After 4 years on KDE, back to Gnome

First a little introduction :

I am a proud long-time Linux user. First I started with Slackware (back in '99) on my IBM Laptop and I succeeded to accomplish many things, like getting my wireless working. But I was a purist on Linux; since I had 3 other PCs with Windows installed. After a long break on PCs, in 2004 I got my hands on a Toshiba Laptop and installed Fedora on it but had some issues and so I switched to Ubuntu. The Gnome DE was something "new" and exiting for me. But then came another break on PCs until fall 2005, where I build a shiny new PC just for me.

I gave Kubuntu a try. It was great, finally a DE where I could go on my servers with Konqueror, as if they where folders on my PC. And the all in all working great together of the applications was refreshing. I changed to Gentoo, Sabayon, Mint - always with KDE - but came always back to Kubuntu.

But with the release of KDE 4, the great deception overcome me as well as so many others. Because I am someone who likes his habits and does not like to change, I wanted to give KDE 4 a try, even if I could have stayed with 3.5 (but it is in all cases a dead end in favour of the new release).
Before the release I had many expectations on KDE 4; I wanted to have the same working horse, just with a new blanket. The first release was buggy, of course - there is no problem with it, they start something new from scratch, I waited for the 4.1. Lesser bugs, but also lesser similarities to the old version I was used to. True, they did go a big step to push forward new techniques, but I never got used to Dolphin as the filemanager, to take an example. And the change back to Konqueror in KDE 4 was not the same anymore. I could feel it in my daily use (and believe me, I use the filemanager quiet often), that they "ditched" Konqueror in favour of Dolphin.

Many may say that I can do many things in the configuration, etc. But I just do not have the time (else I would go back to Slackware or Gentoo). What I love most today is the fact, that - thanks to the big distributions - Linux got mainstream. Ease of use is the key.

So I had less and lesser pleasure working on KDE, and more and more details came to my attention. Some minor glitches in the design of the task-bar, the whole DE was sluggish and "heavy". I do not know how to put it in words.
The fact is, I installed the Beta of Ubuntu 10.04 in VirtualBox to see how Gnome looks like this days. What caught my eyes first was the integration of social networks and IM into Gnome. That was something I did not know I wanted.
And I took also a sneak-peak on Gnome 3 - what seems very promising - to see what the future looks like. Still on my old workstation I changed via tasksel to the Gnome DE and had straight the impression I expected from the VirtualBox experience.

So I took my decision to install Ubuntu 10.04 on my next PC (which arrived last Monday, a Dell Precision T1500).

I have to admit, I still need time to get used to Gnome, but I do not regret the switch to it. I will nevertheless keep an eye on KDE, to see how it will evolve in the near future.