KDE Commit-Digest for 2nd July 2006

In this week's KDE Commit-Digest: PDF hyperlink and file editing support in KViewShell. DVI format support in Okular. Continued progress in "WorKflow", "GMail-style conversation view for KMail" and "KDevelop-teamwork" Summer Of Code projects. BsFilter and DSpam tools are now supported in the KMail anti-spam wizard. LastFM stream support becomes more robust and polished, alongside other notable development work in Amarok. Aesthetic modifications made in Kmplot and Kalzium. KDE 4 changes: Work begins on the "Cokoon" widget style, and KSpell2 is renamed "Sonnet" in preparation for some interesting development work.

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Comments

by Martin (not verified)

Quote
This functionality that was constantly asked for by many of our users, and we regqard this as a big step forward.
/EndQuote

I can only agree. This is a *huge* step forward for all of us who have to work with PDF files in publishing under Linux every day. This is one of the very few things I still run Windows on QEMU for. There just is no replacement yet for Acrobat Pro under Linux. And even for professional users it would quite often not be necessary to replicate all functions of Acrobat Pro. Most of them are used rarely or not all. Great that inserting or deleting pages now works. What I'm still missing to completely get rid of Acrobat Pro:

- Measure Tool to measure the distance between two points on the paper
- Color Picker tool to fetch the CMYK/Spot value of any point
- Modify/Remove crop box

Anyway, KPDF is a great tool! I can still amaze my Windows colleagues when I'm searching in a PDF. This is extremely fast and looks really good.

by Stefan Kebekus (not verified)

Thank you for the encouragement. The measure tool is already implemented in kvieswhell, we will think about implementing the other tools you mention.

Only ... we're discussing the KviewShell application here and not kpdf or its successor, oKular. KviewShell is a similar application that is based on kdvi ---in the KDE 3.5 release, KviewShell is used to view DVI and DJVU files. The current version has seen great improvements over the KDE 3.5 version which makes it my favourite document viewing tool (but then ... I am one of the authors :-) )

The latest KViewShell is currently found in the HEAD branch of the KDE SVN server. Since we find PDF editing imporant, we will come up with a full release for KDE 3 as soon as possbile.

Stefan.

by Miq (not verified)

Those features are great, it means for 95% of users not needing anything else to work with PDF files. Big plus for KDE. But...

Don't get me wrong, but the project has a problem. It wouldn't be bad some clarifying of the project goals and intentions . I'm not blaming KViewShell more than I blame Okular's developers. It is just that the vast majority of users right now only know KPDF. And for KDE4 it will have to be decided which document viewer will be default. So you'll have to sort this out.

Of course, if we end with two different GUI's for the same backends, it doesn't have to be bad. Two options for KDE users.

Btw., KViewShell needs a homepage and a name.

by superstoned (not verified)

two gui's for one backend would be cool, but now it's more like two backends and one gui (exept the gui's don't share their code, just rebuild each other's look).

by Wilfried Huss (not verified)

> It wouldn't be bad some clarifying of the project goals and intentions .

The goal of KViewShell is to write a simple but powerful viewing and editing
application for page oriented fileformats. One of the core design decitions
is that all supported fileformats are first class citizens. Not like for
example in Evince where most of the functionality is only available for PDF,
and it cannot even print a DVI file.

We also still support the KDE3 platform, and maintain two branches for KDE4
and KDE3 that have exactly the same functionality.

> So you'll have to sort this out.

If you are interested you can read an old thread, were we voiced our
concerns at the time the Summer of Code project that lead to okular was
announced:
http://lists.kde.org/?l=kde-devel&m=111789901318841&w=2

I don't know how I could possibly sort this out, if people want to write
a competing program, they are free to do so.

> Btw., KViewShell needs a homepage and a name.

We are open for suggestions.

Greetings,
Wilfried Huss (kviewshell developer)

You might have been right a year ago, but right now Okular seems to be the future, especially since it builds upon the FreeDesktop.org Poppler framework which is receiving support and improvements from both KDE and GNOME developers:

http://Poppler.FreeDesktop.org/

I would encourage you to try to incorporate the superior parts of KViewShell into Poppler and Okular.

Well, my uninformed friend, kviewshell also uses poppler for its PDF plugin,
and has so for longer then okular.

Also me and Stefan help with the Qt3 and Qt4 bindings of poppler, so you
can probably count us to the KDE developers that support poppler.

by Anonymous (not verified)

Thank you for this comprehensive evaluation of the situation, but next time please make sure that you actually know what you're talking about.

"This version requires the latest developement version of the poppler library. We will come up with a full release for KDE 3 in the near future."

As Wilfried says, KViewShell already uses Poppler. Personally, I wouldn't mind a merger between the two applications. But then, although I realize that people talk about oKular more often than about KViewShell, it seems that most people haven't seen both programs next to each other. Perhaps you could compile KViewShell from

SVN:branches/work/kviewshell-0.7/kviewshell

and have a look. I really think KViewShell does a great job.

- Stefan.

I just checked out kvieshell from branches/work/kviewshell-0.7/kviewshell:

svn co svn://anonsvn.kde.org/home/kde/branches/work/kviewshell-0.7/

I compiled it with make -f Makefile.cvs && ./configure --prefix=/usr/local --enable-debug=full && make && make install.

When I try to show a PS file, I get the following error message:

The specified library psviewpart could not be loaded. The error message returned was:
/usr/local/lib/kde3/psviewpart.so: undefined symbol: _ZN10KMultiPage20createDocumentWidgetEP8PageViewP17DocumentPageCache

The same for .dvi:

The specified library kdvipart could not be loaded. The error message returned was:
/usr/local/lib/kde3/kdvipart.so: undefined symbol: _ZNK16DocumentRenderer10totalPagesEv

When I try to open a PDF file, I get:

The file has mime type application/pdf which is not supported by any of the installed KViewShell plugins.

I set KDEDIRS correctly:

echo $KDEDIRS
/usr/local:/usr

KOffice runs just fine when I install it to /usr/local

Greetings,
Michael

Do you have KDVI or kviewshell from KDE 3.5 installed? It looks like the
linker tries to load an old versions of certain libraries.

> The file has mime type application/pdf which is not supported by any of the installed KViewShell plugins.

You need the CVS version of libpoppler, or the PDF plugin will not be build.
If you have compiled the pdf plugin, you just need to recreate ksycoca.
Restarting KDE should do this.

> KOffice runs just fine when I install it to /usr/local

I also have kviewshell installed into its own prefix, so it does work.

Maybe we should continue the troubleshooting per private mail, as it is
probably not so interesting for the rest of the dot readers.

Greetings,
Wilfried

by anonymous (not verified)

I just hope that, whatever will be chosen to be part of KDE4, there will be one and one only. No more kate/kedit/kwrite crap, please.

by anony (not verified)

That never bothered me much. KWrite was the easy editor and Kate was for more hardcore editing. I don't know what KEdit is. I'm hoping this will be clearer in the future though. IMHO, the real confusion lies in the media apps. Kaboodle, Kscd, Noatun, KRec, Kmidi, Juk, Amarok, Kaffeine, KMplayer . . . The last few are the most well-known and established KDE players, but there's definitely deadwood that can be cleaned.

by cies breijs (not verified)

> Kaboodle, Kscd, Noatun, KRec, Kmidi, Juk, Amarok, Kaffeine, KMplayer

c'mon do you know what these apps are doing? which ones compete with eachother?

there is a logic behind the creation of all of them.

by anony (not verified)

There was a logic to creating all of them and some are still needed. I'm not accusing anyone of NIH Syndrome. But KDE4 promised a cleaning up of this kind of confusion. I love KDE and it's my primary DE. But if the nuances of some of these media apps is fuzzy to me, imagine what it would be like for your average user.

by cies breijs (not verified)

i agree,

yet i also like freedom of choise!

people apperently like to make, let's say, amarok and juk. they share lib, maybe some code, but they are separate apps, with separate philosofies, etc.

i like that. first i liked juk more (lean'n'mean intergration into the look of my simple destop), now i like amarok better (streams, lyrics, etc., teased my to their side)

who cares?

the basic modules of kde should not contain apps like this i guess. (i think the module system of kde may have to be revised).

as we're used to, KDE4 will work on better frameworks, KDE always works on the frame works. this is very important i think. this combined with the 'choise' that i meantioned earlier, make KDE the best desktop in the end.

_c.

by Miq (not verified)

Visio

by Fuman (not verified)

"KviewShell is used to view DVI and DJVU files"

Ehmmm, shouldn't this be the job of okular for KDE 4

by Stefan Kebekus (not verified)

Well, that depends on whom you ask. As I wrote above, I would very much like to ask you to compile both applications and have a look at a recent version of the KViewShell.

I will also be able to provide screenshots.

by anonymous (not verified)

> I will also be able to provide screenshots.

Yes, please, it would be interesting.

BTW, why don't you just name it "View" instead of KViewShell? Ok, it doesn't have a k, but these days the k isn't fashionable anymore..

by Wilfried Huss (not verified)

Here are some screenshots of the version released with KDE 3.5

http://finanz.math.tu-graz.ac.at/~huss/kviewshell

But the GUI has not changed that much since then. At least not in a way
that is visible on screenshots.

Greetings,
Wilfried

by Stefan Kebekus (not verified)

Sorry for the long silence ---it's too bad I have to work to make a living. You'll find up-to-date screenshots here:

http://www.mi.uni-koeln.de/~kebekus/KVS

Best,

Stefan.

by Matze (not verified)

At Win plattforms Acrobat reader always kills my system and is soo slow. I would like to see a port to Win plattforms. One reason why I use Linux is the faster and better pdf viewer. Acrobat Reader is a pain in the ass. And when you install a new version it gets 20% slower and takes 30% more memory.

"Color Picker tool to fetch the CMYK/Spot value of any point"

A job for an external colorpicker app which is existing afaik.

by Corbin (not verified)

There most likely will be a Windows version of Okular or KViewShell with KDE4's release. (Acrobat Reader is an even bigger pain in the ass on Linux though)

>>Color Picker tool to fetch the CMYK/Spot value of any point
>
>A job for an external colorpicker app which is existing afaik.

External colorpickers would probably only be able to do RGB I would believe.

by James Richard Tyrer (not verified)

I think that the idea is for the color picker to extract the actual data in the PDF file rather than just to indicate what is being displayed on the screen.

This might be usefull in some cases, but AFAIK, CMYK is a myth (it should only be used internally by printer drivers) unless you are doing professional prepress work.

by Isaac (not verified)

Foxit Reader: http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/rd_intro.php

Problem solved.

by Anonymous (not verified)

Ignore.This is just a trial posting from khtml browser running on nokia e70 :)

by me (not verified)

This teamwork-thing enables multiple users to hack on the same text in realtime, seeing what the others are doing, since they're somehow connected on the network, right?

If I understood this correctly, I have a few questions:

- Why is this limited to kdevelop? Wouldn't it be smart to create a teamwork-lib, which could then be used by kword, kate, kvim etc? Right now, it seems that only kdevelop will benefit?

- Will zeroconf be used to find each other on the network?

by Matze (not verified)

I remember that the abiword developers presented a similar framework for edits at a conference.

by cm (not verified)

That framework has already been brought up when the topic of collaborative editing for KOffice was discussed a while ago but it is completely abiword-specific.

by David (not verified)

"- Will zeroconf be used to find each other on the network?"

I think Jabber would be a better choise

by chris (not verified)

Why is jabber a better choice, explain

by Florian (not verified)

AFAIK zeroconf only works on LANs and not on the Internet. Jabber works also on the Internet

by superstoned (not verified)

and if KDE gets a chat framework, they should use that ;-)

(decibel?)

by me (not verified)

"Congratulations for attempting to post to KDE Dot News!"

Huh, thanks, I know, it was quite challenging for me!

Back to the topic: Noone told me yet why this isn't a teamwork-lib, to be used by koffice, kate etc. Doesn't anyone know?

by Jakob Petsovits (not verified)

> Noone told me yet why this isn't a teamwork-lib, to be used by koffice,
> kate etc. Doesn't anyone know?

I think this is a question for David Nolden (aka zwabel, the author of the teamwork mode) himself. Obviously he doesn't read the dot comments, so you can try hitting him in #kdevelop (he's sometimes there, but not that often) or on the kdevelop-devel mailing list. I think the only knowledgeable people are David Nolden and Matt Rogers (aka mattr), so good luck on the dot :P

by Jakob Petsovits (not verified)

> - Why is this limited to kdevelop?

Well, it was listed in KDevelop's Summer of Code project suggestions, and obviously there was little thought of generalizing it. I also don't know how many parts could actually be reused for generic collaboration features, and probably it won't be too hard to get those general-purpose features out of the KDevelop-specific lib and make a more generic one.

Especially for a Summer of Code project, it's important not to do everything at once, or the student may get lost easily. Just do it like KOffice: add interesting stuff to the KOffice-libs, and if they are mature enough, adapt them for kdelibs. Time will tell if the teamwork mode will be used all over KDE, till then, let's do one thing really good (TM) instead of a little bit of everything.

by Odysseus (not verified)

FYI, the website is down with an "Account Disabled" message. Guess he got Dot-slashed :-)

John.

by Sheldon Lee-Wen (not verified)

I can't get to the digest. Instead I get an "Account Disabled" message.

by Muk (not verified)

How will the freedb closedown affect Amarok?

http://freedb.org/

by Rinse (not verified)

You can set your own CDDB-server in amaroK, so I don't expect that the current situation at freedb would affect amaroK much.