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KDE Plasma 5.19 has a first Beta in need of testing

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Want to ensure the next stable release of the KDE Plasma desktop environment is as good as can be? Plasma 5.19 Beta is out.

I have to say, I'm loving the attention to the small details and overall consistency that the KDE team having been doing for the last year or so. KDE is my daily driver, and there have been lots of rough edges to it and they're making great progress on cleaning it all up. They said their actual priority for this release is exactly that, to make it "more consistent" by "correcting and unifying designs of widgets and desktop elements". Additionally they "worked on giving you more control over your desktop by adding configuration options to the System Settings; and improved usability".

Here's some highlights:

  • Improved the panel spacer so that it can automatically centre widgets.
  • The System Monitor widgets have been rewritten from scratch.
  • Plasma now has a consistent design and header area in system tray applets as well as notifications.
  • GTK 3 applications immediately apply a newly selected colour scheme and GTK 2 applications no longer have broken colours.
  • Default Applications, Online Accounts, Global Shortcuts, KWin Rules and Background Services settings pages have all been overhauled.
  • The Display settings page now shows the aspect ratio for each available screen resolution.
  • The Info Center application has been redesigned with a look and feel that is consistent with the System Settings.
  • The new subsurface clipping for Wayland greatly reduces the flickering in many applications with the KWin Window Manager
  • Flatpak repositories in use are easier to remove now in Discover

You can find the full announcement here. Going by the roadmap, Plasma 5.19 is due to be fully released on June 9 so there's a little while to get your testing done. You can also read about more work being done on KDE developer Nate Graham's blog.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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About the author -
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I am the owner of GamingOnLinux. After discovering Linux back in the days of Mandrake in 2003, I constantly came back to check on the progress of Linux until Ubuntu appeared on the scene and it helped me to really love it. You can reach me easily by emailing GamingOnLinux directly. Find me on Mastodon.
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7 comments

NeoTheFox May 16, 2020
This fixes the long standing rotation issue on Wayland, and so it's finally usable on GPD devices! Thanks, KDE!
no_information_here May 16, 2020
As much as I love plasma, I don't have the space to run beta software any more. Lots of respect to the bug-testers, though!

It is amazing to me how much the KDE project has accomplished without being backed by companies like Red Hat or Canonical.
DamonLinuxPL May 16, 2020
Quoting: no_information_hereAs much as I love plasma, I don't have the space to run beta software any more. Lots of respect to the bug-testers, though!

It is amazing to me how much the KDE project has accomplished without being backed by companies like Red Hat or Canonical.

For most of time I run "unstable" plasma release in OpenMandriva Cooker. Cooker release is just development version for upcoming system release and for most of time contain fresh and unstable package like mesa rc or Plasma/kf5 Qt Alpha/beta etc. Never see here any major issues with this unstable packages. But I know, most of ppl want stable package or stable but fast updated for this people is OpenMandriva Rolling (stable but with fresh Rolling packages). So if anyone want try unstable plasma/Qt on daily distro - then I can stay, this is very stable software, even on pre-release.
mylka May 17, 2020
does anyone know if the dolphins-location-bar-drop-down-menu has any functions?
https://docs.kde.org/stable5/en/applications/dolphin/location-bar.html

i only see the path to the folder where i am.

is it possible to show the most viewed folders like in windows?
iiari May 17, 2020
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Quoting: DamonLinuxPLFor most of time I run "unstable" plasma release in OpenMandriva Cooker...
Huh, OpenMandriva was a new distro name for me. Had to look that up.

I run Manjaro KDE, and I have to say that KDE's progress in the last 2 years or so is nothing short of amazing, and mostly all though small, continuous improvements. It's an absolute smooth, refined, stable joy.

BTW: Which KDE wallpaper is that in the photo. That's pretty sharp!


Last edited by iiari on 17 May 2020 at 4:42 pm UTC
STiAT May 17, 2020
Actually, after having tried Gnome / Budgie again, still having issues with uinput while xfce and KDE ain't .. I'm back on KDE.

I don't know what takes them more than two years to fix that particular issue, but for me .. I'm done with Gnome.
no_information_here May 17, 2020
Quoting: DamonLinuxPLmost of ppl want stable package
Yup, that is me. It is great that you find the fresh packages stable. However, having run various versions of KDE for 18 years I will let others be in the front-line these days ;-)
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