Lubuntu 20.04: alternative programs to those GTK still present

stilnovo · May 14, 2020, 4:01pm

Hi to Everybody.

So, with Lubuntu 20.04 a new adventure has begun.

However, there is still a link with the past that we can see in the presence of programs based on GTK and not QT specific.

In your opinion, could there be preferable QT-specific programs to the existing ones?

For example: Calligra suite instead of LibreOffice?

Chris · May 14, 2020, 4:40pm

You can’t change too much at once or people will be lost. I am very used to Libre and just updated from 17.10. I have already spent a lot of time on the 20.04 OS, and getting used to new program suites would take up more time. If we weren’t in Corona lockdown, I wouldn’t have had time to install 20.04 even because of the time it takes to adapt and modify the new OS.

wxl · May 14, 2020, 5:35pm

@Chris I understand what you’re saying, but given that there will be no supported versions of Lubuntu based on the old paradigm come April, I see no utility to hold onto making changes that are too drastic. We’ve already done them.

Regarding LibreOffice, it’s kind of baffling. It is actually Qt friendly (see libreoffice-qt5) but it’s a little rough around the edges. @HMollerCl can speak more to this.

As for Calligra, never used the word processor or spreadsheet but I do really like Krita a lot and was kind of thinking it might be a nice addition. However, it’s kind of heavy. I’m worried that will be the case for the other applications. Does someone want to put together a comparison of disk usage and memory/CPU footprint?

stilnovo · May 16, 2020, 9:54am

I will try to install Calligra on one of my machines to test…

stilnovo · May 16, 2020, 10:48am

at a first glance screen1

stilnovo · May 16, 2020, 10:49am

at a first glance / 2nd part screen2

wxl · May 21, 2020, 10:12pm

What about usability?

stilnovo · May 22, 2020, 8:50am

Well, I also installed Calligra to two other users, our first impressions are:

the UI is less cute than the LO one (also i don’t like it, it seems coming from the deep 90s!!);
the suite seems very fast and reactive;
the first documents in docx format we are receiving seem “well-translated” (no strange text formattings), although they were simple documents (commercial offers, transport documents…).
So, Calligra looks promising!
If the UI was a little bit different… (I don’t pay too much attention to the UI, but it’s easy to find the LO one definitely better).
Anyway, Calligra would be much more better than your previous choices, Abiword and Gnumeric (I’m joking, of course!!)

wxl · May 22, 2020, 4:46pm

What’s the overall disk footprint like? Does it have a bunch of additional required dependencies?

stilnovo · May 22, 2020, 6:01pm

it seems it has very few dependencies:

zambo@zambo-aspire5732z:~$ apt-cache depends calligra
calligra
Dipende: calligrasheets
Dipende: calligrastage
Dipende: calligrawords
Dipende: karbon
zambo@zambo-aspire5732z:~$ apt-cache rdepends calligra
calligra
Reverse Depends:
kde-full
loook

wxl · May 22, 2020, 6:10pm

It was more of a question of what in addition to what’s already installed in Lubuntu it needs. Also, keep in mind that all of those dependencies have their own dependencies.

stilnovo · May 22, 2020, 9:20pm

Ok… how can I deepen the point? During the installation, apt has downloaded about (only!) 60MB…

wxl · May 22, 2020, 9:28pm

Ok there we go So now we need some more opinions from folks! Anyone vehemently opposed to replacing LibreOffice with Calligra?

Thomas-N · May 24, 2020, 3:42pm

I’ve never used Calligra, but I’ll try it for a while to see how it compares to LibreOffice. I’ll post my thoughts in a few days.

Thomas-N · May 27, 2020, 11:36am

Having tried Calligra for a few days, I can’t say that I’m a fan. The UI is pretty bad and it lacks a lot of functionality when compared to LibreOffice.

Development seems to be going very slowly. The release notes for the latest stable version, which supposedly represents two years of development work, note only a couple of changes for Calligra Words (probably the most used app in the suite). Compared to the massive development we see in LibreOffice, I don’t see the gap in functionality closing any time soon.

Also of note: Kubuntu chooses to ship LibreOffice, even though Calligra is supposed to be the office suite for KDE.

Is it really that bad to keep GTK around? Most users will end up installing some GTK app at some point anyway. At least if it’s included by default, themes can be set up to make everything look cohesively “Lubuntu-y” instead of having the first GTK app users install look horribly out of place.

stilnovo · June 5, 2020, 10:07am

I would like to add my feedback after some days of use about Calligra Suite; this feedback collects also the opinions of some others Lubuntu users I’ve a little bit ‘forced’ to give Calligra a try:

we all agree that the user interface is very horrible and very bad from an ergonomic point of view (it seems hard to customize);
there is an horrible dock on the side that occupies a big part of the screen: also in KDE forums people complain about and it’s not so comfortable to remove it;
the .xlxs format is bad translated by Calligra Sheet;
the .docx documents seem to have a better behaviuor.
My colleagues prefer LibreOffice, I had to uninstall Calligra Suite from their notebooks. I will try Calligra for more time anyway. What a pity, it would be very fast and reactive.