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I know Gnome is the default on popular distros: Fedora, Ubuntu, Rhel, Pop OS (it's Cosmic Desktop yes but it is still based on Gnome)...etc. But Gnome just doesnt work for me. I would pick XFCE - stable and no BS.

Before Manjaro and their cetificate shenanigan, I used to use their XFCE version. At the time, it was marketed as the "Flagship Manjaro version". I went 4 years without any problems and I did tinker a lot, just couldnt get their XFCE to break.

After a tough Arch or Gentoo installs, I just want to put XFCE on and call it a day.

What about you guys?

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[-] Dragonlord21@feddit.org 1 points 5 hours ago
[-] lumony@lemmings.world 1 points 1 day ago

KDE, it's the swiss army knife of DEs.

[-] phoenixz@lemmy.ca 9 points 3 days ago

KDE, always

Used it since I switched to the Linux Desktop 25 years ago. Quickly tried gnome, and others, and hated it.

KDE is fast, efficient, looks awesome, is ready to work with, and highly customizable

[-] potemkinhr@lemmy.ml 8 points 3 days ago

KDE plasma. Coming from 30 years of running exclusively windows it's just the most comfortable and easy for me to use (way more than Gnome). Easily configurable, works. Can't ask for more.

[-] MangoPenguin@lemmy.blahaj.zone 14 points 4 days ago

Probably KDE, it's the most 'complete' feeling to me with settings and GUI for most things.

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[-] Wojwo@lemmy.ml 5 points 3 days ago

KDE plasma, unless it's on a tablet, then Gnome

[-] AugustWest@lemm.ee 21 points 4 days ago

KDE. Been upgrading the same environment for 5 years just keeps getting better.

I started around maybe KDE 3?

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[-] Kory@lemmy.ml 62 points 5 days ago

That's not too hard a question for me, I've been using the same DE for years: KDE

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[-] 6R1MR34P3R@lemmy.ml 5 points 3 days ago

KDE Plasma for ease of use if using Nvidia Otherwise Hyprland or exwm

[-] AusatKeyboardPremi@lemmy.world 5 points 3 days ago

MATE has been on most of my machines, except the BSD ones.

But past year or so, I have grown a fondness towards ctwm, and gradually migrated my machines to it, Linux and BSD alike.

It is not a DE, but the fact that I have to assemble my suite of software myself on my machines, makes the point of using DEs moot.

[-] the16bitgamer@programming.dev 5 points 3 days ago

Cinnamon for 2 reasons

  1. KDE is missing a lot of features which still only works in Gnome. Like the taskbar Calendar app syncing events with services like Google Calendar

  2. cinnamon is extremely stable and doesn’t move your icons around when you connect to an external display with your laptop and the display has a different resolution.

[-] lengau@midwest.social 15 points 4 days ago

This isn't even hard. KDE without a second thought.

I regularly try other desktops, and I regularly come back to the only desktop with any sort of reasonable thought put into it.

[-] ludicolo@lemmy.ml 10 points 4 days ago

KDE the customization is off the charts

[-] nafzib@lemmy.world 12 points 4 days ago

KDE for sure. The modern versions look exactly like how I want a desktop environment to look out of the box, and they keep the full range of customizability that a desktop should, IMO, allow it's users to have. Which is something Windows just kept slowly getting rid of over the years.

I also prefer to have a taskbar that is ever present with a traditional start menu that's cleanly organized by category rather than the current full screen pop up "activities" search thing gnome does nowadays.

[-] slembcke@lemmy.ml 17 points 4 days ago

Definitely Gnome here. Though I have a long list of notes, it mostly just works exactly like I expect with little friction or guessing. I donate $100/year to both Gnome and KDE since they are both good pieces of software, and I love that I get to chose mine. Further, I think KDE is the logical choice for something like the SteamDeck where it's going to have a lot of gamers that expect computers to work like Windows. (even if I don't like it, >_<)

[-] intelisense@lemm.ee 33 points 5 days ago
[-] floppybutton@lemmy.dbzer0.com 12 points 4 days ago

I keep coming back to KDE time and time again. It's so easy to mess with, I can set it up exactly how I like it without much effort, and it always looks good because someone else did all the work making themes and widgets I use.

That said, I love XFCE, I'm just trash with CSS so it takes me forever to get it how I like, and on my Surface I can't get the scaling to work so everything is beyond tiny.

[-] eric5949@lemmy.world 30 points 5 days ago

Plasma, been using it since I was a kid

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[-] steeznson@lemmy.world 7 points 4 days ago

XFCE would be my choice too

[-] Lemmchen@feddit.org 27 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

I'd rather not use a computer at all than use GNOME for the rest of my live.
For me it's KDE Plasma all the way.

[-] Photuris@lemmy.ml 27 points 5 days ago

It’s wild to me how GNOME evokes such strong opinions in folks. It really is a love it or hate it kind of deal (I’m in the “love it” camp).

I wonder why that is. I like KDE ok, but it doesn’t elicit a strong emotion from me. KDE works fine, I just really like GNOME.

There must be something about GNOME in particular that some people love, and others hate.

[-] lumony@lemmings.world 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Personally, I'm disgusted by the "matter of fact" tone GNOME devs take to criticism only to be wrong in the end.

It's like, they dig their heels in so deep on dumb shit like "the dock should be on the side because vertical space is at a premium!" and then renege after years of users telling them they're wrong. Literally whoever is floating ideas like that on their team needs to be fired and blacklisted, but unfortunately they're probably promoted.

They also can't be arsed to include proper settings, so it's up to everyone else to pick up their slack.

At some point, it starts to feel like weaponized incompetence. I genuinely do not want GNOME's culture to pervade more parts of the free software ecosystem.

[-] semperverus@lemmy.world 27 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

For those of us that expect room to breathe and make our machine work for us rather than the other way around, we feel like Gnome takes a lot of liberties away for the sake of "simplicity." There is so much missing from Gnome that is present in most other DEs and even custom WM setups.

The primary contributors who work under The Gnome Foundation also come off as controlling and arrogant in a lot of cases, and refuse to take community feedback to heart, whereas KDE has literal summits to get user feedback on major core features we want to see which then later get added to their backlogs and sprints as Epics. Gnome acts a lot like Apple in the sense that they're very much "we know what's best for you better than you do."

Now, the singular area I can give Gnome true props in is their accessibility functionality, but that's primarily it. KDE's accessibility is fairly behind by about a decade in comparison.

That's just my take, take it as you will.

[-] lumony@lemmings.world 1 points 1 day ago

I also wouldn't have as much of an issue with gnome for removing features if they also made the right design decision in place of those features.

They want to remove features to make things easier on them, not users.

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[-] jokro@feddit.org 22 points 5 days ago

GNOME because it works out of the box like GNOME

[-] warmaster@lemmy.world 20 points 5 days ago

KDE Plasma.

It has been great for gaming, adopting Wayland protocols at a faster rate than other DEs due in part thanks to Valve's contributions.

I freaking love GNOME & Adwaita, but I'll switch back when I deem it better than Plasma.

[-] Horse@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 3 days ago
[-] Bogus007@lemm.ee 2 points 2 days ago

I am absolutely with you about i3. Simply great (there is also dwm or qtile)! But it is a WM, not a DE, what OP asked about.

[-] Horse@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 2 days ago
[-] Bogus007@lemm.ee 2 points 2 days ago

You mean switching between the DE xfce and the WM i3wm, right? Yep, this works and it can indeed make life sometimes easier to have a DE and a WM aside each other.

[-] Horse@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 2 days ago

yeah, basically just running xfce but replacing xfwm4 with i3
i was kinda surprised how well it worked tbh, i had been using i3 on it's own for like a year before i tried it

[-] Bogus007@lemm.ee 2 points 2 days ago

Oh, I did not know about the possibility of replacing xfwm4 with i3. I too am using i3 for some years and like a lot to have a clean surface which facilitates focussing on my tasks. However, never thought about integrating it in a DE.

[-] OmegaLemmy@discuss.online 13 points 4 days ago
[-] Aelis@lemm.ee 9 points 4 days ago

Always wanted to like gnome but never could, and xfce is fine but I much prefer KDE, it is verry likely that I'll actually keep it till my pc breaks.

[-] easily3667@lemmus.org 8 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

That's the beauty of gnome: they don't give a single fuck if you like it. You can return the favor.

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[-] lka1988@lemmy.dbzer0.com 13 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Cinnamon by and far.

I've used so many distros and DEs I don't even know where to begin, but Cinnamon got me hooked for the long run. It's legitimately the most polished and "ready to run" DE I've ever used, yet still allowing for far more customization than Windows ever offered.

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this post was submitted on 28 Mar 2025
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