In this week's KDE Commit-Digest: Replacement of the "toolbox", and a new KRunner in Plasma, with many applets moving from playground into extragear in KDE SVN. SuperKaramba is now fully integrated into Plasma. A move away from KDEPrint facilities, towards more basic functionality for KDE 4.0. More work on restoring the functionality of the Klipper applet. Basic sound support in Parley. General work on KHTML, with more specific work on image loading and testcases. More work on KDE colour scheme handling. A rethink of device handling for Amarok 2.0. Generic style saving work in KOffice. Various optimisation work across KDE. Kaider moves to extragear-sdk. Kicker is removed from KDE SVN. KDE 3.5.8 and KDE 4.0 Beta 3 (with Kickoff included as the menu option) have been tagged for release.
Comments
He can't, it helps him get laid more often.
I don't know what game is being played, but I believe you win.
>>The usability people need to usabil harder.
I just about fell out of my chair on that one.
KDE4.X is exactly like RatPoison - you need a very good terminal knowledge for using it fine...
I'm not sure if I'm understanding this correctly, but it seems that Krunner is now no longer a separate process, but a part of Plasma? "KRunner/Runner -> Plasma/Runner as it is actually hosted by libplasma"
If so, I remember the initial rationale was to keep it simple and separate so that it is more stable and you can always bring up a run dialog or shutdown/logout options. Has that been changed?
No, that thing was about where the code lives, KRunner is still a separate process, afaik ;-)
Like a lot of people I've gone back and forworth on my impression of the Oxygen style (mostly over the amount of contrast), but I have to say the screenshots in the linked article look flat out great. Amarok 2.0 is also coming together incredibly well it seems (Amarok and Konqueror are probably my two most used applications by far, especially since it seems Amarok is on and playing whenever my computer is on).
A lot of people seem disappointed that every single feature that was in KDE 3 series and even pondered about for KDE 4 series aren't in KDE 4.0, but you gotta remember that Rome wasn't built in a day. Also can't forget that sometimes to take a step forward you have to take a step backwards first. At the very least it looks like KDE 4.0's libraries are gonna be incredibly useful (and how boring would it be if 4.0 delivered everything you could ever possibly want? 4.1 would just be lame then ;) to develop all sorts of applications.
Since I seem to be rambling, I'll wrap it up by simply saying: Thank you, to every single KDE contributor out there, you've all created something simply amazing!
Agree!
I think it would be great with more contrast to the Oxygen-theme, no-contrast is kinda boring :( And it's not easy for the eyes.
I think it could be great if they look a bit at bespin - thats beatiful :D
Bespin was poorly coded, and was kicked out. It was the original Oxygen.
I do agree the style still needs more contrast.
I really like how many gradients are used in the KDE 3 Domino style. Is it possible to add support for some custom gradients in Oxygen so we can tweak it to have as much contrast as we'd like?
It is actually better than it was, they did a great job in the last 2 week to add some contrast. Now even on my 10 years old CRT screen, i can clearly see all widgets. I really start to love this theme, even if i was not so sure about it at the beginning.
I hope that the new oxygen will have all feature of the old one (for 4.1), i loved all those small details on tab switching and overmouse stuff.
Now I think the next thing to do is finishing the windeco to match with the nice mini-windeco of QT4 panel. After that, at the exeption of inactive windows the overmouse menu item, the theme will be almost complete!
Yes -- every day Casper commits a little tidbit that makes the style or the windows decoration better. Finished? Not yet -- but when I'm using KDE 3.5.x, I'm actually yearning to open a full KDE 4 session, because the widgets are getting so pleasing -- not in-my-face-look-at-me, not drag. Pleasing.
How is this not a showstopper?
Printing is available via QPrinter, which has gotten much better since Qt3. Of course, not as good as KDEPrint, but it'll do for now.
So I assume via QtGui you will have a UI temporarily that will be accessible for any app in KDE 4?
Yep, that's what I'm spending every waking moment outside work doing, converting every KDE program over to QPrinter...
It is a showstopper, and it would have taken several months to fix up, which is why we're removing it for now and switching to Qt for 4.0. Come KDE 4.1 the situation will be greatly improved (fingers crossed).
Any printing gurus out there, feel free to step forward and commit your time for 4.1 :-)
John.
Thank you for your professional honesty, John.
My C++ has been years, but I'm in the midst of retooling the C/C++/ObjC triple set, but it takes some time.
When I can I will definitely find some projects I can work on and help out.
The QPrinter definitely won't keep me from using KDE 4 on Debian.
I've got OS X and Linux w/ KDE and GNOME environments.
When you look back around 1989 to now, life is really good.
...but as a long time KDE fan I belong to the people who are less than enthusiastic about the current "betas".
Probably the following points will be regarded as trolling, but it's simply my opinion. I'd like to be proven wrong, as I'm basically looking forward to KDE4!
First of all, even considering the fact that KDE seems to define "beta" and "alpha" in another way than other devs, the SVN-Builds I try out are simply far from usable. At least with openSUSE. Single apps work great, but the desktop as a whole - not.
Then, sorry to say it again, Kickoff. I always disliked this menu concept in openSUSE, but you could always, with a mouseclick, revert to the old KDE menu. Even in Windows XP I can revert to the "old style" startmenu.
I really don't care which usability studies say that Kickoff is better for me - I'm simply slower with it. Kickoff for some reason doesn't feel right. Please don't lecture me that I have to get used to it and all will be fine - this is the wrong (Gnome-like) attitude.
That's obviously my subjective personal opinion, however, it's my personal computer and therefore I'm entitled to have an personal opinion on how it works. Others will have other opinions, and everybody should be able to choose his/her solution.
"Usability experts" simply have to accept that nowadays desktop paradigms like the startmenu are more or less common knowledge. In cars you also leave the pedals at the same position and don't change them because usability studies show that drivers would be more productive if switch them.
Then, plasma. I really like the great desktop effects. There is great potential in it. But, to be honest, the current implementation again breaks too many desktop paradigms I have learnt by heart over years. Configuration by a desktop toolbox which constantly pops up in some corner (I thought this was just a hack for the beta versions, but I read above that this will stay)? Why not the context menu? Why reinvent the wheel how a desktop is configured?
BTW, configuring the desktop is a nice thing, and plasma is really great playground for this, but sooner or later the desktop is basically the platform to start one's applications. Its not a standalone app on its own right.
This seems to be a bit lost in all the plasma hype. A working taskbar with a working startmenu and a desktop with app and data icons is, for me, the most basic aspect of a desktop. This simply isn't there currently. Or, you have to do some plasma magic to get this - but why???
All this basically means that I'm really glad when having my KDE3 desktop back after playing around a bit with KDE4. When I remember the switch from KDE1 to 2 und from 2 to 3, I always stayed with the beta releases of the new version as soon as possible.
(BTW - in SUSE's KDE4 preview you still can start a working KDE3 kicker - that always saves my day when trying KDE4...)
So now, come on flame me as a troll ;).
Most applications are really Beta quality, it's just that Plasma isn't. The desktop is important, which is why it feels pre-alpha to you. But really, KDE 4.0 Beta 3 isn't Alpha quality, it's really getting close to RC.
And to be honest, though Kickoff is great in theory (thorough usability testing showed it to be the superior menu compared to much competition), I don't like it that much either. Maybe it has to grow on you. Anyway, there is currently only ONE menu which will be mostly ready for KDE 4.0 (freeze in a few days!!!) and that's Kickoff. Nothing we can do about it, and it's not a bad decision, it's just all we can do.
And about the desktop/plasma configuration, let them play with it, OK? If you want to innovate, you have to experiment. And while most experiments turn out wrong, you WILL find and improve things. It's the only way. You should praise them for trying, you know. Think about it this way:
If you want to promote innovation, you gotta reward brilliant failures and punish mediocre successes. Because every mediocre success is a lost opportunity for a brilliant new innovation, and every brilliant failure must be rewarded so the brilliant ideas will continue to flow.
And yes, Plasma isn't ready yet - but it will be usable for 4.0, it's a showstopper.
Couldn't have put it better myself.
"If you want to promote innovation, you gotta reward brilliant failures and punish mediocre successes. Because every mediocre success is a lost opportunity for a brilliant new innovation, and every brilliant failure must be rewarded so the brilliant ideas will continue to flow."
Just wanted to quote that so it gets said once again!
I've still never seen how a menu that is slower and makes me take extra steps to get to my programs is vastly superior.
Provide Kickoff for those who want it, but please also provide a basic KMenu, and also bring on Raptor!
Extra steps, extra steps, why in the world I still hear that? It has been discussed 1 thousand times. Most people don't use more than 8 applications, favorite menu is faster, a lot faster in the 90% of the cases.
Yes, the normal menu has favorites too, but they are on the top, that a mistake, a big one, and they are little and you actually have to aim them, so, it's far for being nice.
I don't use the menu for launch my favorite aplications! I place one click icons on the tasktbar that are much faster than any menu for that. I use the menu only to turn-off the system and to reach all the dozens of aplications that I open 10% of the time.
So any design like kickoff is redundant and slow for me. I also don't like adaptative menus like Raptor. As those 10% aplications that I use are fairly random, I would have to relearn the position of them everytime that I open the menu. I preffer organize the menu my self, with instant drag-and-drop if possible (windows has it for ages, kde only have that slow kmenuedit aplication), and then leave it that way. So I can have some degree of muscular memory, and be faster.
Someone posted an gigant new menu with various pannels, that also solve the "drift for the right" problem to motion impaired. That maybe intersting for me.
Just wondering, in the latest Dolphin screenshots I don't see the actions sidebar (e.g. "Compress here", "Mail to recipient" etc.) I know there's nothing to worry about, but was it removed? Or is it hidden in the options somewhere? Or am I missing something?