Don't really understand the current convergence push
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| mrider Dec 09, 2014 1:11 PM EDT |
How about instead of trying to turn my desktop into a mobile telephone, or vice versa, why not worry about creating a framework such that a compliant application will work properly in either context. The equivalent of a quality CSS file for a fat application such that it looks like a desktop application on a desktop, and looks like a mobile application on a smart-phone. After that, simply give the device the correct interface for its context. I suspect that Windows 8 wouldn't have been nearly the flop that it was if Microsoft had of left the Win7 interface in place on desktops, put the current interface only on pure touch devices (tablets and phones), and then made a container for the "touch" applets such that they would work inside a window when on a desktop. Side note - is this what KDE does? I know they are pushing something along those lines. |
| frankiej Dec 09, 2014 11:51 PM EDT |
KDE does try to do that with their Workspaces. They have a Desktop and Netbook workspace. I thought they had a third one but apparently not. But yes, they use the same underlying framework and applications but provide a different look for the different device size. I haven't actually tried things so I don't know how well it works out. |
| JaseP Dec 10, 2014 12:50 AM EDT |
KDE's workspaces are a flawed model, unfortunately. I say that as a KDE user. They force you to use the netbook interface in certain screen sizes, and it's hell to try and change that default behavior (way too large a pixel count sucked in with that,... plus, the netbook interface was/is crap). There was talk of a TV/Media interface, which would have been interesting, but I haven't seen much about that. All in all, I guess they are/were concerning themselves too much with pushing to QT5 (and getting on the bandwagon with systemd?!)... |
| Ridcully Dec 10, 2014 1:13 AM EDT |
Does anybody now wonder why I stay with KDE4.6 ? Apart from the fact that its version of KMail runs perfectly as it should, it does one thing very, very well: It gives me "folder view" and the behaviour of that view mode is virtually identical to what KDE did in the final version of KDE3.5.......KDE4.6 doesn't try to force anything I don't want into my user space. It might be an archaic version, but by golly, it works and works well. |
| gus3 Dec 10, 2014 2:43 PM EDT |
Ridcully wrote: It might be an archaic version, but by golly, it works and works well.Could be said about a lot of softwares... |
| Bob_Robertson Dec 10, 2014 3:23 PM EDT |
cat Ridcully | sed s/KDE4.6/Trinity-DE/ |
| gus3 Dec 10, 2014 3:30 PM EDT |
cat Bob_Robertson | sed 's/Trinity-DE/BSD init/' |
| Fettoosh Dec 10, 2014 3:48 PM EDT |
Quoting:Side note - is this what KDE does? I know they are pushing something along those lines. It is called KDE Active PLasma, its still in development but here are couple videos to see it in action. Short demo KDE Plasma Active Running on Nexus 7 More elaborate KDE Plasma Active Running on Nexus 7 More recent KDE Plasma Active 5 Quoting:KDE's workspaces are a flawed model, unfortunately. I say that as a KDE user. They force you to use the netbook interface in certain screen sizes, and it's hell to try and change that default behavior I am not sure what you mean by "Flawed", but I understand it is a personal perspective. I don't use it myself on a desktop but would on a tablet, that is what is it was developed for. See links above for the new KDE Active Plasma for Tablets & Netbooks. Not accurate about changing workspaces all you have to do is go to K Menu => Settings => System Settings => Workspace Behavior => Workspace => then select from dropdown menu option (Desktop or Netbook) |
| Ridcully Dec 10, 2014 6:35 PM EDT |
Dear, Kind, Helpful Bob_Robertson.........please translate into normal English what the command line phrase does. I want to enjoy the laughter as well......Told you I'm not a programmer or CLI operative for that matter. Sigh. :-) Come to think of it: Dear, Kind, Helpful Gus3........yeah, yours too. I'm afraid I am as the "babes in the wood" with respect to anything like that. And gus3, your comment about archaic software does ring a bell. It's almost like: "Hey, the software package is running beautifully, people like it, they enjoy using it, it's simple and elegant..........now.........let's develop it further and totally stuff it up in every one of those ways." Very, very sad. |
| Fettoosh Dec 10, 2014 8:13 PM EDT |
Quoting:Dear, Kind, Helpful Bob_Robertson @Ridcully, Do a "man sed" in Command Line Console window, sed - stream editor for filtering and transforming text sed s/KDE4.6/Trinity-DE/ s for substitue what follows between first two slashes with what is between 2nd & third slash. Sorry for the intrusion. |
| BernardSwiss Dec 10, 2014 9:06 PM EDT |
And you don't even have to define the sections with slashes. eg: sed s/KDE4.6/Trinity-DE/ sed s+KDE4.6+Trinity-DE+ both do the same thing (ie: replaces the fist instance of 'KDE4.6' that it finds with the string 'Trinity-DE'). |
| BernardSwiss Dec 10, 2014 9:20 PM EDT |
Like this:bernardo@mybox: ~ $ echo 123456 | sed s/3/X/ 12X456 See! (Very handy if your dealing with or pathnames or html addresses, for example) but watch out for self-made problems :( bernardo@mybox: ~ $ echo 123456 | sed sX3XXX sed: -e expression #1, char 6: unknown option to `s' |
| Fettoosh Dec 10, 2014 10:24 PM EDT |
True, the character following the s is used as the delimiter of the expressions with the exception of special characters like .
But slashes are most commonly used. Different characters are used to avoid having the same delimiting characters in the expressions and don't want to escape it. Also may be because of personal preference. |
| mrider Dec 11, 2014 12:34 AM EDT |
Things other than slashes are used to avoid LTS (leaning toothpick syndrome). E.G.: sed s/\\/\// :) |
| mrider Dec 11, 2014 12:37 AM EDT |
Sheesh, I had to edit that about six times, the site kept eating the back slashes. :) |
| Ridcully Dec 11, 2014 12:42 AM EDT |
I'm going to be obtuse.........but what does the command do, and what do I gain if I do it ? I'm reluctant to play with the command line at any time (though I do it occasionally with very simple straight forward commands), but especially if I don't know what something is going to do........yeah, okay, I'm not a command line afficionado. |
| BernardSwiss Dec 11, 2014 1:22 AM EDT |
Say you've written the Great Australian Novel, and you've just realized that maybe, just maybe, it was a bad decision to give your protagonist's half-insane, hypocritical, conniving and manipulitive wife the same name as that of your own "better half"... :-/ Fortunately, you saved yourself from tons of distraction (including fiddling with fonts, etc) by composing your magnum opus in a text editor (don't laugh -- George R. R. Martin, for example, wrote and is still is writing Game of Thrones in WordStar). sed s/Dearest/Harridan/g Great_Australian_Novel.txt ... and Presto! Every instance (the 'g' at the end means to apply the change globally throughout the entire file) of Dearest's unfortunately chosen name-sake will be replaced with something else (Harridan) that you won't have to explain... You can even let the love-of-your-life critique the manuscript before you send it off to the publisher. :-) (Whew! That was close!) Of course, in real life, you're much more likely to decide that OH_SO_CLEVER_VARIABLE_NAME in your bash script should be called AREA_CODE or something else similarly pedestrian but less prone to being misunderstood. |
| Fettoosh Dec 11, 2014 1:23 AM EDT |
Quoting:but what does the command do, and what do I gain if I do it ? @Ridcully, What the command would do, if you run in a console, is replace KDE4.6 with Trinity-DE in any text stream you supply it with. If you don't supply any, it will sit waiting for your input. They way to get out of it is by entering Ctrl-D. It is not going to do anything for you or harm your computer unless you supply an important file as a last argument that has KDE4.6 in it What Bob_Robertson is saying to replace KDE on your system with Trinity-DE and Gus is saying to replace Trinity-DE in what Bob_Robertson said with BSD init. I guess you have to wait for them to let you know for sure. :-) |
| Fettoosh Dec 11, 2014 1:34 AM EDT |
This should help LTS (leaning toothpick syndrome) |
| Ridcully Dec 11, 2014 3:06 AM EDT |
Hmmmmmmmm.......thankyou Fettoosh. Y'know what ? I'm not even gonna try it out. I am so content with KDE4.6 that any thought of upsetting this delightful version of KDE makes me wince. I don't want BSD, and I sure as heck don't want any other wife's name instead of my own........LOL.......I think I will just retreat gently and ignorantly into my Neanderthalic cave and cogitate for a while.......You are all too erudite for this "tiller of the soil"...... :-) [ "Oi think the answer lies in the soil" - Arthur Fallowfield].......now there's an oldie from the British years of radio. |
| JaseP Dec 11, 2014 5:45 AM EDT |
Quoting: I am not sure what you mean by "Flawed", but I understand it is a personal perspective. I don't use it myself on a desktop but would on a tablet, that is what is it was developed for. See links above for the new KDE Active Plasma for Tablets & Netbooks. By flawed, I mean that it doesn't do well what it set out to do... Provide an easier interface for a certain class of devices... The netbook interface gets in its own way, and is (OK,... this is ALL opinion) a pain to work with. The user is forced into a particular workflow,... one that I, personally, find annoying and hard to work with or around. The KDE development team would have been better served by making the Plasma Desktop interface a true "tinkerers delight." What I mean by that is to provide the user with the gadgets/widgets and tools to build the interface into what THEY want,... not what the KDE developers THINK you need or should have. Think "software Legos." Let the user build their own use cases. KDE TRIES to do this,... but ultimately fails... The "software Legos" thing is kind of what I was hoping their media interface would be like... But, with THAT project,... It's kind of taken off, out of the starting gate, like a slug with gout. And KDE's got some pretty basic problems with trying to be a media interface, too. DPMS is a complete failure in KDE. I have to issue commands to turn it off as a chron job, just to prevent the screen from blanking after 10 or 30 seconds while playing a video (apparently, SOMETHING keeps turning DPMS back on in KDE,... Something that XFCE does not do,... it lets you disable DPMS as a checkbox item). Without something like "software Legos,"... You can absolutely forget about KDE ever becoming a smart TV/home automation interface. Ultimately, I really like KDE. I use it as my primary workspace desktop (but not as my home theater UI). I wish it could be more,... and less,... I wish there was better Android integration with the desktop plasma widgets. I wish there were (better) media-centric widgets. But I also wish they'd lay off of the netbook interface and akonadi/nepomuk... But as my grandmother used to say, "Wish in one hand,... Spit in the other,... Rub 'em together and see what you get the most of..." (she was NOT a philosopher). If I want a better "this or that,"... I have to wait for it,... Or build it,... Either way,... it's not going to be soon... |
| Bob_Robertson Dec 11, 2014 11:10 AM EDT |
Ridcully, I only meant to say that I would have typed (substantially) the same thing as you did, concerning my continuing use of KDE3.5 in the inestimable form of Trinity-DE, as you did about KDE4.6, simply by substituting "KDE4.6" with "Trinity-DE" in the text. sed = "stream editor", "Take what comes in and do this pattern-matching thing to it, and send it back out again." |
| mrider Dec 11, 2014 12:26 PM EDT |
@Ridcully, It's a sort of "inside joke" if you will to use a simple regular expression when substituting words in a text. So for example, if I type "The dog went to it's dinner bowl", and then later edit that to "The dog went to its dinner bowl", I might jokingly put in s/it's/its/ . The idea being that I substituted "its" for "it's". As for my LTS example, that would substitute a forward slash for the first back slash found in text. The idea being that the slashes are so opaque that one wants to use something other than forward slashes to delineate the "what I'm looking for" from the "what I'm changing to". So for example, the following two regular expressions do the same thing, but one is worlds easier to read than the other (it may take a few edits until I get this correct...): s/\\/\//g Versus: s#\\#/#g Both convert all back slashes into forward slashes (think DOS style path converted to *nix style), but the second one is worlds easier to read. |
| mrider Dec 11, 2014 12:29 PM EDT |
Well, okay the second one isn't that much easier to read, depending on the font, but you get the idea. :) |
| Fettoosh Dec 11, 2014 5:07 PM EDT |
Quoting:The KDE development team would have been better served by making the Plasma Desktop interface a true "tinkerers delight." What I mean by that is to provide the user with the gadgets/widgets and tools to build the interface into what THEY want,... not what the KDE developers THINK you need or should have. Think "software Legos." Let the user build their own use cases. KDE TRIES to do this,... but ultimately fails... Isn't KDE Activities & Widgets enough? May be it would be helpful to read this If it isn't, I guess you might have no choice but to develop your own DM interface |
| Ridcully Dec 11, 2014 5:33 PM EDT |
Thanks for all the explanations everyone......I've got the general idea general idea general idea. Fettoosh, I hear what you are saying, but I sincerely believe there is now a case for the KDE developers to stop and consider for a little while. It would be really, really lovely if they could put out a, .......ummmmmmm.......okay, call it "KDE4-Light". This would be a version of KDE that just did ONE thing......provided a window manager like KDE3.5, nothing else, and totally conformed to simple 'nix rules....no sematic desktop, nada......just a simple DM. It could be time for that too. I mean, KDE has explored the boundaries.....but I'd like to ask sincerely: who truly uses all the stuff they've produced ? KDE is now a "Swiss knife" sorta thing. It's very complexity is what now makes it so daunting to me. I'm an old fashioned kind of blighter and I like simple and stable and before anyone says Xfce, yes, yes, yes, I know that.......but I have a problem. Like JaseP, my preferred DM is KDE.....and I'll stick with KDE4.6 as long as it doesn't fall over. It just woiks. Lovely bit of software. |
| Fettoosh Dec 11, 2014 11:11 PM EDT |
Quoting:It would be really, really lovely if they could put out a, .......ummmmmmm.......okay, call it "KDE4-Light". This would be a version of KDE that just did ONE thing......provided a window manager like KDE3.5, nothing else, and totally conformed to simple 'nix rules....no sematic desktop, nada......just a simple DM. @Ridcully, I hear you and I really really agree with you, but this is not the responsibility of the developers, it should be the responsibility of Distro. managers. The KDE developers create software for very diverse group of users. They try their best to cover the needs, wishes, & desires of as many users as possible. They try to make sure as many features as possible, be configurable and easy to disable if desired. Just like there are multiple versions of *ubuntu. Distros managers can do the same for KDE. One thing would be nice to have is a "scripted installation distro" where users can pick & choose what they like and prefer, from a list of applications, services, themes, etc. or may be a distro that follows a script guided by configuration file. That is certainly doable. I don't know if anyone did that or something like it already, but it sure sound like a good thing to have. IIRC, I believe Suse did something similar long time ago. KDE developers, or may be Kubuntu Distro manager(s) can certainly do that but I am not sure they have the time or the desire. |
| Ridcully Dec 12, 2014 12:31 AM EDT |
Thanks Fettoosh.....I'm always a little reluctant to put things like that forward simply because I can be viewed as an old fashioned Luddite who simply can't be bothered to learn new tricks. But the idea of "KDE-Light" has been with me for some time and I think it has possibilities. I tend to think, though, that I'd take the opposite view as regards its production. After all, it is the KDE4 development team who really know the code through and through and would know almost immediately if some "cut-down" is feasible or loses too many features. Your idea of a scripted installation is rather nice though and perhaps the KDE4 team could easily produce such a concept. Look, I really don't know what is to be done. All I do know is that if the KDE4 team implemented the sort of situation that exists in KDE4.6, they'd have a fantastic "KDE-Light". I only use folder view, so slice out the others as far as I am concerned. The developers may get a surprise I think......I would NOT be surprised at all to see most users opt for the "Lite" version. There's nothing wrong with what they are doing.....never meant, implied or indicated that....But I do think they might like to think about a very simple work station for an individual user. There's still a lot of us around who aren't using smart phones or tablets........can't stand 'em. Oh......and take a bet......at least one KDE developer will be reading this thread......so the idea might get back to the main team. Post Script.......I've been looking at the above all day and thinking about the concept.....A major reason as to why it might be better for the developers to do this "Lite" version is the semantic desktop problem. KDE has so interwoven that concept into a part of the software that only the KDE team could possibly unravel it to provide "clean and Unix based" software. I am thinking in particular of the KMail, Kalendar, Kontact etc. package. It will need "clean prior semantic desktop versions" for a Lite version to work. And I think ONLY the KDE team will have all of those "clean" packages in their KDE4 forms. Now, I could be totally wrong on this and I am speaking off the top of my head, but having written those papers dealing with the complexity of the semantic desktop, I think I could be "in the ballpark" so to speak. It's wiser heads than mine time, I think. |
| Fettoosh Dec 12, 2014 2:09 PM EDT |
Quoting:It's wiser heads than mine time, I think. I doubt it, Haven't you heard the proverb "Older than you by a day, wiser than you by a year." Quoting:A major reason as to why it might be better for the developers to do this "Lite" version is the semantic desktop problem. KDE has so interwoven that concept into a part of the software that only the KDE team could possibly unravel it to provide "clean and Unix based" software. ... I am thinking in particular of the KMail, Kalendar, Kontact etc. package You would be surprised how much more Disro Managers know about the whole OS in general than application developers. They ought to since they are the ones who integrate everything together. Concerning the integration of KMail, Kalendar, Kontact etc. package , I am afraid that is an irreversible decision. they are not going to be broken apart I thought I read somewhere, I could be wrong, that you don't need Symantec Search to use Kmail and local MailDir is still used to store messages.? |
| Ridcully Dec 12, 2014 5:05 PM EDT |
As regards the KMail package Fettoosh, I wasn't after the option of breaking it apart. In any event (and in openSUSE at least) you can uninstall any components you don't want, or just leave them there unused. It's not a big deal. No, what I meant was the decoupling of them from the semantic search package and the ability to turn the entire semantic operation off. That has always been the bone of contention. And I am reasonably sure that KMail still uses the MailDir structure. BUT....the last I explored the situation, you could not alter things in the MailDir directory directly using a file manager like Dolphin and have the alterations immediately recognised by KMail - the version in KDE4.6 will allow that to be done quite happily. Anything you stored in MailDir had to be done via KMail itself and Akonadi was involved. However I will be the first to say that KDE has evolved considerably since then and I have not the slightest idea as to what is (or is not) possible at this stage........I guess it's time for another "white hairs session" where I either go whiter (which is now difficult) or begin to shed, as I fight my way through the KDE maze. Cynical LOL. :-) As I once wrote in an article, ultimately, if you really love using KDE (and I do), then the mess that KMail has become (in my humble opinion) ultimately forces you to consider using an alternative email client such as Thunderbird which can be very easily set up to more or less mirror the display and activities of KMail. |
| Fettoosh Dec 12, 2014 5:31 PM EDT |
That is what I have done, used a different mail agent. By tbe way, I am typing this post on my cheap ($90) RCA 10.1" tablet . I mostly use it to browse the internet and watch videos & selected TV programs/shows over the internet using ChromeCast. It works very nicely. It is amazing how convnient these tablets are sometines. Have you given it a try? |
| Ridcully Dec 12, 2014 8:37 PM EDT |
Again, Fettoosh, I am startled by how parallel our thoughts seem to be running on KDE. KMail was a superb email client and you cannot wish for anything better in the KDE version I am running. Thankyou for your invitation to consider a tablet.......but, honestly, apart from this use in computing, I have no need for a mobile platform. I simply couldn't justify the cost (small though it is) of purchasing something I'd never use. My computer use is sporadic, but always in a comfortable chair in front of a good laptop screen. I'm retired, mostly work around 5 acres and this "antique" HP laptop is all I need.....I am vaguely considering upgrading to a new one, but I'd better not say that in front of this venerable antique in case it gets offended. :-) In any event, I am so used to touch typing on a keyboard that I'd hate to lose any part of the skill. It's still quite useful. PS....actually, I'm dreading having to upgrade. I'm still on a 32bit system and that is so "passe" in today's world - but if it continues to do everything I want, .....no problems. |
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