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On 23rd of April 2015, Mihai Șucan passed away due to metastatic cancer caused by RDEB.

My name is Mihai and I work on the Firefox developer tools. When it comes to web development, I like both server-side and client-side work. I am mainly interested in web browsers, web standards and related technologies.

Fix/configure Linux font rendering

One of the most common issues on Linux is font rendering. Usually the Arial font renders really badly, especially if you use Gnome and you try KDE/Qt applications (for example Opera).

Gnome and KDE use fontconfig to render fonts, but both use different settings. As such, if you pick your Gnome-based distro, you usually have problems with KDE/Qt, and vice-versa.

The Appearance properties (gnome-appearance-properties) allows you to nicely change the font rendering options. You can also manually adjust these settings using the gconf-edit tool, just go to the /desktop/gnome/font_rendering preference keys.

KDE has it's own appearance properties, but usually Gnome users don't know which one it is, and they don't want to install the entire KDE package.

To adjust the font rendering options for KDE/Qt applications, here's what you need to know. You can create a per-user ~/.fonts.conf file, or you can set system-wide settings by editing /etc/fonts/fonts.conf (and/or /etc/fonts/conf.d).

Download my .fonts.conf file. Just save this in your home folder and restart your KDE/Qt applications. I use the same settings in Gnome.

I do not recommend you to edit the /etc/fonts/fonts.conf file. However, you can still adjust global settings by changing the symbolic links in /etc/fonts/conf.d. I did that myself.

Please read man fonts.conf for more details.

Note: you might not like my font rendering configuration, because it also depends on your monitor and screen resolution. Please adjust the settings as needed.

My KDE color scheme

Someone contacted me several months ago asking for my KDE color scheme, after he read my blog post about the Kubuntu theme.

Now I had the time to do so. Download my KDE Human color scheme.

Note: The color scheme was made for personal use. No changes were made for this release. I did not intend to make it look very good/professional. Actually, I believe it looks pretty bad in KDE. I use GNOME and the colors are picked such that the KDE applications look good enough in GNOME.

I use the Polyester KDE Style. You might want to try the Klearlook KDE style as well. Both styles are available in the Ubuntu repositories.

For making your KDE applications even more ... Human, make sure you pick the Human icons in KControl.

Good luck. :)

The themes of (k)Ubuntu

Hello!

One of the first steps, and most likely the easiest, in making KDE and GNOME seem consistent is getting both of them have the same themes.

I simply don't understand (somebody explain to me please) why is Kubuntu required to have a completely different theme than Ubuntu?

Seriously, guys, if you really want that, then no problem: Kubuntu blue and Ubuntu orange. BUT at least take the time and provide both of the themes so we can select the one we want in the theme managers of both DEs.

I personally favour Ubuntu's theme. I can't get get KDE apps to look exactly as those in GNOME. I switched to polyester, I applied my own color theme (the Ubuntu colors available on kde-look suck, and that's nicely said - I had to make mine). The biggest problem is changing the icons. I believed this should be easy: in kcontrol I find the icon set named Human. Yes, it changes most of the icons, but the most obvious ones are still the blue KDE Crystal: file icons - and some others :). Again, KDE-Look provides amateurish Human iconsets for KDE which don't even properly work.

Oh and for those wondering: somebody cannot live in a GNOME-only box, or KDE-only box. It's not going to happen, not today, not tomorrow.

Hint: this is not a "job" that needs to be done by neither of the DE teams. It's the "job" of the distro guys.

Making the orange theme the default in Kubuntu would be awesome, not because of the theme itself - I'd say the same if Ubuntu would use by default the Kubuntu theme.

Bonus suggestion: while they are at it, they should configure the default behaviour of KDE to match the one of GNOME (or vice-versa).

Summary of the post: get the GNOME theme on KDE, and get the KDE theme on GNOME. It's easy, it's doable, both DEs are capable of it.

Good luck!

P.S. I don't like the purple theme in Kubuntu Edgy Eft.

KDE and GNOME

Yet another blog post about KDE and Gnome. You've all been waiting for this one. :)

First of all, I use Gnome 2.14 and I have some parts of KDE 3.5.3 installed too. Why? Gnome seems to be better glued together and more professional, feels less bloated and it also feels faster. I say it only feels so, because I haven't done any real tests.

KDE got some real goodies like Quanta Plus which is probably the best web programmers editor I've used. Given it's free ... I'd say it's amazing. I've seen loads of shareware editors that have far less features (for Windows of course).

KDE TV was also my favourite TV application since it's really good for all my TV viewing needs (it does have the deinterlace filter :) ). However, since then I switched to tvtime, because I find it faster and better in some ways (too bad I can't configure it too much, it's very minimalistic).

I was pleasantly surprised by Konqueror (as a web browser). I've never knew it's so powerful. Much better than IE. Too bad it's very little known. I am aware it's not a browser as capable as Opera or Firefox, but it's very good (it can properly render all the CSS layout sites I have).

Nicest surprise to KDE was KTTS. Nice stuff guys. Just one suggestion: add a global shortcut for reading the clipboard.

KolourPaint is my choice for simple image editing (GIMP is too advanced/different for me ... even if I am used to Photoshop).

Kig and Kseg are two educational packages worth the time spent by their respective authors on development. Meaning Kseg is a very cool dynamic geometry software, but it's not as complete as Kig. Kig, IMHO, will become my primary tool for dynamic geometry. It's very, very good and advanced. Yet, I still need to learn some of its capabilities. :)

Amarok is the music player. Much better than Winamp and all others. I've tested Rythmbox, Banshee, juK and other music players. None comes close to Amarok, which is feature packed and nonetheless it's fast enough. Don't expect it to be as fast as XMMS, but it's faster than Banshee and Rythmbox which are the two music players receiving most attention. Amarok has a very good collection, tagging with online database, automatic scoring of songs you listen most, it also picks similar songs recommended by Last.fm. You can automatically search for lyrics, for artist information, similar artists, etc. The context browser is very nice, because it automatically shows songs you are most likely to be interested of (favourites, new additions, songs from the same album, same artist, etc). Other goodies includes are cover management (automatically finds the cover online), Python extensions (web control and more), nice customizable OSD and lots more. Simply put, amarok is the best player. It doesn't crash, it got a very fast collection search and analizer. Rythmbox and Banshee both crashed when scanning my songs, LOL.

The funniest part in KDE is ... guess what? Image viewers. Amusing, huh? Most KDE image viewers suck big time. They are even worse than the worst image viewer I've ever seen on Windows. There you go, I've said it. Shocking statement? I'd say it's a shocking fact on my Ubuntu 6.06 install (and Ubuntu 5.10): just loading an image of lets say 800x600 in Kview (or KuickShow, whatever) and zooming to 400% sends the system to hell :). Memory usage increases a lot and the virtual memory is required, so the HDD activity raises like I'm copying several files on the network at once (it even slows down mouse movements). I suppose it's because the 400% zoomed image is way too big to hold it all in the memory :). Veeery efficient code. If this caused by the Ubuntu distro, then ... this is the worst thing Ubuntu has.

Worth noting is the problem doesn't apply to KolourPaint, which most likely uses a different library.

Here comes the irony: KDE image viewers have better support for image formats. I wasn't able to view some BMP images with any of the Gnome image viewer (GQView, Gthumb and EOG). Also, I wasn't able to see any PSD image, only KDE supports them. :)

So, my default image viewer is Gthumb and besides it I also have Kview. I removed all the other image viewers.

The latest Kopete seems to be a very attractive alternative to Gaim. I simply enjoyed "hacking" into the XSLT files to change the display of the conversation. I also like it has notifications, and more options. What made me not to use Kopete: it's underdeveloped. Anyway, Kopete is still in its infancy.

Both desktop environments are not professional and fast enough. They should also follow stricter guidelines, making them look more professional.

I like the panels, the applets, menus editing, the multiple desktops/workspaces environment, the keyboard configuration (accessibility, layouts and variants). These are things Windows should get too, just like it should get proper permissions per file and symbolic links. Windows is actually a very weak desktop environment compared to KDE and Gnome.

Gnome 2.14 has noticeable speed improvements. As far as I know, it's going to get more speed improvements for version 2.16. I like that. KDE 4 is going to be interesting, but I have a "hunch": it's going to be buggy, since they make big changes.

I like the idea of KDE: having a single keyboard shortcuts editor in all applications, a single toolbar editor, menu editor, etc. I also seem to like the idea of KNotify with it's integration with KTTS.

As for customization, KDE is the clear "winner". I like I can easily customize the themes and everything I want in a single place: KDE Control Center. Yes, I know it's hatable, but it's also good. The themes in KDE seems to be more flexible than the ones in Gnome.

What I dislike when I am in Gnome, if I start KDE applications, I'm seeing KDE, not Gnome. I know it's normal, because they depend upon the KDE packages, but there should be more interoperability. Why not use the Gnome keyboard shortcuts editor when in Gnome? Why not use the Gnome widgets (and more stuff)? Same goes for when I am in KDE: I see Gnome stuff.

It's all about consistency. Is that too much to ask for? :)

Projects like Tango Desktop Project, LSB and Portland are very good because they help with consistency. I'm glad the latest Ubuntu uses the Tango icons.

KDE and Gnome also play the "catch-up with Windows" game Windows functionality, just like OpenOffice seems to do with Microsoft Office. Microsoft will always be one step ahead, because they are currently modifying the rules of the game with Microsoft Office, Windows Vista and more.

Why not be a bit different? Why not bring something new and better?

Thanks to Microsoft, alternative web browsers (Opera, Firefox, Safari, Konqueror) had enough time to go miles ahead of Internet Explorer.

KDE and Gnome had the same amount of time... and the heads of these desktop environments decided upon using the allocated time to catch-up with Windows. They almost did. :)

KDE 4 received some good press, mostly hype currently (IMHO), about bringing new stuff to the table, about innovation (Plasma, whatever). That's nice. I'd be glad if they'll succeed.

Another thing I do not like, specially in regards to KDE: they include a huge amount of packages. Come on, keep the desktop environment only. Gnome is sticking to Epiphany, which is, with all due respect, yet-another Gecko browser. Seriously, why would I switch to Epiphany? Both desktop environments should be bare bones. The other packages should only be optional, just like screen is.

Konqueror, as a file manager this time, is more feature packed than Nautilius. However, I'm in favour for the simplicity offered by Nautilius.

The overall conclusion is both desktop environments are powerful, each having its own strengths and weaknesses. I am very well aware most of the ideas have already been expressed before by others, yet I think the more people voice their opinions the closer we'll get to this happening (consistency, blah, blah). Those in charge of the development of these two great desktop environments will take into consideration what the majority says.