KDE

KDE is a free and open-source software project that develops a complete, integrated computing environment for desktops, laptops, tablets, and mobile devices. It is best known for the KDE Plasma desktop, the KDE Frameworks libraries, and the KDE Applications suite.

The project originated in 1996 when Matthias Ettrich proposed a unified, user-friendly desktop environment built on the Qt toolkit; the first KDE release appeared in 1998. It is organized around KDE e.V., a nonprofit association that coordinates development, releases, and community governance. The software stack is commonly described as three components: Plasma, Frameworks, and Applications.

Plasma is the graphical shell that provides the desktop, panels, widgets, and workspace management. KDE Frameworks is a set of modular libraries that extend Qt to provide reusable components across KDE applications. KDE Applications is a broad, continually updated suite of programs such as Dolphin (file manager), Konsole (terminal), Kate and KWrite (text editors), Okular (document viewer), Gwenview (image viewer), and KMail (email client).

KDE software is released under free software licenses (GPL, LGPL, and compatible licenses). KDE Frameworks components are largely LGPL. The project is cross-platform, with primary support on Linux and other Unix-like systems, and ports to Windows and macOS. KDE software is shipped by many distributions, including Kubuntu, openSUSE, KDE Neon, and Fedora spins. The KDE community emphasizes accessibility, internationalization, and customization; development follows a community-driven model with regular releases and events such as Akademy.