War crimes against Russia have no statute of limitations — Medvedev
War crimes against Russia have no statute of limitations — Medvedev
According to the politician, this applies not only to those "misled by the Bandera regime," but also to foreign mercenaries and a number of other individualsTASS
Kiev-backed suicide bomb plot thwarted in Russia – FSB
Kiev-backed suicide bomb plot thwarted in Russia – FSB
The Federal Security Service has reported thwarting a new Ukrainian plot involving an unwitting suicide bomberRT
'No, That Is Not Your Job,' Say Critics After Schumer Claims 'Job' Is to 'Fight for Aid to Israel' | Common Dreams
Jon Queally
Feb 02, 2026
Progressive critics of Senate Minority Chuck Schumer had fresh reasons to speak out Sunday after the powerful New York Democrat said that “one of many of [his] jobs” in the US Senate was to fight for ongoing taxpayer-funded military and financial assistance to the Israeli government, a position that has been the focus of growing protest among rank-and-file party members and the public at large in the face of Israel’s brutal genocide against the Palestinian people of Gaza.“I have many jobs as [Senate] leader... and one is to fight for aid to Israel — all the aid that Israel needs,” Schumer said at a gathering of Jewish leaders and community members in New York on Sunday.
According to Jacob Kornbluh, who provided footage of the remarks while reporting for The Forward, Schumer told the audience that his support for Jewish security funding will only continue growing under his leadership, calling it his “baby.”
'No, That Is Not Your Job,' Say Critics After Schumer Claims 'Job' Is to 'Fight for Aid to Israel'
"Seventy-five percent of Democratic voters oppose sending Israel more military aid, as do 66% of independents and 60% of Americans overall," noted one domestic policy expert.jon-queally (Common Dreams)
Nearly a third of kids in UK can't use books when starting school - and try to swipe them like phones
Nearly a third of kids can't use books when starting school - and try to swipe them like phones
Staff also report around 28% of children started school unable to eat and drink independently, and 25% had difficulty with basic life skills.Sky News
Malicious VS Code AI Extensions Harvesting Code from 1.5M Devs
Malicious VS Code AI Extensions Harvesting Code from 1.5M Devs
Two popular AI coding extensions with 1.5M installs secretly harvest your entire codebase and profile you. Both are still live in the marketplace.www.koi.ai
The world is trying to log off U.S. tech
Countries are growing uneasy about their dependence on U.S. technology firms.
U.S tech backlash grows as countries and startups seek alternatives - Rest of World
Proton Mail and UpScrolled attract users looking to quit Big Tech services like TikTok, Meta and Google.Rina Chandran (Rest of World)
How important is a DE to you?
After 2y on Linux I can say with full confidence that switching from GNOME to KDE (for me) is a bigger barrier than switching from Windows to Linux ever was.
I’ve tried a lot to like KDE but I just can’t. I usually see people discussing distros but I feel like picking the right DE makes much bigger impact.
I’m yet to try Hyprland though.
Considering the fact that I’m itching to get Steam Frame and VR on GNOME will likely be broken indefinitely, idk what to do.
blog.zaramis.se/2026/02/02/pol…
That’s easy; because Ikey Doherty wanted to make one.
He abandoned Solus years ago as the project became something he didn’t enjoy anymore, and wanted to start a fresh project closer to his philosophy of engineering everything.
When a person starts a new project it’s usually because they want to.
So the key here is, in classic Ikey style, they want to use/develop all their own tools. engineer everything themselves to be exactly what they want it to be. This is what suits them and Ikey has the chops to do this better than most.
He started this project about 5 years back as Serpent OS, rebranded it last year as he got to alpha release stages.
The unfair society we live in
[a water pipe is delivering water directly in the mouth of a huge character sitting on a chair, gorging on the water, below a label]\
Evil proletarian getting all the unemployment benefits\
\
[a few little droplets are falling from the water pipe into the mouth of a thin character in a suit, next to the label]\
Poor billionaire trying to buy their 7th yacht
thebad.website/comic/the_unfai…
like this
Templates | The Bad Website
Templates - See more by visiting this page on thebad.websiteThe Bad Website
Stiles joins London union leaders in calling for workers’ action centre to remain open in wake of auto layoffs
Stiles joins London union leaders in calling for workers’ action centre to remain open in wake of auto layoffs
There are fears that laid off workers from London’s auto sector will soon have nowhere to turn to help with re-training. This comes as a workers’ action centre gets set to wind down in just a few days.Bryan Bicknell (CTVNews)
blog.zaramis.se/2026/02/02/van…
My thousand dollar iPhone can't do math
My thousand dollar iPhone can't do math
TL;DR: My iPhone 16 Pro Max produces garbage output when running MLX LLMs. An iPhone 15 Pro runs the same code perfectly. A MacBook Pro also runs the same code perfectly.Rafael Costa (Rafael's Journal)
Windows 11 just lost 5% market share in two months despite Windows 10 losing support.
According to Statcounter, Windows 11 held a 55.18% market share in October 2025. That share dropped to 53.7% in November and dropped again in December. Now, Windows 11 holds a 50.73% market share.
gs.statcounter.com/os-version-…
Desktop Windows Version Market Share Worldwide | Statcounter Global Stats
This graph shows the market share of desktop windows versions worldwide based on over 5 billion monthly page views.StatCounter Global Stats
Strit
in reply to WereCat • • •What DE you like is very much dependant on your work flow and how well you can adjust to changes.
Personally, I love KDE Plasma. It's the right amount of "bling", bells, whistles, aestetic and settings for me. Gnome feels way to "simple" and XFCE feels reliable but old.
For me, the DE is often more important than the base underneath, but I do like my rolling release. :)
lascapi
in reply to WereCat • • •For me too!
I was used to Gnome and Ubuntu style, and since I bought a Tuxedo I use their OS with KDE, and even if I love a lots of things there is often little things like gesture that are different and I sometimes miss.
neon_nova
in reply to WereCat • • •I honestly think DE is one of the main reasons people don’t switch from windows.
They just want to use what’s comfortable. The large majority of people would be fine with Linux alternatives, but they don’t want to deal with the different designs.
Limerance
in reply to neon_nova • • •red_tomato
in reply to WereCat • • •I prefer KDE. It works well out of the box and offers a good amount of customization. I tried gnome for a bit and didn’t like it.
What I like about Linux is that it’s easy to switch between DE. Just try out a few ones until you find something you like. I can recommend looking into Cinnamon (the DE of Mint).
fatcat
in reply to red_tomato • • •I really want to try more DEs but for me it feels like work to figure out how to do it without breaking anything existing.
curbstickle
in reply to fatcat • • •Generically speaking, nothing should break.
But if you want to just try out different environments without making any changes, I'd lean toward a VM for testing.
red_tomato
in reply to fatcat • • •just_another_person
in reply to WereCat • • •Not sure what the Frame means with any of this. It's going to be running the same stack as Deck, which is KDE. It's also not going to be any sort of headset for your PC, at least at the outset.
As for your other Dr questions, it's all just personal preference. The Desktop is just window dressing on a compositor and window manager anymore. If you're comfortable without all the system helpers and convenience of using either Gnome or KDE, you can just run a WM like Hyprland or Sway instead.
rozodru
in reply to WereCat • • •Still to this day I switch DEs/WMs every so often to try and find that right "fit". I think that's the biggest minor issue with Linux right now. IMHO there's not a single perfect DE. I like KDE, everything just works, BUT how workspaces/virtual desktops work with multiple monitors is an absolute pain. Yes I'm aware with the update coming this month it'll improve slightly but all I want from it is to have each monitor have it's own set of dedicated workspaces like every other WM has. KDE just won't do that regardless of the fact it's been asked for for like 20 years now.
So I constantly end up switching. Niri, Hyprland, Plasma, whatever. None of them feel perfect and they all have their deal breaker quirks that I tolerate for awhile until I just can't and end up switching. Like for example on Niri with some games when scrolling through windows and going back to the game it doesn't pick up the mouse immediately so you have to do a quick switch to either another window and back or another workspace and back. similar issue with Hyprland except it's with the keyboard instead of t
... show moreStill to this day I switch DEs/WMs every so often to try and find that right "fit". I think that's the biggest minor issue with Linux right now. IMHO there's not a single perfect DE. I like KDE, everything just works, BUT how workspaces/virtual desktops work with multiple monitors is an absolute pain. Yes I'm aware with the update coming this month it'll improve slightly but all I want from it is to have each monitor have it's own set of dedicated workspaces like every other WM has. KDE just won't do that regardless of the fact it's been asked for for like 20 years now.
So I constantly end up switching. Niri, Hyprland, Plasma, whatever. None of them feel perfect and they all have their deal breaker quirks that I tolerate for awhile until I just can't and end up switching. Like for example on Niri with some games when scrolling through windows and going back to the game it doesn't pick up the mouse immediately so you have to do a quick switch to either another window and back or another workspace and back. similar issue with Hyprland except it's with the keyboard instead of the mouse. Sway has similar issues. Hyprland I don't like how workspaces work with multiple monitors either.
This is just the nature of Linux overall. sometimes you just have to tolerate the minor issues for the overall better performance/features. and it doesn't just apply to DEs/WMs. there's rarely anything on Linux that is the total package and 100% everything you want. Take terminals for example. Alacritty is great, fast, responsive...doesn't do images. Kitty is awesome with images, gpu stuff, fast, smooth...doesn't work great with tmux/multiplexers cause the dev hates them. or how about editors? DOOM Emacs has all the features I could ever want...slow as shit on startup. Lazyvim is fantastic with all the plugins available...absolute pain in the ass to get working 100% on my distro NixOS. I could go on and on. none of these are absolute dealbreakers just minor annoyances that make me constantly switch things.
So I completely 100% hear you. you like GNOME, it's your preferred DE, BUT the potential issues with Steam Frame and VR are a deal breaker. And those things work on KDE BUT you're just not happy with how KDE works overall. I get it man. I'm not a fan of GNOME but I get it. I mean give hyprland a shot but try it out with the defaults first before you invest too much time into configuring it and then finding there's like one or two things that just won't work. I've done that before. spent hours configuring like Sway or something to my liking and then finding out one particular application just doesn't play well with it. It's frustrating. Good luck.
Riskable
in reply to WereCat • • •Every decade since 1999 (the year of the Linux desktop—for me) I spend a few weeks trying out all the hot new shit in terms of desktop environments. I'll switch to Gnome for a few days, get disappointed at how much I miss from KDE, and then try one of the newer ones like Cosmic. Then I'll play with the latest versions of the classics (xfce) and marvel that they still make you configure everything in a single file or they still lack basic shit that normal people want like a clipboard manager.
All the actually useful or just plain really, really nice/handy stuff is built into KDE Plasma. I've been using so many of those features for so long, I can't fathom having to go back to a world without say, being able to navigate the filesystems on all my other PCs via
ssh://(and other KIO workers).I remember when KDE 2.0 came out and it added support for kioslaves (now called KIO Workers) and it completely changed how I viewed desktops. That was in the year 2000. How is it that literally nothing else (not other FOSS desktops nor Win
... show moreEvery decade since 1999 (the year of the Linux desktop—for me) I spend a few weeks trying out all the hot new shit in terms of desktop environments. I'll switch to Gnome for a few days, get disappointed at how much I miss from KDE, and then try one of the newer ones like Cosmic. Then I'll play with the latest versions of the classics (xfce) and marvel that they still make you configure everything in a single file or they still lack basic shit that normal people want like a clipboard manager.
All the actually useful or just plain really, really nice/handy stuff is built into KDE Plasma. I've been using so many of those features for so long, I can't fathom having to go back to a world without say, being able to navigate the filesystems on all my other PCs via
ssh://(and other KIO workers).I remember when KDE 2.0 came out and it added support for kioslaves (now called KIO Workers) and it completely changed how I viewed desktops. That was in the year 2000. How is it that literally nothing else (not other FOSS desktops nor Windows or Macs) has implemented the same feature?
It's not just the file manager, either. I can access
ssh://(or any other KIO worker) from any file dialog! The closest thing is shared drives in Windows but even that isn't nearly as flexible or feature rich (or efficient, haha).Then there's the clipboard manager (klipper), Activities, and a control panel that lets you customize everything to extreme degrees. It even supports fractional scaling and has supported that since forever. I remember when they introduced that feature over a decade ago and it still blows my mind to this day just how forward thinking the devs were.
Monitors since forever have had a different X DPI than the Y DPI. Yet only the KDE devs bothered to both query the monitor's DDC info to figure that out and set it correctly when the desktop starts.
There's other features that drive me nuts when I don't have them! For example, the ability to disable global shortcuts on specific windows. So if I've got a remote desktop open to my work I can send Super-. (Win-.) and that'll open the Windows emoji picker in the remote desktop instead of the KDE one (locally). And it will remember this setting for that application!
I can make any window I want stay above others temporarily to take notes, enter values into the calculator, or just turn any window into something like a HUD (you can control any window's transparency on the fly!).
It even supports window tiling! A feature most people aren't aware of. Like, if you're already running KDE, why bother with a tiling window manager? You've already got it (though the keyboard shortcuts to manage the tiling layout in real time are lacking).
TL;DR: KDE Plasma is the best desktop in existence across all platforms and this is easy to prove with empircal evidence.
djdarren
in reply to Riskable • • •I did not know this! I'll look into this and no longer will it piss me off when I tap Super in a VM to open the menu, and have to dismiss my local menu first.
Riskable
in reply to djdarren • • •That's just the tip of the iceberg of cool and useful stuff you can do with KDE Plasma (and Kwin).
Another tip: Did you know that KRunner (Alt-Space) can do unit conversions? Type Alt-Space and
10cmor something like that and it'll give you that value in inches.Another: You can bind shortcuts to mouse buttons like Ctrl-Alt-Right (click) And Ctrl-Alt-Left to say, switch desktops right/left.
You can type Ctrl-i in Dolphin to filter files. So if you're looking at your enormous downloads directory and you want to see all the .png files you can type Ctrl-i,
pngand it'll only show you files withpngin their name.KDE's "get hot new stuff" framework works with Dolphin "actions" (context menu file handlers) so you can go into the settings—>Context Menu and click on "Download New Services" to browse tons of free scripts/tools that let you do things like file conversions, write disk images to USB drives, get checksums, etc.
I actually made a personal script that converts videos to looping .webp files (or just s
... show moreThat's just the tip of the iceberg of cool and useful stuff you can do with KDE Plasma (and Kwin).
Another tip: Did you know that KRunner (Alt-Space) can do unit conversions? Type Alt-Space and
10cmor something like that and it'll give you that value in inches.Another: You can bind shortcuts to mouse buttons like Ctrl-Alt-Right (click) And Ctrl-Alt-Left to say, switch desktops right/left.
You can type Ctrl-i in Dolphin to filter files. So if you're looking at your enormous downloads directory and you want to see all the .png files you can type Ctrl-i,
pngand it'll only show you files withpngin their name.KDE's "get hot new stuff" framework works with Dolphin "actions" (context menu file handlers) so you can go into the settings—>Context Menu and click on "Download New Services" to browse tons of free scripts/tools that let you do things like file conversions, write disk images to USB drives, get checksums, etc.
I actually made a personal script that converts videos to looping .webp files (or just sets WebP files to loop forever). So I can right click on a .WebP, .webm, .mp4, etc and it'll run ffmpeg on it in the background.
djdarren
in reply to Riskable • • •OK, how the hell do you do this? Because I have Ctrl+left click and Ctrl+right click set on my Mac to switch left/right between spaces/desktops, and cannot for the life of me work our how to replicate that in Linux.
Limerance
in reply to Riskable • • •The downside of KDE is the millions of options and features. It can get in the way and makes it a little harder to learn.
That said. KDE is pretty great and currently my favorite.
actionjbone
in reply to WereCat • • •Like others have said, it's very dependent on work flows and personal preference.
I dislike the MacOS interface. Gnome and its derivatives aren't that, but it borrows enough design cues that I don't find it intuitive. (Though I recognize why other people do find it intuitive.)
Most other DEs jive with me. I can effortlessly switch between Plasma or XFCE. I like Enlightenment and LXQT, but generally don't go for them first. Cinnamon is fine, but I like most others more.
I like to play with things. I'll get my hands on a beat-up old laptop, try a few distros and desktop environments on it, then find it a new home. Linux makes it great to experiment like that.
Björn
in reply to WereCat • • •Many people equate the DE with the distro they tried it on. So yeah, DE is a huge factor. There's a lot of them out there and too many people think you have to switch distribution to try a new one.
If you don't like KDE, can't you just stay on Gnome?
atzanteol
in reply to WereCat • • •Yeah - I've even seen people recommend switching distros just because another has a different default DE without understanding that most distros let you install multiple DEs...
The differences between distros aren't as big as people make them out to be*. Mostly just installer, how packages are managed, what versions of packages you get, etc.
myrmidex
in reply to WereCat • • •Feyd
in reply to WereCat • • •DonutsRMeh
in reply to WereCat • • •Dariusmiles2123
in reply to WereCat • • •I’m also trying to enjoy KDE as everyone is praising it and Gnome lacks a tiny bit of customization.
But I really prefer Gnome and feel really different than everyone on Lemmy.
So yeah a DE is more important than the distro to me.
IAmYouButYouDontKnowYet
in reply to Dariusmiles2123 • • •Gnome is polished and slick.
It's kind of like ios vs android.
I use KDE on PC that I want freedom with.
I use gnome on PC I just casually use.
Dariusmiles2123
in reply to IAmYouButYouDontKnowYet • • •What got me disappointed is that I heard so much about KDE customization and that it wasn’t buggy anymore.
I thought I’d be able to reproduce the vanilla Gnome workflow where you easily switch between workspaces. This with the advantage of things being customizable.
But it’s just too buggy and complicated for me..
WereCat
in reply to Dariusmiles2123 • • •Zorsith
in reply to WereCat • • •Same. Its the only thing i like about gnome, that buttery smooth three finger swipe on the touchpad to switch around. It made me actually understand how people can stand to work on a laptop without multiple monitors
Everything else about gnome to me just feels like they're trying to abstract away basic functionality
IAmYouButYouDontKnowYet
in reply to Dariusmiles2123 • • •Yeah... I'm curious to see if SteamOS helps advance KDE.
I never used the virtual desktops with it.
I had set up an htpc and made some customizations to make it more TV and mini keyboard friendly.
orenj
in reply to WereCat • • •anothermember
in reply to WereCat • • •It's an important software choice just like choosing a browser (though unfortunately browser choices are much more limited these days).
Yes I do feel like the emphasis is often wrong; choosing a distro should be about choosing a philosophy towards included packages and updates, choosing a DE is much more relevant for day-to-day user experience/workflow.
Eugenia
in reply to WereCat • • •ffhein
in reply to WereCat • • •Very important. I spend a lot of time at my computer and my desktop environment is like my home. I want it to look in a way that I find aesthetically pleasing and it mustn't try to force me to change the way I work because some UX designer decided that their way was much better than everybody else's. Perhaps you can guess where this is going :D but I've tried to like Gnome 3 since it was first announced. I've given it multiple chances but it just doesn't work for me. It feels like they're going down the same road as all "modern" UIs, where only the most basic features are visible and everything else is either dumped into the "advanced" category or removed entirely. On the other hand, I have a coworker who only uses his PC like a tool, and he thinks Gnome is the best DE ever and can't understand why anyone would want something else.
Currently I use KDE and I'm pretty happy with it. It's highly configurable, and I've made it look and feel the way I want. I used mainly Xfce for a long time but now I prefer KDE.
Limerance
in reply to ffhein • • •djdarren
in reply to WereCat • • •I made the same point to someone on Reddit who asked earlier today what a good distro is from swapping from macOS.
I've only been using Linux for a year or so, so I'm still very much learning how things work, but from my (limited) perspective, whether you use Ubuntu/Fedora/Arch etc... is essentially meaningless to a new user. But how you interact with it isn't.
Personally, I tried Mint first because that's the default answer, and while Cinnamon is fine, I find it too restrictive. Which makes GNOME a no-gno for me. I've tried GNOME, and I hate it. I've landed on Plasma, and I like Plasma.
And crucially, I can use Plasma on my Kubuntu machines, my old MacBook that's now running Arch(btw), and my M1 Mac mini that's running Asahi, and the experience is pretty much the same for what I do. The only difference is the command I use to update my software in Konsole.
scytale
in reply to WereCat • • •exu
in reply to WereCat • • •GNOME and KDE have large philosophical differences and those show when you use them. I really like KDE and the way I can turn it into a tiling window manager.
Comparing a full DE to a WM is a massive difference. DEs have batteries included, you don't need to worry about which notification daemon to use, which tool can do power management or what renders your task bar. You just get every tool and it works.
I used to use i3, then migrated to sway, but the finding of tools that do X or Y got annoying after a while. In KDE everything just works together with no or minimal configuration and I get more features more easily.
Lemmee
in reply to exu • • •What’s your preferred way to turn KDE into a tiling WM? I tried something in the past, but every time I tried to resize a window smaller than 25% of the screen, it would pop it out into floating mode.
I am still using sway because I need to know that there are no hiding windows anywhere. That shit drives me berserk.
erotador
in reply to Lemmee • • •exu
in reply to Lemmee • • •Kröhnkite works well. I'm using it with KDE 6 on plasma no issues.
I just tested a bunch of windows and none of them went floating, not sure about manual resizing though.
Krohnkite
Codeberg.orgLemmee
in reply to exu • • •DickFiasco
in reply to WereCat • • •technocrit
in reply to WereCat • • •Gnome is soooo annoying. You can't customize anything without "tweaks" that barely work.
I definitely prefer the customization of KDE.
Yeah I often wonder about this too. I think that the package manager is another major factor. But I think I might be happy with any distro running KDE. I've gotta get outside my Debian bubble to see.
Luke
in reply to technocrit • • •I'm not trying to convince you to like something you don't, and KDE is a fucking great suite of software.
However, it does sound like maybe you haven't used GNOME in quite a long time. It does have various customizations built in that are available to users through the settings UI these days, and "tweaks that barely work" isn't really a representative critique of the general ecosystem anymore.
GNOME's extension platform is very mature at this point, and I've personally used a bunch of the same extensions for years now spanning like 10 major releases of GNOME without issue. Yeah, the little fly-by-night extensions that get two point releases and then are abandoned don't work forever, but that's true of a lot of old software, and is probably a good thing, honestly.
sakphul
in reply to technocrit • • •Actually that's what I like about GNOME. I don't want a ton of customization options, a right-click menu with multiple dozen entries and a settings menu that needs a "table of contents".
Reduce the UI to such a degree, that you cannot remove anything more without breaking. Thats what I want.
furry toaster
in reply to sakphul • • •somerandomperson
in reply to WereCat • • •youmaynotknow
in reply to somerandomperson • • •I really need to give WMs a try again. It's a huge switch in Streamline, but I think that if I push through with one of the best WMs for a week or 2, I could get use to the new interactions,eventually.
Any suggestions for a long-time Gnome user that feels very comfortable with CosmicDE as it is right now?
somerandomperson
in reply to youmaynotknow • • •NOTE: WMs are only part of what you need for a proper GUI, you'll need to add other components to get a nice desktop GUI.
circuitfarmer
in reply to WereCat • • •DE completely depends on your workflow. The way you do things directly impacts what DEs you'll like and which ones you won't.
I'm with you on KDE: I respect it and it clearly seems to be one of the most feature-rich DEs, but I've had trouble actually using it regularly.
I have been using Cosmic DE for the last 6 months or so. I love it because it seamlessly blends tiled and non-tiled workspaces in an effective way. Part of me really enjoys the simplicity of things like i3, but part of me just wants floating windows. It fully depends on what I'm working on and sometimes just my mood, so for me, the seamless blending in Cosmic has felt perfect.
But how important is DE? Tbh I think it is the most important part of a setup, because you interact with it more than any other piece of the system.
hellmo_luciferrari
in reply to WereCat • • •I have seen people already say similar, but felt like chiming in.
The underlying djstro chosen matters less than the desktop environment or lack thereof. Well, sure you want to pick a district that aligns with your ideals and philosophies. However, as a lot of windows users delve into using Linux they see the distro as what decides the look (and feel) of their new OS.
While many learn about different DEs through different distros, I do think that the DE matters more for workflow for average users.
That being said, I jumped from windows to Arch. I didn't want to be behind on updates. I also am a tinkerer by nature. And I am in the IT industry, have been for more than a decade. So Arch felt right ti me. So I have tried many DE and always go back to KDE. I want war over any being "better." That's a personal choice sincerely.
Hyprland was fun to tinker with, and it can be pretty. But I dont care about ricing as much as many of the stereotypical Arch users.
Limerance
in reply to hellmo_luciferrari • • •yesman
in reply to WereCat • • •Random Dent
in reply to WereCat • • •chaosCruiser
in reply to Random Dent • • •Back in the X11 days, I actively avoided GNOME, because Cinnamon, KDE and XFCE were so much better. I had so many issues with the design philosophy, that using GNOME felt impossible.
However, when Wayland started having some support in GNOME, I got very curious and gave it a try. Then, I also bought my first touch screen laptop, and simply had to try GNOME with it. Turns out, GNOME wasn't that bad, as long as you're not trying to tweak every little thing about it. If you're a tweaker, KDE is definitely the way to go. If not, GNOME might be tolerable or even good.
I've done so much tweaking already, that I don't really have that itch any more. Sure, some things like custom keyboard shortcuts have to be just right, but that's why you have GNOME Tweaks and the dconf Editor.
Joelk111
in reply to Random Dent • • •somegeek
in reply to WereCat • • •I think for most people and normal users, its the most important part of a system.
I'm a software engineer and I've been using only i3wm and sway for the past 3 years. I don't really need a DE. But when I do (very,very rarely) I always prefer Xfce, and after that, Plasma.
BananaTrifleViolin
in reply to WereCat • • •The DE is very important to me, and for me that is KDE. Tbh I find Gnome horrendous to use - too locked down, too uncompromising in it's design. If you like the paradigm then I imagine it's decent - certainly looks very slick. KDE on the other hand is very flexible and has been easy to tune it to exactly what I want.
But i'd say switching DE shouldn't be a "barrier". Almost all distros support multiple DEs, and Gnome or KDE is a common choice.
When is comes to VR, you can set up an alternate X11 session which only runs Steam in gamescope mode, with minimal or no desktop environment. /usr/share/xsessions/ contains defined X11 sessions; you can manually add one that literally only launches one program via a .desktop file pointing to a script (e.g. launches steam in gamescope mode with a specified resolution). Or you can install a very minimal DE such as OpenBox or i3 and set that up to autolaunch Steam in a window or big picture/gamescope mode. This way whenever you want to VR, you log out of your Gnome desktop session and then login to your "Steam" session, and almost a
... show moreThe DE is very important to me, and for me that is KDE. Tbh I find Gnome horrendous to use - too locked down, too uncompromising in it's design. If you like the paradigm then I imagine it's decent - certainly looks very slick. KDE on the other hand is very flexible and has been easy to tune it to exactly what I want.
But i'd say switching DE shouldn't be a "barrier". Almost all distros support multiple DEs, and Gnome or KDE is a common choice.
When is comes to VR, you can set up an alternate X11 session which only runs Steam in gamescope mode, with minimal or no desktop environment. /usr/share/xsessions/ contains defined X11 sessions; you can manually add one that literally only launches one program via a .desktop file pointing to a script (e.g. launches steam in gamescope mode with a specified resolution). Or you can install a very minimal DE such as OpenBox or i3 and set that up to autolaunch Steam in a window or big picture/gamescope mode. This way whenever you want to VR, you log out of your Gnome desktop session and then login to your "Steam" session, and almost all resources are available for Steam and games with minimal overhead. The minimal DE route is probably the better route just because of options to get out of crashes and problem solve. Either way, this route bypasses the Gnome / and general Wayland issues with VR.
youmaynotknow
in reply to WereCat • • •I hate a fee things about Gnome, like how hacky it is to get any screen shot app other than Gnome's to work. Having said that, I tried KDE for a few days, then I tried to customize it to simulate my workflow I think it Gnome as much as possible. Both experiences were a complete fail. It's very hard for me to move from Gnome. Let's see what Cosmic brings to the table in 2026. It's way closer to Gnome in many ways.
As for tour question, to me the DE is 80% of the experience.
TurboWafflz
in reply to WereCat • • •MonkderVierte
in reply to WereCat • • •Less and less, the more i deal with session and tooling issues. Considering going from XFCE to LXQT, for a start. The convenience parts are more and more things i hacked/scripted myself, after the Desktops broke because of circumstances.
And wayland on the notebook... since i don't like Gnome and KDE is too battery-sucking, that was a blank slate from start.
warmaster
in reply to WereCat • • •