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  KDE 4.0-alpha1 Released: "Knut"
KDE Official News Posted by Sebastian Kügler on Friday 11/May/2007, @06:49
from the it-compiles dept.
The KDE Community is happy to announce the immediate availability of the first alpha release of the KDE Desktop Environment, version 4.0. This release is a basis for the integration of powerful new technologies that will be included in KDE 4. Read on for more details.

Highlights of KDE 4.0 Alpha 1 are:

  • A new visual appearance through Oxygen
  • New frameworks to build applications with, providing vastly improved hardware and multimedia integration (through Solid and Phonon), spelling and grammar checking, to name just a few
  • New applications that focus on a smooth user experience, such as Dolphin, the file manager, and Okular, the document viewer

The desktop in its budding glory

KDE 4.0 Alpha 1 marks the end of the addition of large features to the KDE base libraries and shifts the focus onto integrating these new technologies into applications and the base desktop. The next few months will be spent on bringing the desktop into shape after two years of frenzied development leaving very little untouched.

The final release of KDE 4.0 is expected in late October 2007.

The work on the framework makes application development easier and more satisfying. This will result in a crop of new features and applications over the next few years, underlining the position KDE holds as the leading Free Desktop and bringing Free Software to new users worldwide. A detailed release schedule can be found at techbase.kde.org, the new technical resource accompanying the platform, that provides extensive and high-quality documentation about KDE.

More information such as screenshots and installation instructions can be found in the KDE 4.0-alpha1 Visual Guide.



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  Related Links
 ·   Articles on KDE Official News
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Over 40 comments listed. Printing out index only.
First Post!
by Adriaan de Groot on Friday 11/May/2007, @07:24
First post! Everyone should post suggested KDE 4 alpha T-shirt designs here.
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Knut?
by Anon on Friday 11/May/2007, @07:30
Damn, that's a typo just waiting to happen! :)
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konqishirt
by basse on Friday 11/May/2007, @08:22
konqi t-shirt.. i'm happy to render out version of him wearing (or not wearing) anything, so just let me know! I already have some quite strange poses of him in KDE4 fashion... but no place really to put them.

.b
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What a Geek!
by Kris Kerwin on Friday 11/May/2007, @08:25
The projected final release date, according to the above release schedule:

"2.4.12 October 23, 2007: Targeted Release Date"

And the chemist in me celebrates! <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mole_day">Yay for Mole Day!</a>

I sure hope that they release at 6:02 in the morning! ;-)
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Kicker UI
by Flavio on Friday 11/May/2007, @08:33
First of all congratulations to all the devs! You all rock!

I have to say I'm a little surprised to see in the screenshot the same old "kicker" UI. When KDE4 planning was starting it seemed like the whole desktop/taskbar/program launcher/systray area would undergo a revolution. What are the plans in this area? I read on the release schedule that Beta is less than 2 months away. Is the kicker UI as we know it going to stay in KDE4?

(Please don't take this as flame bait, I just like to know where my beloved KDE is heading!)
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Thoughts on what to develop aganist
by Ian Monroe on Friday 11/May/2007, @08:53
How stable is the API? Could a KDE4 app developer develop againist this alpha without having to worry about someone fixing their app to build againist a newer SVN version?

Basically, should Amarok advise new developers to just get the alpha packages or should they still go ahead and build it.
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Great Work!
by rockmen1 on Friday 11/May/2007, @10:09
Appreciate you KDE!
Can't wait to try it!
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Hardware-Acceleration
by EMP3ROR on Friday 11/May/2007, @10:23
Why don't you use more hardware-acceleration? e.g. Marble, Krita, Kalzium
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LiveCD
by ac on Friday 11/May/2007, @10:41
Thanks for providing a LiveCD, so everyone can easily help out finding bugs in the user interface (see pervious post on the dot). For the impatient, you can get it here:

http://home.kde.org/~binner/kde-four-live/
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Oxygen style/window decorations...
by kde.fan.from.brasil on Friday 11/May/2007, @10:52
When are we going to see the new style/window decoration? Plastik is great, but appears a bit old, mixed with all that amazing Oxygen icons...

And congratulations for the release. ;)
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better qt integration !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
by djouallah mimoune on Friday 11/May/2007, @11:08
ok it sounds odd, but please can you do something to make pure qt application better integrated to kde, ie,( open file dialogue, print dialogue...)
for me perhaps the best thing in kde 3.90.1 is when you try to run plasma in terminal, you get a hehehe wonderful surprise.
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Knut?
by Nobby on Friday 11/May/2007, @11:32
Argh, ausgerechnet der blöde Eisbär :P
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KDE 4
by farid on Friday 11/May/2007, @11:35
How does one download and install the new alpha version of KDE 4 is not mentioned anywhere on the site.
I have KDE 3.5.5 with my SuSE 10.2 and KDE 3.5.6 with Kubuntu 7.04.
Being a newbie I find it difficult to upgrade to KDE 4 in both the Distro's and would appreciate any assistance given in this regard.
Thanks,

Farid Ansari
Karachi, Pakistan.
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X
by joesomeone on Friday 11/May/2007, @12:33
i still can't get x to start in minix, oops, wrong thread
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thanks
by 06labs on Friday 11/May/2007, @13:08
thanks for all!!!
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Any chance that the Final will be called
by Knut on Friday 11/May/2007, @14:58
Kunt ? ;-)
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Windows build
by Luizg on Friday 11/May/2007, @19:02
Any timeframe on a windows build?
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Pronunciaton of "Knut"
by Andreas on Friday 11/May/2007, @20:00
For English speakers, it's pronounced "cnoot" with a short "oo".
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They took out KONQUI?!
by zero1 on Friday 11/May/2007, @21:28
WTF blazes.. .?! they took out konqueror? my beloved konqui?! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.................!!!!!!!!!!!

give her back!give her back!give her back!give her back!give her back!

dolphin is like nautilus. i just hate it.. .
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Problem using kdesvn-build
by Florian on Saturday 12/May/2007, @01:31
Hello,
the build script gives an error here:

Updating kdesupport
svn: Unrecognized URL scheme for 'https://svn.kde.org/home/kde/branches/KDE/3.5/kde-common/admin'
Update failed, trying a cleanup.
Executing svn cleanup
Cleanup complete.
svn: Unrecognized URL scheme for 'https://svn.kde.org/home/kde/branches/KDE/3.5/kde-common/admin'
Error updating kdesupport, removing from list of packages to build.

What's wrong?

Thanks,

Florian
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whatever happened to plasma?
by rittmey on Saturday 12/May/2007, @03:21
In early discussions about KDE4 there was a lot of talk about Plasma. It is even still linked from within the oxygen site. But reading this announcement it is no more mentioned. Has it been merged into s.th. else? Has it completely vanished? Has it been postponed? What's up with Plasma? Since I am only an average KDE user, I admittedly visit dot.kde.org only every once in a while - so please excuse me, if I missed some discussions about Plasma.

Anyway: Looking at http://plasma.kde.org/ and following the link "Plasma APIs" the page states: "The APIs for working with and improving Plasma will appear here as they become available. They will undoubtedly be available sooner than that in KDE's subversion code repository where you are welcome to track Plasma development as it happens." Doesn't sound too good to me.
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Beryl integration
by Selene on Saturday 12/May/2007, @05:39
Hi, I was wondering if there is any work done on better support for Beryl. I'm thinking about such things as:

* being able to handle viewports (aka side of a cube) just like virtual desktops, which means:
* taskbar that has the option to only show windows from current viewport
* pager that can handle it (but this has already improved in KDE3)
* more exotic things like different wallpapers on each viewport and give them different names that show in the pager, like you can for virtual desktops now
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Kmail status
by Vide on Saturday 12/May/2007, @11:41
I've just to say.... wow!

I was very pessimistic reading that there's lack of manpower in kdepim, that there will be problem etc. So when I launched KMail in Alpha1 I was expeting to find a bunch of horrible semi-ported widgets and little more but...
- there is (finally) a first time wizard that guide you through the creation of a mail account.
- improved toolbars (especially while composing), that with the power of QT4 really rock (I *love* the effect you have when clicking on >> to show the toolbar's element not shown, simply amazing, the best implementation of this function ever seen)
- options panel: again WOW! Finally HIG is used and respected! There are still lot of options but they are organized way way better than KDE3.x

So, maybe we'll have to wait 4.1 to have full Akonadi support, but I'm quite happy anyway.

Great work!!
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WTF...
by kde on Saturday 12/May/2007, @15:39
Waw...

The new 'GNOME' looks pretty...:(

BTW..
Congratulations to all KDE developers, that I'm sure has not taken part in this HORRIBLE 'UI' design!
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Questions
by Benjamin on Saturday 12/May/2007, @19:23
- will there be nightly builds?

- how to develop for KDE 4 or desriptions how to compile sources?

- are there virtual client images?
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Oxygen icons
by Jonathan on Sunday 13/May/2007, @07:49
Wow, they are great! Simply amazing! I started up the liveCD and I thought this not possible. Although I have seen some screenshots, seeing it work is something else. Really, great.

The only icon I don't like is the folder icon. I don't know, it just looks strange. I think it's 1) the sight from the front and 2) it just doesn't look like a folder. I know this is still work in progress so I hope to see something else soon. I really don't want to offend you, it just doesn't fit with all the other icons that are so detailed and just great...

What do the others think?
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Some cool inspirations
by Andre on Tuesday 15/May/2007, @17:40
http://www.stud.fit.vutbr.cz/~xcapmi00/etoile/index.html
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