Is there a howto on essentials.

Sun Nov 22 09:10:09 GMT 2009

Thank you for the suggestions but wasn't looking to read the entire
docs. Which is usually geared at a windoze users perspective and at
default software, most of which I find rather useless. I've converted
quite a few people to Linux and a huge part of the one's I've been
successful with is finding best of breed software for them. Things
that work like THEY want it.  KDE has been another huge help because
of the consistent interface between apps.  Gnome apps are a hodgepodge
of UIs and each app is starting from scratch. The KB shortcuts are
different, the menus are drastically different from app too app. KDE
apps usually take little or no learning curve to use productively.

I have been using Linux since around 95. KDE almost since it existed.

What I'm looking for is what changed and work arounds to fix the
things they broke. I'm not especially set in my ways. If something is
better I happily embrace it.  KDE 3 was in my opinion a big step up
from KDE 2. I had no problems moving to KDE 3.

I'm obviously not alone. Knoppix has dropped KDE as it's desktop
manager. Pity, I hate choosing between using Knoppix or giving up KDE
for Knoppix. Knoppix was a great way to introduce people to Linux. I
gave them a Knoppix CD and told them how to boot and set up networking
and away they went playing with Linux without ever touching the hard
drive. The default distro had most of the basic tools people needed.
Most Live CDs are barely functional and geared too installations not
rescue missions, live CD work and introducing people too Linux.

I did have one minor success. I had looked at it 3 times and finally
actually saw the desktop options tab LOL. Almost the same place as it
used to be but not quite. Still think that really should be part of
the right click option on the desktops section.

As for the panel, I'm sorry the way you add apps too it is an utter disaster.

First you HAVE to have it in a menu. Half the apps I want to add are
not in any menu even after running desktop updater which didn't even
find Firefox much less the more obscure apps I've installed. . I gotta
seriously question the logic in locking users ourt of adding apps. It
used too be quite simple. You right clicked, pasted or browsed the app
command line in. You picked an icon and away you went.

First it assumes everything I want to add is an X app which is not the
case. A term window with a command line can be mighty handy too have
as a shortcut in the panel.

What about multiple instances of an app? Some of which you don't want
in a menu as they'll be gone and are short term testing or for other
reasons you don't want to clutter a menu with them?

What exactly was wrong with right click, browse and add your OWN apps
to the panel?  What if I write one and want to add it but haven't
worked out the code to add it too a menu yet?  I'm sorry the panel
changes are a huge step backwards in my opinion.

The panel mgr is horrible. Used to be you could drag and drop the
panel wherever you needed it. Not so anymore.  To compensate for some
of the problems I created a 2nd panel but many of the applets were not
panel specific. I can either have the desktop switcher or not. I
cannot have it on just one panel. Same with the "launcher" which is
really the start button. I'm sure there's a way to orient the 2nd
panel on the right side of the menu. Haven't figured that one out yet
but eventually will. One thing you NEVER want to do as I discovered is
try to use the sizing function too do it LOL. Man did KDE puke when I
tried that. The move left right only have to do with vertical
movement. Nothing about orientation like there used to be. 2nd panel
went up top with no option to move to Left or RIght side of the
screen.

No my panels are not locked. To be honest I'd really like to remove
the "chestnut" as it was called. It's taking up screen real estate. I
can see why locking the desktop can be a useful feature but for me
it's not and it's eating up screen real estate. If anybody knows how
to too remove it I'd appreciate it, I'll probably Google it shortly if
not. I'm sure others want it gone.

What happened to Kedit? Man I love Kedit. Don't remember what it was
about Kwrite I didn't like but I'm sure I'll remember real soon. Kate
has some nice features but it's geared far more to coding than light
word processing. I rarely open Open Office or Abiword just to write a
simple doc. I hit Kedit which does everything I need to do for most
documents including checking the spelling. If I need word counts, to
embed images, tables and fancy stuff like that, then that is what
Office suites are for. I'm known to have hundreds of Kedit windows
open for months at a time while working on various projects. Light on
system resources and easy to work with, I'm a big kedit fan.

userbase.kde.org was not very helpful. Actually not helpful at all. I
learned that the chestnut is called a plasmoid or something like that
LOL. Nothing of use in the tutorials which were very simplistic.
Nothing about adding apps except drag and drop which is both tedious
and useless for non KDE apps. BTW I have added the GNome menus which
added some apps the application updater didn't find.

The Linux documentation project is a wealth of knowledge and has
helped me in the past but doesn't even mention KDE much less 3 to 4
conversion issues.

As for works, yes it does work. However technically windoze "works".
Gnome works a whole lot better than Windoze. as do pretty much all
Linux window managers but KDE is something special. The best window
manager on any platform I've worked with. It still works and still
beats Gnome I think, I'm about to give Gnome a new look because of all
the hassles now embedded in KDE.  KDE 4 is a major downgrade from KDE
3. Just ot add insult to injury it seems like it takes more system
resources to do less. It is far more complex but that complexity
brings no added functionality or features, it's just complexity for
complexity's sake.  KDE 3 was simple, efficient, easy to use, full
featured and reliable.   THAT is what I have a problem with. KDE 3 not
only worked it worked great! KDE 4 is broken in my opinion.

> You can look at:
>
> http://userbase.kde.org/
>
> But, I make no guarantee.
>
>
> --
> James Tyrer
>
> Linux (mostly) From Scratch
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