Test KDE 3.3's Public Release Candidate

HulkProtector1 writes "The latest version of KDE beta 3.3 has been released. This version has already received a lot of feedback and has been deemed stable enough for a public release candidate. The KDE team requests that all testers try and break this release as soon as possible, as the bug reports are invaluable to the developers. Please note that binary packages will not be available for this version. Then source code can be downloaded from download.kde.org (or alternately use the excellent Konstruct build tool). For a list of new features skim over the KDE 3.3 Feature Plan."

Re:KDE?

[olliej_nz]

Versus iceWM you mean? Seriously I believe gnome and KDE offer good and bad features... I just wish i could find a environment that had only bad features... then i could install it on my brothers computer :) --Oliver

Re:KDE?

[Omega1045]

I would worry more about "aroung", since it was a Simpsons referring joke...

no Binaries

[managementboy]

Well, without binaries for my SuSE I will stick to the Beta 2...

Re:no Binaries

[managementboy]

Hi, the beta 2 is working perfectly but for some non-show stopping bugs. I use it for dayly work at home. Kmail for email, the Addressbook and and callendar. The visuals have once again got even better! I love the IM Kopete. I use it with ICQ, MSN and Yahoo without any problems. Konqueror filebrowsing is great. Is it better than 3.2... not realy, just nicer. more like how 98 was nicer than 95 (I mean the GUI) but everything works just like before. My PC is a Duron 800 with 256 Megs and kde 3.3 beta2 works fairly fast. When I disable most of the animations (which I used to do on Win2k too) it is extremely usable. By the way, my wife uses the same PC and never complains, but for the spellchecking, which does not detect the language she is writing in, which makes it useless. Themes are nicer now. Hope this helps. Any specific questions?

Re:no Binaries

[name773]

Any specific questions?

what web browser do you use?

Re:no Binaries

[managementboy]

Konqueror for 90% of the work Firefoxzilla for 9%, and less than 1% with IE 6.0 using Wine.

Konqueror because it is best integrated... Firefox because I use it on Windows at Work and I sinc my bookmarks via extension, and IE because I am forced by some job recrutement sites that don`t work on anything else.

Re:no Binaries

[name773]

ok, cool
just asking, because you mentioned konqueror as a file browser, and it does oh so much more (i really really like it for webbrowsing)
thanks

Re:no Binaries

[managementboy]

Its just that a lot of people bitch about KDE not being as good as the Windows GUI, and I think that Konqueror is the prime tool of KDE that differentiates it. I don't think that Konqueror is the best browser, but neither is IE. But both are integrated, so they make sense for 90% of work.

How do you like the new theme manager?

[msimm]

I've been really looking forward to the new theme packages and management. The old system was pretty silly, but from what I've read, the new one puts it all into a nice single package (I'm sure it will be a while before kde-look.org has any to d/l).

Re:no Binaries

[Hooded One]

SuSE now has RC2 Binaries available [suse.com], complete except for updated bindings and i18n. Packages are also available via apt [linux01.gwdg.de]. The page hasn't been updated, but the 3.3 RC2 RPMs are indeed there.

Still working on downloading everything, so I can't give my impression yet.

For those who were wondering, yes there was an RC1, but they intentionally didn't announce it. Apparently some major bugs were discovered after preparing the tarballs but before making the announcement, so they scrapped that and fixed the bugs

Konqueror

[bogaboga]

Have they worked on the spell checker that would sometimes just turn off, or would not work if aspell or ispell are not installed? One of these should be installed by default.

What about the clip-board where you would sometimes want to highlight some text [for replacement], only to find that it has replaced the text you had in the so called X-clip board? I know it is configurable but Joe Six Pack has always found problems. A behavior more like that found in M$ windows is more acceptable. Here, the geeks can choose not to synchronize the two clip-boards.

Re:Konqueror

[rikkus-x]

What about the clip-board where you would sometimes want to highlight some text [for replacement], only to find that it has replaced the text you had in the so called X-clip board?

There are two clipboards. There's the X-style one, where selecting text automatically copies it, and the Windows-style one, where you press Ctrl-C to copy and Ctrl-V to paste. They each have their own storage.

Is this so difficult to understand? Windows users will never notice the X clipboard, X users will never notice the Windows clipboard. Or so you'd think.

If you're confused about this, I'm sorry, but it's really not that difficult to understand. The system works fine for any 'normal' user, who will simply be oblivious to the 'other' clipboard. It also works fine for the user who knows there are two clipboards and whose brain can cope with the rather simple concept that the two are separate.

Re:Konqueror

[bogaboga]

I agree with you on all points raised but please remember that in no document introducing Linux have I ever seen the copying capabilities of Linux being introduced as having 2 separate clipboards. They always say that copying/pasting can be done in the usual "X" way and the Windows way. No mention is made of the separate clip-boards. That's why I humbly request that these two clipboard be synchronized by default in order to accommodate the two worlds of Linux, the geek and the novice.

Re:Konqueror

[rikkus-x]

I agree with you on all points raised but please remember that in no document introducing Linux have I ever seen the copying capabilities of Linux being introduced as having 2 separate clipboards. They always say that copying/pasting can be done in the usual "X" way and the Windows way. No mention is made of the separate clip-boards.

Such documents really need fixing, and whoever wrote them should be spanked.

Rik

Use Klipper

[brunes69]

Try running Klipper (under Utilities in the K menu). If you tell it to it will keep the clipboards synchronized.

It also has lots of other handy things, like clipboard history.

Re:Konqueror

[optikSmoke]

Hmmm, synchronization by default is exactly what you don't want. I'm not sure what the default is right now, because I haven't had default settings for a long time. However, if the two clipboards are synchronized by default, then you have problems where someone would ctrl-c to copy text, highlight some other text to replace it, and ctrl-v to paste, only to find that the highlighted overwrote what was in the clipboard. This is what confuses new users.

On the other hand, if synchronization is disabled (if not by default, you can disable it in klipper's config), then the two clipboard "universes" will never "collide". Users can ctrl-c, highlight, ctrl-v without ever knowing of the existance of another clipboard, and advanced users can use highlight and middle-click-paste to their hearts' content. This currently works exactly as expected; I should know because I use both clipboards regularly (unsync'ed).

Thus, in unsynchronized mode, copy/paste can be done in the "Windows" and "X" way, without either one interfering with the other. Synchronization only serves to confuse new users, because they highlight stuff and go "WTF! The stuff I copied is gone?!?!".

Re:Konqueror

[Brandybuck]

Have they worked on the spell checker that would sometimes just turn off... if aspell or ispell are not installed?

No, they're too busy trying to fix the bug where the window manager sometimes just turns off if XFree86 or X.org are not installed...

Antialiasing in Konsole

[Mmm coffee]

Has anybody figured out how to turn off antialiasing of fonts in Konsole? It slows things down to the point that I now use Multi-Aterm because programs compile in half the time. I don't have any other antialiasing turned on in KDE, and for the life of me I can't find out how to turn that crap off.

Other than that KDE3.3 is decent, although I think they should spend a lot more time than they have planned on bugfixing and optimization. It's starting to get bloated again. :( Don't think it's enough for a minor version upgrade, if you're using the 3.2 line then you're not missing too much. Have fallen in love with the "Start in the system tray" option for starting programs, now I can put my konsole, etc into the system tray to save space when I'm compiling or whatnot. I'd consider that my "killer feature that has forced me to upgrade".

I will repeat that I think it's insane that they want to release this so quickly. It needs a lot of polishing, and there's no way in hell anyone can get it feeling all crisp and clean again before the scheduled release date. Otherwise, it's KDE. I'm in love anyways.

</fanboy>

Re:Antialiasing in Konsole

[stilborne]

konsole --noxft

you can add this as a flag to the entry in the kmenu by using the menu editor (kmenuedit, also available by right clicking on the kmenu icon).

Is it efficient?

[Viol8]

Or does it still suck up disk and cpu like its going out of fashion? Until the teams at KDE and Gnome can write efficient code as well as they can write bloatware then I'm sticking with Afterstep. Still , they wanted to emulate Windows and they've done it in more ways than many people thought they would.

Yeah , mod me down as a troll if you will but lots of other people I know who use linux and BSD are of the same opinion.

Re:Is it efficient?

[lumbarrabmul]

Hey, I help on the KDE-project (one app is 99% my code). Believe me: The code is pretty good. Comparing Afterstep to a full Desktop Environment is a little unfair. Btw: I am using Fluxbox because I also love the speed of it. But my favorite browser is firefox, my fav. EMailapp is KMail and I love JuK, the Jukebox kdemultimedia provides.

Don't call KDE bloatware only because you don't need a DE.

Re:Is it efficient?

[Viol8]

It is bloatware. It takes a HUGE amount of disk space and runs like a dog. WHat other definition do you need? And a desktop enviroment is nothing more than a common look and feel, a few fancy toys with a common method of app communication. Ie its a window manager with knobs on. And before anyone thinks I'm talking out my arse I've written my own WM (which I can post a link for if anyones interested).