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KDE GUI

KDE 3.1 Alpha1 is Here 432

Posted by timothy from the one-excellent-branch-of-reality dept.
navindra writes: "A brand new alpha of the breath-taking KDE 3.1 development branch has been announced. This release sports everything from wonderful new eye candy to tons of popular new features including new and exciting "easter eggs" (aka bugs) just waiting to be discovered. Remember, this is not a stable release -- those of you concerned with stability should use KDE 3.0.2, whereas those of you who want to help KDE 3.1 be the best KDE ever should use this alpha. Kudos to Dre for writing the announcement and to the tireless Dirk Mueller for coordinating this release. Party!" On a related note, pAlpha writes: "Over the past years a large amount of myths has built up around KDE. Recently Aaron J. Seigo released a page about the KDE myths and facts." Good for convincing the boss.
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KDE 3.1 Alpha1 is Here More

KDE 3.1 Alpha1 is Here

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  • Maybe but I doubt it (Score:4, Funny)

    by sheepab ( 461960 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @03:30PM (#3866081) Homepage
    Can they improve upon the best? Honestly....can they?
    • I think the moderators took that wrong, or I posted it wrong, what I MEANT was that KDE 3.0 already kicks major ass, and here we are with 3.1 I just dont see how the best can get better.

      • Re:Maybe but I doubt it (Score:4, Informative)

        by Dr.Dubious DDQ ( 11968 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @03:51PM (#3866263) Homepage
        I just dont see how the best can get better.

        At this point, at least for the 3.x series, it's mostly 'tweaks' for improved useability, more standards compliance, and so on.

        I update my copies of the current KDE CVS a few times per week, though I only occasionally compile and install from there (once every few weeks). I just like to watch what's being updated.

        Last few times I updated the core KDELIBS CVS, for example, I noticed more updates to the html and ecma/javascript code. KMail has had a lot of individual updates...you get the idea. I can't honestly say I know how SUBSTANTIAL the changes have been, but I can at least spot when a section that I use frequently has had updates. so that if I get curious or run into problems in that area (something that hasn't happened to me in some time) I know to try an update...

        I notice a bunch of the less "core" utilities (e.g. K3B, the video transcoding utility) have been moved from the core libraries to a new area ("KDEEXTRAGEAR", if I remember correctly). I need to check out that module too, now...

      • "I think the moderators took that wrong,"

        Don't fret. The editors (for the most part) are morons.

        "or I posted it wrong, what I MEANT was that KDE 3.0 already kicks major ass, and here we are with 3.1 I just dont see how the best can get better."

        It graphically rocks. However, it also sucks balls. All these people that says that X-WIndows is sucky and such.... Well, window managers like this are your problem. KDE uses non-standard messages to the X-server and therefore slows down overall performance. Look at TWM. With basic apps, it's tremendously fast, even on a 233 p2. YOu could add in gtk+ and still have it snappy.
      • We need more eyecandy if KDE is supposed to ever be better than OSX or even XP, better icon animation (its a good start but improve on it and make it more useful)

        Alpha channel, so we can have a alpha channeled kicker and panel

        Some cool special effects, like genie effect or even motion blur,

    • Alpha Channel / Transparency

      Genie effect or equally impressive effects.

      They seriously need to get 4-5 developers working on a project with just THAT specific purpose, of improving the eyecandy in KDE. OR maybe someone like Lindows can fund development of xfree86's render extention.

  • KDE keeps getting better (Score:4, Interesting)

    by cxvx ( 525894 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @03:32PM (#3866094) Homepage
    I've been using the cvs version ever since I heard that konqueror supported tabbed browsing :)
    Now I'm no longer using mozilla, since it doesn't start quite as fast as konqueror and the tabs where the only thing better about it (that and the antialiased fonts in konqueror look much better).

    There are lots of (small) improvements in the kde code that make the whole environment a real joy to use.
    Kde 3.1 is a great thing to look forward for.


    • Konq does look better than Mozilla. The version of Konq in KDE 3.0 is slooow, though. Slower than Mozilla. I have an Athlon 600, 256MB of RAM. Amazingly, Mozilla opens new windows faster than Konq, and seems to use less memory. I remember when the opposite was true.
    • How much memory does it take to run KDE nowadays? It seems to be keeping pace with Winblows (NTM) as a prime example of bloatware.
  • Mmmm... Eye candy and easter eggs...

    (drools)



    • I'm sorry but KDE has a long long way to go before impressing anyone with its eye candy.

      why even bother showing off eye candy when its just drop shadows or anti aliased fonts,

      The animated icons was a good start, they should improve that so for example you can take a gaim icon or instant message icon from your desktop and put it on your panel somewhere and when you get a msg it animates, or when its on your desktop and you get a msg it animates.

      When you put a Cd in the CD drive, the CD icon should appear and begin to spin, to animate whats happenining. Basically they should let our actions influence the animations, more so than just a random animation when you put your mouse over it. Maybe an animation when you actually click it, or if you modify a folder somehow like lock or unlock it, the animation should occur with the lock being slapped on the folder.

      Animations is something that OSX and XP does not do, so why not improve that?

  • not to be a wet blanket, but... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by krog ( 25663 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @03:33PM (#3866110) Homepage
    ...is Slashdot the place for alpha announcements?

    i'm sure there are plenty of KDE fans here and all, but this isn't even beta yet. if Slashdot announced every alpha release of every decent-sized Open Source project... Oh [slashdot.org] wait [slashdot.org], they [slashdot.org] do [slashdot.org].

    • Re:not to be a wet blanket, but... (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Soko ( 17987 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @04:03PM (#3866353) Homepage
      Ummm... Hi there.

      You do realise that /. is frequented by folks who know what "it's an Alpha version" means, yet will still download and try it? Ya, them "geek" types.

      There's a lot of these folks here, too. This translates to lots of knowlegeable, quailty testers for the KDE team. Quality testers == a quality product for the rest of us. Knowlegeable testers == help for the KDE people in fixing bugs. /. therefore does the community a service when they announce new developments on major OSS projects, by pointing the right eyes to the source code.

      BTW, I think it's cool that the only major browser without tabs after KDE3.1 is released will be IE. The Galeon folks should be proud.

      Soko

      • Re:not to be a wet blanket, but... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 11, 2002 @04:14PM (#3866454)
        The Galeon folks should be proud.
        Somewhere in Norway [opera.com] a man is crying.
      • If you don't want to ride the cutting edge on your work desktop, I'd suggest those of you running Red Hat should install apt and add the following to your sources.list:

        rpm http://www.math.unl.edu/linux/redhat/apt 7.2/i386 kde3

        This guy has packaged KDE 3.02 for Red Hat 7.3, but more to the point, also a bunch of useful apps from apps.kde.com, including KRFB (the desktop sharing app) and, IIRC, the samba / nfs right-click file sharing Konqueror plugins.
    • is Slashdot the place for alpha announcements? (...) if Slashdot announced every alpha release of every decent-sized Open Source project.. Oh wait they do.

      Not to be glib, but I believe you just answered your own question.

  • Myths About KDE (Score:3, Funny)

    by LordYUK ( 552359 ) <jeffwright821@noSPAm.gmail.com> on Thursday July 11, 2002 @03:33PM (#3866111)
    "Over the past years a large amount of myths has built up around KDE..."
    Number one of which is: KDE does NOT stand for "Killer Dog Eaters"
    :P

    • Re:Myths About KDE (Score:5, Interesting)

      by krmt ( 91422 ) <therefrmhere@yah o o . com> on Thursday July 11, 2002 @03:37PM (#3866146) Homepage
      I'm pretty sure that it originally stood for Kool Desktop Environment. I think now the official position is that the K doesn't stand for anything, but I think that they're just covering up the dumb idea to deliberately misspell cool :-)

      I've also read that they chose K because it was the first letter after L, for Linux. I believe the former more than the latter though.
      • I for some reason thought it was "Kommon Desktop Environment" (what with the use of "k" in front of everything and using it in place of "c" or "q"). Perhaps it means KDE Desktop Environment, because we could always use more recursive acronyms (presumably it would be pronounced "de", as the "k" is silent).

      • Re:Myths About KDE (Score:2, Informative)

        by zdzichu ( 100333 )
        I head that at the beggining they tried to reassemble CDE - desktop environment popular on unix workstations.
      • Unfortunately, they polluted everyone's thinking and now people insist on naming their KDE software with Ks. Of course, if someone writes something it's their right to name it Stinky Dog Poop if they want. In fact, that might be preferable to the "K" thing. I've seriously thought of writing a script that will tr/[kK]/[cC]/ the name of every program and every reference to those programs.

        Maybe I'm just need mental help.

    • Re:Myths About KDE (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Oestergaard ( 3005 )
      KDE stands for:
      (The) Kalle Dalheimer Experience ;)

      (See http://www.kde.org/people/kalle.html [kde.org])

  • Alpha menus & drop shadows (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Eagle7 ( 111475 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @03:33PM (#3866114) Homepage
    I looked at the screenshots, and the transparent menus and the drop shadows on the menu look really nice. I'm curious - are these KDE application things? Are they part of the windows manager that comes with KDE? Are they QT? And will they work over everything, or will they only work when QT menus are displayed over QT aps?

    Just wondering if it is possible to have such nifty eyecandy work with my 95% GTK+/Sawfish environment, or if I would have to switch to the KDE environment to see this features.
    • You have to have all the KDE Libs installed, but you do not have to be running KDE to take advantage of the eye candy. You will have to configure it with the KDE controll panel, but you can keep on using whatever other environment you wish.


    • First, we should be able to set the max framerate of the animations.

      Second developers should be able to create animations so programs illustrate our actions.

      You put a CD in your CD rom and its a game CD, you should see maybe a little light or flash on the desktop which turns into a little spinning CD, if the game programmers wrote an animation for their icon, the doom CD could have an animated icon of the devil or whatever.

      Or you could set it up so when you run a program the icon animate.

      When you burn a CD a spinning burning CD animation could appear, why would this be useful? someone who doesnt know a damn thing about computers could look at that burning spinning Cd icon and know what the computer is doing without opening up any programs.

      Animation is what seperates OSX from linux, the genie effect, alpha channeling, that extra level of overkill eyecandy is what people want and need for ease of use.

  • KDE Usability (Score:5, Insightful)

    by krmt ( 91422 ) <therefrmhere@yah o o . com> on Thursday July 11, 2002 @03:33PM (#3866115) Homepage
    Aaron J Siego also started up the KDE Usability Project, in order to spearhead work on improving the KDE UI. I was following the list for quite a few weeks, until the traffic grew too substantial to keep up with. But according to the 3.1 alpha release notes, some of their intial work, including work on Kicker, is going to be included in the new release.

    This is a wonderful thing. From reading the list, I know that they've painstakingly thought through the work they've done, modeled and remodeled, discussed and argued all the little details to get things as good as they could. Progress has been slow for that reason, but it is substantial, and over time I think it'll bring KDE's usability to something we can all really be proud of.

    Features are nice, but I think improving the usability of KDE will help everyone in the long run.

    • Re:KDE Usability (Score:3, Interesting)

      by stilborne ( 85590 )
      well, to be fair, i didn't "start up" the KDE usability project. it just wasn't very active before i and a few others descended upon it and decided to get some actual reports written and some actual coding done.

      i believe jono started the project and others such as chris howells were involved early on.

      the time and effort of everyone who took the initiative has resulted in more and more of the KDE developers and users (along with some new devels and usability people) getting on the list and getting involved.

      it's fun to be part of something positive and intense as it unfolds ...

      AJS
      • Either way, as near as I can tell, you guys jumpstarted the project, and it was a badly needed thing. I feel bad that I can't follow the mailing list any more (you guys just generate way too much traffic for me :-) but I'm glad you're all doing the work that needs to be done. It's really the next major step for KDE, and I'm really happy that you guys are working on it. Linux will make it on to more desktops, and it will be because of projects like this one.

        Now if all developers really start to pay attention beforehand, things will really start to improve :-)
  • Unfortunately Aaron Seigo didn't make his KDE Myths a single FAQ style page but a cascading set of pages. Can someone mirror them before they are slashdotted out of creation?
  • Have been looking forward to this - thought it was going to be a while before we got it. Nice to see they are still making a lot of progress after the 3.0 release.

    PS: keramik kicks a$$

    Derek

  • Nothing original (Score:2, Interesting)

    by d3xt3r ( 527989 )
    I know that copying is the best form of flattery, but this is getting ridiculous.

    KDE 1 - 2 were attempts to copy windows UI with some small differences.

    It now appears that KDE 3.1 is going for the Appple OS X Aqua look. Look at the screen shots. The task bar looks like the OS X dock and they even called it Qwertz.

    I love Linux on the desktop, and I love KDE, but unless it offers something original, something that Windows and Mac OS don't, then what's the point?

    • I find the OSX/XP-like look not as appealing as the classic looks myself, and I do agree with you.

      But, you can always change it. I do find it interesting that with the newest development of any major desktop environment, window manager, or application, one of the first things that always gets ported is an OSX/XP looking theme.

      Someday, E17 will come out - and someone will do an OSX for E and Luna for E theme too. Check out the stats on theme sites, those themes are popular, so its natural that the developers would cater to the users.

      I don't like them either, but at least we have a choice!

    • Re:Nothing original (Score:4, Insightful)

      by LMCBoy ( 185365 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @04:17PM (#3866480) Homepage Journal
      I love Linux on the desktop, and I love KDE, but unless it offers something original, something that Windows and Mac OS don't, then what's the point?

      What's the point? Freedom, for starters. You get a first-rate GUI without sacrificing Freedom. Isn't that worth celebrating, even if the GUI is not totally "original"?

      Besides, why is it necessarily desireable for a GUI to be completely original? It's been said often before, but I guess it bears repeating. Most modern GUI systems look very similar. They all use "windows", "menus", "icons", "buttons", and "desktops". Does this mean that no one can think of anything new, and it's all about "A copied B copied C copied D! Shame on A, B and C!" ? Perhaps. But it's also possible that the Desktop metaphor just makes sense and it works well. Would you rather KDE make a completely new computing paradigm, even if it meant it was harder to use? Just for the sake of being "different"?

      Besides, KDE offers plenty that Win/Mac don't, besides Freedom. Themability, for one. You claim to "love" KDE, and yet it seems you don't understand that the way your desktop looks is largely up to you in KDE. You can make it look very similar to WinXP, or very similar to OSX, or not really like either. The person who took those screenshots chose to have a panel that looks like the OSX dock. Others have an XP-like panel. Mine looks like neither. KDE gives you the freedom to build a desktop that suits your needs and style. How is that copying either OSX or XP?

      I guess I shouldn't even bother...there will always be naysayers. I remember when they were saying "KDE will never be as good as Windows or Mac!". Now it's "Ok, KDE is just as good as Windows/Mac...but it's not BETTER, so what's the point?!"

      Indeed, what's the point?
    • you wrote: "I love Linux on the desktop, and I love KDE, but unless it offers something original, something that Windows and Mac OS don't, then what's the point?"

      The moment that KDE will be radically different from Mac OS & Windows - thats the moment you'll start loosing people who wants to use Linux and came from Windows world. It's pretty hard to teach a newbie an entirely new window manager and/or desktop enviroment.

      Try taking a kid who used only windows and give him Window Maker. See what he tells you.
  • I'm pretty new to linux, and I have no idea how to install this if I wanted to. Can some one point me to a site that would have a step-by-step for something like this?
    • don't want to put you down, but since it's an alpha release it's not likely to have precompiled packages yet. this means downloading sources and compiling by yourself, wich is not a trivial task.

      a step-by-step isn't likely to happen too, since the parameters for compiling might change from one distro to another.

      basically:

      download sources
      expand the tar.gz files
      locate a file called README or INSTALL
      follow the instructions on them

      this probably involve solving dependencies (updating other stuff that KDE needs to run such as openGL, QT, etc.), setting up environment variables, telling the configure script where it's suposed to install the binaries, etc.

  • My favorite new things: (Score:5, Informative)

    by friedmud ( 512466 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @03:47PM (#3866233)
    From the 3.1 feature plan:

    KRfb:
    NEW IN KDE: VNC-compatible server to share KDE desktops
    Remote Desktop Connection (KRdc):
    NEW IN KDE: VNC-compatible client

    Now you don't have to have a seperate instance of KDE running with the vncserver - you can share your CURRENT desktop just like you can with Windows and vnc. This is mucho cool - I will use it often!

    Derek

    • Re:My favorite new things: (Score:4, Informative)

      by aminorex ( 141494 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @04:23PM (#3866564) Homepage Journal
      You can do this with any X desktop, using x0rfbserver.
      • They're not trying to invent something new here - the great thing with this feature is that it's MUCH easier for end user to use without getting the headache of security (it's secured, expires after a period of time, etc)
      • But I don't want to use "x0rfbserver" - I want to use my nvidia server so I can have accelerated graphics - or are the 2 not mutually exclusive (and if not - how does that work?).

        Derek
    • This seems to be another case of copying Microsoft again. They've bundled a remote desktop viewer tool, and now KDE has it. Why can't people integrate some of the cooler stuff before MS? Yes, you could do some of this before, with much setup, but it's going to be point-and-click, and MS beats people to 'point-and-click' implementations usually.

      Here's something I've seen people BEGGING for in Konqueror and Mozilla - file upload progress bars in the browser. How much do we want to bet that MS will put that in IE7, THEN konqueror or mozilla will implement it poorly 6 months later?
      • Hmm... i started krfb before I knew the Remote Assistance feature in WinXP. But when I saw it I got a number of ideas from RA, no doubt.
        The question is: dont you want a feature anymore just because MS implemented it first?

        One of the reasons why MS gets the cool stuff first is because KDE still needs to catch up. Many people claim that Linux/KDE is already competitive, but that isnt true. There are many things that Windows has and Linux/KDE doesnt, so be prepared to see even more copied features before KDE gets the big features that Window lacks.

      • How can you call this copying Microsoft when it has been available years before they included the "feature". I mean PCAnyware and the likes...

        Come on, they implement things as they see fit, when they like it and of course, everyone can contribute.

        You've see some people begging for file upload progress bars in the browser? So? I've seen hundreds if not thouthands of people begging for different stuff. The thing is doing them, and doing only the ones than make sense.
        • I think the point is that they copied the GUI from MicroSoft. Of course you could do this years before MicroSoft thought of it by using VNC and typing the right cryptic thing on the command line on both machines, but nobody thought to make this user-friendly until they saw MicroSoft do it. That is what the original poster was saying.

      • Re:Copying Microsoft again (Score:4, Insightful)

        by rseuhs ( 322520 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @11:15PM (#3868727)
        How come that everytime Microsoft copies a something it's OK, but if KDE copies something it's evil?

        What about tabbed browsing?
        What about multiple desktops?
        What about opening new browser windows with the MMB?
        What about themes!
        What about scrollbar-jumping?
        What about the Alt-modifier key for faster window-manipulation?

        MSFT copied often enough and is now clearly lagging behind KDE in the GUI area because they still have a lot to copy to catch up.

  • Is debian ever going to have an official package? Did I just miss something? Seems like I've been waiting forever.

  • New Look (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Ween ( 13381 )
    After looking at the new screenshots, I can honestly say that this will be the first KDE which I will not have to alter the look of significantly from the default install. This will mean good things for people unaware of kde-look.org and other enhancements that are 3rd party to kde. KDE will finally look very polished and professional (if not a little bit over the top like XP .. but definately far more attractive than XP).

  • Mirror of screenshots site (Score:3, Informative)

    by idiot900 ( 166952 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @04:25PM (#3866569)
    I've set up a mirror of the screenshots site:

    [wustl.edu]
    http://wuarchive.wustl.edu/users/tom/kde31alpha/

    Enjoy!

  • Evolution of Software (Score:3, Informative)

    by peterdaly ( 123554 ) <{petedaly} {at} {ix.netcom.com}> on Thursday July 11, 2002 @04:28PM (#3866601)
    I am already starting to see comments in this thread like "feature X is just a ripp-off of product Y", who decided to put in feature Z, I hate it", etc. I just finished reading Survival Is Not Enough [amazon.com], by Seth Godin, who is a former Executive at Yahoo, among other things. These complaints are features that really should be applauded instead. Which criticizm is good, just the fact that a feature is similar to something else another product has is not bad.

    Much of the book has to do with the evolution of products suchs as web sites and software. Evolution happens in software just like in life forms. Much of the book pushes the idea of making as many "mutations" in a short time with as little money as possible. Let the bad ones die, keep the good ones. If another product has a feature that works well, why not use as much of the basic concept as possible. Image what the word processor world be like to day if none of the publishers used features other software had already implemented. Cross polination in evolutionary terms. This is along the lines of the tabbed browsing in Konquer, and the "Qwertz" toolbar thing.

    The rant about the stupid KDE clipboard function? I admit, I don't use the feature either. Is it bad it was put in? No. As many "test" features as possible should be put into the public view to see which are good and which are bad. The good features will stay, the bad will be phased out. These "mutations" of the core are what helps create innovative features. Who knows, someday a desktop envirnment might be considered horrible if it doesn't have whatever the KDE clipboard thing does. (I don't even KNOW what it is supposed to do, which may be more the problem.)

    These are not bad, and in my mind should be encouraged of both the Gnome team and the KDE team. As many people here know, innovation happens much faster when there are competing technologies, and not just a big monopoly in any given market.

    -Pete
    (Book link is an affiliate link...I read the book and liked it. I think you will too.)
  • Looking at these new screenshots, I can see that the KDE developers are improving the look/feel of KDE recently, which is very good because frankly I found it rather ugly.

    One thing that keeps from from giving KDE much attention is a small pet peeve of mine. The task list, I absolutely hate task lists, it's absolutely the the epitome of bad interface design. You have a horizontal list of application names, which are variable sizes, and the more you have the smaller they can be... ugg, disgusting.

    So, my question is, does KDE have any type of drop down task switcher, a la MacOS Thanks

  • KAudioCreator (Score:4, Informative)

    by IceFox ( 18179 ) on Thursday July 11, 2002 @04:53PM (#3866810) Homepage
    As many of you know kde2->3 was not much for eye candy and was more underneith and even then was mainly bug fixes. 3.1 was the first time that developers got to put up new stuff. One of the least known new items is KAudioCreator which is a ogg/mp3/everything audio ripping tool. From the website [rit.edu]:

    KAudioCreator is an audio file creation solution for kde. It allows you to use whatever encoder you wish to encode your audio files while providing a comfortable gui. KAudioCreator also provides a job control system so you can see what files have succeeded, failed and stop or cancel jobs as the application progresses.

    Screenshots! [rit.edu]

    and for those kde 2 users I have back ported it to kde2 and put it on my webpage. -Benjamin Meyer

  • If you're just after the eye candy, you can download a srpm of the keramik theme here:

    http://kde-look.org/content/show.php?content=219 3

    or a tarball here:

    http://kde-look.org/content/show.php?content=219 4

  • The PaperKlip.

    This is a software agent that determines what kind of task you're trying to do, pops up, and provides "helpful" advice. Like the MS Office Paperclip agent, the advice isn't that great, and it's a HUGE burden on resources. Unlike the MS Office Paperclip agent, it provides "helpful" advice for the ENTIRE KDE project.

    Mandrake users will love it; Debian users will want to destroy the author on sight. The author will show up to LUG meetings with a fake beard and sunglasses.

  • I can only see glimpses of the backgrounds in the last 6 screenshots, but they rock! Any one have any idea where I can grab them (besides checking out the KDE tree...)????
  • Wasn't KDE 3.1 supposed to bring SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) icons / wigets? That'd be so shweeeet...

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