- cross-posted to:
- linux@programming.dev
- cross-posted to:
- linux@programming.dev
While Cinnamon is great for many users, KDE Plasma provides a flexible and powerful alternative, particularly for those who desire a more dynamic and configurable desktop environment.
In this guide, we’ll cover everything you need to know to successfully install KDE Plasma on your Linux Mint 22 system.
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Honestly I’m not sure why they discontinued Mint KDE Edition.
From what I heard one component was that it was difficult to line up the release dates between updating the Ubuntu base and KDE because Ubuntu uses GNOME and they line up their release dates with that
Idk I’ve noticed a jump in quality since they’ve honed in all their focus on GTK environments
The developers of Linux Mint develop the Cinnamon desktop, they are close and/or share some members with the MATE desktop team, and so Linux Mint is pretty much that. There are several other good distros for KDE Plasma including KDE’s own distro, Neon, so they figured they weren’t really serving much of a purpose with it. Plus Plasma is qt, MATE and Cinnamon (and xfce AFAIK) are all GTK, so.
@JRepin Not quite sure why you’d use Mint if you wanted to run KDE. Most of the draw of Mint is the Cinnamon desktop. At that point you might as well run Kubuntu.
Because I prefer that Mint undoes Ubuntu’s shit decisions?
@ReversalHatchery I mean, that’s fair. But if your gripe is with Ubuntu there are plenty of other KDE-focused distro releases to go with (KDE Neon, Fedora KDE Spin, Kinoite, etc) that would probably accomplish this in a cleaner fashion. You’d also get Plasma 6 as opposed to Mint’s KDE 5.
Adding a Qt-based DE to Mint’s GTK-focused environment just seems a little messy and wasteful in storage. It’s fully possible and to each their own, but… why, when there are better ways to use KDE?
I don’t have experience with the others, but KDE Neon will shit itself if you upgrade it with it’s custom upgrade tool after leaving it unused, or just un-updated for months.
To answer the question, when I get this idea I never remember which other distros would be worth to try, but also it’s often for use in a resource constrained environment enough that I can’t afford anything that insists on snapshotting on every change.
Snaps.
Kubuntu comes with snap support but you can uninstall it and the default snaps, mark the snapd package as forbidden and that’s pretty much it.
But then you could ask the same question again. Why install (K)ubuntu if you’re gonna get rid of snaps anyway.
If you want Plasma with an Ubuntu-based OS without snaps, your best option is probably TuxedoOS (unlike Kubuntu they’re already on Plasma 6 too).
Ubuntu and Kubuntu are nice distros, the problem with Ubuntu is that Canonical makes snaps mandatory. But on Kubuntu you can make them optional.
If you want KDE, why not use a KDE-distro? Any time I’ve installed a different Desktop Environment, I’ve found it pretty janky.
About the only semi-exception is immutable distros, which can easily swap out the system layer. I’ve done it, and only had minor jank.
Still, it’s better to know what you want ahead of time, if you want an opinionated installation; VMs and live ISOs are good for testing other DEs. Otherwise, you might as well get ready to do it the way Arch users do it.
Same reason that dude installed Doom on a pregnancy test!
I’m new to the world of Linux as a main OS, and I ran Mint for a while, wanted to try KDE Plasma, installed and ran it on mint for a while and blew away mint for a distro with KDE Plasma once I knew it’s what I wanted.
To say I had jank is an understatement.
How do you mean? And did switching distros fix it?
Also, out of curiosity, what did you go with and how do you like it?
I’m currently running KDE on Mint (Cinnamon is nice but limited and had some issues for me), but I’ve considered trying something else…
If you want something KDE with the stability of Ubuntu and no snaps, I’d consider Fedora-based. There’s Fedora’s community spin of KDE and if you want to try an atomic update distro, Kinoite.
There’s also Nobara, a distro done by Glorious Eggroll, the main developer behind Proton gaming. It’s a distro that’s highly optimized for games and video editing, as well as Wine usage for Windows programs, and has the codecs and non-free repos installed by default. I’ve been really impressed with its capability and being up to date without sacrificing stability.
Not to put down Nobara, they do good work, but Bazzite is way better at doing the same stuff. It’s essentially a gaming spin of Kinoite. Aurora is the same but without the gamer-y parts. Bazzite’s what I’m running on my desktop, as well as my Legion Go, and I love how little it gets in the way.
