Re: improving the UX with the default KDE installation
I agree with you about konqueror, but in the case of kwrite vs kate, I think
the reason is that kate depends on some kwrite components. Technically kate is
also targeted at programmers, whereas kwrite is similar to MS Notepad.
On Wednesday, March 15, 2017 7:01:16 PM PDT fradev wrote:
> Hi everyone
>
> The default KDE/Plasma 5 installation in Stretch, via task-kde-desktop, in
> my opinion doesn't provide the best user experience because of the many
> applications installed by default.
>
> While the experience with the Plasma desktop is pretty good, the same
> cannot be said for some KDE applications. To improve the situation, at
> least for me, in different occasions I had to:
>
> - manually install only the required KDE applications in a minimal Debian
> setup;
> - or manually remove all the unwanted KDE applications in the default KDE
> installation (and break meta-packages).
>
> The main issue is that, in some cases, the applications required recursively
> by the package task-kde-desktop are obsolete, bugged and/or are useless
> redundancies. I'll make some examples at the end of this e-mail to better
> explain my point of view.
>
> I don't know if there are other users considering this as a usability issue
> but, in case, and if it is still possible to do something given the freeze
> of Stretch, it could be solved by changing the applications listed as
> dependencies and recommended by the meta-packages used in the default KDE
> installation in Stretch.
>
> I'm working just for myself on a list of packages that can be omitted or
> substituted and if someone is interested I can continue in this discussion.
>
> Regards
> Francesco
>
>
> EXAMPLES
> ========
>
> Let's start with Konqueror, installed by default in the case discussed
> above. Despite its history and how interesting it is, we all know that
> Konqueror nowadays lacks developer manpower. Its web engines are obsolete
> and probably not suitable anymore for a safe web surfing. Surely many of us
> will not suggest its usage, especially to newcomers. Firefox and Chromium
> are far superior web browsers and, besides, Firefox is recommended by
> task-kde-desktop and it is installed in the default KDE installation.
>
> Konqueror can also be used as a file manager but we already have Dolphin,
> that I'm sure is considered the de facto file manager in the Plasma
> desktop, installed along with it. Konqueror therefore is pretty much
> useless and redundant in a standard installation. If it so, why install it
> by default?
>
> Same story with some of the KDEPIM applications installed by
> task-kde-desktop/kde-standard. I'm a Kmail user but like many others I know
> that Kmail can be a difficult beast to handle, it has its bugs, akonadi
> could be a pain sometimes, and it lacks developer manpower too (and maybe
> it will be replaced by Kube in the future).
>
> Despite I'm using Kmail I will probably suggest to other users and newcomers
> to try Icedove/Thunderbird instead, or simply use their e-mail accounts via
> web browser if it is too much for them. In my opinion Kmail and friends
> should not be installed by default.
>
> There are other cases like that or minor redundancies, such as Kate and
> Kwrite installed altogether. Why install them both?
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