On 01/27/2010 01:23 PM, David C. Rankin wrote:
Devs,
Just dropping a note to say great job with both KDE Classic (3.5.10-51) and KDE 4.3.95 (44beta). KDE Classic is near flawless and KDE4 is much improved between 4.3.4 and 4.4 beta (from Factory). From a user prospective, it is obvious that a great amount of effort has been directed to both desktops and it is much appreciated.
The striking difference in 44beta is the actual addition of kde4 tools (like the "Add Widget" drag&drop implementation, etc..) which for the first time look like what must have been envisioned when kde4 was conceived, but were not completed or ready for release until now. As more of the kde4 features are implemented, the 'vision' of what kde4 will be becomes clearer and why kde4 behaves in certain ways now makes more sense -- much of which has been indiscernible to date. There is some cool stuff here.
There are a couple of regressions of note:
Err.. Umm.. I hate being wrong! There are a few more than a 'couple of regressions of note.' It is obvious that a lot of work has been done on kde44beta to implement the kde4 tools and make the interface look striking. The only problem? All of the new interfaces are broken, and moreover things that used to work don't any more. In addition to the original regression list, you can no longer "Add Widgets" -- unless you are lucky enough to have the widget you need appear in the first 6-7. If you have to scroll to the right to get to the one you want -> you're hosed, all the widgets disappear. If you scroll the categories, you have a 50/50 chance of plasma crashing. Next, for some reason kde4 grabs the kde3 window decorations and there is no way to get your kde4 decorations back until you downgrade to 4.3.4. Additionally, numerous widgets, like the daisy launcher, and others no longer launch anything. Quicklaunch can no longer add a .desktop file from /usr/share/applications -- it just errors and refuses to load. The screensaver will not start, even after configuring it multiple times. Worse yet, the screensaver is still broken after a downgrad to 4.3.4. In 4.3.95 plasma crashed quite a bit, which was expected due to the beta status of the packages. Probably the most frustrating part of 44beta was virtually none of the 150+ bugs I filed against 43beta nearly a year ago have been fixed -- oh well, all is normal with kde4, but it does look a lot nicer. Will, anybody - which config files should I delete and recreate in 4.3.4 after the downgrade to get the screensaver working again? The most frustrating problem is the install of 4.3.95 broke compiz in kde3 and it is still broken after the downgrade. What do I need to do to get compiz working again in 3.5? The good news is kde4 styles and window decorations are back after the downgrade and widgets can now be added to the desktop and quicklaunch in a reliable way. 44beta is still usable -- as long as you just want to use it without changing anything. Next time I'll kick the tires a bit more before pronouncing great improvements. There are improvements that look really good -- problem is they just don't work :( The worst part about the whole ordeal was cleaning my local repositories of the beta rpms. However, we are back up and running. (note to self -- create a separate repo for the next kde4 upgrade :) -- David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E. Rankin Law Firm, PLLC 510 Ochiltree Street Nacogdoches, Texas 75961 Telephone: (936) 715-9333 Facsimile: (936) 715-9339 www.rankinlawfirm.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org