I guess theming would make a lot of the work, I don’t remember the names but there are a few plasma themes that aim to mimic windows 10 and 11. If not the entire theme, the icons at least would make it way more intuitive.
For the office suite you might want to check out OnlyOffice(or even freeoffice), it probably looks more modern and less jarring than libreoffice for someone coming from recent versions of MS Office.
The start menu also has versions of it more similar to the windows one, but the standard one Is much better, maybe it’s a change she can get used to.
Make sure the desktop is in Folder View, so she can put files and folders on it, and set Dolphin’s view to the one she’s used to, icons or details.
I’m not sure for gaming, but maybe check beforehand if hers work on kubuntu.
Finally I’d make a post-it explaining the names of programs: dolphin - > file explorer, Kate - > notepad, ark - > 7zip and so on. The most frustrating thing is looking for a program that should have an obvious name and finding only unknown nicknames, it takes a while to get used to!
It doesn’t have to be 1:1. Make sure to install drivers, set up proton (so that proton is used by default), Install Only Office (because it is the most appealing to Microsoft office user) and if she really needs it create web apps for Microssoft Office and ensure that they can be launched from the desktop, taskbar, and start menu. Also Install adblockers and whatnot on her browser. Just nothing that could interfere with her workflow. So Ublock, Sponsorblock, CleanURL, I Don’t Care About Cookies, and Return Dislikes to Youtube. Also use this hardening script because it makes Firefox secureoit of the box and in my experience has never gotten in my way: github.com/hnhx/user.js
Oh, how weird lol. The Lemmy UX definitely doesn’t fit on Mastodon, now this “community account” as it appears on Mastodon just boosts every post made in the community, without context to the exact post it seems.
It is nice to be able to boost or favorite individual comments though!
@PureTryOut@carlschwan Yes it's a bit weird but the other way is pretty nice, if I ping the kde community account it will create a new post on the lemmy instance and also I can reply to your lemmy post with my mastodon account :)
hmm, that’s a tough one, the KDE defaults are pretty good these days. maybe try to identify any points of friction and configure KDE to be more similar to Windows. a few that come to mind:
Ensure double-click is selected for opening files in Dolphin
Ensure Flatpak is working in Discover
Windows users are used to desktop icons, if she wants that, set the desktop to Folder View (or teach her the glorious ways of Application Launcher and a clean icon-less desktop)
Play around with the different options for Application Launchers, Taskbar, Task switcher.
Set up virtual desktops, and the desktop switcher applet? it’s such a killer feature. just tell her about it so she doesn’t get annoyed all her windows are suddenly gone. also maybe disable “scroll on desktop background to switch virtual desktop”
I’m not sure if setting up a Windows-like theme is a good idea or not? If everything looks “the same” she’ll expect it to work the same way, and get annoyed whenever it doesn’t.
Because it’s KDE, remind her that if there’s something she doesn’t like, chances are she can change it.
OH, and use dark theme! Breeze Light looks kinda meh and old fashioned. Breeze Dark looks slick and modern
What’s more important than KDE is the applications you mentioned…
Gaming is (ironically) the easiest these days. Assuming she uses Steam, and her games are working through Proton
Which browser does she use, and is she willing to switch? Although every modern browser is available and running well on Linux, there’s is a slight caveat for Google Chrome: (last I checked) Google Chrome is not available in most software repos. Chromium is available, but not Google Chrome. Because Chromium is degoogled, it’s lacking certain features, most importantly Google Sync (password etc). You can still download and install Google Chrome from the Google website, it’s just a bit more cumbersome than having it easily available in the repository. And anyway Firefox is superior xP especially once Google implements ManifestV3 which disables (good) adblockers.
The office suite can be the hardest part. Does she use Microsoft Office? Microsoft Office doesn’t run on Linux, so she would need to swap. The good news is that she can try out the alternatives while still on Windows, to see if it’s a deal-breaker or not.
OnlyOffice ( change the setting to make each app a separate window )
KDE
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