I thought the setup work had already been done on XFCE, and would not need revisiting for some time (given the pace of XFCE development) - AFAIK once the setup is done once then copying the ‘done’ configuration should be a minimal effort (given the configuration file covers it all). So you can count me for a half a vote for XFCE to continue…
Half a vote, because I am prejudiced in XFCE’s favour, and I like having the starting point that EnOS has offered so far for easing the setup task for me (yes, I am becoming lazier as I age further!). Of course - the laziness extends to trying to understand how KDE actually works (when it does) with those complicated, multi-entry configs that need doing on more than one place…
Also, half a vote because I know I am outnumbered - and I am not the one doing whatever setup there is involved, and so my vote is completely ignorable too! If KDE is actually, rather than just conceptually easier for the one’s doing the work to get going, then do it - it isn’t like I can’t setup XFCE on my own by now! (yes, that means that my long-standing avoidance of KDE, originated by its similarity to WIndows ‘memes’, continues until alternatives cease to exist
yea what i mentioned here and there already… it was the case indeed for a long time that xfce4 was not breaking at any point… but lately after the last major update to 4.18 we start getting issues with it and also xfce4 is updated and fixed a lot of issues there are some stuff it is carry with it for a long time already non working defaults in every corner… a lot of stuff is simply not following modern standards anymore all the poweroptions and the default look and feel… there is a lot of configs we need to change and maintain.
And on the other hand… kde usies very common working defaults… we only need to disable some feautures we dop not want on the LiveSession thats all we need … what is compüared to xfce4 very little stuff toi maintain ++ The installer is QT based so we do not need to maintain extra configs and theming to have it look nicely on the livesession.
And once again… we do only talk about the LiveSession and in addition the offline install option, you still can install all the Desktops in exactly the same way as before with the default online installer.
Thanks for the clarification on the config issue - just because I didn’t notice it I guess I’ll have to be less lazy on the next install! I’m still pretty sure that I’ll stay on XFCE though - and perhaps I’ll have to learn how to work around things like screen size issues on KDE to be helpful to new users. (does KDE have the default equivalent to left-mouse drag for repositioning windows for instance?) I guess Welcome handles most other things though, if you can get to it
The thing that bugs me the most about KDE is the forced transparency on EVERYTHING which looks ugly. Sure, there are window rules, but those don’t seem to apply to the taskbar, and the taskbar options do nothing to solve it. Also, that might make the ISO lag on older computers.
if transparency is enough to lag the DE on a computer, it will have a very hard time running Arch anyway. Other distributions are much better suited for ancient hardware.
just change the default theme and you are good. Transparency is actually depending on the theme you use.
we go through a long complex testing phase before we change ISO and release with this changes…
There is a group of testers plus the developers with different hardware we use for testing.
That will make sure ISO will run fine. And indeed if it is not working we will not release it.
But in addition, some legacy hardware does not fulfill the specs to run a full featured Desktop anymore, this will not be only transparency causing issues on such hardware you will not be able to use any modern Browser p.e. Also that`s really about real old hardware. And is it smart running archbased rolling distro in that worse case scenario anyway? slow unstable limited internet connection, old legacy hardware… better go with something stale, most of the latest features will not do anything for these devices.
My Thinkpad T60 runs fine with 3GB of RAM upgraded harddrive to SSD and CPU to most modern one it can hold. It has no issue with running KDE livesession…
Just a small note from another thread, - kgamma5 seems to be missing from the packagebase for the latest installation, meaning there’s no way to adjust gamma within xorg for Plasma installs. Otherwise, great work as always!
We ship a fairly minimal base of packages with our DEs and let individuals install the components, addons and applications they need for their own installs.
I hear you From experience, it’s not knowing what’s actually a bug, and what’s a missing component that leads to confusion. Hopefully Wayland should mitigate some of these edge-cases.
No, it’s still needed for non OLED devices too. I use an Asus VG248 via DisplayPort which is absolutely washed out without proper gamma control settings. Gamma config is absolutely still an essential.
R2 means rebuild two it is a simple rebuild of the same ISO and installer against new packages.
New ISOs, also new real releases, are never upgrading older installs.
From experience, it’s not knowing what’s actually a bug, and what’s a missing component that leads to confusion. Hopefully Wayland should mitigate some of these edge-cases.