My take on 8.10 and KDE 4

[Manuel McLure]

First things first. I like KDE 4 and have been using it since 4.1.0 .
About a month ago I pretty much uninstalled all remains of 3.5 except
for a couple programs that didn't have 4.x ports yet. That said, I
don't think it's a good idea for Kubuntu Intrepid to switch
exclusively to KDE 4. Part of it is having worked in customer support
for 13 years, and understanding just how important stability (in the
sense of "doesn't change behavior" as opposed to "doesn't crash") is.
When something works for people, they don't want it to change. They
don't want to learn new ways to do their tasks. They just want to get
work done. And until KDE4 can do everything KDE3 does, there will be
huge resistance to its adoption amongst all but the bleeding edgers.
I'm a bleeding edger, and I like KDE4, but I would posit that the
majority of the Kubuntu user community is not.

I use KDE 4 with the complete understanding that it's still a work in
progress. It's getting better by leaps and bounds (4.1 was a huge leap
in usability over 4.0) but it's just not there yet. I think it will be
at least 4.2 before KDE 4 is at the point 3.5 was at in terms of
stability and functionality.

Hopefully KDE4 will improve a lot between Intrepid Beta and Intrepid
Final, but even so it's an uphill battle.
-- 
Manuel A. McLure WW1FA <manuel at mclure.org> <http://www.mclure.org>
...for in Ulthar, according to an ancient and significant law,
no man may kill a cat.                       -- H.P. Lovecraft