Misplaced Pages

#3996

60-580: The KDE Software Compilation ( KDE SC ) was an umbrella term for the desktop environment plus a range of included applications produced by KDE . From its 1.0 release in July 1998 until the release of version 4.4 in February 2010, the Software Compilation was simply known as KDE , which stood for K Desktop Environment until the rebrand. The then called KDE SC was used from 4.4 onward until

120-525: A brief pause to redraw themselves. The Kross scripting framework allows developers to write widgets in a variety of programming languages in addition to C++ . KRunner is a versatile tool for several functions. It replaces the dialog box "Run Command" from K Desktop Environment 3 , and also inherits from the application launcher feature, expanding the possibilities through a modular plug. KRunner stores previously entered commands and searches, accessible via an auto-complete feature. KRunner can be shown on

180-448: A default configuration that works with minimal user setup. Some window managers‍—‌such as IceWM , Fluxbox , Openbox , ROX Desktop and Window Maker ‍—‌contain relatively sparse desktop environment elements, such as an integrated spatial file manager , while others like evilwm and wmii do not provide such elements. Not all of the program code that is part of a desktop environment has effects which are directly visible to

240-430: A desktop environment typically consists of several separate components, including a window manager (such as Mutter or KWin ), a file manager (such as Files or Dolphin ), a set of graphical themes , together with toolkits (such as GTK+ and Qt ) and libraries for managing the desktop. All these individual modules can be exchanged and independently configured to suit users, but most desktop environments provide

300-454: A feature release is ready and announced, work on the next feature release starts. A feature release needs several months to be finished and many bugs that are fixed during this time are backported to the stable branch, meaning that these fixes are incorporated into the last stable release by bugfix releases. During the KDE SC 4 series, KDE SC had a feature release roughly every six months. Since

360-429: A maintenance release roughly every month, except during the month of a feature release, while with Plasma 5, bugfix releases tend to happen even shorter like 2–3 weeks. The KDE team releases new versions on a regular basis. Most KDE software uses Qt which runs on most Unix and Unix-like systems (including Mac OS X), Android and Microsoft Windows. As of 2011 CMake serves as the build tool. This allows KDE to support

420-607: A much smaller number of tablets and smartphones. However, the majority of Unix-like operating systems dominant on handheld devices do not use the X11 desktop environments used by other Unix-like operating systems, relying instead on interfaces based on other technologies. On systems running the X Window System (typically Unix-family systems such as Linux , the BSDs , and formal UNIX distributions), desktop environments are much more dynamic and customizable to meet user needs. In this context,

480-535: A new interface concept with its version 3 , while a popular Linux distribution Ubuntu introduced its own new desktop environment, Unity . Some users preferred to keep the traditional interface concept of GNOME 2 , resulting in the creation of MATE as a GNOME 2 fork. The most common desktop environment on personal computers is Windows Shell in Microsoft Windows . Microsoft has made significant efforts in making Windows shell visually pleasing. As

540-557: A powerful configuration for the FVWM window manager, a theme and further adds, altogether forming a "construction kit" for building up a desktop environment. X window managers that are meant to be usable stand-alone — without another desktop environment — also include elements reminiscent of those found in typical desktop environments, most prominently Enlightenment . Other examples include OpenBox , Fluxbox , WindowLab , Fvwm , as well as Window Maker and AfterStep , which both feature

600-753: A result, Microsoft has introduced theme support in Windows 98 , the various Windows XP visual styles , the Aero brand in Windows Vista , the Microsoft design language (codenamed "Metro") in Windows 8 , and the Fluent Design System and Windows Spotlight in Windows 10 . Windows shell can be extended via Shell extensions . Many mainstream desktop environments for Unix-like operating systems, including KDE , GNOME , Xfce , and LXDE , use

660-513: A separate visualization for the more confined taskbar. Plasma separates components into "data engine" and their visualization counterparts. This is intended to reduce the total programming effort when there are multiple possible visualizations of given data; and to make it easier for the data engine and the workspaces to be written independently. The scalable nature of the Plasma widgets allows for them to be resized and rotated to any size, with only

SECTION 10

#1732791440004

720-424: A unified look and behavior. A windowing system of some sort generally interfaces directly with the underlying operating system and libraries. This provides support for graphical hardware, pointing devices, and keyboards. The window manager generally runs on top of this windowing system. While the windowing system may provide some window management functionality, this functionality is still considered to be part of

780-495: A wider range of platforms, including Windows. GNU gettext is used for translation. Doxygen is used to generate api documentation. The Software Compilation consists of the following packages: Major applications by KDE Software Compilation include: In November 1998, the Qt framework was dual-licensed under the free and open-source Q Public License (QPL) and a commercial license for proprietary software developers. The same year,

840-600: Is a growing market for low-cost Linux PCs using the X Window System or Wayland with a broad choice of desktop environments. Among the more popular of these are Google's Chromebooks and Chromeboxes , Intel's NUC , the Raspberry Pi , etc. On tablets and smartphones, the situation is the opposite, with Unix-like operating systems dominating the market, including the iOS (BSD-derived), Android , Tizen , Sailfish and Ubuntu (all Linux-derived). Microsoft's Windows phone , Windows RT and Windows 10 are used on

900-495: Is a metadata and search framework, incorporating Strigi as a full-text file indexing service, and NEPOMUK with KDE integration. Starting with Qt 4.5, Qt was also made available under the LGPL version 2.1, a major step for KDE adoption in corporate and proprietary environments, as the LGPL permits proprietary applications to link to libraries licensed under the LGPL. As of August 2014, KDE no longer provides synchronized releases of

960-423: Is built using Qt 5 and KDE Frameworks 5 , predominantly plasma-framework . It improves support for HiDPI displays and ships a convergable graphical shell , which can adjust itself according to the device in use. 5.0 also includes a new default theme, dubbed Breeze. Qt 5's QtQuick 2 uses a hardware-accelerated OpenGL ( ES ) scene graph (canvas) to compose and render graphics on the screen, which allows for

1020-414: Is highly customizable, and contains many complex features, all whilst trying to establish sensible defaults. GNOME on the other hand is more prescriptive, and focuses on the finer details of essential tasks and overall simplification. Accordingly, each one attracts a different user and developer community. Technically, there are numerous technologies common to all Unix-like desktop environments, most obviously

1080-412: Is intended to be more configurable for those wanting to update the decades-old desktop metaphor . There are a number of new frameworks, including Phonon (a new multimedia interface making KDE independent of any one specific media backend) Solid (an API for network and portable devices), and Decibel (a new communication framework to integrate all communication protocols into the desktop). Also featured

1140-432: Is the same underlying toolkit GNOME uses. The MATE desktop environment, a fork of GNOME 2, is comparable to Xfce in its use of RAM and processor cycles, but is often considered more as an alternative to other lightweight desktop environments. For a while, GNOME and KDE enjoyed the status of the most popular Linux desktop environments; later, other desktop environments grew in popularity. In April 2011, GNOME introduced

1200-436: Is the successor of Plasma 4 and was first released on 15 July 2014. It includes a new default theme, known as "Breeze", as well as increased convergence across different devices. The graphical interface was fully migrated to QML , which uses OpenGL for hardware acceleration, which resulted in better performance and reduced power consumption. Plasma Mobile is a Plasma 5 variant for Linux-based smartphones. KDE Plasma 5

1260-481: The Common Desktop Environment , KDE , and GNOME . On a system that offers a desktop environment, a window manager in conjunction with applications written using a widget toolkit are generally responsible for most of what the user sees. The window manager supports the user interactions with the environment, while the toolkit provides developers a software library for applications with

SECTION 20

#1732791440004

1320-604: The GNU LGPL , but the only way for proprietary software to make use of them was to be developed under the terms of the Qt proprietary license. Beginning 23 October 2000, the second series of releases, K Desktop Environment 2 , introduced significant technological improvements. These included DCOP (Desktop COmmunication Protocol), KIO (an application I/O library), KParts (a component object model , which allows an application to embed another within itself), and KHTML (an HTML rendering and drawing engine). The third series

1380-631: The NeXTSTEP GUI look and feel. However newer versions of some operating systems make self configure. The Amiga approach to desktop environment was noteworthy: the original Workbench desktop environment in AmigaOS evolved through time to originate an entire family of descendants and alternative desktop solutions. Some of those descendants are the Scalos, the Ambient desktop of MorphOS , and

1440-1002: The Presentation Manager . The BumpTop project was an experimental desktop environment. Its main objective is to replace the 2D paradigm with a "real-world" 3D implementation, where documents can be freely manipulated across a virtual table. KDE Plasma KDE Plasma is a set of graphical shells developed by KDE for Unix-like operating systems. With the KDE brand repositioning in 2009, Plasma 4.4 succeeded KDE 4.3 . Currently, it has four workspace variants: one for desktop PCs and laptops (Plasma Desktop) , one for TVs ( Plasma Bigscreen ), one for smartphones ( Plasma Mobile ), and another for embedded and touch-enabled devices ( Plasma Nano ). Plasma Desktop, in its default configuration, resembles KDesktop from K Desktop Environment 3 and Microsoft Windows XP ; however, extensive configurability allows radical departures from

1500-649: The Wanderer desktop of the AROS open source OS. WindowLab also contains features reminiscent of the Amiga UI. Third-party Directory Opus software, which was originally just a navigational file manager program, evolved to become a complete Amiga desktop replacement called Directory Opus Magellan. OS/2 (and derivatives such as eComStation and ArcaOS ) use the Workplace Shell . Earlier versions of OS/2 used

1560-469: The X Window System . Accordingly, the freedesktop.org project was established as an informal collaboration zone with the goal being to reduce duplication of effort. As GNOME and KDE focus on high-performance computers, users of less powerful or older computers often prefer alternative desktop environments specifically created for low-performance systems. Most commonly used lightweight desktop environments include LXDE and Xfce ; they both use GTK+ , which

1620-483: The proprietary desktop environments included with Windows and macOS have relatively fixed layouts and static features, with highly integrated "seamless" designs that aim to provide mostly consistent customer experiences across installations. Microsoft Windows dominates in marketshare among personal computers with a desktop environment. Computers using Unix-like operating systems such as macOS, ChromeOS, Linux, BSD or Solaris are much less common; however, as of 2015 there

1680-474: The Desktop in earlier KDE releases. They are bundled as the default environment with a number of free software operating systems , such as Chakra , Kubuntu , Mageia (DVD version), openSUSE , or TrueOS . From KDE SC 4.0 to KDE SC 4.2, the default theme, " Oxygen ", was characterized by dark tones. In KDE SC 4.3, it was replaced by the new "Air" theme, which predominates in transparency and white as

1740-511: The GPL for Linux and Unix-like operating systems, including Mac OS X . It is marked stable running on Mac OS X since 2008. Unlike KDE SC 4 , however, it requires an X11 server to operate. In 2002, members of the KDE on Cygwin project began porting the GPL licensed Qt/X11 code base to Windows. KDE Software Compilation 4 , first released on 11 January 2008, is based on Qt 4, which is also released under

1800-579: The GPL for Windows and Mac OS X. Therefore, KDE SC 4 applications can be compiled and run natively on these operating systems as well. KDE Software Compilation 4 on Mac OS X is currently considered beta, while on Windows it is not in the final state, so applications can be unsuitable for day to day use. KDE SC 4 includes many new technologies and technical changes. The centerpiece is a redesigned desktop and panels collectively called Plasma , which replaces Kicker , KDesktop , and SuperKaramba by integrating their functionality into one piece of technology; Plasma

1860-454: The KDE FTP server in the form of source code with configure scripts, which are compiled by operating system vendors and integrated with the rest of their systems before distribution. Most vendors use only stable and tested versions of KDE SC, providing it in the form of easily installable, pre-compiled packages. The source code of every stable and development version of KDE SC is stored in

KDE Software Compilation - Misplaced Pages Continue

1920-656: The KDE Free Qt foundation was created which guarantees that Qt would fall under a variant of the very liberal BSD license should Trolltech cease to exist or no free version of Qt be released during 12 months. Debate continued about compatibility with the GNU General Public License (GPL), hence in September 2000 Trolltech made the Unix version of the Qt libraries available under the GPL in addition to

1980-615: The KDE source code repository, using Git . KDE Platform is licensed under the LGPL, BSD license, MIT license , or X11 license. Applications also allow GPL. Documentation also allow FDL . CMake modules must be licensed under the BSD licence. Major releases are releases that begin a series (version number X.0). These releases are allowed to break binary compatibility with the predecessor, or to put it differently, all following releases (X.1, X.2, ...) will guarantee binary portability ( API & ABI ). This means, for instance, that software that

2040-490: The LGPL version 2.1, now allowing proprietary applications to legally use the open source Qt version. Desktop environment A desktop environment typically consists of icons , windows , toolbars , folders , wallpapers and desktop widgets (see Elements of graphical user interfaces and WIMP ). A GUI might also provide drag and drop functionality and other features that make the desktop metaphor more complete. A desktop environment aims to be an intuitive way for

2100-599: The QPL which eliminated the concerns of the Free Software Foundation . Trolltech continued to require licenses for developing proprietary software with Qt. The core libraries of KDE are collectively licensed under the GNU LGPL but the only way for proprietary software to make use of them was to be developed under the terms of the Qt proprietary license. Starting with Qt 4.5, Qt was also made available under

2160-578: The Qt toolkit was dual-licensed under the free/ open source Q Public License (QPL) and a proprietary license for proprietary software developers. Debate continued about compatibility with the GNU General Public License (GPL), so in September 2000, Trolltech made the Unix version of the Qt libraries available under the GPL, in addition to the QPL. Trolltech continued to require licenses for developing proprietary software with Qt. The core libraries of KDE are collectively licensed under

2220-636: The X Window System or Wayland , any of which may be selected by users, and are not tied exclusively to the operating system in use. The desktop environment for macOS , which is also a Unix-like system, is Aqua , which uses the Quartz graphics layer, rather than using X or Wayland. A number of other desktop environments also exist, including (but not limited to) CDE , EDE , GEM , IRIX Interactive Desktop , Sun's Java Desktop System , Jesktop , Mezzo, Project Looking Glass , ROX Desktop , UDE , Xito , XFast. Moreover, there exists FVWM-Crystal, which consists of

2280-469: The base color. New themes for Plasma can be chosen and installed through software like Discover or online at store.kde.org. With the release of KDE SC 4.11 on 14 August 2013, Plasma 4 was placed into a feature freeze and turned into a long-term stable package until August 2015. On 15 July 2014 Plasma 4's successor, Plasma 5, was released. Plasma features containments , which are essentially applets that contain other applets. Two examples of containments are

2340-473: The default layout. Its technology is a fundamental rewrite of several desktop interaction programs included in previous KDE desktop environments for Unix-like systems, focusing on eye candy and special graphical effects. Plasma replaces the previous KDesktop shell, Kicker taskbar and SuperKaramba widget engine used in the K Desktop Environment 3 series with a unified system of widgets that can be configured and replaced with alternative designs. Since

2400-438: The desktop background and the taskbar. A containment can be anything the developer wants: an image (either raster graphics or an SVG image), animation, or even OpenGL . Images are most commonly used, but with Plasma the user could set any applet as the desktop background without losing functionality of the applet. This also allows for applets to be dragged between the desktop and the taskbar (two separate containments), and have

2460-484: The desktop via the keyboard combination Alt + F2 or by selecting "Run Command ..." in the desktop menu. These functions are handled by the plugin: This is a list of widgets that the current release version of Plasma supports. Not all widgets are supported by default in all Linux distributions ; some may require different packages or even a recompilation of Plasma. Previous Plasma Workspaces releases also supported Edje gadgets and E17 modules. Support for those

KDE Software Compilation - Misplaced Pages Continue

2520-924: The entire software compilation; instead the software is split into three parts: Major changes include a move from Qt 4 to Qt 5, support for the next-generation display server protocol Wayland , support for the next-generation rendering API Vulkan and modularization of the KDE core libraries. Initial releases of Frameworks 5 and Plasma 5 were made available in July 2014. The releases KDE Frameworks 5, KDE Plasma 5 and KDE Applications 5 are not one singular entity. These parts have been only released together, and cobbling them up under one name really has not been helpful. 3rd party developers thought they would only target Plasma Workspaces, Plasma users have thought you’ll only be able to run “KDE apps”, potential users of applications will assume that you can only use them inside Plasma workspaces — all of them untrue, all of them taken right out of my daily experience. KDE SC releases are made to

2580-480: The final release 4.14 in July 2014. It consisted of the KDE Plasma 4 desktop and those KDE applications, whose development teams chose to follow the Software Compilation's release schedule. After that, the KDE SC was split into three separate product entities: KDE Plasma , KDE Frameworks and KDE Applications , each with their own independent release schedules. KDE was founded in 1996 by Matthias Ettrich , who

2640-474: The main workspace UI of Plasma Active and was shipped as 1.0 in October 2011. Plasma Active has been succeeded by Plasma Mobile starting with Plasma 5. Plasma Mobile was targeted at smartphones and small tablet devices that are mainly used via touch input . It was originally expected to be released in 2011 along with Plasma Active 1.0 but development focus shifted towards Contour . A new version with

2700-580: The offloading of computationally expensive graphics rendering tasks onto the GPU , freeing up resources on the system's main CPU . KDE Plasma 5 uses the X Window System and Wayland . Support for Wayland was prepared in the compositor and planned for a later release. It was made initially available in the 5.4 release. Stable support for a basic Wayland session was provided in the 5.5 release (December 2015). Support for NVIDIA proprietary driver for Plasma on Wayland

2760-551: The original Macintosh from Apple in 1984, and was popularized further by Windows from Microsoft since the 1990s. As of 2014 , the most popular desktop environments are descendants of these earlier environments, including the Windows shell used in Microsoft Windows , and the Aqua environment used in macOS . When compared with the X-based desktop environments available for Unix-like operating systems such as Linux and BSD ,

2820-493: The release of Plasma 5, Plasma Netbook's functionality was merged into Plasma itself. Plasma Active was a workspace for devices with touchscreens. It shipped with several applications such as Kontact Touch and a document viewer based on Calligra Suite . "Contour" was the name of an interface for tablet devices. Its development was started in April 2011 by basysKom. Replacing an earlier tablet prototype, Contour has then become

2880-495: The split of the KDE Software Compilation into KDE Plasma Workspaces, KDE Frameworks and KDE Applications , each subproject can develop at its own pace. Plasma 5 is on its own release schedule, with feature releases every four months, and bugfix releases in the intervening months. Plasma 4 was released as part of KDE Software Compilation 4 and replaced Kicker , KDesktop , and SuperKaramba , which formed

2940-414: The split, KDE Plasma releases a new feature version roughly every 3–4 months. Bugfix releases have three version numbers, e.g. KDE 1.1.1, and focus on fixing bugs, minor glitches, and making small usability improvements. Bugfix releases in general do not allow new features, although some releases include small enhancements. A shortened release schedule is used. Starting with the KDE SC 4 series, KDE SC has

3000-412: The time was that his girlfriend could not use them. His initial Usenet post spurred a lot of interest, and the KDE project was born. Ettrich chose to use Trolltech's Qt framework for the KDE project. Other programmers quickly started developing KDE/Qt applications, and by early 1997, a few applications were being released. On 12 July 1998, K Desktop Environment 1.0 was released. In November 1998,

3060-404: The user to interact with the computer using concepts which are similar to those used when interacting with the physical world, such as buttons and windows. While the term desktop environment originally described a style of user interfaces following the desktop metaphor, it has also come to describe the programs that realize the metaphor itself. This usage has been popularized by projects such as

SECTION 50

#1732791440004

3120-426: The user. Some of it may be low-level code. KDE , for example, provides so-called KIO slaves which give the user access to a wide range of virtual devices. These I/O slaves are not available outside the KDE environment. In 1996 the KDE was announced, followed in 1997 by the announcement of GNOME . Xfce is a smaller project that was also founded in 1996, and focuses on speed and modularity, just like LXDE which

3180-444: The window manager, which simply happens to have been provided by the windowing system. Applications that are created with a particular window manager in mind usually make use of a windowing toolkit , generally provided with the operating system or window manager. A windowing toolkit gives applications access to widgets that allow the user to interact graphically with the application in a consistent way. The first desktop environment

3240-564: Was added in the 5.16 release (June 2019). KDE Plasma 6 is the sixth and current generation of the graphical workspaces environment made by KDE. It is the successor to Plasma 5 and was initially released on the 28th February 2024. Plasma 6 changes the default display server from X11 to Wayland, though the former is still available. Plasma Desktop is the main variant of KDE Plasma, targeted to desktop PCs and laptops. Plasma Netbook aims at netbooks and may also be used on tablet PCs . The first stable release shipped with KDE SC 4.4. With

3300-546: Was created by Xerox and was sold with the Xerox Alto in the 1970s. The Alto was generally considered by Xerox to be a personal office computer; it failed in the marketplace because of poor marketing and a very high price tag. With the Lisa , Apple introduced a desktop environment on an affordable personal computer , which also failed in the market. The desktop metaphor was popularized on commercial personal computers by

3360-760: Was developed for KDE 3.0 will work on all (future) KDE 3 releases; however, an application developed for KDE 2 is not guaranteed to be able to make use of the KDE ;3 libraries. KDE major version numbers follow the Qt release cycle, meaning that KDE SC 4 is based on Qt 4, while KDE 3 was based on Qt 3. Qt 5.0 was released 19 December 2012, Qt 5.2 12 December 2013. And for example KDE Frameworks 5.21.0 requires Qt >= 5.4, and no longer supports Qt 5.3 (cf. Qt version history). There are two main types of standard releases: Feature releases and bugfix releases. Feature releases have two version numbers, for example 3.5 and contain new features. As soon as

3420-413: Was developed in 2008 but removed later, in 2010. Google Gadgets were also supported. After Google announced the discontinuation of its two services that utilize Gadgets –  Google Desktop and iGoogle  – KDE removed support for this widget engine in early 2013. Plasma 5 is the fifth generation of the graphical workspaces environment created by KDE primarily for Linux systems. Plasma 5

3480-418: Was much larger than previous series, consisting of six major releases starting on 3 April 2002. The API changes between K Desktop Environment 2 and K Desktop Environment 3 were comparatively minor, meaning that the KDE 3 can be seen as largely a continuation of the K Desktop Environment 2 series. All releases of K Desktop Environment 3 were built upon Qt 3, which was only released under

3540-610: Was started in 2006. A comparison of X Window System desktop environments demonstrates the differences between environments. GNOME and KDE were usually seen as dominant solutions, and these are still often installed by default on Linux systems. Each of them offers: In the early 2000s, KDE reached maturity. The Appeal and ToPaZ projects focused on bringing new advances to the next major releases of both KDE and GNOME respectively. Although striving for broadly similar goals, GNOME and KDE do differ in their approach to user ergonomics. KDE encourages applications to integrate and interoperate,

3600-585: Was then a student at the University of Tübingen . At the time, he was troubled by certain aspects of the Unix desktop. Among his qualms was that none of the applications looked, felt, or worked alike. He proposed the formation of not only a set of applications, but, rather, a desktop environment , in which users could expect things to look, feel and work consistently. He also wanted to make this desktop easy to use; one of his complaints with desktop applications of

#3996