Open Ended

The openSUSE Linux distribution will offer KDE as its default desktop environment in future versions. This move echoes the SUSE community's historical affinity for KDE and indicates that this preference still persists among contemporary users of openSUSE.

SUSE, one of the oldest commercial Linux distributions, was originally established in 1992 as a derivative of Slackware. It evolved considerably over the years and dropped its Slackware heritage, shifting towards the RPM package manager and other aspects of the Red Hat ecosystem. It also gained many unique features such as the YaST configuration system. The company behind SUSE was one of the most well-known European Linux vendors and became a very active contributor to the KDE project.

Novell acquired SUSE in 2003 shortly after acquiring Ximian, one of the most prominent GNOME distributors. Novell brought the two distros together and continued to actively contribute to the advancement of both KDE and GNOME. Novell's commercial SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop (SLED) ships with a GNOME environment, however, and much of Novell's investment in desktop application development has been heavily focused on GNOME.

Novell's community-driven openSUSE distro, which is used as a proving ground to stabilize the technology that is used in SLED, has largely aimed to be desktop-agnostic. The installation DVD image includes the full set of packages for both desktop environments and requires users to manually select one during the installation process. Installable Live CD images are also available for each desktop.

It's all in the numbers

Despite this effort to create the perception of desktop equality in openSUSE, the community has always been more culturally and technologically aligned with KDE. The latest openSUSE desktop survey shows that roughly 68 percent of openSUSE users favor KDE and only 27 percent use GNOME. In light of the clear preference towards KDE, the only thing that is really surprising about the decision to make it the official default is that it didn't happen sooner.

Although debates about the distro's relative level of endorsement for KDE and GNOME have been present consistently ever since openSUSE was founded, the issue was elevated to a high-priority topic of discussion recently when a user posted a feature request at the openFATE brainstorming site encouraging the developers to adopt KDE as the official default. The suggestion attracted a considerable amount of attention and received a lot of positive feedback from members of the openSUSE community. According to the openFATE voting system, 449 users side with the proposal and only 121 oppose it.

Prominent KDE developers also weighed in on the issue and voiced their support, including Sebastian Kügler who posted a blog entry with some insightful arguments in favor of making KDE the default.

"The numbers are clear, KDE is the preferred desktop of the openSUSE community. There is a formal request to reflect that in the installation process. Novell, and those with decision-making powers in the openSUSE team now have the opportunity to prove that features.opensuse.org is not just a lip-service, that the community does control the direction of openSUSE," he wrote. "Not having a preset for the desktop that is installed is hampering adoption of openSUSE."

Over the past year, Novell has taken some important steps to give the openSUSE community greater autonomy and more control over technical decisions relating to the distribution. For example, the project's governance model got a boost last year when the first elected board took office. The movement to make KDE the default desktop has been closely watched because it provided an opportunity to test Novell's willingness to respect the community's independence.

On Thursday, Novell's Michael Loeffler announced on the openSUSE mailing list that the proposal to make KDE the default desktop in openSUSE will be implemented. The decision was made by Loeffler in collaboration with the openSUSE leadership and was based on the feedback provided by the openSUSE community. He emphasized the fact that the distro's commitment to GNOME would not be negatively impacted by the change.

"After consideration of the project discussion I discussed the feature request further with the openSUSE Board and other leaders within the openSUSE project and came to the decision to follow the request: we will default the radio button to KDE in the DVD installer," he wrote. "We want to make clear that both desktops are considered equal citizens within the openSUSE Project, and this will not have any impact on the quality of the GNOME desktop within openSUSE."

Users will still be able to select other desktops instead during the installation process, but the KDE option will be preselected so that it will be installed by default for users who do not choose a different option. Although much of the debate around the decision has focused on desktop commitment and making the installer accurately reflect the preferences of the user population, one particularly noteworthy advantage of the change is that users will no longer be forced to manually select a desktop environment during the installation process—a query that could be intimidating to new users.

The decision to make KDE the default desktop in openSUSE arrives at a significant moment in the evolution of KDE itself. The desktop environment suffered some setbacks during the difficult transition to version 4, but it is beginning to solidify and now delivers considerable value over the previous series. The endorsement of a high-profile distro validates the underlying vision behind KDE 4 and serves as a reminder that KDE still has a very strong presence on the desktop.