openSUSE 12.1 VMware image with KDE

This openSUSE appliance comes with KDE, the classic alternative zu Gnome. After Gnome's simplicity went the way of the Dodo, KDE may the best bet for rich desktop feature enthusiasts. Other alternatives exist, like the Ubuntu LXDE VMware image, which has a minimalist hierarchical start menu and taskbar.

Typically KDE is a bit more resource hungry than Gnome and even more so compared to LXDE. On the other hand, it offers to adjust and finetune many more things than the rigid Gnome allows. The tool and utility set is also more complete, but Gnome has some great applications like Gimp and Gnumeric.

Given that both classic desktops, KDE and Gnome, nowadays try to be so cool like Apple's water and focus more on gimmicks than usability, other desktop environments like LXDE become more interesting.

Additional choices are surely nice, but with Gnome coming off its track and all the babble of cloud computing and toy apps, the open source communities are risking to scatter their energy too much. KDE seems to be the first victim that is going to lose its mind share, despite a desktop that is still ergonomic and functional.

Applications: Firefox, LibreOffice, Gimp and the whole KDE application universe with audio, CD, video, system and communication tools.

Zip md5: 08dca3c4c6a54b01a9a0835dfecd7e9a