Board efforts: scope, concept, and permission?

[Kevin Kofler]

Toshio Kuratomi wrote:
> This may be true on its own but we need to be careful of setting it up as
> a dichotomy because it becomes false when put in that context.  I want my
> computer to stay out of my way and let me do things.  Yet I use KDE
> because KDE stays out of my way much better than Gnome.  So no matter what
> the desktop environment targeted, KDE gave me the option to have the OS
> stay out of my way whereas gnome forced me to fight the OS when I just
> wanted to get my work done.

What you found is an inherent problem with lack of options: if what you need 
to do is not covered by the unchangeable defaults, you computer stands in 
your way in the most annoying possible way.

> So there's a false thought in here.  Just because you have a configuration
> option doesn't mean you have to change it.  It just means you can change
> it. If I install KDE and don't touch any configuration options I have a
> usable, general purpose desktop that probably fits me as well as gnome. 
> If I were the kind of person that hated touching configuration, I'd be in
> the same boat whether I used KDE or GNOME.

Right, and that's exactly why not offering options doesn't make sense. 
Nobody forces anybody to use the KDE options. Despite rumors to the 
contrary, KDE carefully choses sane defaults. But you still get the option 
to override them if they don't match what you like or what you need.

        Kevin Kofler