I’m currently testing Fedora KDE on a VM (windows host) before eventually switching over to Linux completely.
I have to say KDE Plasma, but I look really forward toward Cosmic Rust.
KDE is simply so damn old and has weird quirks everywhere, it has features and basic things like
- functional apps: dolphin, spectacle, kate, kde connect, systemsettings, discover, …
- SSD with hitboxes in the very corner (looking at you GNOME)
- wayland support
- a regular but modular bottom panel
- extensible everywhere
But it also just has too many features. Extensions are not tested or versioned so many simply dont work anymore, often some of the dozens of components has an issue. I cant imagine Cosmic reaching the level of features in like 3 years, but if it would do, this could be great. But in the end its up to the devs, so I have no idea at all.
I dont find GNOME usable really. At least in the default settings. The decorations make no sense on Desktops (they are perfect for tablets), the top bar makes you look down too much, the ubuntu way wastes space too. Everything is too thick, too little GUI settings and the standard apps could be from Android, the little features they have.
KDE for me. As much as I hate windows, I like the floating windows, task bar and tray. KDE has that out of the box and lets me tweak all the little annoyances away.
Cinnamon! Although I want to give KDE another chance to become my default DE.
Plasma, but only on Wayland (which is better anyway unbiased opinion).
Man i didnt realize how much better Wayland is until I had to use a provided setup for a few weeks.
The fact that I can’t swipe to switch virtual desktops on xorg was enough to make me question why xorg doesn’t offer such basic things after all the years
How are you swiping, out of curiosity? I have windows occupying the whole screen.
I switch workspaces with a keyboard shortcut or by clicking buttons on the panel.
It’s with three fingers on a touchpad.
There’s some short clips of it here: https://kde.org/announcements/plasma/5/5.25.0/
Oh I see. But I thought such gestures were available a long time ago, I remember apps like Fusuma, and there was talk of adding them to libinput so that every DE could let the user assign actions to gestures.
Yeah, this is now using the libinput gestures. It’s mainly exciting, because it’s available out-of-the-box, even for non-techies and lazy people (me).
With general technological advances and I believe Windows having similar gestures, it’s now also rarely the case that touchpad hardware doesn’t support multi-touch input…
The swiping thing is apparently a deliberate decision by KDE for whatever reason.
Well, yeah, but they made that decision, because X11 is a pain to implement and debug this stuff on.
Hyprland
Honestly, this is the first I’ve heard of Hyprland, but it looks sick.
Kde Plasma. Customized so there are no visible panels, only an auto-hide panel at the top for wifi/bluetooth etc. I do app switching and opening new apps via the Overview effect.
KDE Plasma. Number 2 is Cinnamon
Cinnamon LMDE
Gnome. Feels most polished and least cluttered to me.
When I switched from Windows definitely Cinnamon but by now it’s Gnome, it’s a little odd at first but I absolutely love the workflow!
