KDE misconceptions on being slow and bloated
KDE misconceptions on being slow and bloated
Let me preface this by saying I use KDE on a daily basis, and have for a very long time. There's a persistent misconception about KDE
being this slow and bloated monstrosity of a desktop and, admittedly,
at one time it was true. It's certainly not anymore, but sometimes the
ghosts of the past intrude on the present and just won't be quiet. So
let's see where this ghost came from and put it to rest.
How did this misconception start? Back in late 2005 KDE reached a
pinnacle with the release of KDE 3.5, what many believed to be their
finest desktop. It had all the KDE hallmarks, infinite configurability,
deep integration and most memorable, it was the cheetah amongst big
cats. It was super fast. I used it at the time, as well as occasionally
using Gnome 2, and KDE was noticeably faster on my hardware. Unfairly or
not, this milestone 3.5 release would become the yardstick that later
KDE's would be measured against.
For all of it's greatness, 3.5 was also an evolutionary dead-end. Now I don't know how, but it's always seemed to me that the KDE developers have this uncanny ability to see into the future, and act upon that vision. The future they saw needed even tighter integration, more flexibility, the ability to adapt to different uses and hardware, and an all-around "smarter" desktop. The realization of that vision started to come together in what became KDE 4.0. This new KDE would be more than just another desktop, it would be an environment. Required was a total rethinking, a total change in it's underpinnings and completely new innovations on how things related to one another. Simply put, it needed to be a totally new beast. It's initial release created an uproar, and started a reputation that has haunted KDE ever since.
KDE 4.0 Alpha 1 was released in the Spring of 2007 and like all alphas, was never intended for general use. Not only was 3.5 still being maintained, it was still getting updated, and would be for another year and-a-half. The initial release of 4.0 was supposed to be only for developers, testers, and brave souls who were willing to try it and help with bug reports. To say it was slow, bloated and extremely buggy would be an understatement. But it was shiny, new, and oh so tempting to try out. Many people did, and to put it mildly, most were not impressed. Not only did it have a weight and speed problem, it was different, and people are not always ready or willing to accept change. The fact that this alpha was never intended for daily use was lost in the uproar it's introduction caused.
In mid-2008 the last update to the 3.5 series came out, 4.1 was in the wild, and the developers at KDE put all their energies into the new environment they were creating. Later that year Ubuntu put the new KDE as the default desktop in Kubuntu 8.10, and as they say, the rest was history. I would imagine the howls from users were deafening in the halls of KDE, but they persevered. To say they had a lot of work to do would be more than an understatement, considering they were innovating, refining and chasing bugs all at the same time. Today, users like you and I can reap the rewards of all their hard work and perseverance, but it wasn't a quick process. It took time, and people tend to be impatient, so the unflattering reputation was repeated release after release, until it became accepted as fact regardless of the constant improvements.
So now you know the how, and why, KDE earned that reputation. It seems that just like people, software can gain a infamy that's awfully hard to shake, regardless that it no longer applies. If you put KDE 4.0 on the same machine today with KDE 4.10 and ran a comparison, you'd see a difference similar to comparing a hippo to a cheetah. I have a six-year old Dell computer with only four gigabytes of ram, and KDE 4.10 flies on it. Just for comparison I installed XFCE 4.10 on the same machine, a desktop known for lightness and speed. While certainly not scientific by any standard, I honestly don't see any difference in performance. KDE is a bit larger in memory, 450 Mb compared to XFCE's 325 Mb. Considering I'm comparing my default KDE desktop with effects turned on and running several Plasma widgets to a bare-bones XFCE, I don't really see those extra megabytes as excessive or "bloated". I could have turned off the effects and killed the widgets to make it a more even comparison memory-wise, but in the end I didn't bother. After an hour using XFCE it was apparent to me there was no difference in speed, only a loss of the usability I've become accustomed to with KDE. For those who like to see numbers though, here's a recent test by Phoronix.
Today's KDE (4.10.1 as of this writing) is not the same animal it was 6 years ago. It's not the same animal it was just two years ago. No, it's not a lightweight desktop like XFCE. Instead it's a complete computing environment more comparable to Gnome 3 and Unity, or Windows and OS-X for that matter. Today's KDE however has the speed of the lightweight desktops combined with usability and configurability like no other. And it's not standing still: it's community of dedicated developers and contributors are continually refining it, making it better with every release, cleaner, leaner and faster.
It's time for the ghost of the past and the misconceptions of the present to be put to rest. Today's KDE is a slimmer, faster, elegant and extremely usable computing environment, more than a match for any other desktop around. Try it, you'll see.
For all of it's greatness, 3.5 was also an evolutionary dead-end. Now I don't know how, but it's always seemed to me that the KDE developers have this uncanny ability to see into the future, and act upon that vision. The future they saw needed even tighter integration, more flexibility, the ability to adapt to different uses and hardware, and an all-around "smarter" desktop. The realization of that vision started to come together in what became KDE 4.0. This new KDE would be more than just another desktop, it would be an environment. Required was a total rethinking, a total change in it's underpinnings and completely new innovations on how things related to one another. Simply put, it needed to be a totally new beast. It's initial release created an uproar, and started a reputation that has haunted KDE ever since.
Now
I don't know how, but it's always seemed to me that the KDE developers
have this uncanny ability to see into the future, and act upon that
vision. The future they saw needed even tighter integration, more
flexibility, the ability to adapt to different uses and hardware, and an
all-around "smarter" desktop.
KDE 4.0 Alpha 1 was released in the Spring of 2007 and like all alphas, was never intended for general use. Not only was 3.5 still being maintained, it was still getting updated, and would be for another year and-a-half. The initial release of 4.0 was supposed to be only for developers, testers, and brave souls who were willing to try it and help with bug reports. To say it was slow, bloated and extremely buggy would be an understatement. But it was shiny, new, and oh so tempting to try out. Many people did, and to put it mildly, most were not impressed. Not only did it have a weight and speed problem, it was different, and people are not always ready or willing to accept change. The fact that this alpha was never intended for daily use was lost in the uproar it's introduction caused.
In mid-2008 the last update to the 3.5 series came out, 4.1 was in the wild, and the developers at KDE put all their energies into the new environment they were creating. Later that year Ubuntu put the new KDE as the default desktop in Kubuntu 8.10, and as they say, the rest was history. I would imagine the howls from users were deafening in the halls of KDE, but they persevered. To say they had a lot of work to do would be more than an understatement, considering they were innovating, refining and chasing bugs all at the same time. Today, users like you and I can reap the rewards of all their hard work and perseverance, but it wasn't a quick process. It took time, and people tend to be impatient, so the unflattering reputation was repeated release after release, until it became accepted as fact regardless of the constant improvements.
It's
time for the ghost of the past and the misconceptions of the present to
be put to rest. Today's KDE is a slimmer, faster, elegant and extremely
usable computing environment, more than a match for any other desktop
around. Try it, you'll see.
So now you know the how, and why, KDE earned that reputation. It seems that just like people, software can gain a infamy that's awfully hard to shake, regardless that it no longer applies. If you put KDE 4.0 on the same machine today with KDE 4.10 and ran a comparison, you'd see a difference similar to comparing a hippo to a cheetah. I have a six-year old Dell computer with only four gigabytes of ram, and KDE 4.10 flies on it. Just for comparison I installed XFCE 4.10 on the same machine, a desktop known for lightness and speed. While certainly not scientific by any standard, I honestly don't see any difference in performance. KDE is a bit larger in memory, 450 Mb compared to XFCE's 325 Mb. Considering I'm comparing my default KDE desktop with effects turned on and running several Plasma widgets to a bare-bones XFCE, I don't really see those extra megabytes as excessive or "bloated". I could have turned off the effects and killed the widgets to make it a more even comparison memory-wise, but in the end I didn't bother. After an hour using XFCE it was apparent to me there was no difference in speed, only a loss of the usability I've become accustomed to with KDE. For those who like to see numbers though, here's a recent test by Phoronix.
Today's KDE (4.10.1 as of this writing) is not the same animal it was 6 years ago. It's not the same animal it was just two years ago. No, it's not a lightweight desktop like XFCE. Instead it's a complete computing environment more comparable to Gnome 3 and Unity, or Windows and OS-X for that matter. Today's KDE however has the speed of the lightweight desktops combined with usability and configurability like no other. And it's not standing still: it's community of dedicated developers and contributors are continually refining it, making it better with every release, cleaner, leaner and faster.
It's time for the ghost of the past and the misconceptions of the present to be put to rest. Today's KDE is a slimmer, faster, elegant and extremely usable computing environment, more than a match for any other desktop around. Try it, you'll see.
