Hello, I’m really interested in the development of Budgie Desktop.
I’ve long been looking for a good desktop environment to introduce my family and friends to Linux. However, every commonly used DE somehow disappointed me. In short:
- Plasma: Bloated, ugly if you don’t spend a lot of time customizing it and you know what you are doing, not noob-fiendly, config files everywhere.
- LXDE, XFCE, Mate, Cinnamon: Old looking, doesn’t visually attract attention, not much innovation.
- Gnome: Doesn’t feel like it’s been designed for PC. At least not for people who come from Windows (+90% of PC users).
So, after looking for a while for a solution, I’ve recently found Budgie (doesn’t work in Arch, but I’m in a Virtual machine), and I like what I see. Clean and modern design, lightweight, powerful, and seems like you are putting a lot of effort on it.
However, Budgie is not perfect. I have again the feeling that it’s designed for macOS users, like almost everything in Linux. The only 4 applets I, and more people who wants a Windows-like panel, use aren’t really powerful. Not for a bottom panel.
Two days ago I saw in a post that you are open to ideas for the next UB version, and it encouraged me to login and ask for some features I think are missing. But, if I’m not mistaken, the next actualization is far, and I’m worried you don’t have resources enough to implement most of the ideas people is proposing. Specially after fossfreedom comments about having talented developers.
Is there any way to see how are you doing? How are donations doing? I know you do this for free and probably while you are working in your real job.
As I’m not a programmer, I can’t help you but with donations, translations and bug reports. That’s why I wanted to thank you here for your project. I like your idea of what a good DE is and looks like, and I hope you keep improving it until you become the most used DE.
Good luck!