It’s always been just KDE to me. In the past year or so, I’ve noticed people calling Plasma KDE or even just Plasma. What happened? Why do people insist on making the name longer? Why the word Plasma? What is Plasma referring to? And, are they trying to move away from the KDE name to just Plasma?
i think plasma is just the shell that KDE develops. KDE also develops the other programs that are included in the desktop environment, like dolphin and konsole.