KDE's Version Timing Drops It In Ubuntu Support Priority

News.com is reporting that the next version of Ubuntu will see KDE unsupported, but only for the time being. Because of the dramatic changeover from KDE 3.5 to 4.0, Ubuntu sponsor Canonical is unwilling to initially support the popular Linux GUI. Gnome will still be supported, and the company expects to return support to kubuntu soon. "Developer interest is focused on KDE 4.0, but it's not mature enough yet to use in the next KDE-based variation of Ubuntu, called Kubuntu, Scott James Remnant, leader of the Ubuntu Desktop team, said in an explanation to a Kubuntu mailing list. But most Kubuntu developers adding features "upstream" of today's products are focused on KDE 4.0, meaning that it's risky to release a long-term support version based on 3.5."

Not suprising

The next version of Kubuntu/Ubuntu would have been an LTS, which means that it would be aimed at those who expected a long life out of an operating system, such as enterprise users.
KDE 4.0, in its current, and rather buggy state, does not fit the bill.

Re:Not suprising

KDE 3.5 will be perfectly usable for many more years, but people working on the Kubuntu project have moved to KDE4 for the most part. Considering they are volunteers it is perfectly reasonable for them to do so. But without anyone working on the packages, Kubuntu can't release a long term support version of Kubuntu with KDE 3.5. There just isn't anyone around to maintain it.

Re:Not suprising

I agree this will be unfortunate for KDE.

However your inference that LTS is of limited utility misses the point. 6.06 was chosen as the host platform for emc, precisely because by using 6.06, the emc developers were guaranteed a stable platform and could then concentrate on improving emc, and boy howdy have they ever. It is, I believe, the fastest moving development I've ever seen for an OS product in the field of computer numerical control software. It has gone from a somewhat twitchy & difficult to tune 3 axis milling machine driver to a stable 6 axis platform (9 is being discussed) capable of operating either a mill or a lathe. It can now bore a hole, then swap bits and thread both the bolt to fit that hole, and the hole itself on the milling machines table, I've done the threaded hole operation myself. Or to do the ornate carving in 3D of a beds headboard on a production line basis in a major high quality furniture makers factory.

When the next LTS comes out, emc will have to chose which of the realtime additions to the next kernel will be used, and adapt emc to live with it, and once done they can get back to the real project, that of making emc the accepted king of such applications. It is not far from that status now as commercial controllers are being ripped out, and emc put in their place to control machining centers as the older machines are being rebuilt, both due to wear in the machine, and bit rot in the controlling software which is no longer supported.

So the LTS versions do have a place in this world, very much so.

--
Cheers, Gene
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
  soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
10.0 times 0.1 is hardly ever 1.0.

Re:Not suprising

I recently wrote a patch to fix a particularly egregious bug in Kopete 3.5 (the history search feature being totally and unnecessarily slow), and the response I got when I submitted the patch to the mailing list was that it would be pointless to apply it, they're not making any more releases of that branch. So there are people around to maintain stuff, but apparently nobody around to release it.

Re:Not suprising

KDE4 starts KDE 4.x series and it isn't in that condition that everyone could use it like they can use KDE 3.5 on it current state. So, then when KDE 4.1 comes, it should be then in state it is good for anyone. Now when in few weeks KDE4 comes out, it is mostly for application developers and users who knows how to submit wishes and use KDE3.x applications in KDE4 too etc.

LTS support didnt come to kubuntu because KDE 3.5.x series support will be ended before LTS support and KDE4 isn't in shape it could be supported time what LTS needs. So, Kubuntu dont get LTS support, mayby next time when LTS version is coming from ubuntu.

But for those whole like to have supported KDE, can turn for other distributions like Mandriva, SUSE etc.

(im not developer but this info i have got from KDE blogs and it is UOM)

ubuntu shmoobuntu

ubuntu wants to kick a release out the door every 6 months, i think it would be wise to release once a year and no more frequent than that, the rest of the Linux distros & community works at a slower pace than ubuntu wants to run at...

Re:ubuntu shmoobuntu

Ubuntu feature freezes all releases. For six months nothing about your desktop changes, at all. Only security and bug fixes are released. If they moved to a one year release cycle they would either end up hopelessly out of date, or would have to sacrifice desktop consistency without a given distribution. Ubuntu doesn't want to surprise users with an update to their desktop that changes functionality.

Re:ubuntu shmoobuntu

Personally I like Ubuntu's approach. IMHO Linux for the desktop can lose momentum very easily but Ubuntu seems to be keeping things rather stable. I have seen more improvements in Linux for the desktop since Ubuntu became popular than any time before. Perhaps it is just coincidence, perhaps not. Either way 6 months isn't an outrageously quick turn around time, I feel yearly releases would just cause everything to slow down.

Re:ubuntu shmoobuntu

Your comparison is idiotic, momentum is needed regardless of if there is a "race" or not. Momentum is needed just to get things done in general. I am surprised you do not understand this.

As for the pointless attack on "lusers", what exactly is your point? That the default configurations are too simple? How is this a bad thing? You can change it however you want so why complain? Because it is not how YOU want it? Linux still has many rough edges, making it simpler is important not just for wider adoption but also just to make lifer easier for people. Providing I can still change it, I don't care how it is by default. Having everything complex from the get go is just stupid, why make things harder than they need to be?

Re:ubuntu shmoobuntu

Strongly disagree. Ubuntu is doing a lot of things right, and the recent commercial end-user available machines rallying around Ubuntu/Gnome shows it. If anything other projects should speed up to keep pace with Ubuntu.

The regular release cycle helps contributing developers to enjoy their work - they can count on finished new features to be out in less than 6mos, rather than less than a year, which can be pretty exciting. And it aids iterative development - a year between releases can encourage hail mary style development where you go big and failures are crushing.

I hope this doesn't mean

my fancy blue Kubuntu splash screen isn't going to work any more.

Someone explain how LTS works to Zonk?

... adding features "upstream" of today's products are focused on KDE 4.0, meaning that it's risky to release a long-term support version based on 3.5.

Someone's not been paying attention to the point of LTS - the point is that since there is no addition of major features, there's less risk involved, making it a better choice for those seeking stability. Zonk's next accepted feature:

FreeBSD - too many versions?
News.com reports that only damned fools would go for FreeBSD 5.5 - where no major features have been added for years. Server maintainers should get with the program and start download FreeBSD 8 alphas - it has something called superpages and network stack virtualization, and while none of us know what that means, the names are impressive.

I'd rather see them be honest

The Gutsy version of Kubuntu broke a _lot_ of things on my powerbook. Up until this release I was really happy with Linux on it, rating it well above OS X for geeks. Right now I'm seriously considering reverting back to Feisty.

So, with that in mind, it's actually nice to see them declare that something won't be working _before_ I waste time trying to upgrade to it. I can then make an informed decision about what to do, instead of using a half assed release that would disappoint me. Not meeting expectations is about the worst thing you can do to your credibility.

BFD

Any distro must make a choice of what to include or what not to include.

If it's critical software such as the kernel or compiler, the distro release is reasonably delayed. If it's not critical such as mtools, there's no need to wait.

With a desktop environment, it's somewhere in-between. If it is something most users depend on, then one would expect a reasonable delay. Obviously, maintainers of this distro don't believe that KDE users are in the majority and the distro can adhere to its release schedule and provide solid KDE4 support later. Good decision; not a problem.

However, making this NEWS implies there is something nefarious afoot and that alone should provide the usual morons who love to debate these things an opportunity to display their ignorance.

I, for one, do not welcome our flame-baiting masters . . .

Misleading article

Looking at the mailing list message [ubuntu.com] linked from the article clears up things. Kubuntu 8.04 will not be "unsupported" - it will simply not be an LTS (long-term support) release. This means that it will "only" be supported for 18 months on the desktop instead of three years.

Also, the concern is not whether features will still be being added to 3.5, but whether bugs fill be fixed upstream. From TFM: "Will a bug in KDE 3.5 receive upstream attention in March 2011?"

Re:Misleading article

Doubtful, as an AC mentioned (in a much cruder way), Trolltech is not supporting QT3 any more... or at least not much longer since they are now at QT4. KDE3.x QT3 and KDE4 is programmed using QT4. At least that is how I understood things to be.

Bottom line is that KDE3.x likely is not really going to be supportable till 2011. But who knows? That is a long way away.

KDE release and LTS

Disclaimer: I am GNOME user for eight years, but I recommend KDE for powerusers. Thanks God that we have choice.

Problem is very simple - KDE guys don't guarantee that KDE 3.5 will be supported next 3 years (which is obvious - KDE 4 is just around the corner and all development efforts will be channelled to it), but KDE 4 won't be useful until end of next year (basis is there, but lot of stuff must be ported). So it is kinda dumb situation. However, Kubuntu 8.04 WILL be released, it just won't be 3 years supported, aka LTS, but tradicionally 18 months, which is half of that time. After that, Kubuntu 8.10 release will contain KDE 4 at it's best.

So - not kinda cool that there won't be LTS for KDE, but still - there will be release.

p.s. it is a little bit sad that rather fine article summary contains somehow weak attempt to cause flamewar. Yes, KDE is popular, but also is GNOME - I know lot of KDE fanboys has problems to admit that (ohh, and it is similar with GNOME fanboys to admit that KDE is desktop of choice for many people, of course).

Anything on the KDE 4.0 release?

Is there any info regarding how soon KDE 4 will be out?
I'm having problems with KDE under FreeBSD, but now Mr Yushchenko suggests [blogspot.com] I should just use the latest release. I'm not sure if 3.5 will do the trick, or I should just wait for 4.0?

What next for Kubuntu users?

I use Kubuntu and was looking forward to the new version. What does this mean for me? Will I be stuck on the current version while the Ubuntu folks roll out a nice LTS version with nice features I won't be getting, or will there be an "unstable" version I can track?

Failing all that, what's a nice distro for KDE power users and developers? I've been using Debian for ages and I'm comfortable with Gentoo (although I'd prefer something else). Any suggestions?

I have to wonder ...

Scott James Remnant

I guess there's not much of this guy left.

Disappointing Turn

I think this move is a mistake because the goal of Ubuntu has been to lessen the gap between non-technical users and Linux gurus. This introduces another layer of complexity for those non-technical users. I think it's a mistake to mix LTS and non-LTS in same-numbered/named versions of the OS. They have a variety of options here and I think they picked the worst of the lot. They should just add it to a community maintained repository or a backport from the next version.

Someone with an active interest in Linux isn't likely to be confused, but there's a growing number of Linux users who don't follow Linux as an interest, it's just the thing on their computer. More than most other distros, those are the people that Ubuntu has been trying to cater to. I think they chose the worst possible option given their target audience.

It might seem ridiculous to think a seemingly minor detail could confuse or scare off people, but after years of working in support (and I think any support representatives would agree) you might be surprised at how easily people form mental blocks and shut down (mentally) when faced with any computer-related issue. When you walk someone through a process and a button doesn't say exactly what you indicate, they panic. To them "END" is not the same as "FINISH" or "DONE, even though they should all mentally register as a word signifying completion. And then they won't even tell you the name of the button that appeared on their screen, they'll only tell you that they don't see the one you said, like you're playing some sort of sadistic "I Spy" riddle game. Sorry for the digression. Old trauma.

(I'm not knocking Ubuntu for catering to non-technical users. I prefer Ubuntu myself, though I've been a Linux user much longer.)

And yet the question remains:

KDE or emacs?

Re:And yet the question remains:

Haven't they already integrated KDE into emacs yet?

I still don't get it

I can see that Kubuntu 8.04 will be released without LTS. Fair enough.

But this is just confusing. Will it use KDE 3.5, or will it use KDE 4.0?

Re:I still don't get it

It'll be using 3.5. Long term support is not offered because upstream won't be prioritizing fixes for 3.5 bugs in three years time

Just use fedora

In other news... For those of you wanting to use KDE 4.0, Fedora 9 will be supporting it. It is currently in the rawhide build and can be installed on Fedora 8 by using the development repo.

I can understand why.

I imagine a lot of Ubuntu's users don't want to be guinea pigs for KDE 4, and to claim 3 years support for something that will only be supported for a fraction of that time would be dishonest. Besides 18 months of support isn't that bad considering with Ubuntu's 6 month release schedule they'll be on something like 10.2 before support for 8.4 will be gone.

Plasma is revolutionary

Even after KDE 4.0 is released it will take some time for Plasma to mature and accumulate useful accessories, but the real issue is how long it will take for other systems to either pick up or in some way duplicate Plasma as they almost certainly will.

LTS = a bad joke

I'm a Kubuntu user and currently consider it the best OS for me since I want the bets open source system I can have. However, the LTS policy is a bad joke - I never got the current LTS version (dapper) to work with my Asus K8N4-E Deluxe motherboard and sata harddrives and I along with many other users complained about it on the forums until the bug report was closed with the decision that it won't be fixed since fixing it might break too many other things (and some had reported the bug even prior to the release). And in addition to that motherboard, the problem seems to be common with many other nforce4 motherboards as well - sata drives don't work. They do, however, work fine with the new, non-LTS release.

Any Ubuntu developers reading this: As much as I appreciate your efforts and am grateful for the OS, it is hard to take an OS seriously if developers decide that in the "long-term support" version they won't fix a bug like that which affects motherboards with such a common chipset. Can you imagine MS ever doing such a thing? Ubuntu has reached a state where people do try to take it as a viable alternative for serious use and consequently expectations are higher and that's what you want, isn't it? So live up to those then.

Right now is not the time...

I use Kubuntu. Right now KDE is in a major transition phase, moving from KDE3/qt3 to KDE4/qt4 is a bigger change than Gnome has ever done, seriously. While a few things survive porting it's fairly close to a rewrite of everyting KDE is. Supporting KDE4 for a LTS is a "no way" kind of thing, it'll barely be released and KDE has some creative defintions of RC. The only real option would be supporting KDE 3.5, which while I think would be good it something upstream may or may not do. After all, "kubuntu" will support all the server packages in Ubuntu, just not KDE. If they've been recültant to promise 3 years support, I certainly understand why Canonical would. When push comes to shove, they really don't want to sell much more than what upstream provides anyway.

Marvelous vs. Splendid

This is a conspiracy to force all users to switch to GNOME. We will NOT be fooled! We will NOT switch from KDE, which works splendidly, to GNOME, which works marvelously. Ubuntu is a splendid OS. It deserves a splendid UI. Not a marvelous one.

My gift.

On release-day I'll send some money to KDE for their effort and their dedication. I can spare $10 and I'm sure some of you can too. Let's do it and not just talk about it.

It would be interestng to see if we can make a donation that stands out when the new and improved KDE is released.

.haeger

kde vs gnome

There are several ways to define the differences between these two fine desktops.
On the technical side KDE uses a true object oriented toolset built on a true object oriented
language (c++). Gnome uses GTK, which emulates the the OO environment and is built using a NON OO language
(C).

The look and feel of the desktop is unique to each package, and each has it's own set of applications.
The good thing is that (by installing the required lib's from each) you CAN run Gnome applications on KDE
and visa versa. In fact RH's "blue curve" was an attempt to steal the good things from KDE and make them
available in Gnome.

I prefer KDE, but I do wish that some of Gnome's configuration "wizards" were available in KDE.
In (k)Ubuntu the Gnome package manager is better than the POS that ships with Kubuntu. I don't even TRY to
use symantic, I just go to the command line and use apt-get. (Well, I AM an old Debian user who even
remembers how to use dselect!). I do install some Gnome apps here and there.

Bullsh*t!

This is bullshit! KDE 3.5 is perfectly acceptable. The fact that a new version is coming out sometime in the future is a idiot reason to drop support. "Old" versions of software don't just vanish on release dates. Who they hell died and made Ubuntu the god of release dates? Is this going to happen for any piece of software that happens to have a release date close to Ubuntu's? Or is this only the case for KDE because Ubuntu is GNOME centric?

Re:News?

Previously kubuntu release have been synchronous with the ubuntu releases, this decision breaks that pattern which is why it is news. It looks as if ubuntu and kubuntu may actually diverge enough to become separate distributions.

Kubuntu 8.04 still coming

Kubuntu 8.04 is still planned to be released alongside Ubuntu 8.04, just without long-term service as previously planned. That just means the Gnome stuff in 8.04 will receive security updates longer than the KDE stuff in 8.04.

Re:That's what you get...

................... Wow.

This is the most blatant bit of racism I have ever seen. I live a charmed life, I'll agree. Still... Wow...

P.S. Language is a beautiful thing. What geek would disagree? What is this person doing on Slashdot?

LTS

It relates to Long term support. KDE delayed the release of 4.0 for ubuntu 7.10 (october). It cannot thus be included in the LTS version coming out next year. This is mostly KDE's own fault for not meeting their projected deadlines.

Cheers.

Re:LTS

or rather KED is "done when it's done" and Ubuntu needs a full cycle of completion before they'll claim LTS status for KED 4. In this case KDE 4 will only have been released 3 months before Canonical has to make a decision on wether to be tied to that release for 5 years. Ubuntu is much smaller than Red Hat or Suse and they don't want to play the games of supporting backports and cross-grades like done with the various boxed versions of Suse or RHEL. They waited until an odd time to release that's on nobody else's schedule.. The more politically correct thing might be to delay the LTS release in general then fewer feelings would be hurt.

The situation is not that KDE 4 is "not supported" but the combo in 8.04 will include BOTH 3.5 and 4.0! but only for the standard 18 months. Then the 8.10 will be fully supported for 4.0 only and probably LTS as well. It's a matter of Canonical not wanting to be tied up supporting bleeding edge releases just yet. Remember, Red Hat and Suse don't SUPPORT the free versions for customers, only the carefully limited pay-for versions and if you go "off the reservation" with upstream updates, they tell you to reinstall the base just like other commercial OS vendors do. Part of the Ubuntu experience is that there is no artificial divide between the "open source" and the "tweaked" versions.. it's their stated interest to work CLOSER to the upstream source, not wall their stuff off to versions they have to babysit for 5 years like RH or Suse has.

Re:real shame

the more I use Knoppix vs Ubuntu the more Gnome seems limited.. but KDE is too wide open.

The effect of Suse or Mandriva releases I've used was to reskin half of KDE to make it "simpler" but then leave you digging for options in the other half they didn't feel like updating. Neither distro reskins the same things either. The effect is that most KDE "fans" end up using the bog default version and adding their own customizations to it.

While that's great for everybody to have their own, it sucks for a community distro because nobody agrees on which things to strip out.. nobody agrees on a sane default and nobody want's to clean up the multiple option panes in 8 different places in a sane manner. That's what keeps it from being default in more distros. The Gnome folks just force what they think is sane and everybody lives with it... it's not great but it's easier for new users because there's only "one way" in most cases so at least support is easier.

There is still some licensing issues with the underlying QT license in that it is all-GPL or all-pay... there's no LGPL like GTK and Gnome. It looks like they fixed the cross-platform license problems (QT windows was pay only for a long time) but GTK already snapped up most of the cross platform action and troltech hasn't done much to go after it. Most QT stuff at this point is strictly Linux as "K" apps.. there's not much incentive to port to windows or mac because there are already GTK equivalents in that space.

i do agree, I think we should trust Trolltech more than Novell at this point due to Novell being "in bed" with Microsoft and the head of their cross platform projects being too much of a Microsoft fanboi and not paying attention to Microsoft's history of screwing their partners over IP issues. Mono, Samba, open office are all on the block for Novell to screw up by putting Microsoft "IP" in there "nobody" else can use.

Re:real shame

I agree, and don't think you should have been modded flamebait, though I can see why some people might think it is. Special cases are anathema to good interface design. Things that are by all appearances of the same kind should be treated the same by the interface. Each special case introduces a new context the user has to learn. Special cases that change with every release are even worse.

I don't have a problem with limited configurability, if the defaults are sane. Special cases aren't. KDE has some problems with special cases too, but they're easy enough to configure away if they become a nuisance. I've only run into one special case problem in Leopard, and it was hard to fix -- but honestly no harder to fix than a Gnome usability issue would be to a noob. I'm referring to how the Dock handles folders. In Tiger and before, clicking a folder would open a Finder window for the folder. Now "Stacks" open by default, a layer of indirection I don't want.

Re:real shame

This GTK2/Gnome apps are removed if I uninstall Mono via Apt:

• F-Spot (which sucks, is slow, nobody should use it and is not a part of default Gnome install anyway)
• Tomboy (that is slow also, is part of default install but the old applet is still there)

Yeah, Gnome is now totally dependent on Mono.