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Comment by sho_hn | Hacker News Reader

There's an interesting pattern where particularly device applications that don't use one of the "big distros" end up picking KDE Plasma over the alternatives, e.g.

- Steam Deck: Desktop mode is KDE Plasma

- PinePhone and PinePhone Pro: KDE Plasma Mobile

- Asahi: KDE Plasma

One may speculate what distros would do if it wasn't for inertia and compatibility.

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Why compatibility? Or inertia for that matter? Switching DEs in Linux is generally as easy as installing a package and switching the DE at login, and you can use any app compiled for a certain toolkit in any other DE. The default choice is usually done for either pragmatic or preferential reasons (Developer preference, easy of upstream collaboration, flexibility, stability, bug fix schedule)

Compatibility e.g. with user support docs they have, or installed bases. It's not easy for distros to decide to switch defaults.

That's why what new systems choose is interesting.

>Or inertia for that matter?

Humans, including devs and distro builders, are creatures of habit. They tend to stick to using whatever they already know.

No need to speculate. Every Linux distro I have looked at recently allows the user to install loads of different desktop environments. KDE and Gnome are just the big ones. I use Cinnamon (a fork of Gnome 3 that looks more like Gnome 2) on Linux Mint on my laptop, XFCE on an old netbook also with Mint.

Just pick whatever DE you prefer.

Sure, but their default is usually GNOME3 these days. And there's always a ton more effort towards making the default work seamlessly.

Kubuntu is notorious for having issues trying to fit the "Ubuntu" way and not quite getting it right. (Font/theme issues, primarily) Fedora's KDE spin is pretty decent, but that's mostly because it is bog standard aside from the logo and RPM/dnf integration. Outside of those two, you're better off using a KDE-primary distro in most cases.

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