“The KDE Project is happy to announce a new major release of the award-winning K Desktop Environment. Many features have been added or refined, making KDE the most complete, stable and integrated free desktop environment available.
Notable changes include:
* Konqueror is the second web browser to pass the Acid2 CSS test, ahead of Firefox and Internet Explorer
* Konqueror can also now free web pages from adverts with its ad-block feature
* SuperKaramba is included in KDE, providing well-integrated and easy-to-install widgets for the user’s desktop
* Kopete has support for MSN and Yahoo! webcams
* The edutainment module has three new applications (KGeography, Kanagram and blinKen), and has seen huge improvements in Kalzium”
One of the things I’ve been looking forward to in KDE 3.5, is the MSN webcam support in Kopete. This one feature has prevented a lot of my friends from installing Linux on their girlfriends’ computers because girls, for some odd-ass reason, appear to like using webcams 😛
Also Konqueror now passes the Acid2 test, which means it’s complies with standards a lot better, than before, which is great for everybody.
Now that KDE 3.5 is out of the door, the KDE guys can finally fully focus on KDE 4.0, which be a huge change in KDE’s design, which they expect to release in a year from now. One of the features they look to do is to create a new multimedia layer so that all the issues with the old arts audio server will go away, also they are creating a new theming engine called Oxygen, and a new interface for developing applets, a little bit like dashboard in OS X Tiger but with a significant difference, instead of adding another layer to the desktop, you make the applets intergrate with the desktop.
The future looks very brigt for Linux on the desktop, 2006 is gonna bring a lot of great stuff, a long with two extra next-gen consoles. Personally, I’m going to preorder the Nintendo Revolution ASAP, because I just love Nintendo’s ideas of doing a pure-gaming machine and adding so much goodness for gamers and not a lot of multimedia shit.
For example, they’ve promised a Smash Bros. title at launch, with online gaming from day one.
That I just can’t wait for, but sadly I have to. 😉