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Linux distro/desktop competition



On Fri, 17 Aug 2007 09:16:33 -0400 (EDT)
markw-FJ05HQ0HCKaWd6l5hS35sQ at public.gmane.org wrote:
> I know I'm just voicing a long time gripe, but isn't it time that the
> "leaders," site down and make these things a published standard? I know it
> has been tried for a long time since LSB and other attempts, but at some
> point it has to happen. The fact that it is a hard thing to do does not
> mean it is not possible.
>=20
> I mean come on, why can't KDE an GNOME use the same file layout? It's jut
> petty immature crap that they don't. Why do they need different (99% the
> same information) X start up scripts? Different menu files and
> directories. Different icon and art directories? You can get the two to
> use the same art work, mostly, just by copying, in my book, that's a
> waste.
>=20
> Network configuration, environment variables, standard file locations,
> etc. These need to make sense for corporate IT to consider Linux more.
>=20
> How does it all get fixed?

We are getting into religion here.=20
It would be really nice if both GNOME and KDE were unified, but that is
not going to happen. They are 2 different organizations (although a
number of the same people are involved with both). They all sit under
the X Windows System supported by X.org. There are a number of
components to consider:
1. The Display Manager. This is the guy that owns your keyboard,
monitor, and mouse. There are a number of them:
	XDM - the older X display manager
	KDM - The KDE Display Manager
	GDM - The Gnome Display Manager
	Since the KDE and GNOME people are different communities, you
will have different display managers, but both KDM and GDM work with
either.=20

2. The underlying libraries.=20
	KDE is written primarily in C++ and uses QT as its underlying
graphical management where GNOME is written primarily in C, and uses
GTK as its underlying library code.=20

In the past, Red Hat has strongly supported the GNOME desktop
environment where SuSE had strongly supported the German KDE group.
Today, Novell owns both SuSE and Ximian. Ximian, based in thr
People's Republic of Cambridge is a major developer of GNOME
components, and as a result of this and corporate pressure, SuSE
Enterprise now uses GNOME as the default desktop environment. But, many
people in the Linux community prefer neither GNOME nor KDE.=20

The bottom line is that there are choices in Linux, and it is this fact
that makes it more difficult for corporate IT groups. It is easier in a
corporate environment for the IT people to say "we support Windows XP
Professional, with Microsoft Outlook as the email client, Microsoft
Exchange as the MTA, Microsoft Office 2003, Microsoft Internet Explorer
as the browser".=20=20

We come down to the difference between political structures.
Dictatorships can be much more efficient. "Mussolini made the trains
run on time" in Italy. Democratic societies are much less efficiant,
but we all have a lot of choices.=20


--=20
Jerry Feldman <gaf-mNDKBlG2WHs at public.gmane.org>
Boston Linux and Unix user group
http://www.blu.org PGP key id:C5061EA9
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