generally preferred the design choices taken by the GNOME
people, although the implementations have far too oft disappointed me
thoroughly.

> I have used KDE 99% of my linux life, only checking out GNOME for
> Mono (as its got native support).
> KDE has power, Gnome is the best bet to win over joe-user-public on
> using linux for the first time,
> but surely they could look at merging the two and making one able to pull from both
> in what they need for a custom desktop?

No, a useless idea, because the code isn't compatible.  It isn't
written in the same language.  The developers don't think the same
way.

> and they are both supposed to be supporting opendesktop standards anyways ..
> i guess the down size it it makes for quite a large install to wrap the two together,
> but thats becoming almost a mute point with all the HD/RAM space for cheap these days.

I'd consider it a mostly moot point.  Yes, indeed, disk space is
pretty cheap.  "Enough" memory is always more than you have, mind
you...

The useful thing that we *do* see is that GNOME and KDE try some new
techniques and develop new facilities, some of which are useful. 
Those that are useless get dropped, over time, and those that aren't
get reimplemented by the other system.  By having two projects, they
can try riskier things as "losing" isn't so much an utter disaster.
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