[TriLUG] Best Linux Desktop and Desktop Apps?

[Tanner Lovelace]

On 3/10/06, Tarus Balog <tarus at opennms.org> wrote:
> 1) What should I look at in terms of a nice, clean, powerful desktop?
> I like KDE. Is there a distro out there that is stable enough to use
> in a mission critical application (i.e. my desktop) that is current
> enough to contain lots of cool, bright, shiny things? I think Debian
> is out since I don't want to run sid. CentOS? Ubuntu? I doubt anyone
> has duplicated the usefulness of Exposé, but one can hope.

You mean  like Kompose? http://kompose.berlios.de/ :-)
It seems to be installed on my Kubuntu Breezy box (that I upgraded
to KE 3.5).  I'll have to try it when I get home.

> 2) Recommended apps? I believe I will have to have CodeWeavers just
> because my job requires access to Office and I'd like access to
> iTunes, but others:

iTunes is supported in Codeweaver's wine and sadly, none of the media
programs in linux yet reach it's level of functionality.

> Office: OpenOffice, KOffice?

Or just MS office under Codeweavers.

> Widgets: ?

Superkaramba?  I think it's fairly similar.

> Calendar: ?

You could try Mozilla Sunbird, but I'm not sure if it's ready
for prime time yet.  I know it's not nearly as good as OS X's
iCal. :-(

Alternatively, there's always KOrganizer, but I haven't been
able to figure out how to easily subscribe it to remote calendars.

> Address Book: ?

KAddressBook has good integration with KDE apps.

> Adium: ?

Gaim is probably your best bet here.  Kopete works too, but
it's not nearly as featureful as Gaim is.

> iPhoto: Gallery?

I've heard good things about digiKam.

> iMovie: ?
> iDVD: ?

Cinelerra is probably your best bet here.

Other notes:  If you're mainly using KDE but have a few GTK apps
you want to use, you can install the GTK-QT theme which will make
GTK use Qt widgets for it's theme.  The advantage here is that
all your apps will look the same whether they're KDE or GTK.

Also, take a look at
http://linuxgangster.org/modules.php?name=Content&file=viewarticle&id=15
for information on how to make KDE look just like OS X. :-)

Good luck.

Cheers,
Tanner

--
Tanner Lovelace
clubjuggler at gmail dot com
http://wtl.wayfarer.org/
(fieldless) In fess two roundels in pale, a billet fesswise and an
increscent, all sable.