KOffice 1.5.1 Released

The KOffice team today released the first bug-fix release in their 1.5 series. Critical bugs in KSpread, KWord and Krita were fixed, thanks to the helpful input of our users. We also have updated languages packs. You can read more about it in the press release and the full announcement. A full changelog is also available. Currently, you can download binary packages for Kubuntu and SUSE.

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Comments

by Guillaume Laurent (not verified)

I'm sorry but the answer "please tell us about bugs" works only so far. In my experience people will only report bugs on apps which already look good and behave mostly properly. But below a certain quality threshold, they just won't bother, because if the app looks this bad already, it seems pointless to tell the dev about glaring problems which show up after 5mns of testing.

Given the abysmal level of user-friendliness of Gimp, I really hope Krita will be a suitable replacement someday, however I'm not holding my breath. So far, trying to use it has been an extremely frustrating experience. It's still very alpha IMHO, and should not be released.

by Cyrille Berger (not verified)

Yes that is true, but on the other hand a lot of people take the time to comment on the dot or in a blog, where the tracking of such information is very difficult instead of taking the same amount of time to report.

Bugreports and wishlist entries take far more time than comments on the dot...

by Aaron J. Seigo (not verified)

and yet comments on the dot will be forgotten tomorrow while reports on bugs.kde.org are archived properly.

moreover, it takes a lot of time to fix the bugs. usually much more than filing them. perhaps you could invest a tiny amount of your time to allow the developers to effectively use their time.

You don't need bugzilla to remember that Krita needs usable sharpen and blur filters. Those are just basics. If those filters become included into Krita, people will start to write bugreports about details. But not about those basics. That's the real world.

by cirehawk (not verified)

Maybe. But also in the real world the people who don't exercise their right to vote usually complain the most. They certainly have the right to complain, but chances are things won't change. If you want change, vote. Same as here. You certainly have the right to not report what you consider as basics, and you have the right to complain. But if people don't report their concerns via proper channels, they can't EXPECT their concerns to be addressed. That's my .02 cents.

I am not a programmer, just a user. But I would be willing to bet that developing this program takes a heck of a lot more time than making bugreports and wishlist entries. So if you are going to criticize the developers efforts, at least go through the recommended channels for making issues known. To do otherwise is "lazy" and just comes across as complaining.

Now if developers are unresponsive to bug reports, then that's different. But that doesn't seem to be the complaint.

In the middle of all this love, I would like to say:

Thank you for Krita.

I have been using it for simple tasks in the last month, and it surely works for me. And by following the efforts of the Krita gang, in the create mailng list (cross platform / toolkit standards for creative apps), in the colorspace area, putting pressure on the Gimp guys, I like you even more. It is not only a great app, it is a great team.

Cheers, and don't worry about the naysayers!

Amadeo

I second this. Just upgraded to ko 1.5.1 and krita has really improved. The tools I use most are now implemented and I'm very satisfied with the UI. I was always unhappy with the gimp and its UI. Krita now does all I need. The gimp wil stay on my computer but I'll use Krita as it just starts up instantly whereas the gimp takes 5 secs to come up.

Thanks for Krita!

by Officer (not verified)

Dear KOffice developer,

thanks a lot for all your efforts! It is getting better and better, and this is wonderful.

@Hans: Shut up, you lousy demanding taker for free, and get some friend finally, or you will end very lonely at the edge!

by KOfficeFan (not verified)

KOffice is great.

What isn't great is the amount of bad comments on this article. If you found a bug, file it. If you want to just complain about life in general, go to slashdot or osnews or send your buddies at microsoft an email.

by sundher (not verified)

I am skeptical about releasing it with RC bugs, but I trust the devs to make the right choice. Krita's progress has been remarkable and I'm hoping that many of these filters are provided by plugins ala GIMP. I have to chime in requesting a howto somewhere. At the risk of being off-topic, the SoC results are supposed to be in today. When will we find out how KDE fared?

by Boudewijn Rempt (not verified)

I'm writing a howto... Maybe I should release it before it's done? About soc: Google is going to write the applicants real soon now, and after that, I guess the dot story won't be long.

by sundher (not verified)

Nah, release it when it's done and maybe announce it on the dot? That way this sort of flamewar can be averted and no one will complain that the Krita documentation is incomplete or no one made an announcement about it. :) Thanks for the info about SoC and thanks for all your work on Krita. Its progress in the past year has been nothing short of amazing. :-D

by max (not verified)

> I'm writing a howto... Maybe I should release it before it's done?

Of course. The sooner people can start to write scripts and plugins the more popular Krita will become. Release early, release often!

by Odysseus (not verified)

What, and have you complain it's only half-complete, inaccuarate and caused you to lose data/time/whatever. Man, you seem to be an irony free zonee...

John.

by Derek Kite (not verified)

Koffice and Krita seem to be hitting a critical mass.

Stages of development:

1. Great idea sees first implementation. Diehard users, developers and family members with no other choice use software and assist in development.

2. Project progresses to the point of being useful. Users who have watched start using, instantly finding limitations, unfinished features. Comments made are positive, hinting that we may have an (insert well established software here) killer.

3. Project attracts developers who are able to add features easily, and fix bugs. Project hits walls due to lack of infrastructure, mature organisation, possibly limitations in design. Initial enthusiasm carries everything through.

4. Project starts becoming genuinely useful to users, ie. some actually replace other software and use project extensively. Again limitations show up; unfinished or unpolished features, bugs and regressions, organizational teething pains. Comments made tend to be negative, showing a deepening investment in the project, where it's limitations are genuinely painful to the now dedicated users.

5. Project reaches maturity. Not perfect, but very useful. Further development focusses on finish and fit that only can be perfected by use.

Looks like Krita and KOffice are at #4.

Well done everyone. Remember that the negatives come from people who deeply care. Also remember the enormous work (usually given freely) that has gone into the project already.

Derek

by Iuri Fiedoruk (not verified)

I already replaced gimp by krita. It has improved a *LOT* after koffice 1.4, it's a good tool that works well for most parts (I still don't like the way selection works) and just do the job.
Unfortunally I can't say the smae for kwrite, I'm still need to use openoffice for that.

by Min (not verified)

Sorry, I don't believe you. What have you done with gimp? Painting? Then Krita might be a good replacement. But I doubt that anyone doing image manipulation already can replace gimp by Krita. Plugins are lacking, Filters, export filters, ...

by Iuri Fiedoruk (not verified)

Well, you can belive me yes. :)
If you read the original message you will notica #4 is *some users starting to do some work*. It isn't *a lot of users doing some serious work*.
I'm not using krita as photoshop replacement, I'm just using it as image cuting, resizing, painting yes.
I'm not a designer or artist, I just need it work some small but usefull (to me work).

by anon (not verified)

Krita might not have the community that GIMP does but I think Krita's real strength is that its base is strong and its interface isn't a usability nightmare. It already supports 16 bit color and CMYK whereas GIMP is tangled in code that won't let it upgrade from 8. Plugins and filters come with time and community involvement. On a funnier note, Krita's raindrops filter has been ported to GIMP.

http://maurits.wordpress.com/2006/05/23/gimp-09-progress/

by Boudewijn Rempt (not verified)

That's not gimp, but gimp-sharp -- I never knew such a project existed, I'll check it out.

by Maurits Rijk (not verified)

GIMP# (aka gimp-sharp) is not a replacement nor a rewrite of GIMP. It's actually two things: firstly an OO framework which makes it easy to derive new plug-ins with minimal effort. And secondly it wraps the complete GIMP API in C#.

We also look at other programs like Paint.NET and of course Krita to learn from. GIMP is a very powerful program, but writing plug-ins for it is not much fun. And I should know, because I've written a few :)

We ported the Raindrops filter because it was very straightforward to do so (from C++ to C#) and we were also interested to learn about the performance differences between the two languages.

(And although I come from the GIMP side, I think Krita is an absolutely marvelous program with a great future ahead!)

by Kanniball (not verified)

I'm sorry but I have to be some kind of rude, with people which are always complaining about.
Hey you don't even pay a cent for this software, and you are allowed to change it to meet your needs. Every project in opensource is made by contributions, people coding at night and working all day, and there's no project with enough human resources to fill all the features, so sometimes things take a lot of time to get on point.

I'm talkig as a user only, but when there's something really annoying I try to fix it, as you can see here: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=121337

I don't have skills at C++ and QT (but I will learn for sure), and I've found one way to fix it.

So what I suggest is read this page http://www.kde.org/jobs/ , and apply!!!

KDE wants you... and needs you!!!

I am seriously and desperately looking for job. I am located in <> and would like to work from home. I have been using linux only for 5 months.
I know C language , x86(nasm) , C++(never used extensively) . I have gone thru QT documents briefly.
Most of my programming has been on ms platform.
At present i am THINKING of writing bittorrent client for linux platform, which will help me , hopefully get a job ??? .
I need advice , how should i go about it , should i first join the community and work with them or should i go alone. also how do these great talented respected koffice devlopers make there living?
I have limited capabilities , will not touch anything related to web or html or xml(until no option left) , but if need a lowlevel protocol communicae , i will do it.
Please give me or advise me a small project , which atleast be of some use in kde environment.
Thank you all

If you're new to the KDE technologies, I really recommend helping out an existing project, rather than try to start from scratch.

Have a look at a project you like, and think of ways to improve it. Read the mailing list for a bit. Look at the bugs that are filed against it. Pick something that looks easy enough, either a bug or a feature you really want. Try it. Ask for help when you're stuck.

You won't have your own application on your CV, but you will be able to show-off those essential team-working skills!

Oh, and have fun!

by Boudewijn Rempt (not verified)

I seriously doubt creating a bittorrent client for Linux will get you a job: free software development experience can be a pro, with some employers, but especially telecommute software development jobs are very thin on the ground and it tend to be the very best developers who can get one. Oh, and expect that most developers will wonder whether you will be spending enough energy on the job if you're also deeply involved in free software.

As to how I make my living: I've got a 40-50 hour day job coding custom applications, some in Java, some in Javascript, some in Python. None of the KOffice developers is exactly paid to work on KOffice, though two are sponsored to do work on KDE/KOffice.

Thanks for your sincere advise both mart, Boudewijn Rempt .
I think i'll join the mailing list , and will check if i can be of any help there and work up from there and what will happen will happen.
Thanks all.
Excuse me for the offtopic.
bye

by Anonymous (not verified)

> At present i am THINKING of writing bittorrent client for linux platform

Another? KTorrent is the best, and there are also others for Linux.

When I use a software with bugs, I don't waste my precius time fixing it, I use a better one instead.

by cirehawk (not verified)

Have fun using your better software.

by Thorsten Schnebeck (not verified)

Hi,

I have tested Krita 1.5 for ebv4linux:
http://www.ebv4linux.de/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=31
(Sorry, German only)

Krita got 5 from 10 points. Deeply missing are selection or alpha layers, basic dynamic and color filters. For multi-monitor usage it would be nice to dock the separate tear-off tool windows together. More useful than the current filter gallery would be a preview of different parameters of a single filter. Scripts seems not to have a GUI option.
Kritas good features are CMS support, RAW support, tablet support, multi color space painting engine and scripting/in process controlling.

Bye

Thorsten

by Boudewijn Rempt (not verified)

Um... Selections _are_ layers, basically. I'm not sure what color filters are missing: there are color adjustment filters that work on any channel. You can use PyQt to QtRuby to provide a gui in your scripts without problems. Not sure what

Docking of tool windows outside the main window is dependent on what Qt offers. I am not going to spend time working around or against the toolkit, life is too short for that.

And for the good points, don't forget the adjustment layers. They didn't work all that well in the first beta, but are quite reliable in 1.5.0.

by Thorsten Schnebeck (not verified)

Hi Boudewijn,

Can I save selections into layers? Can I switch them on and off, to use them when I need it?
Missing filters: white balance, level(!), contrast, brightness, HSV control.
Krita has a (BTW wrong named) gradation tool but its far more handy to have sliders for contrast, gamma, saturation etc and not only generic gradation filters for channels. Krita has some auto tools to stretch the levels but manual control rules. The color tool has only 8bit selections range independet to the used color space.

Adjustment layers (AL) are named in the review but they would be better, if you can combine them with an alpha mask. I'm not sure if AL scales UI-wise. If I write a cool filter as Kross-Script can I use it as AL? Or are AL only for build-in functions?

As I follow Kritas development since years I know that the basic are now there and working but there are still some interface problems to present the user the needed function.

Please go one. Krita is on a good way.

Bye

Thorsten