I’m not moving any goalposts. You’re the one arguing about the semantics around “Plasma”, and I keep saying that’s irrelevant.

Refer back to my original comment which was, and I quote:

So, are there any plans to reduce the bloat in KDE, maybe even make a lightweight version (like LXQt) that’s suitable for older PCs with limited resources?

To clarify, here I was:

• Referring to KDE + default apps that are part of a typical KDE installation
• Stating that a typical KDE installation is bloated compared to a typical lightweight DE like LXQt
• Saying with the intention that the “bloat” is RELATIVE, with respect to a older PC with limited resources

The ENTIRE point of my argument was the KDE isn’t really ideal RELATIVELY, for older PCs with limited resources, and I’m using LXQt here are a reference.

In a subsequent test, here’s a direct apples-to-apples(ish) component comparison:

plasmashell was sitting at 250MB btw in this instance btw.

The numbers speak for themselves - no one in their right minds would consider KDE (or plasmashell, since you want to be pedantic) to be “light”, in RELATION to an older PC with limited resources - which btw, was the premise of my entire argument. Of course KDE or plasmashell might be considered “light” on a modern system, but not an old PC with 2GB RAM. Whether something is considered light or bloated is always relative, and in this instance, it’s obvious to anyone that KDE/plasmashell isn’t “light”.

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You’re arguing semantics and that’s not the point I’m trying to argue here. Forget the term “Plasma”. I don’t really care about what the DE is branded as or what’s in “Plasma” the software package. When I say “KDE”, I mean the desktop + all the basic default/recommended apps that you’d see on a typical KDE installation, such as Dolphin, Konsole, Kate, Kalculator, Spectacle etc that’s part of the KDE project. IDK whether the apps I’ve mentioned are considered part of “Plasma” or not, but again, that’s not the point, I’m saying this is what I meant when I said “KDE” - and what most people would expect when they picture a “KDE” environment.

Anyways, I tested this myself on two identical VMs with 2GB RAM, one installed with Fedora 40 KDE, and another with Fedora 40 LXQt, both set to use X11 (because LXQt isn’t Wayland ready yet), both updated and running the latest kernel 6.8.10-300.fc40. I logged into the DEs, opened only two terminal windows and nothing else, ran, and ran htop. The screenshot speaks for itself:

And when I tried disabling swap on both machines, the KDE machine was practically unusable, with only 53MB RAM remaining before it completely froze on me. Meanwhile, the LXQt one was still very much usable even without swap enabled.

I’d like to see you try running without swap and see how it fares. And if you think it’s unfair disabling swap on a 2GB machine - try installing LXQt yourself, disable swap and see for yourself how much more usable it is compared to KDE.

And this is why I say KDE is bloated and not suitable for old machines.

Edit: Also, check out the memory consumption listed by a user in this post: https://lemmy.nz/comment/9070317

Edit2: Here’s a screenshot of the top 30 processes on my test systems, side-by-side:

Of the above, I calculated the usage of the top 10 processes specific to each respective DE, and you can see that KDE’s memory usage is almost double that of LXQt. Had I counted all the DE-specific processes, it’d no doubt be a lot more than double.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but this #OptGreen project isn’t talking specifically about Plasma, is it? They don’t mention Plasma anywhere on the page they linked.

In any case, that’s irrelevant, also, I don’t doubt that KDE can’t run at all under the specs you mentioned - that’s not the issue. The question is, how much free/usable RAM do you actually have on that machine - let’s say with no apps open first, and with then check again with Konsole + Dolphin + KWrite/Kate open? And for fun, fire up Konqueror as well and check again.

Edit: Screenshots proving that what you’re saying is not correct:

I’m not talking specifically about Plasma, I’m talking about the “DE” part of KDE in general; and particularly in this context of repurposing and extending the life of old PCs.

I find it a bit ironic for KDE to be pushing this message, when it’s a heavy DE (relatively speaking) - it’s NOT what anyone would have in mind when when selecting a DE for an old PC.

For instance, take LXQt - run the default/recommended file browser, terminal and text editor, and compare it with KDE + equivalents - you’d see a significant difference in resource consumption. On a system with low RAM, that extra bit of free memory makes a big difference, as it could mean avoiding the penalty hit of the swap file, which you’d invariably run into as soon as you fire up a modern Web browser. So it’s vital that the DE use as little resources as possible on such a machine.

So, are there any plans to reduce the bloat in KDE, maybe even make a lightweight version (like LXQt) that’s suitable for older PCs with limited resources?

You’ll need to bind a hotkey to a third-party tool such as ydotool.

Eg using ydotool, the command would be ydotool click 0xC1

Well I haven’t used Plasma Mobile or any of the apps you’ve mentioned, so it’d be nice to see what it all looks like! (and I don’t have a device I can try it on either, unless I can get it working with Termux + Termux-X11?)

Nice writeup, but it would’ve been nice if you added some screenshots or a short video of your setup!

It’s easiest to just register a domain name and use Couldflare Tunnels. No need to worry about dynamic DNS, port forwarding etc. Plus, you have the security advantages of DDoS protection and firewall (WAF). Finally, you get portability - you can change your ISP, router or even move your entire lab into the cloud if you wanted to, and you won’t need to change a single thing.

I have a lab set up on my mini PC that I often take to work with me, and it works the same regardless of whether it’s going thru my work’s restricted proxy or the NAT at home. Zero config required on the network side.

This shouldn’t even be a question lol. Even if you aren’t worried about theft, encryption has a nice bonus: you don’t have to worry about secure erasing your drives when you want to get rid of them. I mean, sure it’s not that big of a deal to wipe a drive, but sometimes you’re unable to do so - for instance, the drive could fail and you may not be able to do the wipe. So you end up getting rid of the drive as-is, but an opportunist could get a hold of that drive and attempt to repair it and recover your data. Or maybe the drive fails, but it’s still under warranty and you want to RMA it - with encryption on, you don’t have to worry about some random accessing your data.

Starts with a T and ends with an a?

• The gestures are pretty much on par with Gnome, which means A LOT.

Are the gestures (I’m assuming trackpad gestures) finally customisable now?

Ah, if you’re interested in Steam games as well then look no further than Bazzite - it’s got all the optimisations that Valve put into SteamOS + more (like more recent kernel and drivers). But before you switch though, you might want to check whether your Steam games are compatible using this website: https://www.protondb.com/

Get some decent CRT shaders and spend some time calibrating your display and setting them up correctly - it makes a massive difference IMO. Personally, I’m a big fan of the “Megatron Death To Pixels” shaders, check out this video on how to set it up properly.

My goal is to eventually have a “pick up and play” setup

For that, I’d highly recommend switching to a gaming/emulation-oriented Linux distro, such as Bazzite with Emudeck, ChimeraOS, Batocera, Lakka etc. I personally prefer Bazzite due to it’s Steam-first approach and excellent compatibility with various controllers and proprietary drivers (nVidia), but Lakka might be better if you’ve got an Intel iGPU or an AMD card, and want to stick purely to retro gaming - it’s the official distro for RetroArch afterall, so it’s very polished in that regard, and very lightweight.

Those drag-n-drop fixes are much welcome!

Also:

I also had it ignore the mysterious “DELETED” format Firefox sends that is likely a remnant from the XDnd specification. The latter fixes dropping an image to the desktop to set it as a wallpaper

I never knew you could set wallpapers that way!

I hope you didn’t forget that banger of a soundtrack!

As an MSDOS and platformer fan:

• Dangerous Dave (1990 version)
• Prince of Persia 1 & 2
• Crystal Caves
• Bio Menace
• Commander Keen series (keen 4 being the best)
• Jazz Jackrabbit series
• Jill of the Jungle
• Aladdin

My favorite from the above would be Bio Menace, followed by Dangerous Dave, Prince of Persia 1 and Jazz Jackrabbit.

Most of these games should be available on GOG, if not, search for “eXoDOS”.

Unlikely. Best option would be to it in a VM, or install a second distro to your drive and upgrade it to Plasma 6.

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