On 08/14/2018 03:01 PM, andre_debian@numericable.fr wrote:

...

Somebody told me on tnis list, that TDE was based on Icewm. (if I understood correctly).

Chuckling.... (you didn't)

That would be the same as saying KDE was based on IceWm. IceWm as well = as Blackbox (and its forks, Fluxbox, Openbox, etc.. -- the boxtops) were ori= ginal code. Neither were Qt3 based. TDE was a continuation of KDE3 based on Qt3= . Information and history on all are available online (Wikipedia is a good = start).

While both IceWm and Blackbox (and its progeny) are very, very good win= dow managers, they are not "Desktop Environments". That is a critical distinc= tion.

KDE and Gnome were considered desktop environments as they included a n= ice set of integrated desktop applications (terminals, editors, calculators, = color choosers, file managers, etc..) with a common look and feel provided by t= he toolkits they use (Qt3 in the case of KDE3 and Gtk+2 in the case of Gnome= 2, etc..)

TDE continued the mature KDE3 build on Qt3, that kde.org basically "left-for-dead" when it went chasing this pipe-dream of Qt4 widgets makin= g the world a better place to live. (much as Gtk+3 did with Gtk+2/glade when it= ran off with GtkBuildable and css styling of objects)

TDE, in an inspired bit of forethought, was written with a somewhat too= lkit agnostic tqtinterface layer to prevent being limited to Qt3 only. However= , since KDE4 has become synonymous with "How to totally botch a desktop", t= he impetus on toolkit flexibility has lost a bit of necessity. Qt3 was a rob= ust and well written toolkit and there nothing it lacks inherently and what security and maintenance is needed is provided in-house.

So in short, TDE was a continuation of KDE 3.5.10 which was left for de= ad by kde.org and relegated to desktop history. Now kde.org has abandoned KDE4 = and "left-it-for-dead" (though it that case, I doubt you will see anyone run = in to try and save it....)

Those intimately familiar with desktops, recognized what had been achie= ved with KDE3 was special, in terms of flexibility and efficiency and the hum= an factors taken into the desktop design that minimize the keystrokes or mouse-clicks required to do a task, and how that philosophy shared by the= team created not only the desktop interface itself, but was also evident in ea= ch of the applications developed as a part of the project. KDE3 was the result = of that ground-up process, the desktop and all of the application that made = up the environment benefiting from that process in terms of usability and ef= ficiency.

It is something that can never be captured in a "Let's move to a new to= olkit and port all the applications over" effort. Every time that has been attempted, it invariably results is a "just get it ported and working... = and let's get a release out" mentality that cannot, and will never, achieve t= he same efficiency or usability that a ground-up design did. Thus KDE4 could= n't and Plasma never will match the elegance, the integration or the usabilty= of the KDE3 desktop environment.

TDE continues the best of KDE3 -- that's why you are here.

--=20 David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E.

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Well said prof. Umm, may I have me soapbox back now?

Kate Seriously, well said.