KDE/Vision/Drafts/A: Difference between revisions

Latest revision as of 12:50, 14 March 2016

This document is a vision for the future of KDE. It describes worthy goals we see today for the next few years directly ahead of us. It is a living document, and will change over the years.

An end-user focused, openly governed free software community

KDE is a community of free software enthusiasts that strives to provide graphical user interfaces and applications for end-users for all types of computers across the device spectrum: desktops PCs, laptops, tablet, smartphones, etc.

We believe that software should be free and respectful of the privacy of our users. Our values are stated in the KDE Manifesto.

To achieve our goals we work on:

A complete set of cross-platform end-user applications

We want to offer a complete set of end-user applications running on all major operating systems (Linux, OSX, Windows, Android, etc.). This way we enable end-users to manage their "digital life" using free software no matter on which operating system. The set of applications covers internet, office, communication, multimedia, games and many other. They provide the familiar and consistent KDE user experience while fully integrating into the host operating system. This is reached by following common guidelines and using common technologies.

A modern desktop environment for UNIX operating systems

We provide a classical desktop environment for computers and devices running Linux or any other UNIX-compatible operating system (as known from KDE 3 and Plasma). It delivers a polished user experience, is easy to use and flexible. It contains the essentials of a desktop and basic applications like a file manager and a web browser, etc..

A user interface for mobile/embedded Linux systems

We want KDE to offer the most advanced "desktop" for "mobile Linux", like tablets, smartphones or embedded systems.

A cross-platform Software Development Kit

We support the development of end-user desktop and applications by developing reusable software frameworks. We build on top of the cross-platform Qt framework and provide an extensive set of add-on libraries and components to do the tasks above. Our libraries are cross-platform, stable, and provide source and binary compatibility guarantees. They are licensed under Free Software licenses which allow commercial use.

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-So, were would we like to see KDE in 5 years, i.e. 2020 ?
+This document is a vision for the future of KDE.
+It describes worthy goals we see today for the next few years directly ahead of us.
+It is a living document, and will change over the years.
-=== A great community ===
+=== An end-user focused, openly governed free software community ===
-KDE will be a community developing free software for graphical user interfaces, typically using the Qt libraries.
+KDE is a community of free software enthusiasts that strives to  provide graphical user interfaces and applications for end-users for all types of computers across the device spectrum: desktops PCs, laptops, tablet, smartphones, etc.
-"Developing" in the broader sense, with everything which belongs to it, not only programmers, but also designers, user support, translators, etc. etc. Everybody who wants to contribute is welcome in the community.
-* I mentioned Qt here because this is what we have been doing since KDE started, and since we don't have a plan to port away from it to anything else. Why hide our experience in this field ?  (Alex N)
-* Since this point covers what "KDE" by definition now is (a community), this seems to be the heart of the proposed VisionA. (the following points are then visions by itself for the individual projects like KF5, Plasma Shell Desktop/Mobile, KDE Applications, etc., which are interesting by themselves, but imo not in the broader KDE sense). Therefore if one only looks at this point as the main vision, you see it is exclusive and narrow as it only picks out and mentions specifically "graphical user interfaces typically using Qt" (which can be good or not so good depending on what we as a community want the vision and focus to be, so I am not judging here). So with the premise that any following points are not part of the definiton of "KDE" as in the community, but concrete project visions, this should be the main point discussed and focused on. (Clemens Toennies)
-=== The best classic UNIX desktop ===
+We believe that software should be free and respectful of the privacy of our users. Our values are stated in the [http://manifesto.kde.org KDE Manifesto].
-The KDE desktop (Plasma ?) will be the most polished, most easy to use and most flexible desktop for PCs running a UNIX-compatible OS with X11 or Wayland.
-*  that's basically the original vision from Matthias Ettrich  (Alex N)
-* with "PCs" I mean workstations, desktop PCs and notebooks  (Alex N)
-* I excluded Windows and OSX on purpose, those have native desktops, trying to replace them won't fly (it didn't for the last years)  (Alex N)
+''To achieve our goals we work on:''
-=== The mobile/embedded Linux user interface/desktop of choice ===
+==== A complete set of cross-platform end-user applications ====
-KDE will be the "desktop" of choice for "mobile Linux", in case some of the projects for Linux on mobile devices takes off (Plasma Mobile, or Sailfish OS, or Firefox OS, ....).
+We want to offer a complete set of end-user applications running on all major operating systems (Linux, OSX, Windows, Android, etc.). This way we enable end-users to manage their "digital life" using free software no matter on which operating system. The set of applications covers internet, office, communication, multimedia, games and many other.
-* not sure about this one. No such platform currently really exists.  (Alex N)
+They provide the familiar and consistent KDE user experience while fully integrating into the host operating system.
-* Should this include stuff like TVs, in-car/plane-entertainment systems, technical/industrial user interfaces ? Or just things like RPi ?
+This is reached by following common guidelines and using common technologies.
-* Should this target mainly the hacker community ? Or also commercial use ? (Alex N)
-* Or leave this point away completely ?  (Alex N)
+==== A modern desktop environment for UNIX operating systems ====
+We provide a classical desktop environment for computers and devices running Linux or any other UNIX-compatible operating system (as known from KDE 3 and Plasma). It delivers a polished user experience, is easy to use and flexible. It contains the essentials of a desktop and basic applications like a file manager and a web browser, etc..
-=== The Leader in Cross-platform applications ===
+==== A user interface for mobile/embedded Linux systems ====
-KDE will be well known among end-users for high-quality applications, robust, stable and running smoothly under Windows, OSX,  Android and Linux (and "mobile Linux"). This way we enable end-users to use free software to manage their "digital life".
+We want KDE to offer the most advanced "desktop" for "mobile Linux", like tablets, smartphones or embedded systems.
-The applications should integrate well into the "native" desktop of the respective OS.
-The set of applications should include an office suite (at least word processor, spreadsheet and presentation) and a state-of-the-art web browser (using a widely used web engine).
-* Currently there are very few KDE applications which are used widely outside desktop Linux. Krita comes to my mind. This point means we want to change this, and people will use Calligra instead of LibreOffice on Windows, and Okular on their Android tablets.  (Alex N)
+==== A cross-platform Software Development Kit ====
-* This also means users should not have to install a system similar to cygwin, but the KDE applications should feel like normal applications for each platform.  (Alex N)
-=== First Class Qt addon libraries ===
+We support the development of end-user desktop and applications by developing reusable software frameworks. We build on top of the cross-platform Qt framework and provide an extensive set of add-on libraries and components to do the tasks above. Our libraries are cross-platform, stable, and provide source and binary compatibility guarantees. They are licensed under Free Software licenses which allow commercial use.
-KDE will be well known among FLOSS- and commercial developers as the Number One source for high-quality Qt addon libraries: the libraries are robust, stable, they provide source- and binary compatibility guarantees and they work smoothly on Windows, OSX, Android and Linux (and "mobile Linux").
-* We are aiming at this with KF5, so make that a top priority. (Alex N)