What is the basic difference between GNOME and KDE? If you kindly clear it from the root level, I shall be obliged.

Don't know what exactly you mean by "root level" but for me at least the main fact is that they look very dissimilar - at least back when I still used GNOME. IMHO KDE is much more mature and full featured, but GNOME does have GTK...

Read your reply carefully. May you tell me why do you prefer KDE better than GNOME? Why are you telling KDE much mature though the desktop of those are almost similar and have same access to the programs even in similar presentation.

say what

Whahahah That's a discussion that started a long time ago and still is going on
Simply they are two desktop environments that look very very dissimilar.

It is you that have to choose which is the best for you.
In performance they are almost the same i think you can run all linux application on booth
so it really doesn't matter which u run.

Off course KDE rocks but that's my opinion

what do u wanna say?

This is for havelino :
Thank you for your opinion. I think you have a good command over both of them. May you tell me why do u feel that KDE rocks?

I prefer gnome myself. I think gnome is written in C while KDE is C++. KDE used a non open gui toolkit in it's early days, don't know if thats changed, gnome was always meant to be open source. Bunch of other stuff.

That's a personal opinion.

I tried GNOME for a while but never liked how the menu components are arranged, of course it
doesn't matter very much because 80% of the time i'm using a kernel. Furthermore you can personalize you're KDE environment look at: kde-look

PS I think KDE is open source now so if you want to develop go ha head

havelino may you tell, how do u use that kernel? as much i know kernel is the core of the operating system. how do u use it? please be clear friend.

My bad ,

Terminal / Konsole

To clear up the KDE/Gnome arguments on open source/free software.

KDE uses the qt toolkit, produced by TrollTech. It was (past tense) non free, but is now released under a dual license scheme - the GPL and TrollTech's own license. If you want to develop GPL or GPL-license compatible applications, you can do this. If you don't want to use the GPL/GPL compatible license, you have to pay TrollTech for their alternate qt license (that's how they make the money to continue development on qt).

Gnome uses the Gimp Toolkit (GTK+) developed originally for The Gimp, which is licensed under the LGPL. One of the reasons for Gnome coming about was the fact that in the early days KDE was not using a free license. This is no longer the case as I have just explained.

To summarise therefore: Both KDE and Gnome are open source (and possibly also 'free software'. Read some of RMS's literature to understand the difference between the two terms)

The 'basic' difference, then, is that they use difference toolkits with different licenses for their applications.

You can also personalize your GNOME environment. Look at: GNOME-Look.org (There's a link to GNOME-Look at KDE-Look).

That said, IMHO GNOME is still way behind KDE in the eye candy department. KDE has a lot of support for translucency which GNOME lacks, and in particular KDE's Crystal-GL Window decoration is simply cooler than anything GNOME has to offer.

OTOH, GNOME has support for vector graphics icons, which KDE lacks. Whether this is an advantage or disadvantage is debateable. On the KDE side, bitmap icons are incredibly detailed and can have a "photorealistic look". On the GNOME side, vector graphics may be cartoony but they can be scaled to any size.

does that really need to be pointed out?

if our talking asthetics. gnome feels (to me) like working on the old macs back in highschool. and thats the main reason i dont like it, i dont understand all the technical angles of this argument but kde is like the os most linux migrators know and hate/love