Been using XFCE for over a decade, I tried several other DE in the past but always came back to it because it’s simple, stable and stays out of the way. Long time ago all major DEs were buggy and laggy, today it’s not the case anymore, so I wanted to give KDE a shot once again, because deep down I’ve always been fascinated by it and Plasma 6 looks better than ever.
In the first minute of using it problems started, I got an error related to encryption keys (because XFCE uses Seahorse, but on KDE there’s KWallet). I tried to look for a solution but it seemed a little more complicated than expected, and my alloted time for the switch was over, so in the end I decided to switch back to my trusty and functional XFCE, because I need a functional PC more than a beautiful one. I really want to use KDE as my daily driver for a few months at least, so I can get used to it or fall out of love with it, but every time I try it always turns into a major waste of time.
I like Plasma a lot, but I just want the eye candy, widgets and themes, I don’t care at all for KDE specific apps, in fact I want to use Desktop agnostic apps (e.g. I will use Recoll instead of Baloo, Thunderbird instead of KMail, etc.), and over 90% of the apps I use are GTK, so in the past windows and buttons were often poorly rendered on KDE.
In conclusion, I really want to love KDE, but it seems that it doesn’t like me at all, so I’m afraid the relationship wouldn’t work. But I would like to hear opinions from people more expert with it, am I making it worse than it really is? Did you also had issues in the beginning? Were they ironed out quickly? Do you spend time fixing issues you wouldn’t have on another DE? Any perspective is greatly appreciated.
while the plasma incorporation of GTK apps is pretty smooth, it’s no perfect, so if that’s important to you then staying with XFCE would be the better choice.
also plasma 6 is relatively new, and there are still a lot of things being worked out so now would not be the best time to evaluate the bugginess of a DE as complex as plasma.
i was going to suggest LXQt as an alternative, but your heavy reliance on GTK apps sort of negates it’s strong points.
Many people have no clue whatsoever on to what extend gtk DE’s can be themed to begin with. If over 90% of what you use is gtk based, there is absolutely no point whatsoever in using kde. In your case I’d just do a bit more research on gtk theming. Besides numerous how-to’s on, for example, youtube, the documentation is plenty.
It doesn’t have to be xfce btw. The basics apply allover desktopland. Lxde, cinnamon, mate. It doesn’t even have to be a DE. WM desktops ( JWM, icewm, fluxbox, openbox…) or tilers…doesn’t matter as long as they’re gtk ( for most part of course).
On a sidenote: I’ve never met anyone who never experienced some degree of issues on any form of pc environment.
MY XFCE is not vanilla, I customized it to make it more pleasant and not even close to its full potential, I understand the degree of customizability of GTK and I also understand that with GTK3 and now 4 that is fading away, so Qt is actually a more appealing prospective for the future. I’m also aware of WMs and other DEs (I tried basically everything), but I like the fact that KDE has all the main features of every DE/WM available in one package (which some call bloat, but I don’t mind having all the possibilities at my fingertips), that’s why I’m specifically asking about KDE, not any other replacement.
LXQt is going great, but it feels not yet very mature, I like its simplicity and modularity, but XFCE is (or rather can be made) much more beautiful. LXQt has a bright future ahead, but it’s not quite there yet.
while the plasma incorporation of GTK apps is pretty smooth, it’s no perfect
btw, of course nothing is perfect, I was mainly thinking about people who switched to KDE after using something else for an extended period of time, instead of people who started with KDE and they are more comfortable with it because it’s what they’ve always used
Well, what can I say. I was sold ever since openbox was born, over two decades ago. Over the years I learned everything what’s to be known about it and ran highly customized ( scripts and bling, the works) for a very long time ( still do). I’m generation icewm, rox-filer and Joe’s so to speak. I’m also gen Compiz standalones.I’ve tested evry known DE but it was never really my thing. Too restricted for my taste. But I could appreciate some…um…special ones. The original Peppermint for example. Spoonfed chrome os ( mind you, that thing is getting brilliant nowadays) people thought of it as a Frankensteinish DE, hardcoded in this-de-is-the-best mindset. That thing was brilliant. Nowadays Peppermint is another 13 in a dozen xfce’s. But a couple of years ago I decided to give kde a swing. Mostly kubuntus for their overall good nature. I’m maxing out the stuff, both with custom scripts, menus…and ui. It would be extremely difficult to switch to another DE knowing what can be done with it today. However. I’m still on plasma 5. And I am far from in a hurry to switch to 6. Moreover, it’s a 5 on a debian. I mentioned it in previous posts, it’s my best kde experience thusfar and I couldn’t care less about the so-called latest and greatest. I need it to work flawlessly. It’s the very same reason why, despite the evolution of linux, I’ll never travel again with a linux laptop ( if the travel requires one). I’ve learned my lesson the very hard way and I was saved by some American saint on his way home who gave me his ipad. For me, stuff has to work, proven to work. I know a bunch of kde users who are very reluctant to use plasma 6 because their business depends on it. They either stick to 5 for the time being. Or they switch. Now, in regards to those many gtk apps you use. It shouldn’t be a prob. They’re rendered just fine. And there are qt counterparts so…
I went via Gnome2, Cinnamon, then Plasma. I couldn’t get along with XFCE and was lazy to work out how to use it properly.
For sure, Plasma is superb now - however, as Philm (Manjaro dev) says - he uses XFCE because it just works and is the most stable.
Now the experience of installing KDE apps (maybe Konsole or Kate) on XFCE or Gnome definitely wouldn’t sit right, but Plasma is quite happy running anything I throw at it… (this I remember was a huge issue with Cinnamon, one reason I decided to move on).
Certainly Konsole and Kate are superb…
I think Plasma is much better when it isn’t tweaked and abused too often or too heavily (the massive number of options and settings are great - if you don’t just sit playing with them… a bit like a toddler in a fighter jet).
Really, you need to suck it and see. I don’t spend much time fixing anything.
Not sure why you’d deny Baloo - I’d give it a go first.
Personally, I wouldn’t install both though - the last time I messed with multiple desktops I ended up feeling like a complete moron and stuck to separate installs since then.
Not saying you can’t, but you have to really know your Sh1T to get away with it… it’s a lot more than separating settings/folders.
Thank you for the advice. About the multiple DEs, do you mean they mess up you home folder? Do other DEs read/write files belonging to KDE and viceversa? Or is it a thing with Qt DEs interfering with each other and same for GTK DEs?
In my experience - yes and yes I’ve never had good luck trying to run multiple different desktop environments under the same user, personally, because it seemed that the different environments would have “edit wars” over configuration files.
To your original question - I use whatever best fits what I need. For my desktop environment, that’s Plasma, because it fits the kind of desktop usage that “just works” for me. For email/calendar, that’s Thunderbird. For RSS, that’s Newsboat. In my experience, Plasma generally accommodates using applications from different environments quite well, and offers a lot of flexibility if you so choose.
I’ve never had good luck trying to run multiple different desktop environments under the same user, personally, because it seemed that the different environments would have “edit wars” over configuration files.