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<chapter id="what-is-tde">
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<chapterinfo>
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<date>&tde-release-date;</date>
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<releaseinfo>&tde-release-version;</releaseinfo>
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</chapterinfo>
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<title>What is the Trinity Desktop Environment?</title>
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<anchor id="whatistde"/>
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<sect1 id="what-is-tde-introduction">
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<title>What is the Trinity Desktop Environment?</title>
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<para>&tde; is a desktop environment. In other words, &tde; is a
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collection of programs, technologies and documentation that attempt to
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make life easier for computer users. &tde; is targeted at &UNIX;
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workstations. &tde; features network transparency and a contemporary work
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flow philosophy.</para>
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<para>Historically, the Trinity Desktop Environment is a fork of the K Desktop Environment
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version 3.5, originally written by the KDE Team, a world-wide network of
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software engineers committed to Free Software development. This group's
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major goal in free software development is to provide high quality software
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that empowers the user with easy control of their computer's resources.</para>
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<para>The &tde; developers continue the tradition of KDE 3.5.</para>
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<para>&tde; seeks to fill the need for an easy to use desktop for
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&UNIX; workstations, similar to the desktop environments found under
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&MacOS; or &Windows;. &tde; meets the requirement
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of users for an easy to use work environment. Tools used to reach
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this goal are: enhanced inter-application communication, component
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reuse, generalized drag and drop, uniform look and feel and many
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more. Thus, &tde; offers much more than the traditional &UNIX; window
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managers.</para>
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<para>Stability, scalability and openness are qualities which have
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made &UNIX; the undisputed choice for the information technology
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professional for many years. &tde; builds on top of this excellent
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base framework and brings new, much needed qualities: usability, user
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friendliness and beauty! &tde; remains as a forefront
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player in bringing these qualities to &UNIX; systems, which constituted for
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years, the premier platform for server computers and scientific
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institutions, but wasn't very attractive for desktop users.</para>
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<para>Without Unix the Internet would not exist, or at least would
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have a vastly different form. Unix has not, until recent years, addressed the
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needs of the average computer user. This fact is particularly
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unfortunate, since a number of implementations of &UNIX; systems (<ulink
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url="http://www.linux.org">&Linux;</ulink>, <ulink
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url="http://www.freebsd.org">FreeBSD</ulink>, <ulink
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url="http://www.netbsd.org">NetBSD</ulink>, &etc;) are freely
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available on the Internet, all of which are of exceptional quality and
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stability.</para>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="what-is-tde-the-desktop">
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<title>&tde; The Desktop Environment</title>
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<para>In combination with a free implementation of &UNIX; systems, &tde;
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provides to the world an open and completely free desktop computing
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platform either at home or at work.</para>
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<para> This platform is available to anyone free of charge including
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its source code for anyone to modify.</para>
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<para>While there will always be room for improvement we believe we
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provide a viable alternative to some of the more commonly
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found and commercial operating systems/desktops combinations available
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today. It is our hope that the combination of &UNIX; systems and &tde; will
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finally bring the same open, reliable, stable, and monopoly free
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computing to the average computer user that scientists and computing
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professionals world-wide have enjoyed for years.</para>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="what-is-tde-the-development-framework">
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<title>&tde; The Application Development Framework</title>
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<para>&tde; focuses on the user's needs, but it's obvious that this
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focus is more easily achieved by also giving developers the best
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tools. &tde; code contains, and comes with, some of the best
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development technologies of the modern computing age.</para>
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<para>Authoring applications under &UNIX;/X11 systems used to be an extremely
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tedious and labor intensive process. &tde; developers recognize the fact that a
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computing platform is only as good as the number of first class
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applications available to the users of that particular
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platform.</para>
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<para>&tde; includes technologies such as &DCOP; and KParts, created to
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offer a component document model and technology. Together with the
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complete &tde; libraries programming interface, &DCOP;/KParts are set
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in direct competition with other similar technologies like &Microsoft;
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<abbrev>MFC</abbrev>/<abbrev>COM</abbrev>/ActiveX technologies. The
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excellent quality and the high level of refinement of &tde;'s
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application programming interface (<acronym>API</acronym>) enables
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developers to focus on original and interesting issues and avoid
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reinventing the wheel.</para>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="what-is-tde-the-office-suite">
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<title>&tde; The Office Application Suite</title>
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<para>In its current form, &tde; provides, apart from the essential desktop
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component applications, a suite of office programs known as &koffice;.</para>
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<para>&koffice; is based on the &tde; &DCOP;/KParts
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technologies. It contains: a word processor with desktop
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publishing capabilities (&kword;), a spreadsheet application (&kspread;)
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and accompanying charting program (&kchart;), a presentation program
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(&kpresenter;) and a vector drawing program (&karbon14;). Tying things
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together is the <application>KOffice Workspace</application>, an
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integrated shell to ease the use of the &koffice; components in
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conjunction with each other. Additional components include an email
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client, a news reader, and a powerful <abbrev>PIM</abbrev> (Personal
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Information Manager - an organizer).</para>
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</sect1>
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</chapter>
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