Too many cooks...

I'm still moving forward with Kubuntu, but I haven't fully committed yet. I had been doing some synchronization tests with my Treo, and at one point my calendar and todo list got wiped out. I was able to get them back from Windows/Outlook. So far I haven't tried to sync with kpilot/Kontact since that mishap, but I think I'll try it soon.

Over all I like Kontact as a replacement for Outlook. In addition to all the features I was used to from Outlook, Kontact also includes a news reader and something called Akregator, which provides a news reader like interface for RSS feeds. It's pretty nice for keeping up to date with the latest developments on the Ubuntu community sites as well as news sites like Google News and SlashDot.

There are a few other KDE applications I'm starting to like. One is Kopete, which is an Instant Message client. It supports all the major formats (Yahoo, MSN, AIM, IRC, etc.). I suppose it's pretty similar to Gaim. I also like the default music player/manager, Amarok. It has a pretty good interface as well as some interesting bells and whistles. I think I need to play around with it some more.

I have had a few problems with the KDE tools. One problem is the System Setting tool does not allow me to use administrator mode. This means I can't do much as far as managing system resources through the GUI. The Adept Manager (package manager) does not seem to have a way to refresh the packages after I change the repository settings. I have to quite the tool, do an 'apt-get update' then run the tool again. Fortunately I don't change the repository settings very often. Finally, the wireless management is not the best. I wasn't able to use the default tool, so I downloaded wifi-radar. I can't seem to launch wifi-radar from the menu interface. I have to run it from the command line. So far I don't have any wifi indication on my system bar either. Finding and enabling new networks is a little more troublesome than under Windows.

I still may revert back to Ubuntu and try using kpilot for synchronization. I'm not sure if I would pick Evolution or Kontact for email and such. I guess that's another problem with Linux, there are too many choices. It would be nice if the open source community would band together to back one key application in each area, but I guess too many cooks spoil the broth...