Does Kubuntu have what it takes to become the ultimate KDE distro?

[Alexander Antoniades]

Hey,

On 5/10/05, Peter Shillan <peter.shillan at gmail.com> wrote:
> A great many distributions build on other ones.  Ubuntu builds on
> Debian.  Kubuntu builds on Ubuntu.  Kubuntu is no more an
> 'afterthought' than any other distribution.  It is, like all the open
> distros, a great effort by a group of people all of whom in this case
> want a Debian based distro with a faster release cycle and for it to
> come with a well tested KDE desktop.

Yeah, I don't know how well the back and forth is between kubuntu and
Debian main is at this point. According to someone I talked to on
#debian-kde there currently isn't much (any?) sharing between kubuntu
and Debian. I think they're trying to work it out and from all I've
read ubuntu is going out of their way to not leech off of Debian like
other distros.
 
> Whether it is the 'ultimate' KDE distro kind of misses the point. 
> Debian has a huge number of virtues going for it.  Ubuntu addresses
> some of it's shortcomings (release cycle especially).  Ubuntu has
> focused on GNOME because, I would imagine, that most businesses using
> desktop Linux would favour a GNOME solution.  Linux is about choice
> though and we have a great bunch of guys verifying and testing KDE for
> us.

Well, I would question your assertion that businesses (i.e. companies
looking to roll out Linux desktops) favor either KDE or Gnome at this
point.

>From what I've seen one reason commercial Linux distributions choose
Gnome over KDE is to escape being dependant on Trolltech, although
obviously there many other factors.

> There is no such thing as the ultimate KDE distro in the same way as
> there is no such thing as the ultimate distro or the ultimate Linux
> text editor... we all pick what works best for us.  Kubuntu is proving
> to be a very solid choice though and it does that while staying
> current with KDE.  It works for me!  You should choose what works for
> you.

Oh I agree, realistically there is no ultimate distro, it's all open
to debate. To me though, a polished KDE distro with Debian package
management would be the ultimate KDE distro, which was what I meant to
say. I've been really happy with Hoary and KDE 3.4, Linux, for me at
least, is getting to point where I can see it being genuinely useful
to regular people as alternative to Windows, which is really exciting.

What I was trying to get out of the list, in a very clumsy fashion it
turns out, was Canonical's dedication to Kubuntu, since that will
clearly be a factor going forward.

Specifically will Canonical hire KDE developers or obligate to making
an up-to-date KDE part of it's releases? From my recollection on the
users mailing list initially it was KDE would be part available, but
not necessarily supported.

Then it seemed the Kubuntu came into being and great developers like
John and Chris Halls were working on it, but Chris is no longer a
Canonical employee and John Riddell doesn't work for Canonical either.

Kubuntu appears to be a project that is of interest to Canonical and
has these great stats like being #24 on distrowatch, 40% of the
torrent downloads, etc. Then hopefully Canonical will take definitive
steps to assure its development, and assure those of us that use it it
will continue.

If it's a project that may or may not succeed based on any volunteers
it may attract and Canonical will provide web hosting, and
miscellaneous help, that's OK, but I don't see it as any sort of a
guarantee.
 
This isn't volunteer organization like Debian, this is a company
assigning the resources and paying salaries. If they're promsing some
level of support then let us know, if not so be it, but I for one
would like to know.

Sander