First review of KDE 2.2

There is a nice and favorable review of KDE 2.2 available here.

The author does make some mistakes and some propositions that do not seem too clueful (Gecko instead of KHTML? Try KMozilla..), but it's still a nice read.

I do agree about the need for better integration between the kdepim programs and kmail, however.

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Comments

by Kefah Issa (not verified)

I can view arabic pages on KDE 2.2 RH7.1.
Check the fonts setting for konqueror (as a browser) and if that is still pointing to arabic fonts and codecs.

by Tony Caduto (not verified)

How do you install in KDE 2.2 final?
I compiled it and did the make install, everything when OK , but I can't see any new stuff in the KDE control panel.
Nothing on the newsgroups either.
after the make install there is a little message that say dont forget to add /usr/local/kde/bin to your path, but there is not a bin dir in /usr/local/kde/ ?

T

by Scott (not verified)

I'm having the same trouble. Any tips for those of us less technical would be most appreciated!

Thanks. . . Scott

by Tony Caduto (not verified)

I figured it out, you need to edit the paths to the KDE directories in the configure file before doing the make install. Mofset has them set to his KDE install which is different than my Suse 7.2. Anyway just change the paths and it will install perfect. I really like it, it looks alot better than windoze.

the default paths are set to /usr/local/kde, and my actual kde2 instal was in /opt/kde2, the paths are near the top of the configure file.
Basicly follow the install instructions, then after doing the ./configure make the path changes, then make install :-)

Tony Caduto

by nq (not verified)

or do
./configure --prefix=/opt/kde2

by Mosfet (not verified)

Yep, this is correct, or set KDEDIR. AFAIK this is required for compiling any KDE software.

by Bob (not verified)

Desperatly need help compiling v0.5 on slack8:

/bin/sh ../libtool --mode=compile --tag=CXX g++ -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I. -I.. -I/opt/kde22/include -I/usr/src/qt-copy/include -I/usr/X11R6/include @CPPFLAGS@
@CXXFLAGS@ -c main.cpp
g++ -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I. -I.. -I/opt/kde22/include -I/usr/src/qt-copy/include -I/usr/X11R6/include @CPPFLAGS@ @CXXFLAGS@ -Wp,-MD,.deps/main.pp -c main.cpp -fPIC -DPIC -o .libs/main.o
g++: cannot specify -o with -c or -S and multiple compilations
make: *** [main.lo] Error 1

by Chris (not verified)

Slack8's versions of automake and autoconf don't play nice with the mosfet configure scripts...I dunno who is at fault but I just downgraded to the automake and autoconf packages from Slack7.

by Mosfet (not verified)

Oh, and BTW, Liquid 0.5 isn't automasking HTML widgets properly... I was using a khtml checkout done after KDE2.2, and it busted some of the code (automasking is pretty buggy in KHTML widgets to begin with). Thus the background around rounded edges shows through. I'm checking out the KDE_2_2_BRANCH (the official KDE2.2 release), and will fix this then release a 0.5.1.

by Tony Caduto (not verified)

Yes, I noticed that, but it still looks real good :-). Even with the background showing through it looks alot better than mozilla.
I think liquid is the best looking theme for KDE2. It just has a elegant look and feel to it.
Keep up the good work.

Tony Caduto

by Fredrik Corneliusson (not verified)

Liquid is nice and slick but I find the background too noisy, and the normal kde background settings are ignored. Will there be better integration and fine grained settings for liquid in the coming versions?
Also would it not be nice to have the effects from liquid available to all themes so that not only C++ programmers is able to do cool effects (like being able to add transparency for menus in a themes editor).
Also I had to set --prefix=/usr for my Mandrake 8.0(using texstar prelink 2.2 RPM’s) to pick up the theme, it would be nice if the readme informed about this.
Thanks!

by Mosfet (not verified)

RTFM, background settings are not ignored ;-) If you read mosfet.org you'll see that this issue is noted, that the background wallpaper gets messed up when the style is first applied but you can reset it in KControl or it will fix itself the next time you log in. If you see a rendering error I suggest looking at the website first, since this *is* beta software. I'm working on fixing this for 0.5.1, but I want to release this today or tommorow because it has important fixes (HTML, KSCD, etc..). I *do* appreciate all new rendering error reports, tho! :) I usually take care of these pretty quickly.

There is already fine grained configuration for Liquid, at least as much as there is under regular KDE: colors, wallpaper, fonts are all done in the normal way. It's quite integrated, it's exactly the same! ;-)

As for configure, your going to have to set that when compiling any KDE software, AFAIK. If not let me know. I think Liquid is many user's first time compiling KDE software... Hopefully distributors will start making an RPM (I believe there is already an RH one). If they do and send it to me I'd be glad to put it on my site.

As for menu effects, all the styles I maintain and support will have them.

by Ranger Rick (not verified)

I made an RPM for RH71, you can grab the source RPM at http://www.opennms.org/~ben/kde2.2/kdeliquid-0.4-1.src.rpm if you want it. Looking forward to the new release, I plan on packaging it up if you want RPMs for "official" release... =)

by Mosfet (not verified)

Sure! RPM's or other package formats would be much appreciated, both by the users so they don't have to compile it if they don't want to, and by me so I don't get the email ;-) I'd make RPM's for RH myself, but my system is significantly different (paths, glibc, compiler, kernel, X11, KDE, etc...).

Anyone who wants to contribute packages please give me a mail and I'll put them up! :)

by caatje (not verified)

Hi mosfet,

I want to thank you for this wonderful style.

There's just one thing that bugs me:
whenever the button color is the same as the background color, the style automagicly chooses a default (other) color. Could this be modified to just accept the button color of the colorstyle (even if it's the same as the background color)

Thanx

by Mosfet (not verified)

No, because it looks like crap ;-) Having a separate button color is important to the style since that is what draws all the "blue" components, but most color schemes don't have it set. Even more importantly, it's also used in mouse hover. I *may* change it to a color based off the background color, tho.

by Spoon Merchant (not verified)

Hi, I used the Liquid Theme on an old box with KDE 2.2beta1 a while back. I recently built a new box, installed KDE 2.2.1 today and then remembered the "missing" (and the best) theme. Anyway, I managed to download and compile 0.5.1. It looks great :). Unfortunately, as soon as my mouse goes over the panel, it disappears. Then it comes back. But as soon as my mouse goes near it, it disappears again, permanently. Arse :).

Any ideas?

PS. Good job Mosfet - such a cool theme (when it works :) ).

by Spoon Merchant (not verified)

Posted a little too soon :).

It turned out to be the panel background picture was missing... Turned it off and my panel stayed put :).

One other thing - if I had animate menus selected in the style dialog, the translucent menus were all weird. Turned that off and now all is well :)...

by MozFet Site Down (not verified)

I cant seem to be able to download his theme *anywhere*. Does anyone have the source code who can email it to me. His site is down and his tarball is no where else.

by fern (not verified)

What would be the correct prefix for Red Hat 7.3 with KDE 3.0?

by Eb (not verified)

Hello. I am running SuSE 7.1 KDE 2.2. When I run ./configure, it generates the following error "Qt (>= Qt 2.2.2) (libraries) not found." I have installed QT 2.3.1. Any suggestions would be appriciated. Thanks.

by Krame (not verified)

Include apriopriate fragment of ./config.log file ( ./configure messages tells nothing, so nobody will tell you what is the reason ) and post it to the newest header on KDE.dot. I think that few people read this old messages.

by Krame (not verified)

Ups ! It looks like it is the newest header.

by Jon Tillman (not verified)

You need to issue ./configure --with-qt-libraries=/whatever/your/qt/path/is

For me it was /usr/lib/qt2/lib

Now that I have that figured out, does anyone know why make install tells me:

make[2]: Entering directory `/usr/src/packages/SOURCES/mosfet-liquid0.5.1/kcmtransmenu'
/bin/sh ../libtool --mode=compile --tag=CXX g++ -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I. -I.. -I/opt/kde2/include -I/usr/lib/qt2/include -I/usr/X11R6/include -O2 -fno-exceptions -fno-check-new -DQT_CLEAN_NAMESPACE -DQT_NO_COMPAT -DQT_NO_ASCII_CAST -c transmenu.cpp
g++ -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I. -I.. -I/opt/kde2/include -I/usr/lib/qt2/include -I/usr/X11R6/include -O2 -fno-exceptions -fno-check-new -DQT_CLEAN_NAMESPACE -DQT_NO_COMPAT -DQT_NO_ASCII_CAST -Wp,-MD,.deps/transmenu.pp -c transmenu.cpp -fPIC -DPIC -o .libs/transmenu.o
In file included from transmenu.cpp:129:
transmenu.moc:45: new declaration `static void TransMenuConfig::staticMetaObject()'
transmenu.h:19: ambiguates old declaration `static class QMetaObject * TransMenuConfig::staticMetaObject()'
transmenu.moc: In function `void __static_initialization_and_destruction_0(int, int)':
transmenu.moc:29: no matching function for call to `QMetaObjectInit::QMetaObjectInit (QMetaObject * (*)())'
/usr/lib/qt2/include/qmetaobject.h:259: candidates are: QMetaObjectInit::QMetaObjectInit(void (*)())
/usr/lib/qt2/include/qmetaobject.h:261: QMetaObjectInit::QMetaObjectInit(const QMetaObjectInit &)
make[2]: *** [transmenu.lo] Error 1
make[2]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/packages/SOURCES/mosfet-liquid0.5.1/kcmtransmenu'
make[1]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/packages/SOURCES/mosfet-liquid0.5.1'
make: *** [all-recursive-am] Error 2

by jd (not verified)

Just a wild guess (I'm at work on a w2k machine and can't check it...):

If you have to specify the qt-lib-path for it to work (normally, you don't have to if your $QTDIR path is set correctly) maybe your "moc-path" isn't correct either? It could be that you pick up the wrong version of "moc" during compilation, and that is sure to mess things up...

I have $QTDIR, $KDEDIR and $MOCPATH (not sure if this is the correct name, but can't check it right now) all set correctly and the only thing I normally add to ./configure is --enable-final (which sometimes works and some times doesn't...)

by jonathan (not verified)

hi, i'm having trouble getting the theme to work too. i did ./configure; make install; just fine. then i added /usr/local/kde/bin to my path just fine. rebooted, and looked in the Look and Feel | Colors and nothing. I can't find a trace of liquid in any of the KDE control screens.

also, one more thing, after i finally do get liquid working what do i do with the Liquid-0.1.kcsrc file??

thanks in advance,
jonathan

by jonathan (not verified)

oops. i guess it pays to watch the dates of previous posts and not just reply to them because they seem relevant. sorry for the screw up.

by Tony Caduto (not verified)

Konqueror is great and getting better all the time, but it seems to be lacking feedback when you click on a link or open a new page.
If you click on a link that is slow, you don't know if anything is happening, it would be nice to have the cursor change to a hour glass or something.
Is there something that I missed and just don't have it enabled?
Comments anyone?

Tony Caduto

by not me (not verified)

Just look for the spinning Konqueror logo. (Much more reliable than the IE globe, which doesn't spin sometimes)

by Jelmer Feenstra (not verified)

Sometimes the konqueror logo isn't spinning either although a link was pressed (and a new page comes up in a few seconds). Haven't seen any concistency in this behaviour yet so I'm not sure where the problem could be. Personally I'd like to some more feedback - it adds a lot to perceived speed as well (take a look at opera, it seems very fast because of the timers starting off every time etc etc).

by tweet (not verified)

My problem probably has an easy solution but I am frustrated. I want to organize my desktop icons any way I want. But, as soon as I move an icon, kde reorganizes it. I've tried setting the desktop icons in the control center organized as vertically, horizontal and I've kept both unchecked -- no luck. Suggestions? Thanks

by Danny (not verified)

log out and log in again. Second time I logged in I could reorganize them myself.

Danny

by aleXXX (not verified)

Known bug, it is being worked on.

Alex

by Anonymous Coward (not verified)

After upgrading to KDE 2.2 on Mandrake 8.0.
I faced 15 crashes within an hour! Ugh!
Hitting refresh in Konqueror crashes,
enabling java in the browser crashes,
screen savers crash, kdeinit dumps core
regularly, and so many apps... the list goes
on. Arrgghh! I'd better use Windows (it will
crash 4/5 times, but in a day, not in a single
hour).

- Anonymous coward

by Erlend Bøe (not verified)

Strange that you should get so many crashes.
In general I think that KDE is very stable, and that a crash like you have is caused by configuration problems (wrong glibc, compiler, etc...)

Did you update KDE from the official KDE RPMS for Mandrake 8.0, or did you use some other ones (for example the ones from cooker or RedHat?)

I have upgraded to KDE 2.2 on mandrake 8.0 (using the "official" rpms for mandrake 8.0 on my "clean" 8.0 system), and I have not experienced any problems

by Anonymous Coward (not verified)

Yes, it is so unfortunate.

I updated the fresh Mdk 8.0 installation with the
latest updates from Mandrake (including the glibc
update).

Then I used the official KDE RPMs for Mdk 8.0.

I have a iPIII 1GHz system on i810E mboard,
512 MB RAM, 20 GB HDD, running Mdk 8.0 system
on ReieserFS 4GB partition, 512MB swap.

KDE first refused to run and the kernel
(2.4.3mdk-up) spit out an 'oops' during the
KDE startup.
I had to then upgrade the kernel to 2.4.8
(recompiled from sources and installed).

Do I need to rebuild KDE 2.2 from sources
on my system?

- Anonymous Coward

by thierry (not verified)

Do you install the RPM with --nodeps option ?
If yes you can :
reinstall the RPM with
rpm -i --force kde*
and try to resolv the dependencies problem

Some dependencies are not important,
while others can cause big instability.

regards

by thierry (not verified)

Do you install the RPM with --nodeps option ?
If yes you can :
reinstall the RPM with
rpm -i --force kde*
and try to resolv the dependencies problem

Some dependencies are not important,
while others can cause big instability.

regards

by ik (not verified)

unrelated but due to a bug in 2.4.8 and 2.4.9
you will see bad performance (and this affects kde a lot). you can use 2.4.8-ac7, or wait
until the bug will be fixed.

by WereCat (not verified)

With crashes like that, I'd suspect faulty hardware, possibly RAM? I suspect hardware because crashes occur in both operating systems.

by Jay (not verified)

Well it could be your ram. How much ram do you have? Or it could be hardware. But if you have 128 megs of ram or above its probably hardware.

Have you ever had pc troubles with software ect... Come to my site and post for free and you dont even have to become a member. SO stop on by. This url is. http://denim.bbboy.net/pcdr

by flyher (not verified)

but if I restart X server under KDM in the pull down menu and KDM starts up again, the keyboard works. Any suggestions on getting the keyboard to work the first time? thanks

by flyher (not verified)

I remain stumped.

by Si (not verified)

I've found that with some Microsoft mice, you need to stop GPM from running before you launch X otherwise you get the same problem that you've mentioned.

Hope this helps.

by Bansaie (not verified)

I have the same problem with the difference that a X server restart doesnt help, but choosing console login in the pull down menu does. The keyboard works in the console and also starts to work in KDM after the return from the console.

Suggestions ?

Regards
_______
Bansaie

by Chris Pierson (not verified)

I have a similar problem that started after I upgraded to KDE 3.3.2. Just like this, I have to login to the console then let it timeout back to KDM, then the keyboard works.

Let me know if you find of solution. It is kind of annoying.

by Bansaie (not verified)

Problem solved!

Under [General] in /etc/kde3/kdm/kdmrc add the line:
ServerVTs=-7

Or run "apt-get -u --reinstall install kdm" and choose to replace the current configuration file with the one in the package.

Hope this is of any use for others too.

Regards
Bansaie

by Henry Kroll (not verified)

The keyboard can also appear unresponsive, to the impatient, when slow keys is turned on. KDE Control Center >> REgional & Accessibility >> Keyboard Filters >> Slow Keys.

by Philipp Spitzer (not verified)

Solution:
Add
ServerVTs=-7
to
/etc/kde3/kdm/kdmrc

A longer description can be found at:
http://lists.debian.org/debian-qt-kde/2004/10/msg00486.html

Greetings, Philipp

by deman (not verified)

Great works by kde team. Kde 2.2 has came with all its promises. Now for kde 3, put usability as one of the priorities.

-deman