You can not select more than 25 topics
Topics must start with a letter or number, can include dashes ('-') and can be up to 35 characters long.
130 lines
5.7 KiB
130 lines
5.7 KiB
<chapter id="what-is-kde">
|
|
<chapterinfo>
|
|
<date>2002-01-18</date>
|
|
<releaseinfo>3.00.00</releaseinfo>
|
|
</chapterinfo>
|
|
<title>What is &kde;?</title>
|
|
<anchor id="whatiskde"/>
|
|
|
|
<sect1 id="what-is-kde-introduction">
|
|
<title>What is &kde;?</title>
|
|
|
|
<para>&kde; is a desktop environment. In other words, &kde; is a
|
|
collection of programs, technologies and documentation that attempt to
|
|
make life easier for computer users. &kde; is targeted at &UNIX;
|
|
workstations. It features network transparency and a contemporary work
|
|
philosophy. </para>
|
|
|
|
<para>The creators of the K Desktop Environment are a world-wide group of
|
|
software engineers. This group's major goal in free software development is to
|
|
provide high quality software that empowers the user with easy control of his
|
|
computer's resources.</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>&kde; seeks to fill the need for an easy to use desktop for
|
|
&UNIX; workstations, similar to the desktop environments found under
|
|
&MacOS; or &Windows; 95/NT. &kde; meets the requirement
|
|
of users for an easy to use work environment. Tools used to reach
|
|
this end are: enhanced inter-application communication, component
|
|
reuse, generalized drag and drop, uniform look and feel and many
|
|
more. Thus, &kde; offers much more than the traditional &UNIX; window
|
|
managers.</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>Stability, scaleability and openness are qualities which have
|
|
made &UNIX; the undisputed choice for the information technology
|
|
professional for many years. &kde; builds on top of this excellent
|
|
base framework and brings new, much needed qualities: usability, user
|
|
friendliness and beauty! &kde; was the first, and stays the forefront
|
|
player in bringing these qualities to &UNIX;, which constituted for
|
|
years, the premier platform for server computers and scientific
|
|
institutions, but wasn't very attractive for desktop users.</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>Without &UNIX; the Internet would not exist, or at least would
|
|
have a vastly different form. &UNIX; has not, until now, addressed the
|
|
needs of the average computer user. This fact is particularly
|
|
unfortunate, since a number of implementations of &UNIX; (<ulink
|
|
url="http://www.linux.org">&Linux;</ulink>, <ulink
|
|
url="http://www.freebsd.org">FreeBSD</ulink>, <ulink
|
|
url="http://www.netbsd.org">NetBSD</ulink>, &etc;) are freely
|
|
available on the Internet, all of which are of exceptional quality and
|
|
stability. </para>
|
|
|
|
</sect1>
|
|
|
|
<sect1 id="what-is-kde-the-desktop">
|
|
<title>&kde; The Desktop Environment</title>
|
|
|
|
<para>In combination with a free implementation of &UNIX;, &kde;
|
|
provides to the world an open and completely free desktop computing
|
|
platform either at home or at work.</para>
|
|
|
|
<para> This platform is available to anyone free of charge including
|
|
its source code for anyone to modify.</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>While there will always be room for improvement we believe we
|
|
have now delivered a viable alternative to some of the more commonly
|
|
found and commercial operating systems/desktops combinations available
|
|
today. It is our hope that the combination of &UNIX; and &kde; will
|
|
finally bring the same open, reliable, stable, and monopoly free
|
|
computing to the average computer user that scientists and computing
|
|
professionals world-wide have enjoyed for years. </para>
|
|
|
|
</sect1>
|
|
|
|
<sect1 id="what-is-kde-the-development-framework">
|
|
<title>&kde; The Application Development Framework</title>
|
|
|
|
<para>&kde; focuses on the user's needs, but it's obvious that this
|
|
focus is more easily achieved by also giving developers the best
|
|
tools. &kde; code contains, and comes with, some of the best
|
|
development technologies of the modern computing age.</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>Authoring applications under &UNIX;/X11 used to be an extremely
|
|
tedious and labor intensive process. &kde; recognizes the fact that a
|
|
computing platform is only as good as the number of first class
|
|
applications available to the users of that particular
|
|
platform.</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>&kde; defines new technologies in &DCOP; and KParts, created to
|
|
offer a component document model and technology. Together with the
|
|
complete &kde; libraries programming interface, &DCOP;/KParts are set
|
|
in direct competition with other similar technologies like &Microsoft;
|
|
<abbrev>MFC</abbrev>/<abbrev>COM</abbrev>/ActiveX technologies. The
|
|
excellent quality and the high level of refinement of &kde;'s
|
|
application programming interface (<acronym>API</acronym>) enables
|
|
developers to focus on original and interesting issues and avoid
|
|
reinventing the wheel.</para>
|
|
|
|
</sect1>
|
|
|
|
<sect1 id="what-is-kde-the-office-suite">
|
|
<title>&kde; The Office Application Suite</title>
|
|
|
|
<para>In its current form, &kde; provides, apart from the essential desktop
|
|
component applications, a suite of powerful office programs known to the
|
|
world by the name &koffice;.</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>&koffice; is based on the &kde; &DCOP;/KParts
|
|
technologies. It currently contains: a word processor with desktop
|
|
publishing capabilities (&kword;), a spreadsheet application (&kspread;)
|
|
and accompanying charting program (&kchart;), a presentation program
|
|
(&kpresenter;) and a vector drawing program (&kontour;). Tying things
|
|
together is the <application>KOffice Workspace</application>, an
|
|
integrated shell to ease the use of the &koffice; components in
|
|
conjunction with each other. Additional components include an email
|
|
client, a news reader, and a powerful <abbrev>PIM</abbrev> (Personal
|
|
Information Manager - an organizer).</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>While some of those components are still in alpha development,
|
|
others are already extremely powerful. For example, &kpresenter;,
|
|
&kde;'s presentation application, was successfully used at the 5th
|
|
International &Linux; Congress in Cologne, Germany to deliver a &kde;
|
|
presentation. </para>
|
|
|
|
<para>We would like to invite you to <ulink
|
|
url="http://www.kde.org">learn more about &kde;</ulink> and <ulink
|
|
url="http://koffice.kde.org">&koffice;</ulink>.</para>
|
|
|
|
</sect1>
|
|
</chapter>
|
|
|