A Qt Blog

From KDE Dot News:

Version 4.1.1 of KDE, the Qt 4-based desktop environment for the Unix desktop, has been released. Major changes include:

• Significant performance, interaction and rendering correctness improvements in KHTML and Konqueror, KDE's webbrowser
• User interaction, rendering and stability fixes in Plasma, the KDE4 desktop shell
• PDF backend fixes in the document viewer Okular
• Fixes in Gwenview, the image viewer's thumbnailing, more robust retrieval and display of images with broken metadata
• Stability and interaction fixes in KMail

Full changelog here. Announcement here, source downloads with links to binaries at the info page (see Kubuntu home page for Ubuntu binaries).

Posted by Indigo Jo at 5:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Version 3.5.10 of KDE has been released. This version has improvements to Kicker (the panel and menu system) and KPDF, along with translation updates and various bug fixes, including crashes. Source downloads and compile instructions are at the usual location, the info page, along with any binary downloads.

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From KDE Dot News:

KDE 4.1 has been included in the FreeBSD ports tree for the first time. The ports install separately from KDE 3 (${LOCALBASE}/kde4), to allow them to be installed side-by-side; installation instructions are here. DBus and HAL are required for sound.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 11:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

Version 4.1 of KDE, the open-source desktop for Unix based on Qt 4, has been released. Important new features include:

• the KDE PIM module (a straight port of the KDE 3 version, not the new Akonadi-based version)
• Improvements to the Plasma desktop
• New Dragon Player, a video player
• Lokalize, a translation tool
• KSCD, a desktop CD player
• Dolphin now supports tabs
• Konqueror now supports re-opening closed windows; smoother scrolling also
• Stable Python and Ruby bindings
• Akonadi PIM storage system

Announcement, with detailed changelog and screenshots, here; source downloads, with links to binaries, at the info page. Binaries currently available for Ubuntu, OpenSUSE, Fedora and Magic Linux. Note that there is a problem with performance on nVidia when using the proprietary driver.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 8:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

Version 4.0.5 of KDE has been released. Changes include:

• Improvements to XRender compositing in the window manager
• Fix 100% usage of CPU in Dolphin
• Various bug-fixes to Kopete including one crash
• Other bug fixes and improvements, particularly in Juk (more comprehensive changelog here)

Announcement here, info page (with source downloads and links to binaries) here.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 11:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

Version 4.0.4 of KDE, the desktop environment for the X11 window system used on Linux and other Unix-type workstations, has been released. This is mostly a bug-fix release; see the changelogfor details. Downloads, and compilation instructions, available here. Requires Qt 4.3 (use of Qt 4.4 features will come in version 4.1, which is at alpha stage now).

Posted by Indigo Jo at 5:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

KDE 4.0.3 release announcement

The KDE project has announced that version 4.0.3 of its desktop environment for Unix type operating systems has been released. Major improvements:

• Scrolling optimisations in KHTML, KDE's HTML rendering engine
• Improved handling of dialog windows in KWin, KDE's window manager
• Various rendering improvements in Okular, KDE's document viewer
• Translation updates and bug fixes

Full changelog here; source downloads and links to third-party binaries here.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 9:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From the KDE website:

Version 4.0.2 of KDE has been released. Most significant changes include:

• Repainting issues in the HTML engine (KHTML) fixed
• New Farsi and Icelandic tranlsations
• Ability to resize Plasma desktop toolbar
• Numerous other Plasma improvements and bug-fixes
• Stability improvements to Kopete (chat client) and Okular (PDF reader)

Full changelog here. Source downloads, and links to third-party binaries (currently for SUSE, Ubuntu, Debian experimental and Magic Linux) on the Info page.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 7:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The KDE project has announced the release of version 3.5.9 of the KDE desktop. Major changes:

• Merging of the KDE-PIM Enterprise branch into the stable branch
• A new "favourite" email folders view in KMail, with drag & drop support for folders
• Easier scheduling in KOrganizer through various improvements in the user interface
• Improvements in KAlarm and KAddressbook

For full list of changes since v3.5.8, see here.

Source downloads, links to available binaries and some installation instructions are on the info page.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 9:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE website:

Version 4.0.1 of KDE has been released. Major changes include:

• Konqueror, KDE's webbrowser has seen numerous stability and performance fixes in its HTML rendering engine KHTML, in its Flash plugin loader and in KJS, the JavaScript engine.
• Stability problems have been addressed in components that are used all over the KDE codebase. Translations in this release are more complete.
• KWin, the KDE window manager has improved detection of compositing support, some effects have been fixed.
• Improvements to Okular, System Settings and KStars
• New translations including Danish, Frisian, Kazakh and Czech

Full changelog here. Source downloads, and links to available binaries (currently, Debian Experimental, Ubuntu and OpenSUSE) are on the info page. Requires Qt 4.3.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 10:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Feature: Distributions and KDE 4

DistroWatch reports on the state of play with Linux distributions and KDE 4: it is not the default in any except for the Fedora Rawhide (unstable) repository. OpenSUSE, Kubuntu and Mandriva have binaries available and there are third-party binaries for Slackware 12, but the next versions will have version 3.5.8 as default; live CDs are available from OpenSUSE and Shift (the latter based on Ubuntu). However, Gentoo, Arch and Slackware itself appear to have no intention of providing packages, at least until KDE 4.1 appear in six months' time or thereabouts.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 11:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE home page:

Version 4.0.0 of KDE, the X11 desktop environment based on Qt, has been released. This is the first stable release based on Qt 4. Major new features include the Plasma desktop with widgets similar to those in Windows Vista and Mac OS X Tiger, Oxygen artwork, a much improved KWin window manager, the Okular document viewer and Dolphin for the file manager rather than Konqueror. A visual guide with screenshots is here; source downloads are on the info page here, with links to binaries on the main page linked above.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 9:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

K Desktop Environment - KDE 3.5.8 Release Announcement

Version 3.5.8 of KDE, the Qt-based desktop environment for Unix, has been released, containing hundreds of bug fixes. Main changes:

• Improvements in Konqueror and its web browsing component KHTML. Bugs in handling HTTP connections have been fixed, KHTML has improved support of some CSS features for more standards compliance.
• In the kdegraphics package, lots of fixes in KDE's PDF viewer and Kolourpaint, a painting application, went into this release.
• The KDE PIM suite has, as usual, seen numerous stability fixes, covering KDE's email client KMail, the organizer application KOrganizer and various other bits and pieces.

The full changelog can be found here. Source code can be found here, with instructions on how to compile it here. The KDE project do not produce binaries, but the upcoming Ubuntu release (v7.10 Gutsy) includes it as standard.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 7:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

Intel and Novell have both become corporate Patrons of KDE, having both been strong supporters of the desktop (including financially) for several years. Novell, in particular, "has persistently been among the strongest supporters of KDE by employing many KDE developers and continuously sponsoring events".

Posted by Indigo Jo at 6:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

KDE version 3.5.7 has been released. This version features major improvements to the PIM module, with bug-fixes to KAddressBook, KAlarm and KOrganizer, improved user-interface and IMAP handling in KMail; Umbrello can now generate C# code and gains Java 5 generics support, and there are improvements to KPDF also. The full changelog is here; source downloads are here.

The multi-language IDE for KDE, KDevelop, has also been updated. Version 3.4.1 includes improved code completion and navigation, a more reliable debugger interface, and improved support for Qt 4, KDE 4 and Ruby. The source can be downloaded from the same location as KDE 3.5.7.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 6:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From Qt Apps:

Version 0.5.1.1 of QTM, the blog entry composition app using Qt 4 written by the author of this blog, has been released. Changes:

• User interface: the system-tray icon no longer displays on the Mac. Instead, the same menu is displayed by double-clicking on the dock icon. A bare-bones default main menu, with New, Open and Quit functions (the latter displayed in the dock and application menus), appears when there is no top-level window present on the Mac (only on Qt 4.2; this may change in future releases).
• User interface: the Abort Quick Post action in the STI menu appears (albeit greyed out) even when it is disabled; this is to get round a bug in Qt on the Mac
• New feature: the user can now reset changes made to quickpost templates before closing the dialog (Qt 4.2 only)
• New feature: option to "treat posting as saving" - in other words, when this is on, if you write a post and post it (draft or publish) and then try to close the window, QTM will not ask you if you want to save it.
• New feature: in Quickpost Templates (Qt 4.2), to set whether posts written using a given template should be draft or publish (or simply to use the default setting)
• New feature: qtm.desktop file, which provides a KDE/GNOME menu entry on platforms which support it
• Bug fix: fixed crash when attempting templateless quickposts; I suspect this was introduced with 0.5.1

Screenshots here; downloads (source, Ubuntu Feisty binary, with more expected to follow) here. Requires Qt 4.1 (most recent features, including quickpost and templates, require Qt 4.2).

Posted by Indigo Jo at 5:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

KDE 3.5.6 has been released. New features include Compiz support, session management for browser tabs in Akregator, KMail message templating, faster frame rates for Kopete video chat, and new summary menus in the Kontact organiser. There are also bug-fixes in KHTML, Kate, Kicker, KSysGuard and elsewhere and various translation improvements, particularly for Galician. Full changelog here with binary links, source downloads and compile/install instructions here. The KDE project does not produce binaries, but others have produced packages for Debian (Experimental), Ubuntu (all platforms), Pardus 1.1 and SUSE 9.3-10.2.

Technorati Tags: kde

Posted by Indigo Jo at 8:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The KDE project has released version 3.5.5 of their Qt-based desktop environment. Major enhancements include an upgrade to Kopete with improved Yahoo and Jabber support and Adium theme support, sudo support in kdesu, support for input shape from XShape 1.1 in the window manager, bug-fixes and speed improvements in the HTML rendering engine KHTML, CUPS 1.2 support in KDEPrint, and improvements to the traditional Chinese, Farsi, Khmer, Low Saxon and Slovak translations. Full changelog here. More information, including source downloads and instructions (the project does not issue binaries), here. However, binaries have been released by Kubuntu and OpenSUSE.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 11:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

Version 3.5.4 of the Qt-based X11 desktop system KDE has been released:

Significant enhancements include improved support for removable devices (users can now mount all devices supported by FreeDesktop's HAL and control how it will be done). Multiple holidays can now start on the same date in KOrganizer. Lots of fixes have been applied to Konqueror's HTML engine, KHTML. The dialog for sending client-side SSL certificates is now more usable, the StartCom SSL certificate was added and KNetworkConf now supports Fedora Core 5 and handles WEP keys better.

Sources and links to binaries here; also you can build with Konstruct.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 7:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

Kubuntu developer Jonathan Riddell has appeared on the UbuntuOS "podcast", discussing plans for the upcoming Edgy release (due late this year). The OGG file can be downloaded here and here (100Mb); Riddell appears 1hr 10mins in.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 11:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

KDE 3.5.3 has been released; in a change to the usual practice of including only bug-fixes in maintainance releases, this release features "well-tested new functionality". Start-up times have been shortened, new features have appeared in Akregator, KMail and KAlarm, and "over 800 minor issues fixed with the aid of Coverity (full changelog here). Information on downloading and compiling here; the release is source only, although there is information on where to find binaries for some distributions (currently Arch, Kubuntu, Red Hat, Fedora and SUSE).

Posted by Indigo Jo at 12:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

KDE 3.5.2, the second maintainance update of KDE 3.5, was released today. This is a general maintainance release and most of the changes are bug fixes; changelog here. Source downloads are available here with links to binaries below.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 3:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

South African Free Software magazine Tectonic published a preview of KDE 4. Written by AJ Venter of South African distribution OpenLab the article describes how the KDE developers are going to "rewrite the desktop rules with KDE 4" with technologies such as Plasma, Solid and of course Qt 4. The article concludes that "when KDE4 comes out, it will spell the end of the traditional way of using a computer".

Posted by Indigo Jo at 10:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The KDE project have just released their new localisation site, replacing their old internationalisation site (i18n.kde.org), now using the default KDE layout. The site contains instructions for localising KDE applications and documentation, and software for translators such as KDE's standard localisation app KBabel.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 12:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The first maintenance release of KDE 3.5 was issued yesterday. Version 3.5.1 contains more than 150 bug fixes and many other minor improvements; KDE Dot News mentions Konqueror, KMail, KPDF, Juk, Kopete, Kalzium and Quanta as packages which have received major improvements (full changelog here). The whole system can be built from source with Konstruct, and binaries are available for Kubuntu and no doubt more will follow.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 11:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

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.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 2:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Here is an article, with a series of screenshots, which explains why "KDE rules" in the author's opinion. It refutes some of the myths (such as that Qt isn't Free, that "C++ sucks" and a few others) and explains the benefits of technologies like DCOP and KParts. (This is a useful rejoinder to the writings and sayings of certain GTK bigots, like the people on a certain Linux User Group radio show who called Qt "sh-t" and the guy at the Linux User expo earlier this year who said C++ is for people who can't implement OOP in C or something stupid like that.) (Hat tip: OSNews.) Here's an earlier related story.

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From KDE Apps:

Version 1.1 of konqil.icio.us, a KDE "service menu" for del.icio.us, has been released; the previous version appears to be 0.5. Five changes are listed in the changelog (see link above), including that "service menu items now uses the current Konqueror window" and that the password setting has been removed as unncessary. Install instructions and download location are at link above (no home page and no screenshots).

Posted by Indigo Jo at 12:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

KDE 3.5 has been released! Major changes, according to the official announcement, include an ACID2-compliant Konqueror which also blocks adverts, SuperKaramba (a facility similar to OS X's Dashboard), and MSN and Yahoo webcam support in Kopete. A complete guide to new features, along with screenshots, can be found here. Packages are available for Arch, Kubuntu, Slackware and SUSE; it can also be built from source using Konstruct.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 4:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Andreas Aardal Hanssen has posted a report on the San José Developer Day on the Qt Developers' Blog. Not much detail but a few photos. Also, Ariya Hidayat has drawn attention to a Blogspot with details of fixed KDE bugs; it's auto-generated with a Python script.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 11:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

A first release candidate of KDE 3.5 is out, and the developers say it's almost finished, and they'd appreciate if people test the system by downloading the sources, which they may build using the Konstruct script, and then reporting any bugs. Binaries are available for SUSE Linux and Kubuntu Breezy.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 8:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Developers:

A FAQ for klik, a method of easily installing applications from an "image" file similar to the Mac's disk image download, has been published here. Only very limited information is there at present, covering some requirements and what systems currently support it.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 10:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE FreeBSD website:

KDE 3.4.3 and KOffice 1.4.2 have been released in port form for FreeBSD today. This is too late for yesterday's FreeBSD 6.0 release, however, which features KDE 3.4.2 and KOffice 1.4.1.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 4:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Developers:

KDE Developer "el" reports on his test of KDE's accessibility to visually-impaired users with Lars Stetten of linaccess, a long-term KDE user who is himself visually-impaired. The test concludes that the system is not usable for the visually-impaired (note that totally blind people are not even in the picture here) without much modification. Also, here developer "seele" reports on a KDE Usability Project poster for Word Usability Day.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 10:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

A "strong KDE presence" is to be found at the Andalusian Free Software Conference (Jornadas Andaluzas de Software Libre), sponsored by the Andalucian regional government and the University of Cordoba, among others, to be held in Cordoba this weekend. Presentations are to be given on KDE's Kiosk feature, Guadalinex, Bulmages (KDE accounting software) and the FreeNX remote desktop software. Schedule here, all in Spanish as is the entire website.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 7:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

A research group in the Institute of Software at the Chinese Academy of Sciences have been working on an operating system to support traditional Eastern languages such as Mongolian, Uighur and Tibetan. An extension for Qt and KDE to support these languages has now been developed. Some screenshots show the scripts in use (mirror at Kubuntu). The work is against KDE 3.4 and Qt 3.3.2.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 1:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Developers:

Inorog reports that he has taken delivery of a Ricoh colour laser printer for the purpose of testing KDE's printing systems. George Liu, Ricoh's Linux engineer, is reported to be an enthusiastic Linux advocate within the company.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 2:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News;

The KDE Project is pleased to announce the immediate availability of KDE 3.5 Beta 2, dubbed "Koalition". The 3.5 Beta 2 info page lists where to download with packages available for Archlinux, Kubuntu, Slackware and SUSE.
The KDE team asks everyone to try the version and give feedback through the bug tracking system. A Klax Live CD is available or you can build it yourself using Konstruct. If you want to see what it looks like OSDir has screenshots. Requirements list here.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 6:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

Latest version of KDE is out, featuring a substantial number of bug fixes and increasing translation coverage (51 languages). Packages are already available for Arch Linux, Kubuntu, Slackware and SuSE; Konstruct is recommended for building from source.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 11:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Via KDE Developers:

We are apparently assured that KDE 4 is going to be "about speed" (and not bloat, unlike a certain competitor and unlike the impression you'd get from all these new technologies). Daniel Molkentin's blog entry (in link above) also states that the KDE3 codebase that has so far been ported to Qt 4 has run faster. There is also a link to a Qt Development Blog entry about better performance in QSA 1.2.0 over 1.1.3, which use Qt 4 and Qt 3 respectively.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 10:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

A new article on Newsforge discusses the new features in KDE 4, which is to feature Appeal, "a mechanism for bringing artists, usability experts, programmers, and enthusiasts together in the earliest stages of development by holding in-person meetings and maintaining ongoing communication over mailing lists, wikis, and Web-based forums". This includes Tenor, a contextual link engine which makes information about files available to other KDE apps via "another KDE framework". Also discussed is Plasma, "a project to design and implement an entirely new desktop shell, combining the desktop (including wallpaper and icons), the panel and its applets, and desktop applets like SuperKaramba into a coherent and innovative vision". Looks ambitious. Worth reading.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 4:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Developers via Planet SUSE:

Binaries of the recent beta release of KDE 3.5 for SUSE are available at the KDE website; they are for SUSE versions 9.1 to 10. They are unsupported and untested, so are certainly not for mission-critical use.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 11:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From KDE Dot News:

Recent weeks have seen a lot of cooperative activity between the KDE Accessibility Team and various other Free Software accessibility teams. The Free Standards Group Accessibility Workgroup, KDE Accessibility and GNOME Accessibility teams have now released a joint statement describing some of this cooperation. "We believe users who are persons with disabilities should be empowered to choose technologies from any and all environments which provide accessibility just as other desktop users today routinely use a mix of technologies from different desktop environments. Our goal is seamless interoperability."

There's more over at KDE.News.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 10:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The KDE project has shipped the first Alpha of KDE 3.5, codenamed Kanzler. See the site's own announcement.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 2:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

At Newsforge, there's a write-up of the recent KDE conference aKademy, which was held in Malaga in Spain. With a couple of photos and lots of links.

Posted by Indigo Jo at 4:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

dot.kde.org and OSNews have both linked an interview with long-time KDE Developer Zack Rusin which was conducted at the recent KDE aKademy conference in Malaga, Spain. Zack modestly describes his job at Trolltech as "to create things that others can only dream about", but his main focus is graphics, as with this interview which mainly focuses on the new graphics rendering technologies which are planned to appear in upcoming versions of Qt, the X Window system and KDE. (Auf Deutsch)

Posted by Indigo Jo at 11:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From dot.KDE.org:

The amaroK developers are currently working on the 1.3 release of their live CD. If you are an Open Source artist and are interested in creating the amaroK 1.3 live CD artwork then join the 7 day artwork challenge. Excellent prizes await the winner. The CD will include songs from Magnatune, the "open music record label". These songs are "free as in free music". In other artwork-related news the logo contest for Kontact has come to an end with over 60 individual pieces of artwork submitted by 24 artists. The winner, who will receive a Wacom Graphic tablet, will be announced soon.