Is KDE Winning?

Wow. Linus "my name is Linus and I am your god" Torvalds has spoken - and the answer is KDE.

If you haven't been following the great war between GNOME and KDE - and frankly, if you haven't, you probably made a wise decision - over what the face of GNU/Linux will be on the desktop, this news may not mean much. After all, Linus is just one voice, right?

Well, no: Linus is *the* voice when it comes to the Linux kernel, and his views carry enormous weight within the free software world. For this reason, he has always assiduously avoided coming down on one side of the other regarding desktop interfaces - until now.

As well as this flat-out endorsement from the man himself, there are other straws in the wind that suggest that KDE may emerge as the preferred desktop environment. For example, the amazing Knoppix live CD system, which has spawned dozens of other live CD systems, has always opted for KDE. More recently, the increasingly popular Ubuntu GNU/Linux distribution, which uses GNOME, has appeared in an KDE incarnation known as Kubuntu, and received the blessing of He Who Is Known As The SABDFL.

The reason this all matters is that 2006 may well prove the year that GNU/Linux makes its big breakthrough on the desktop. Just like 2005 and 2004.