Has Kubuntu become less stable?

[Waleed Hamra]

On 12/26/2010 12:31 AM, Jeffrey Barish wrote:
> When I first started using Kubuntu a few years ago, I remember reading
> complaints from people about how it had become less stable with
> successive releases.  I was mystified by these complaints because I
> found Kubuntu pleasant to use and reliable.  However, I was reminded of
> the remarks when I upgraded to 10.04.  When 10.10 came out, I did a
> clean installation hoping to eliminate any problems attributable to
> kruft.  A few problems did vanish, but I am still amazed by the number
> of problems I am experiencing.  I upgraded to KDE 4.5.4 hoping that the
> latest code would solve the problems.  It did not.  I guess I am going
> to hang on a little longer because there is so much that I like about
> Kubuntu, but I'm wondering whether anyone else has had the same
> experience.
>

i just an upgrade from lucid to maverick yesterday... apart from 
lsb_release telling me i'm on maverick, i dont have the foggiest clue as 
to what changed, everything looks the same, afterall, it's KDE changes 
that are usually noticeably, but since i had the beta PPA enabled, i was 
and still am on KDE 4.5.3.

> Here's a sampling of some of the problems I am having.  The most
> serious is that after running for 2-3 days, dbus-daemon starts
> consuming 100% of CPU and the CPU temperature goes to 85 (it's normally
> around 50).  I have to reboot regularly in an effort to forestall this
> problem, but I still fear what could happen to my computer if I don't
> catch the overheating quickly.

doesnt seem to happen here, but the max i've tried is some 36 hours, and 
computer was still very stable. instead of full reboot, try logging out 
and in (an X restart).
>
> An especially annoying problem is that drop-down menus often do not
> appear.  I get sort of a ghost of the menu, but no text is visible.  I
> have to activate the drop-down over and over before eventually it does
> appear.  I have had the X server lock several times.  Screen updates
> often do not occur properly.  For example, half a window might scroll
> while the other half does not.

this looks like display driver trouble. in the past, my old nvidia 
drivers used to show absolute garbage of pictures and icons and stuff 
that it had rendered in the past few minutes in every menu i try to 
open, the menu stay in this mess for some 10 seconds, and the appear 
normally after it gets re-rendered. but since nvidia version 200+ 
(currently using 260, official package), such problems never happened again.

>
> KOffice tools are seriously broken.  KOffice used to be a joy: simple
> to use and fast.  Now it's slow as a dog (I have one file that takes
> about 5 minutes to open); it consumes screen space with a docker that I
> don't use and can't remove.  It sometimes insists on scrolling whenever
> I type anything so that the text is no longer visible.  Dates cannot be
> formatted (meaning the formatting that I apply disappears when I reopen
> the file).  KSpread seems unable to display the grid.  KNode was
> missing some icons, but fortunately they have reappeared in the latest
> upgrade.  On reboots, KDE still cannot keep track of which desktop some
> programs were on.

never used koffice except for a brief period few months ago, i recall it 
being very unstable and bugged, not sure how it is now, i use openoffice 
(or go-oo, whatever the ubuntu repos are providing). but then, koffice 
is just a seperate program, cant say KDE is bad, because one of their 
suites is bad, the underlying system is quite stable in 4.5, it has been 
so since 4.3, whatever trouble you are exeriencing, is mostly bad 
programs misbehaving with KDE. KDE introduced a vast revolutionary 
system, that many programmers still are not sure how to fully utilize, 
resulting in bad software that interacts wrongly with KDE and causing 
trouble.
>
> And so on.  Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed a deterioration
> in stability?