KDE 4.0 Release Candidate 2 Out Now, Codename "Coenig"

The KDE Community is happy to announce the immediate availability of the
second release candidate for KDE 4.0
. This release candidate marks the last
mile on the road to KDE 4.0. This release sees increasing participation from distributions, you can download packages for Debian, Kubuntu, Mandriva, openSUSE & Fedora or grab the live CDs from Kubuntu & openSUSE.


KDE's webbrowser Konqueror

KOffice has also put out a sixth alpha release, released separately.

While progress on the quality and completeness of what is to become the KDE 4.0 desktop
has been great, the KDE Community decided to have another release candidate before releasing
KDE 4.0 on January 11th. The codebase is now feature-complete. Some work is still being done
to put the icing on the KDE 4.0 cake. This includes fixing bugs,
finishing off artwork and smoothing out the user experience.

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Comments

Well, I downloaded and installed the packages as per the instructions on the kubuntu site, but no dice. I can run some kde4 apps from my normal kde3 session, but when I try to start a Kde4 session from kdm nothing happens. I get a blank screen for a few seconds, then the kdm login screen re-appears as if nothing had happened.. hmm.

put

export KDEHOME=~/.kde4

to

/usr/lib/kde4/bin/startkde

and it should work

I can top that. I installed the Kubuntu packages exactly as the instructions specified, and it uninstalled my entire KDE3! I was able to test drive KDE4 OK. From a console, I reinstalled KDE using apt-get, and I had my old faithful back. No real harm, just had to click out of all the first-run dialogs again. Good news is that I now have 3 and 4 working. Sweet.

by Sam (not verified)

I've always been a big fan of KDE, but 4.0rc2 seems to be totally not KDE. One of the great things about KDE was the ability to configure it however you wanted, but now you can't configure anything anymore. Its a total nightmare -- like the Gnome developers kidnapped and replaced all of the original KDE staff. All I can say is I won't be switching to KDE 4 unless it goes through some major changes.

Please, please, please bring back the KDE philosophy that the user should be able to configure their GUI how they like. Eye-candy is nice but giving me the power to choose is really what I thought KDE and FOSS was all about.

Thanks to the KDE 3 people you've done great, and I love KDE. Sadly my KDE is gone.

by Griobhtha (not verified)

I totally agree with you Sam. KDE 4 has become more Gnome than Gnome. They should change the name to BKE for Broken Knome Enamel. The Plasma interface is (to paraphrase an old proverb) the look of honey with the taste of ash. What's really astounding are the statements that this is "Release Candidate" quality material and that it is complete for final release except for minor tweaking. RC2 is a beginning alpha at best. There is nothing there! Behind the candyass look there are NO serious controls and NO configurations. This is a bad turn for KDE.

by Coolvibe (not verified)

It's not done yet. Stop whining.

by Velvet Elvis (not verified)

amen

It's like the whole desktop was designed after listening to gnome users complain about KDE on /.

The only criticism I ever agreed with was KDE's fondness for distracting eye candy but that never bother me because you could turn it all off. By all I mean all. No shadows, no heavy themes, no shadows or compositing, no animations, none of it. If I want something that's nice to look at, I'll go to an art museum. Now it seems like the eye candy has been made the whole point.

Hello. Part of the point of running linux is that forced hardware obsolescence is stupid. I should be able to use the same machine until it dies and not be forced to get a new one in order to upgrade my OS shell.

by Velvet Elvis (not verified)

Another possibility is that Havoc Pennington left a bunch of seed pods at a KDE developers conference somewhere

by Ian Monroe (not verified)

With plasma you'll be able to totally swap out anything and replace it with another plasmoid. Personally I don't really notice what options your talking about (I still see plenty of configuration dialogs), but regardless in the long run (probably not even that long) there will be many many choices you can make. And not just little piddly things.

by Bille (not verified)

The Plasma config is just not done yet. No konspiracy.

by Bobby (not verified)

LOL, it seems like Gnome is the greatest nightmare for KDE users. Anyway don't worry, by the time the next RC is ready you will realize that the Gnomies haven't managed to kidnap our heroes ;)
KDE4 will be more powerful that all the versions before.

by Fred (not verified)

Stop whining! By now everybode must know that:

1. This is an RC for a techonology preview version (called v4.0) in the KDE4 series.
2. It's a work in progress where plasma and the panels are still in heavy development. Please check out all the other greatness.
3. It's called RC. OK, maybe that's a bit confusing.

by Velvet Elvis (not verified)

Using the same terminology as, say, the rest of the world rather than calling dogs cats and cats dogs?

If you call something a release candidate, you'll get people installing it expecting something that's feature complete and of release quality, because that what release candidate. If you call it RC, it means that to the best of your knowledge it's ready to release as a stable version but needs more testing to be sure.

At best this makes the KDE developers look out of touch with the rest of the software ecosystem and does not build confidence.

It was my impression that in this case it was being used to mean that core features are presumed stable but bells and whistles still need tweaking because that would at least be in the same ballpark as how the rest of the world uses the term. No such luck.

Newsflash. This is a buggy beta release at best.

by Paul Eggleton (not verified)

Newsflash: missing features != bugs.

by Richard (not verified)

news flash

release candiates are NEVER FEATURE COMPLETE

example microsoft has just release vista sp1 RC to the general public, 300 bug fixes, and they have stated this is not the finished product and there is much more to come in it.

Final releases are feature complete, not beta's not RC's. And if you knew the reasoning behind kde4 you will know it wont be feature complete until around 4.1 that 4 is being released so that people can port their software to it.

gezzzz, I can't count the amount of times I have read kde people explain that to you people and still you don't get it, and cry

by Paul Eggleton (not verified)

Don't tell me, tell the parent poster - I agree with you :)

by Velvet Elvis (not verified)

"Microsoft breaks it too!" should not be an excuse.

The way I understand it is that once you're get all the redefined vocabulary out of the way, things aren't going to be out of beta until 4.1.

The reason I'm hacked off is because I was tricked into beta testing on my work machine and lost the better part of a day's work as a result.

One more time. "Release candidates" = "this software has the potential to be bit for bit identical to the final stable and feature complete release."

by tendays (not verified)

> 1. This is an RC for a technology preview version (called v4.0) in the KDE4 series.

Thank you. "Technology preview". That's the thing all those people who keep whining don't seem to understand...

I don't expect the actual release to be totally feature complete and totally bugfree. I don't even expect it to contain all features found in 3.5.x.

The 4 in 4.0.0 means it is using new APIs and new technologies etc, breaking continuity from the 3.x series.

The .0.0 means it is the very first "release" version (as opposed to alpha, beta, rc), which means those technologies and their applications have hardly had time to mature, and libraries have hardly had time to get applications.

Comparing to Windows is misleading, because Windows has had punctual releases for a while now (95, 98, etc) which people buy, which are supposed to be stable, and get patches now and then.

KDE, and most open source software, on the other hand, has a continuous development - we will have 4.0.0, 4.0.1, 4.0.2, 4.1.0, etc.

If you want absolute stability and "full-featuredness" and configuration dialogs for every single detail, and all kinds of plasmoids, just wait for a few extra releases!

And yes, it is called "whining". Calling things "crap", etc, is not exactly constructive criticism. Saying this and that should be configurable just shows you haven't been following the development AT ALL.

by tendays (not verified)

(by the way when I say "you" I mean whoever is whining that way - not the GP in particular)

by SVG Crazy (not verified)

C'mon, this is ALREADY the most configurable KDE version EVER! The technology for many configurations is already there, but there are some configuration dialogs missing on RC2. I bet many of them will come for KDE 4.0, for instance, the configuration dialog for the panels. They are not there yet because the developers had got to worry about the most important thing first (the technology, which makes things actually work), since there aren't sooo many developers, they had to have priorities...

But don't worry, you will be able to configure things and you will see KDE 4.0 and 4.X series will be a dream coming true. Make configurations dialogs and menus for configuration is the easiest part.

by Iuri Fiedoruk (not verified)

I've always tought peoplke complaining about the betas where exagerating a bit.
So today I've tested KDE 4.0.0 on Ubuntu Gusty and man... what a BAD first impression!!
Speed isn't nice but that was expected from a debug build, it really uses a lot of I/O to write debug messages so it's ok and probally final version will be even faster than KDE3 series.

Visual is terrible! A nighmare!! Oxygen style is crappy! All constructive critics made during months here and there whent to deaf ears. BUT (big but) I've never used KDE default stile for more than a day, so I'll just use other thing. Sorry for people who stick with the default :-(
Another problem is plasmoids visual, it just dosen't mix with Oxygen style. It's like having two toolkits in the same DE, like a mix of ghnome and KDE.

Talking about plasmoids... man! It's way too late! They just ... exist! No configurations, no answer for right click in most cases... I was lost when clocking on clock didn't call calendar! OK, you can tell me it's a work in progress, it will be fixed in 4.1... but it shouldn't! It should be very good already.

I was planning to keep KDE 3.X until version 4.1, but now I'm seriously thinking about 4.2 or even 4.3... Blah! I'm installing fluxbox right now! KDE4.. sorry, double sorry, sucks :-(

by Shawn Starr (not verified)

To all those naysayers, just let us code. It is KDE 4.0.0. It's just the beginning. There is no possible way for us to get KDE 4.0.0 completely polished now. You could extend the release date another 1 year but then who would begin porting their apps to KDE 4?

I'm just going to ignore all the negative comments and then wait for those to eat their words once things are polished up. Then you can beg for forgiveness, and maybe we'll accept your apologies :P

Trust me, when you look back at this whole affair everyone will say how cool KDE 4.x is and that they should've believed the developers in their vision.

Shawn.

by Richard (not verified)

I think if you read just the positive comments you will miss out on a lot of good points and discussions. You may not like the negative comments, but remember they are coming from the kde users, do ignore what they say because you don't like the comments and focus on the positive is how you end up creating microsoft software ;)

plus you need to understand that the 3.5 release was manily to linux people, now with the release of 4, you have a lot of windows people joining the kde and linux community who have no idea, through no fault of their own, how things work with kde releases. Be kind to windows people, for they know nothing but buggy operating systems that are released buggy and end their life buggy, lol

by Shawn Starr (not verified)

True, There's a a mixture of good and negative comments. Sure, but our KDE users need to understand, Rome wasn't built in one day, nor will KDE 4.0.0 be. If we have more developers things can move faster, so, Help us! :)

Shawn.

by Richard (not verified)

agree, but remember to window's users they never go through any of this. They buy their XP, or Vista, etc, and are lead to believe that is the final version, until a few weeks latter bug fixes come out, a few months latter service packs come out. What I would like to see from dot is to show people how KDE is developed. Then maybe people will realise, that KDE is not a weird piece of software like windows, and that it continues to grow and develop with each release.

I mean lets face it, I've read comments in here claiming that Release candidates are meant to be feature complete. God only knows where that comes from. Perhaps they should read about Vista SP RC that was just released to the public and how it was explained that it is not complete and still a lot more to come. OR they could read the opensuse RC's and see how they were also not feature complete, yet KDE is meant to buck the trend and be feature complete in RC's, go figure, lol

I just think a nice article, dumbing everything down to explain to people that hey, RC's are your way of testing, and improving, finding bugs, etc, etc. That KDE 4 is your way of releasing so people can port their software to KDE, and that KDE in it's essence is something that is never finished and will always grow and change, it is the nature of it. Does that make sense? KDE 4 has a shit load of new users who simply do not understand how it is made and released, etc. I think dot needs to do an article on that. It's the windows effect,t hey come to kde expecting it's done like that. I don't even know if people realise you all do this for the love of it.

by Louis (not verified)

>>God only knows where that comes from.

From years of software development standard language:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Release_candidate#Release_candidate

Granted, the release team is free to use whatever language they like for their releases, and they have explained that they are allowing some leeway for UI stuff, but that doesn't mean they should get pissed when people are confused by it. On the flipside, there's no reason for commenters to be dicks to the developers; that's not gonna have positive results.

by Richard (not verified)

It's up to the developers to decide if their candidate is a RC. For people to say it has to be feature finished is incorrect, and naive

Just recently Vista 1 SP1 RC released today XP SP3 RC released, and both microsoft has openly stated these are not feature complete, and there is more to come in them. so perhaps you would like to go and tell them also that they can't be release candidates because they don't go by what you believe an RC should be

It is solely the decision of the developers to what they term a release candidate.

Look at the linux community. Opensuse RC, they were not feature complete, It is anal for people to argue with the people releasing their own software on the terms of what they call it. From what I have read the developers have every right to get pissed because the people constantly moaning have not read any of the explanations of how they are releasing, and keep moaning and complaining about the same thing without listening.

by Anon (not verified)

"It is solely the decision of the developers to what they term a release candidate."

True. Especially considering the fact that many are doing this in their free time. But nevertheless they shouldn't be surprised by negative feedback if they choose a different definition than anybody else ;).

The times whern KDE could be a considered a toy just for geeks are over, that's good. But this also means that you have to play by the same rules than the competitors. Microsoft gets negative comments when releasing a crippled version as final version of their OS despite much marketing hype, and nowadays the same goes for KDE.

I would suggest - with no authority but that of a reader of the dot - that everybody cools down. And for the next release sit back and learn from the experiences the KDE4 release has brought. All of this mess could have been avoided by simple steps like replacing "beta" with "alpha" or "final release" with "technology preview" etc.

Nobody would have get hurt and really everybody would be happy with the great bunch of code and possibilities KDE4 is even now. So why not mark this simple naming problem as "leasons learnt" for the next release cycle and leave it be?

by Richard (not verified)

True. Especially considering the fact that many are doing this in their free time. But nevertheless they shouldn't be surprised by negative feedback if they choose a different definition than anybody else ;).

Why use microsoft? because like it or not they are the largest player in the market, and the fact that they, as well as many other developers are releasing RC's that are not feature complete shows that the meaning of the word has progressed and changed. And the way that the meaning has changed has shown anon that their definition is not different to others, but that the market and release cycles are changing. As was evident with Vista RC1 in 06, which blew all the arguments up that because it still needed a lot of work, and was not feature complete it wasn't an RC. And a year latter KDE has followed track, Opensuse releases RC's that are not feature complete. The meaning has changed.

I think also this will continue into KDE 4 release, people will be complaining that all the software isn't ported over and claim it isn't a release, in all honesty, who cares. All I care about is getting my hands on it, lol

by MamiyaOtaru (not verified)

I'm rather surprised to see you use a Microsoft practice as a justification for calling the current KDE4 a Release Candidate. Look at the meaning of the words. Something labelled as such is commonly understood to be a _Candidate for Release_. That is to say, it is something that is believed to be done, something that can and will be released barring the discovery of Release Critical bugs. It is by definition feature complete. There is no excuse for labelling the current state of things as a Release Candidate.

Now doing so is not a cardinal sin. Fixing, adding and coding things is far more important than dickering over semantics. I'm not going to reject KDE4 because of a terminology screwup. But a spade is still a spade, and it will have negative repercussions among those who understand the common definition of Release Candidate and are expecting something a little more complete. Then again, the same people will likely be disappointed with what will eventually be labelled "final" and will need to have the concept of *.0 software explained to them ;)

Bottom line: RC is a terrible choice of label, but I totally wasn't stuck on it until people started defending it. Illogicality is what actually set me off ;)

by Anon (not verified)

Nicely put...

I'm looking forward to KDE 4 and appreciate the coders hacking on it, really.

But the way any criticism is nowadays handled as evil flaming coming from stupid users really is disgusting.

As must criticisms are repeated from different sides, why cannot anybody say "OK, maybe it takes a bit longer, maybe the naming was uncommon and therefore a bit misleading, we'll think of that next time. But look at this and that, we are really getting there. This and that is not yet there, but wait, it will come."

But, on the contrary, anything not praising the new KDE4 here on the Dot is getting flamed. That's a sad development. After all, it's the users that count if you programm a desktop.

In fact, I have to admit that the way negative response to KDE4 is handled here on the Dot, even by developers, instead of professionelly taking it into account as user feedback by supporters of KDE, is for me more strange than any naming problems.

by LTV (not verified)

I was wondering how you select apps for Autostart.

by szlam (not verified)

I'm sure it's gonna be as buggy as every new release. The older I get, the less I care about eye candy.

by bleh (not verified)

Where's the taskbar?? That shit down there is exact oposite of usability...

by kirill (not verified)

It will be great if kde4 will support switching to old style menu.
In my opinion new menu is worse then one from kde 3 and it is not so useful.