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A new site has been launched to act as the "new home for KDE's promotional activities". SpreadKDE.org will act as a central holding place and discussion forum for promotional and marketing activity in the KDE community, and also serve for co-ordinating KDE-related events. A mailing list is available for discussion of how it can be improved.
Version 0.7.3 of kdesvn, a KDE front-end for Subversion which uses an API rather than parsing output from the command-line client, has been released. Screenshots here and at the KDE Apps page; documentation here, downloads of source and Fedora 4 RPMs here.
A first test release of version 0.8.1 of the KDE database front-end Knoda has been released (announcement here). The changelog lists an improved report generator, dynamically-resizing fields, improved encoding handling, and many bug fixes. Source downloads here at Sourceforge; screenshots here. Supports a number of open-source and commercial databases and ODBC; requires kh-classes which is developed by the same main developer as Knoda, Horst Knorr.
Version 0.8.4 of PiKdev, a KDE-based IDE for PICMicro applications, has been released. PikMicro features a Kate-based multi-view editor for assembly and C code, with syntax highlighting. The new version features support for new devices and a revamp in the underlying "pkp" programmer, which does not require Qt or KDE, and other important changes. Screenshots available on the homepage; source and RPM downloads here.
Version 0.5.5 of KPowersave, the KDE front-end for the powersave daemon, has been released. This version features a reworked network dialog, a new help menu, updated German translations, and bug-fixes. Screenshots and links to download locations can be found at the KDE Apps page (including SUSE RPM files).
Version 1.4.4 of Skim (originally SCIM, Smart Common Input Method), "an input method platform based upon scim-lib under *NIX systems (including GNU/Linux and FreeBSD) systems optimized for KDE", has been released. This version contains a number of bug fixes (including one concerning KDE 3.3 compatibility) and adds Punjabi support. A few screenshots and links to documentation and downloads are on the KDE Apps page link above (the homepage is taking a long time to load at the time being).
Version 1.0.3 of K9Copy, a "small utility" that allows copying from DVD9 to DVD5, has been released. The latest edition allows the compression of menus, selection by title set, and entering of the size of the DVD; it also "improves compatibility" and fixes "IFO update bugs". Downloads here (source and links to binaries), screenshots at the home page and at the KDE Apps link.
Version 0.7 of Scythia (or here in English), a Qt-based FTP client, has been released. The main feature is a port to Qt 4; the rest of the changelog is in French which I don't understand. Some screenshots of old versions can be found here (lovely icons); downloads (Windows, Ubuntu 5.10, source) are to be found on the KDE Apps page.
Version 0.8.3 of Kim (KDE Image Menu), a KDE service menu which uses ImageMagick and Mpegtools as back-ends, has been released. The new release, which requires KDE 3.3, fixes some security issues (by using temporary files), UTF-8 encoding issues regarding temporary files, and copyrights and licensing issues. A download and a few screenshots are available at the KDE Apps link above (homepage had not been updated as I wrote this).
Version 0.7.7 of QtiPlot, an Origin-like scientific plotting and data analysis application, has been released. The new version features improved main menu behaviour, "improved data analysis by adding: convolution/deconvolution, correlation, FFT from tables", and several bug fixes for 2D plots. Downloads here (sources free, binaries require a 15-euro donation). A few screenshots are on the KDE Apps page.
VariCAD have released an updated version of their CAD package. Version 2.01 includes a new tutorial and "some minor improvements". VariCAD has a commercial licence and requires Qt 2.3 (minimum) and hardware OpenGL support. Downloads for Windows and various Linux distributions are available (with a user account) here.
Riverbank Computing announces that it has released a new snapshot of its Python-KDE bindings, downloadable here. They give no indication as to its stability. The changelog in the bundle (there is none on the website) refers to updated docs, particularly fixed tables of contents, "added X11 include", a DCOP-related fix and "removed kkeyserver.sip references from all .diff files". (The last release was only last week, and when one release follows on the heels of another, it usually means a major bug fix.)
Version 1.5 of KNetStats, a "simple KDE network monitor that show rx/tx LEDs of any network interface on a system tray icon", has been released. New features include a chart view, a new statistics dialog, the use of bksys as the building tool, and a Romanian translation (and more). Downloads available at SourceForge; screenshots on the home page. Requires KDE 3.3 and the Linux kernel - it's not BSD-compatible.
A third pre-release (1.1pre3) of the KDE collections manager Tellico has been released. This fixes one bug from 1.1pre2, namely one that caused data loss when changing configuration options for writing images to data files, and in the "Save As..." routine. They urge everyone to back up their data before using the pre-release. A source download is available at the KDE Apps link above.
Version 1.8.1 of Lintouch, a Qt-based open-source application for designing human-to-machine interfaces (HMIs), has been released. This is the first GPL release of Lintouch, with some components under the LGPL; new binary builds for SUSE 10, Fedora Core 4, Ubuntu 5.04 and Debian Sarge are also available; one bug fix to its editor is also mentioned. Screenshots here, downloads here (includes Windows installer; requires MinGW).
Version 1.3.2 of Scribus, the Qt-based open-source desktop publishing application, has been released. New in this release is a cleaner, restructured codebase, a new Windows installer (by dispensation from Trolltech), EXIF support, improved TIFF and PSD file support, PDF export with viewer export options, updated documentation (including 1.3-specific documentation), and more (full details here). Downloads are to be found here with screenshots of 1.3.0 here. Stable version is 1.2.4.1.
A second pre-release version of Tellico, the collections database for KDE, has been released. Changes include updated documentation, a Russian translation, support for drag and drop from Mozilla and Firefox, and images being saved inside data files rather than in the Tellico data directory (the reverse, a change applied in 1.1pre1 is now an option, not the default). Full details on Tellico news page, downloads of source here, screenshots (stable version) here.
Version 0.5.2 of cb2Bib, "a tool for rapidly extracting bibliographic references from email alerts, journal Web pages, and PDF files" aimed at scientists and students, has been released. Changes include the default colour being taken from the window manager rather than hard-coded to black, and context and highlight colours being customisable. There are various bug fixes also (full changelog here). Single screenshot on homepage, source and binary downloads here. Requires Qt 3.2 or higher (but less than 4).
VisiScript 0.4.3 has been released. VisiScript is a Qt-based editor for scripting languages like Python, Perl and Tcl. Among the changes listed is that all images are compiled into the binary, so no extra files are required. Requires Qt 3 and QScintilla, and is available for embedded as well as desktop Qt platforms. Downloads and screenshots to be found at the home page.
Version 0.8.1 of digital photo management app digiKam has been released. The new version includes 8-bit RAW support (16-bit RAW is planned for 0.9), star ratings for images, copy-paste support (also allowing copy-paste from Konqueror), new icons, memory leak fixes, and restored printing functions. Detailed changelog at the KDE Apps link above. Screenshots here, links to binary downloads (possibly out of date) here, source downloads here. Requires KDE 3.
Via OSNews, PC-BSD have released a second release candidate of their FreeBSD-based desktop operating system which uses KDE as its main desktop. New features include an updated core FreeBSD (version 6.0), KDE 3.5, a fix for the loading of the "kcm fileshare" KDE module, many package updates, the use of portsnap to update ports, and the online update checker now running at startup (changelog here). A "tour" is available here, downloads here, and patch updates here.
A new stable version (1.0.14) of Gambas, a Visual Basic-like RAD application which uses Qt, has been released. The new version features a number of bug fixes, including a crash-inducing bug affecting the EXEC and SHELL commands and four in the Qt module. The sources can be downloaded here; some screenshots here.
A security advisory has recently been issued regarding a heap overflow problem in KDE's JavaScript engine (used in Konqueror). There have recently been overflow-related security problems in KPDF also. Links to sources for security patches are to be found in the advisories; Novell has issued an announcement for users of its SUSE and other Linux products (nothing as I write on the KJS fault).
Version 0.9 of Veusz (Velvet Ember Under Sky Zenith), a scientific plotting app which is designed to produce publication-ready Postscript output, has been released. Major new features include undo/redo, rubber-band axis zooming, and contour support. Requires PyQt (which requires SIP) and numarray; Microsoft Core Fonts and PyFITS are recommended (see release notes; changelog here). Screenshot here, download here.
Riverbank Computing report that they have released a snapshot of their Python-KDE bindings which provide full support for KDE 3.5 (no changelog can be found with any material more recent than October 2005). It can be downloaded here; documentation is in the bundle. Requires PyQt 3.11 or later, and SIP 3.10.2 or 4.0 or later.
Version 0.35 of KlamAV, a KDE front-end for ClamAV which "does try to be a bit more than that", has been released. The new version features an added event logger and viewer, an improved configuration interface, the ability to scan progress bars and to scan devices. Requires KDE 3. Screenshots here, downloads at SourceForge here.
Johan Thelin informs me that a beta of version 0.7 of his SpeedCrunch calculator app has been released. This version now features a keypad and has been ported to Qt 4. Source download here, Windows installer here. Screenshot here.
Version 2.5 of Syntext Serna, a commercial XML editor which runs on Linux, Windows and Mac OS X. New features include the ability to edit XML source without switching to text mode, to convert to XInclude with a simple selection, to comment or uncomment sections of a document, and to force Windows or Unix-style line breaks in documents. There is also an enhanced and fully-reworked text editor for Text Mode. I cannot find which version of Qt is required.
Piotr Pszczolkowski from Poland has released version 2.07 of his Beesoft Commander (in Polish), which is a Qt3-based file manager (with an editor) and FTP client. I can't find any changelog, but there are a few screenshots at the homepage. Downloads here (source and gzip binary, with links to Fedora RPM repositories; again all in Polish except for instructions in English and German).
Trolltech has updated its embedded Qt by releasing Qtopia Core 4, which would underlie both phone and PDA editions of the Qtopia environment. This replaces the earlier Qt/Embedded product, using Qt 4.1 while earlier Qt/Embedded products used the Qt2 series, and provides all the features of Qt 4.1 such as right-to-left text, advanced graphics and tool integrations. (OSNews discussion here.)
Version 0.7.6 of QtiPlot, an open-source Qt-based clone of Origin, a scientific data plotting app, has been released. New features include smoothing, completely rewritten FFT code, "the possibility to change the axes' labels by specifying a non-linear function with respect to the labels of the opposite axis", and a number of bug fixes. Downloads (source, DEB, RPM, and OS X package) here, screenshots on the KDE Apps page.
Version 1.3.8 of the KDE sound application AmaroK has been released. The changelog lists nine bug fixes, including a crash bug which showed up after a playlist finished, and one in which "old error message could be shown instead of current track lyrics". Source download here, list of binary download sources here; screenshots here.
Via OSNews, O'Reilly's LinuxDevCenter has an interview with the KDE developer Aaron Seigo, on the subject of KDE 4: Previewing KDE 4. As well as the new features of KDE 4 (Qt 4, Plasma, JavaScript-based widgets, etc), they also talk about the advantages of Scalable Vector Graphics and the possibility of porting KDE applications off KDE.
Elections are to be held over the next few months for the KDE Technical Working Group, whose purpose of which is to "help the hundreds of KDE contributors come to technical decisions and smooth processes such as major releases" and "provide technical guidance to KDE contributors". The people elected will be seven members of the KDE e.V.; the working group's charter can be found here, and to apply for membership, see this page.
A pre-release of version 1.1 of Tellico, a KDE-based collection manager (collections as in books, videos etc) has been released. Improvements include "vastly improved" table editing, images being written to the Tellico data directory rather than inside the file itself, which is expected to speed loading up "significantly", file cataloguing, and new data sources. Changelog with press release here; dependencies now include KDE and Qt 3.2. Source download here.
Version 0.24.2 of QtCurve, a set of themes for both KDE and GTK based on BlueCurve (but very much modified), has been released. This version features a compile fix for KDE. Download and three screenshots at the KDE Look link above. (Not sure if it works with Qt without KDE or for Qt 4 - it's a very nice-looking theme.)
Version 3.0.10 of KRename, a file management utility for KDE which allows the mass renaming of files in one go and integrates into Konqueror and Krusader, has been released. This release "adds a context menu to easier insert a few KRename tokens and updates some translations", according to the KDE Apps page. Downloads (source, SRPM, SUSE 9.3, SUSE 10 and Fedora 3 RPM and Klik) are available there as well as here. Requires KDE 3.1.
Version 0.7.2 of KDESVN, a KDE Subversion client, has been released. The new version enables drag & drop operations internally and to Konqueror, two new options including one for the user to display changed, locked or updated items coloured, and a number of bug fixes including a couple of show-stoppers. Full changelog here; screenshots here, downloads (source and FC4 RPM) here. Depends on KDE 3.3.
Linux Format issue 76 (Feb 2006) has just been released in the UK. On page 32 is a round-up of the spreadsheets available for Linux, namely Gnumeric, PlanMaker, OpenOffice.org Calc, ThinkFree Office Calc and KSpread. The last (version 1.4.2) receives a score of 1 out of 10, and labelled "a disaster area that needs some serious work to even be considered". The review highlights the lack of macros and filters ("you're better off looking inside the nearest coffee machine"), and says that it has the bare minimum of spreadsheet functionality but nothing else, and that the stock SUSE 10 build of KSpread "steadfastly refused to create any charts whatsoever":
Select your data, click the Chart button, monkey around in the Create Chart dialog, then bang! it crashes. What kind of spreadsheet can't do charts? A rubbish spreadsheet, that's what kind.
Top score went to OpenOffice.org Calc, with 9 out of 10. Commercial contenders ThinkFree and Planmaker also scored badly, with 3 and 5 out of 10 respectively. On page 26, the magazine gives 7 out of 10 to KDE 3.5 itself, calling it "an excellent release, marred by the feeling that KDE is missing genuine innovation". Attention is drawn to new features, and ACID2 compiliance, in Konqueror, webcam support in Kopete, SuperKaramba and improvements in the Kicker.
Aaron Seigo is to address SCALE 4x, the Southern California Linux Expo in LA, 11-12 Feb this year, on the subject of the next KDE release and "how the Plasma project is looking to reinvigorate the desktop experience by centering the desktop on workflow-centric interfaces". KDE is also to have a booth on the expo floor. Early bird discounts available at the registration page until 15 Jan; quote reference "KDE" for 40% off.
Trolltech has released Teambuilder 1.3, "a distributed build system that takes advantage of the spare computational power in a networked group of workstations to drastically reduce compilation times for all users". It is available for Linux, IRIX and Solaris. Sales contact and licensing details here; no open-source licence seems to be available.
Version 0.8.1 of KShutDown, an advanced shut-down utility for KDE featuring screen-locking, time and delay options, DCOP and Kiosk support and various "extras", has been released. This release adds German and Chinese translations and updates the Czech translation, and there are minor bug fixes and improvements also; full details at Sourceforge here. One screenshot on the homepage; link to source downloads at Sourceforge here.
A new development release of KDirStat, version 2.5.2, has been released. KDS is a graphical disk usage utility which displays disk usage data in a tree like the Unix "du" command. (Full feature list
