Following yesterday’s release of Ubuntu 5.10RC, the Kubuntu developers are pleased to announce the Kubuntu Breezy Release Candidate. New in Kubuntu Breezy are KDE 3.4, modularized X.org 6.8.2, a new package manager (Adept), easier control center, OOo2, and much more.
Kubuntu is great, comes with some good apps like amaroK already and is blue-themed. Kynaptic was enough for my needs and pretty easy to use. I hope this Adept will be a good replacement. Anyway, it’s a pitty they don’t send pressed Kubuntu cd’s via shipit.
Kubuntu is great, comes with some good apps like amaroK already and is blue-themed.
amaroK is a really nice app in terms of features, probably the best new generation music players I’ve seen. But it is so unstable that I have stopped using it for the time being.
I find this to be a problem with a lot of KDE software. There’s some really nice ideas and features in them but they are in general way too unstable. I guess features comes before bugfixes?
It’s not meant as a flame, I’m just wondering how the developers can live with their software being that buggy?
I like both KDE and Gnome, but I find Gnome much more stable and that’s the reason why it’s my main desktop.
I do envy a lot of the features KDE has though.
> It’s not meant as a flame, I’m just wondering how
> the developers can live with their software being
> that buggy?
Probably because it’s not unstable for them.
Let’s take your example amarok. It’s been perfectly stable for me (mostly Debian Sarge with KDE from unstable and ekhis).
And the usual question: Did you file bug reports at bugs.kde.org?
As you said. Bugs we encounter, are bugs we fix.
(There is a known issue with amaroK being rather unstable on HyperThreading systems, which is either a bug in amaroK or in the kernel’s HT code, which we haven’t been able to track down, largely because none of us have P4s with HyperThreading.)
And yeah, bugs.kde.org (or Help -> Report Bug…), with a backtrace and/or detailed instructions how to reproduce the bug, is generally a good idea.
KDE and KDE apps overall have always been a lot more stable for me than anything Gnome has to offer. It seems I’m killing X once a day with that :/
I also use Gentoo ( though with non-riced flags ) I’ve never had problems with any KDE application which I’ve compiled.
Props to the Ubuntu team on this one, I’ve heard its no easy switch.
Some questions though. What does modularizing it do? Will anyone notice the change? Was it worth the effort?
Some questions though. What does modularizing it do? Will anyone notice the change? Was it worth the effort?
One major benefit is that X.org will be able to release updated drivers between releases. Previously you had to wait until the next big monolithic release, which (especially in the XFree86 days) could mean a really, really long wait.
Let me cut to the chase and say that Kubuntu 5.04 was completely unusable for me. KDE flaked out so badly if you tried to change any of the settings. I can’t remember exactly, but I played with the live CD, and it flaked out, so then I thought, “must just be a bug with the live CD.” I went ahead and installed it via the normal iso, and lo and behold, it was even flakier. My hardware was detected, but Ubuntu’s PPC sleep support sucks. Additionally, I could coax the live CD into connecting to the internet, but a real installation wanted nothing to do with that intarweb thing. Programs were slow to launch, and konqueror ended up having so many problems that it was unusable. Caveat usator: Do. NOT. edit. the. toolbars.
Maybe 5.10 will be better, but I will not touch a distro that has a history of releasing something like that as “stable.” Maybe “OMG, foobar bork suck release alpha # 372943.b39” would be a better term. For all that I have been pleasantly surprised by the progress Linux has made in the desktop arena, this was an abomination, and hopefully an abberation from what we can expect in the future.
Wow. I’ve been running 5.04 for a few months and love it, it has been rock-solid, soooooooo, I don’t know what you did. Since I didn’t use the LiveCD perhaps the LiveCD is flaky, I don’t know.
The only issue I have is some Gnome/GTKish tendancies in Firefox and some default file application handlers.
Other than that, thumbs up to the Kubuntu team, they stopped my constant distro switching and I look forward to 5.10.
Well, there are some nice things with Kubuntu, but I agree with you that kubuntu 5.04 was unusable. I’ve played with 5.10, and i’d like to focus on the things I liked :
– simplified web browser profile : good work, it is actually not bad at all. Of course, there are some points that I don’t get, like, where is the option to have an opened konsole while browsing with konqueror.
– aesthetics (KDM for instance is quite good).
– package choices (I would prefer kmplayer than kaffeine, but I understand that it may be due to its dependency with mplayer).
As a user of Hoary since April (it’s in my main machine, which doubles as firewall machine and workstation), I couldn’t disagree more.
It’s stable (my uptime is of months), fast (faster than XP in the same machine), my wife and mother-in-law use it without problems.
Ah, and I *did* edit Konqi’s toolbars.
http://shots.osdir.com/slideshows/slideshow.php?release=466&slide=8…
Thanks for the link. It looks even better than Warty. Kubuntu is still the way to go IMO.
but does Kubuntu come with the KDE games package? If it doesn’t, is it at least installable through apt-get? I’m thinking of overwriting the regular Ubuntu in favor Kubuntu.
Why would you overwrite it with Kubuntu? You can apt-get it all instead. That way you could still have Gnome installed as well, in case you needed it for something. Not to mention not having to back up any Data first.
Better integration? I don’t know.
Why would you overwrite it with Kubuntu? You can apt-get it all instead. That way you could still have Gnome installed as well
yes you can, but i think it’s a bad idea.
I have installed GNOME and KDE on one system too. But what i don’t like is that also all GNOME apps are in the KDE menu and all KDE apps are also in the GNOME menu.
This makes both DEs bloated. I would really like it if the (k)ubuntu team would find a way to keep KDE and GNOME completely separated. I want to have KDE and GNOME on my system. But if i decide to use GNOME i want a GNOME-system and if i decide to use KDE i want a KDE-system and not that jumble all over both desktops.
But what i don’t like is that also all GNOME apps are in the KDE menu and all KDE apps are also in the GNOME menu
At one time, GNOME and KDE menu items weren’t compatible. Speaking from experience, I have no desire to go back to the way things were. Belive me, it’s much nicer this way. 😉
However, digging through menu files I’ve seen a “GNOME only” tag, though I’m not sure if it actually works or not. I’m not sure if there is a “KDE only” tag. Though for KDE applications in GNOME’s menu, you can always hide the menu items via SMEG.
I have installed GNOME and KDE on one system too. But what i don’t like is that also all GNOME apps are in the KDE menu and all KDE apps are also in the GNOME menu. This makes both DEs bloated.
Only a few of us geeks are doing that. The typical use case is a Gnome user installing a few KDE apps, or a KDE user installing a few Gnome apps, so having a shared menu system makes sense. If you’re a Gnome user and you install AmaroK, you want it to appear in the menus; especially if you’re a non-technical user and you don’t understand the distinction between Gnome and KDE apps anyway – they’re just apps to you. If it didn’t show up in your menus you’d be damned confused.
But it should be pretty easy to make a “keep menus separate” option by redirecting the KDE and Gnome configs to different files. Might be a good question to raise in a KDE or Gnome support forum.
But it should be pretty easy to make a “keep menus separate” option by redirecting the KDE and Gnome configs to different files.
You would have to set the respective XDG_* environment variables differently depending on which DE you start and make sure no application installs into the default path /usr/share/applications
I think KDE needs a “preferred applications” program, like Windows and GNOME. Rather than forcing you to change mime types by hand.
I have to reluctantly agree that the latest Kubuntu isn’t very stable. :/
Wondering what they mean by simplified Konqueror. I don’t like Nautilus because it is has too simple. I hope they have not turned konqueror into Nautilus.
I have used Kubuntu for a month or so till I gave up to try something else. I found it usable but I thought that it lacked the same polish of other kde based distros. I like the concept of keeping things pretty close to the bleeding edge but it struck me that it needed some work. I have confidence that Breezy would be much better.
Matt
Don’t worry.
They use a simplified, that is uncluttered web browser profile, that’s all. I haven’t really tested it yet, but from what I’ve seen it’s really nice.
It just would make more sense to me.
Both Ubuntu and Kubuntu have committed themselves to a 6 month release cycle. Waiting for KDE 3.5 would mean releasing two months late or so.
I’m pretty confident Kubuntu will have KDE 3.5 packages ready, right when KDE 3.5 comes out.
Both Ubuntu and Kubuntu have committed themselves to a 6 month release cycle. Waiting for KDE 3.5 would mean releasing two months late or so.
I’m pretty confident Kubuntu will have KDE 3.5 packages ready, right when KDE 3.5 comes out.
So what’s the point in making a “stable” release now and doing a major upgrade two months after that? One sense of the term “stable release” is that the released package set stays the same (except for security updates). The other sense is that the software contained in the release is tried and tested and works without any major bugs. It seems that Kubuntu isn’t stable in any sense of the word. 🙁
>One sense of the term “stable release” is that the released package set stays the same (except for security updates). The other sense is that the software contained in the release is tried and tested and works without any major bugs. It seems that Kubuntu isn’t stable in any sense of the word. 🙁
i think the point is, that ubuntu is still a gnome distribution and is connected to the gnome release, which has a 6 month release cycle too.
KDE has no release cycle and at the end Kubuntu is just KDE for Ubuntu.
> So what’s the point in making a “stable” release
> now and doing a major upgrade two months after
> that?
The point is that the upgrade to KDE 3.5 will be *optional*, AFAIK. So the base distro can be stable in both senses you defined.
People who like to have always the newest version and are ready to potentially sacrifice some stability can upgrade to packages created by the same packagers. But that’s their decision.
SUSE has offered the same service for years so I really don’t see your problem.
> The other sense is that the software contained in
> the release is tried and tested and works without
> any major bugs.
That’s another reason why KDE 3.4.x is included in the release and not some KDE 3.5.0beta or whatever.
> It seems that Kubuntu isn’t stable in any sense of the word. 🙁
That may or may not be the case but definitely not because of this release policy.
I have just started using it. I didn’t notice anything unstable so far.
I’ve previously commented that perhaps Kubuntu should freeze Sid whenever KDE releases and therefore do what Ubuntu does with KDE instead of GNOME. On the one hand, you have a distro that showcases the new KDE releases with the latest and greatest from Sid stabilized into a less bloody repository. On the other hand, development suffers because you can’t harness the resources of the Ubuntu project, and you can’t accurately predict when KDE will release.
If KDE switches to a time-based release cycle (I think all large community projects should consider this), then Kubuntu should follow this route. Until then, Kubuntu will be essentially a backport of the most recent KDE and associated Kpackages to the current Ubuntu release.
In general, I think comments along the lines of “other than not having the following packages that are supposed to come out in the next 6 months, this is a good release” are very silly. If we keep waiting for everything to come in the next six months, we never release. If you can predict when one large package is due to be released, then you can time your development cycle around that. This is what Ubuntu does with great success. Perhaps the most important design consideration for the Ubuntu project is that it releases shortly after each GNOME release, putting the latest and greatest in the hands of hordes of users. There is no KDE distribution (that I know of) that really focuses on this concept. Does MEPIS release like this?
If KDE switches to a time-based release cycle
AFAIK KDE releases are basically time-based in the sense that there is a minor release every 6 month, but of course it sometimes makes sense to increase that period.
For example releasing 3.5 6 months after 3.4 wouldn’t have made much sense as it would have required to freeze development before the annual KDE conference where usually a lot of things are improved.
It’s refreshing to see osnews try something different by posting a Ubuntu related article.
Krita’s default brush for most painting tools is a square. Quite weird.
Mmm.. (k)ubuntu should be simple and user friendly, but adept fails pretty short og that – i simply dont understand how to use the application. But the same can be said about the other kde-based system tools kubuntu uses – they are absoluttely not the same quality as the gnome ones. Thats a shame since i have to have Gnome installad to get things done egen though i use KDE.
There is a lot usability wise to be done with KDE, and its a shame.
So what’s the point in making a “stable” release now and doing a major upgrade two months after that? One sense of the term “stable release” is that the released package set stays the same (except for security updates).
The current version of KDE in Kubuntu are stable. Making the next stable version of KDE available when it comes out does not make it any less stable. But calling anything stable because the major version numbers stays the same, are are on the other hand pure nonsens.
And, I don’t think KDE 3.5 will ever make it to Breezy, If you want KDE 3.5 on ubuntu you’ll either have to backport it or wait untill Draper Drake is ready in April 2006
> And, I don’t think KDE 3.5 will ever make it to
> Breezy, If you want KDE 3.5 on ubuntu you’ll either
> have to backport it or wait untill Draper Drake is
> ready in April 2006
Oh, so you don’t think there will be official backports?
i have used kubuntu 5.04 since 3 months now (after dumping a xp installation ) and its super rock solid .
at the beginnning it was quite unstable , but after some time and some upgrades it all turned out fine and useable . can’t wait for the final release of 5.10.
congratz to all the involved developers .
btw the default design is horrible..:-)
my only complaint is that they don’t have any system configuration tools for Kubuntu (like snd/network/x configuration tools)
> amaroK is a really nice app in terms of features,
> probably the best new generation music players I’ve
> seen. But it is so unstable that I have stopped
> using it for the time being.
Switch to xine engine, it’s a lot more stable than the crappy (and afaik unmaintained) arts engine.
After 1.3 release, amarok became really stable for me, using xine engine. Before it was unusable for me, too.
> I like both KDE and Gnome, but I find Gnome much
> more stable and that’s the reason why it’s my main
> desktop.
Well, as amarok is not part of the official KDE release, you can’t make KDE developers responsible for the instability of a third party app. And the core applications are quite stable in my experience. (Except for Konqueror which tends to crash on crappy websites)
Aherm what are the differences between them? I use hoary with KDE packages with satisfaction, those packages come from kubuntu or are duplicated?
(sorry if it’s a dumb question)
There aren’t any dumb questions, just dumb answers 🙂
To answer your question, I’ll quote from the Kubuntu FAQ ( http://kubuntu.org/faq.php )
What is Kubuntu?
Kubuntu is the first Ubuntu derived distribution. Our Kubuntu CDs are made up of Ubuntu’s base plus KDE. You can get exactly the same effect by installing Ubuntu and adding the KDE packages (and removing the Gnome packages) from the Ubuntu archives.
Hope that helped 🙂
I have to question the stability of Ubuntu, it mixers gcc-3.3.4 with 4.0 to get the nvidia driver to compile. nvidia-settings segmentaion faults and so does OO.o after a update. Also the naming for packages are very confusing, instead of gcc-dev we have gcc and gcc-4 and load of others with many names.
Just keep it i.e gtk2 and gtk2-dev, not this many names crap, Mandriva are a arse for doing it as well, splitting up packages and calling them different names.
> AFAIK KDE releases are basically time-based in the
> sense that there is a minor release every 6 month,
> but of course it sometimes makes sense to increase
> that period.
KDE releases _are_ time-based, in a sense that as soon as the schedule for a release is decided, it is binding. Releases are not delayed by a month, because some feature xy is not finished. So KDE releases are time-driven and not feature-driven.
What KDE hasn’t in contrast to gnome, is a fixed period of the release cycle, like every 6 months.
The schedule of release n+1 is decided some time after release n. So you can plan how much has to be done and what a reasonable timeframe is.
In case of KDE4, there isn’t such schedule yet, as there are so many things to do that it is impossible to set fixed dates already. But there will be one at some point.