People who want to learn GNU/Linux always find this discussion, which Desktop Environment should I use in my daily computer activity. When it comes to Desktop Environment, there are 2 names which come in mind, either GNOME or KDE. These Desktop Environment have their own vision and mission in how Dekstop in GNU/Linux should like and of course their own implementation.

GNOME is built on top GTK+ library using C Programming Language. It was a simple, fast, clean and lean desktop environment. Currently GNOME is on the road to GNOME 3.0, hopefully in the next year. Some popular GNOME applications are Evolution, a Personal Information Management Software with great interface and well integrated in GNOME Desktop. Not forget to mention Nautilus, a powerful and fast file manager.

GTK+ also used in some popular application beside GNOME, like Pidgin and Mozilla Firefox. Some distribution also add mono-based application inside GNOME Desktop package. In openSUSE and Ubuntu, a GNOME desktop also consist Tomboy, a note-taking application. F-Spot, a Picture Management application, and Banshee, a music player with a lot of interesting features. There are also popular application built using Mono, such as GNOME Do, a Quicksilver-like task launcher for GNU/Linux desktop and Tasque, a simple To-Do Manager using Remember The Milk Web Service as the back-end.

KDE, or K Desktop Environment is a well-designed Desktop Environment. The latest version of KDE, KDE 4 was a big change in Desktop Environment. KDE Developer decided to re-design the building block of KDE. Start with Plasma, a desktop containment framework, responsible to manage the desktop appearance, window decorations, and of course, plasmoids. You may think plasmoids as desktop Widgets in Mac OSX or Gadgets in Window Vista. The next framework is Akonadi, which manages personal information application like KMail (Mail Application), KOrganizer (Organizer), KNotes (Note-taking Application), Akregator (RSS Reader Application), and KAddressbook (Contact Manager Application). Decibel, a Telephaty-based communication framework, which is still postponed indefinitly. Not to forget Phonon, a framework to manage Sound and Video-related application, and last but not least Solid, a long-awaited Hardware Manager framework. Solid will appear in KDE 4.3, where it will replace HAL to manage Hardware in GNU/Linux.

KDE is well-known with its smooth integration between its components. KDE Developer have successfully built very good communication mechanism between the framework which result in a very solid Desktop Environment. Some KDE Applications like Amarok, a very good and solid Music Player application and Konqueror, a swiss-knife application, capable as a reliable Web Browser and also powerful File Manager.

KDE is built using C++ programming language on top Qt, a graphic library released by Qt Software, a Nokia company based on Finland. Qt provides a cross-plattform capability, which make KDE 4.x comes in Linux version, Windows Version and also Macintosh Version. Popular applications use Qt are VLC and Opera.

Why did I decide to write about this? Well, actually last night I discovered that some applications that I use most of the time are built using GTK+ and Qt library. I found some suggestions in the Web said that you should not mix Qt and GTK+ software, because it will cost you higher memory comsumption. And then, I think that I should make a list about my-most-used application in order to help me to choose which Desktop Environment I should use. So here we go

Daily Usage Application:
1. Mozilla Firefox 3.0
2. Opera 10 .0 Beta
3. Pidgin Instant Messaging 2.5.6
4. Amarok 2.1
5. Tomboy 0.15.1
6. choKoq
7. Geany IDE
8. VLC 1.0 Pre Alpha
9. Drivel Blog Client 2.0.3
10. OpenOffice.org 3.1
11. Yakuake
12. GNOME Do 0.8.2
12. KRunner 4.2.88
13. KShutdown 2.0 Beta

As we can see, we have 7 GTK+ applications and 6 Qt applications. Perhaps I should try GNOME as my primary Desktop Environment.

Update:
Yes, I have tried GNOME 2.26 in openSUSE 11.1 box and I found GNOME is not the one. Every time I launched a Qt Applications, the desktop effect suddenly failed and revert back to the old good Metacity. This problem is bugging me, since I need to re-activate the Desktop Effect every time I finish using a Qt Applications. So in the mean time, I think I will stick to KDE 4

Latter Update:
I finally found the culprit!. Apparently I need to install compiz-kde package in order to enable KDE / Qt application to use compiz as their compositing window-manager.

Note:
– I am trying to update my experience using Desktop Environment in GNU/Linux