For people who already tried both, what’s the reason you’re sticking with GNOME or KDE as your desktop environment?
I use KDE. I found GNOME annoying and extemely opinionated. I also got turned off by it when I asked a question on mastodon like a year ago about an issue I was having with GNOME and an actual GNOME dev replied to me and essentially said I was using the DE wrong. basically I wasn’t using it the way the GNOME devs use it.
I always find it quite funny that when talking about KDE, your type of people always talk negatively about Gnome instead of just saying why you like KDE. It just reminds me of the little children I work with.
fine. KDE is more customizable, more configurable, more solid, better wayland support, doesn’t break scripts or addons when updated, and the devs nor the users (i.e. you) don’t have conniption fits if you knock it. I swear GNOME users are just like Omarchy users. heaven forbid you knock their poor choices.
You almost did it! Congrats, big steps. Not a gnome or KDE user tho… <3
Gnome is simple and clean. It gets out of my way and functions the way I expect a modern DE to function.
The opinions of Gnome are not a match for mine.
KDE let’s me get really specific on the things I want to, and its well supported.
Just that simple for me!
Gnome. Sublime flow, very polished. Simply works.
KDE can be OK but it is very overloaded on customization, not nearly as polished, and honestly I dislike that style it upholds. IMHO.
One adapts to me.
The other requires me to adapt to it.
The best thing about this comment is we all know which is which
KDE doesn’t adapt to you. You adapt KDE to yourself.
it lets me
I needed a desktop environment with a UI that wasn’t intended to be hidden away. Or a desktop that wasn’t challenging the way that I intend to work with the computer.
KDE may be boring and it may not challenge any paradigms. But it works well and stays out of the way.
KDE just works. The few things I want to change I can. GNOME by default is further away from what I want and you have to get extensions that break with updates to change anything.
GNOME expects the user to adapt to the workflow its developers have in mind. It’s the desktop environment that should adapt to me, not the other way around.
Plus, I love customization and theming. But GTK app developers create angry websites where they try to shame me for it.
I got tired of “customizing” everything and just wanted to get work done. GNOME is the default on many distros, so I learned the intended workflow instead of fighting it. Now I can just install a distro and be productive immediately instead of spending time tweaking things.
I’ve been running KDE now, almost exclusively, for almost 15 years. KDE works (by default) in a way similar to the way Windows XP worked in the late 90’s - late 2000’s. It felt familiar enough that I didn’t have to try and figure out most things that I wanted to do. The few things that didn’t work the way I wanted ( or felt they should) were easy enough to change. XFCE was similar (had a Windows 95-98 feel) but was not as configurable.
Gnome 2, I rather liked as it had a feel similar to Mac OS 8 from way back when I was in school, however I just never got along with Gnome 3. Everything felt… off. I can use it, Just don’t care for it. Same for most other DEs.
GNOME. It’s clean, I like it, and I don’t feel the need to customize it.
KDE looks modern, has features I didnt even know I wanted. Whatever I can think of wanting it’s either already there or I make a post on the fourm and its there in a month.
When I had an issue with an update removing something that I liked. I made a post and KDE devs added a toggle so I could keep the functionality I had before. Even though it was a minor thing they could have told me not to worry.
XFCE!

In all serious, while I use XFCE on most personal things, if I was pressed to choose between the big two, I think I’d choose KDE over GNOME; in fact, when I had to loan my younger sibling a laptop recently and that laptop was too old to run Windows 11, I put them on Debian with KDE. I think KDE is also my backup plan if major applications start dropping xorg support before XFCE has implemented sufficient Wayland support, although they seem to be making progress.
Out of the box, KDE tends to be more Windows-like and just better for my workflow in general, while GNOME can just be… weird. Like, I don’t quite hate GNOME as much as I used to - I plan on throwing it on an old Surface tablet soon - but like others have said, it’s very opinionated and doesn’t like customization and whatnot. I also resent GNOME in the sense that they tend to make design designs (such as in GTK 4) that reduce ease of interoperability across different open source desktops.
Gnome employs Jeremy Bicha as a person convicted of sexual battery of a minor and as far as we know never notified other employees especially at conventions or other employee gatherings.
I’ll stick with KDE
GNOME doesn’t really employ developers, it’s mostly unpaid contributors with the occasional contract work. Canonical is the one that employed him - and no longer does.
He has spoken for gnome, Ubuntu, and Debian in the past. Ubuntu has separated themselves from Bicha. Gnome and Debian have not AFAIK.
I don’t believe he’s around anymore, he probably started using an alias once people “canceled” him. This is the internet after all, you’re one pseudonym away from a fresh start.
Was his code already substituted on the codebase or not? And what components are currently tainted with his code?
This is just a cursory search. Debian says he’s still involved as of April this year, Gnome has him assigned to something as of last week.
https://contributors.debian.org/contributor/jbicha/
https://gitlab.gnome.org/Teams/Releng/AppOrganization/-/work_items/43
So he’s still active, I guess your witch-hunt will continue then.
GNOME is not a single entity, it’s hundreds of developers - it doesn’t assign things to people. It looks like he’s part of the releng team which gives him some responsibilities. The status quo will likely continue as he hasn’t committed any infraction, though some people will refuse to work with him i guess.
I mean, yeah. I’d rather not run software made by convicted child molesters or people who turn a blind eye to it much the same way i would assume we would also not like to run the lunduke distro. No witch hunt here, can’t change the past. What I’m more worried about is Gnome and Debian being cool enough with Bicha to have him be a spokesperson at their events.
Gnome has enough problems as it is, but this feels like throwing gas on the fire for their public image. KDE plasma is fine for me.
I’d rather not run software made by convicted child molesters
I get that sentiment, but what would you want to happen here, should he have just stayed in prison? Should he end up in a ditch somewhere? At some point reintegration into society needs to be happen, and i sure as hell think contributing to FOSS is a good deal better for everyone.
If he’d not been a spokesperson and just another cog in the machine, I don’t think anyone would have known who he was. Hell, even without that I don’t think anyone would have known who he was if he didn’t make a ruckus by vandalizing the xlibre wiki. When you have a past like the one Bicha has, you can’t just go throwing stones. Now that it is out there, you can’t unring the bell.
How is a credible accusation of a crime not an infraction of the code of conduct? Or would they rather wait until after the verdict to see if he should be removed definitely or not?
It’s not just an accusation, he’s been convicted. That’s why he’s on the sex offender registry.
Plenty of people have been banned from GNOME, if you feel like he committed an infraction you’re more than welcome to report the issue. But i doubt you’ll find sympathy just clutching your pearls over his past crimes that have nothing to do with FOSS.
Gnome lost a lot of functions when streamlining, just compare Dolphin to Nautilus, and instead of fighting their vision I went for a DE that works the way I want.
I love information density and easily get hooked on spreadsheet games, I feel as if that is the exact opposite of the Gnome vision.edit: I prefer Gnome for touch only devices like Microsoft Surface Pro 7 without physical kbm.







