> [how many computer users would have the slightest idea what any of
> this means?]
Plenty of Linux users. But since Linux has a desktop market-share in the single digits, that isn't saying a whole lot. For the rest, the text is rather too laden with buzzwords, typical press release-speak.
But aside from all that, what is interesting about a project like Xfce is that it gives new life to old computers, that is to say, PCs between five and ten years old. Those old boxes don't run the latest versions of Windows well, but you could easily run Linux on them with something like Xfce. (Depending on your requirements you could even run Linux in text mode on an old 486 from the mid 1990s; I've heard of people rolling their own routers that way.) I was recently reading about a group in L.A. which gets old computers from Goodwill, kits them up with Linux, and donate them to less affluent communities.
There is a surprisingly active sub-culture within the Linux world dedicated to developing and maintaining versions of it with surprisingly modest hardware requirements. Given juggernaut of OS and office suite upgrades engendered by certain convicted monopolists and the ensuing mountain of computers which get dumped every year, this seems to me to be a very Good Thing indeed.
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Colin Brace
Amsterdam