There seems little doubt that
KDE
4,
the flagship desktop environment used by many Linux aficionados, was
released too early. After seven years of solid, steady KDE 3
deployment, KDE 4 was released amidst the much media hoopla and
near-universal user disappointment. It simply wasn't ready for
userville. There was too much missing and too many differences; it felt
like a retrograde step. To be fair, the KDE team did describe it as a
work-in-progress, and some of the fault lies with distro packers who
slapped essentially beta code into their latest releases. As a result
many users simply avoided it. Including me. At least until recently.
Since
its ill fated inception in November 2007 KDE 4 has undergone a
number of significant upgrades. Version 4.1 came out in July last
year, 4.2 in January this year, and for the last month I've been
working with version 4.3 which was released in August. I reckon KDE 4's
now ready for the big time, and with
Kubuntu 9.10
("Karmic Koala") due shortly, it's time to throw off the shackles of
KDE 3.
Moving
from 3 to 4 is a big shift. There's lots of new stuff and many
unfamiliar concepts so to start with I'm going to show you how to make
it all look familiar. We're going to make KDE 4 look and act like good
old KDE 3. That way you can ease into the new environment without
losing productivity.
(Note 1: The following discussion ignores all the new stuff for now.
We'll get to that next time!)
(Note 2: If you're already running KDE 4, I strongly recommend
upgrading
to version 4.3!)
Menus
The
new menu style is known as "Kickoff". If you want to make it eff-off
and go back to the traditional K Menu, simply right-click the K button
and choose
Switch to
Classic Menu Style. Right-click again to switch back to
Kickoff.
Desktop icons
The
absence of desktop icons has caused no end of concern. By default
they're replaced by a "containment" -- a semi-transparent
window displaying the contents of the Desktop folder. (We'll
talk
about some of this new terminology in Part II.) To get your icons back,
proceed as follows;
- Move your cursor into the containment and a handle will
appear, either to the left of right of it.
- Click on the X to make it go away.
- Now right-click a blank area of the Desktop and choose Appearance Settings.
- Under Desktop
Activity click on the Type droplist and
select Folder View.
Adding icons to the
Desktop or Panel
To
do this you first need to switch to the Kickoff menu style. (See
"Menus" above.) Then you just navigate to the desired application,
right-click it and choose
Add
to Desktop or
Add
to Panel.
Modifying the Panel
The bar at the bottom of the screen is officially called
the "Panel". To modify it, right-click in an unused area and choose
Panel Options
followed by
Panel
Settings. This will open an extra GUI. with extra controls.
The arrowed sliders immediately above the Panel allow you position and
size it horizontally. Click and drag
Height to adjust its
height. If you want to move the Panel to the left, right or top of the
screen, click and drag on
Screen
Edge. And you'll never believe what's under the
More Settings
button. Yup, more settings including auto-hide and how windows interact
with the Panel.
You
can also reposition things on the Panel by hovering your
cursor
over them and left-clicking and dragging when the four-pointed arrows
appear.
Defaulting to Konqueror
If you don't like Dolphin, KDE 4's new default file manager, you can
switch back to Konqueror like this;
- Hit the K button and open System / System Settings. (Or
Computer
/ System Settings
if you're using Kickoff.)
- Choose Default
Applications, select File
Manager and click Konqueror.
I prefer the Details view as my default but until KDE 4.3
there was no way to lock this in. There is now though!
- Choose View
/ Adjust View Properties.
- Choose Details
from the View Mode
droplist.
- Under Apply
View Properties To select All Folders and tick
Use as Default for
New Folders.
What the hell happened to
...?
* KControl now has a more meaningful name: SystemSettings.
(Or "systemsettings" if you want to run it from a console.)
* KCron is now part of System Settings. Choose the
Advanced tab and
click on
Task Scheduler.
* Ctrl+Alt+Backspace to restart the X server is disabled by default.
You can either use the more awkward Alt+SysRq+K combination or
type
sudo
dontzap -d in a console window to re-enable it.
*
Compiz
is still around but you might like to check out
Desktop Effects
under
System
/
System Settings
/
Desktop
first. (I particularly like the Fall Apart option for closed windows
...)
In the next part we'll explore some of KDE 4s core concepts --
and what makes it different and
sooo
exciting. Stay tuned!
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Cyber Cynic Steven J.
Vaughan-Nichols has come up with a list of seven
reasons not to upgrade to
Windows 7. Here's his list (in brief);
