Linux Just moved from gnome to kde 4.2- few questions.. please help

H

halo_3

Disciple
hello, I installed kde 4.2 yesterday and its awesome! look and feel of GUI is very good and performance level compared to gnome is almost the same. But I am so used to gnome that I cannot figure out a few things. Can anybody who has experience with kde 4.2 help me?

1. How to create application shortcuts in the plasma panel at the bottom of the screen? If I click on add widget, there is something called "application launcher" but that creates another kde menu with the icon of menu. If I right click on the new menu icon created, there is no option to change that shortcut to something else like konsole or opera.

2. how do I get rid of the banana in the top right corner of the screen? If I click on "lock widget', the small banana in the botton right disappears but the large one in the top right still remains. That is spoiling the look of my desktop.

3. How do I change the windowing scheme - currently i have oxygen theme for my windows and other options included in the kde system settings are very poor almost like windows 95. I found a few kde 4 native window schemes on kde-look but if I drag and drop those theme files to settings manager nothing happens?

4. how to create application keyboard shortcut? for example, i had set up ctrl+alt+T as terminal and ctrl+alt+F as firefox in gnome. There is a keyboard shortcuts menu in settings manager but there is no option to add custom shortcuts?

5. Is there any way to reduce the boot time? From login prompt to gnome desktop used to take only 4-5 seconds, now the kde splash screen appears and it takes almost 10-12 seconds from login prompt to kde desktop. I have already completely removed gnome so only kde engine is getting loaded.

6. I read somewhere k3b is not ready for kde4.2. what to use for writing cds in the meantime?

Pls help. I am loving kde but because of these problems I cannot use it efficiently.
 
Good questions, I will also search and try at home later and update here :)

For #3 I installed some packages with "qtcurve" in the name and chose that for the theme which I like a lot.

For #6 I just installed GNOME's brasero package which works fine for me...

I am running Kubuntu 9.04 which distro/version are you running?
 
1) AFAIK as of now, the only way to do this is drag and drop the app from the menu onto the panel. If you want a custom app, you need to first edit the main menu, add the app there and then drag-n-drop.

2) You can't ged rid of the cashew. However you can make it hidden by placing it under your panel. For your current setup, drag the cashew to the bottom, it will automatically go behind the panel, then Lock Widgets.

3) Theming is still at nascent stage, however you should find some good ones like Skultpure, Qtcurve etc on kde-look.org, also check for the same in your distribution repo, as many will be added there and will save you the effort of install from source tar sometimes.

4) Most things on panel can be defined a shortcut by right-click and checking their settings. However in the case where you won't this, go to System Settings > Input Actions. http://www.imgx.org/pfiles/17229/h1.png

5) To disable Splash Screen, go to System Settings > Appearance > Splash Screen. Also check Advanced > Service Manager to disable unwanted services and apps from startup.

6) Yes. KDE4's K3b is still in testing, however you'd have no problems in using KDE3.5's K3b. It will install and use the KDE3.5 libs and looks, that's all.
 
Thanks for the replies.

1. Drag & drop works. Thx for that.

2. I did get rid of the cashew without any extra panels (check screenshot of desktop below). It only takes 2 mins and I can post instructions here if anybody wants it.

3. some confusion here. i know how to download themes but there does not seem to be a way to apply them.

4. Okay global shortcuts.. ahh! how did i miss that? am too used to the easy menus in gnome.. :D

5. Splash screen disabled and desktop now appears in 3 seconds. yay! thanks again!

6. not using any burning app for now coz i dont want to load unnecessary extra kde3 libs at startup. will stick to burning in windows7.

reps to both. thanks!

here is my current desktop.. still a work in progress.. hope to have final desktop ready by sunday.

snapshot2s.png


@vishalrao: i think you can guess what distro i am using. :)
 
halo_3 said:
Thanks for the replies.

1. Drag & drop works. Thx for that.

2. I did get rid of the cashew without any extra panels (check screenshot of desktop below). It only takes 2 mins and I can post instructions here if anybody wants it.

3. some confusion here. i know how to download themes but there does not seem to be a way to apply them.

4. Okay global shortcuts.. ahh! how did i miss that? am too used to the easy menus in gnome.. :D

5. Splash screen disabled and desktop now appears in 3 seconds. yay! thanks again!

6. not using any burning app for now coz i dont want to load unnecessary extra kde3 libs at startup. will stick to burning in windows7.

reps to both. thanks!

here is my current desktop.. still a work in progress.. hope to have final desktop ready by sunday.

snapshot2s.png


@vishalrao: i think you can guess what distro i am using. :)
Click to expand...

3. Windows decoration basically comes in distro packages .. you can either install them from binary files [search Arch community repo] or compile it.. You can change windows deco. from System Settings - > Appearances -> Windows ..

6 .. Nero Linux Nero - Nero Linux 3 - Trial version

OMG awesome desktop. I have been off from customization from years but now i believe i must get started..

Which clock applet is that ? Is that dock kde panel or something else ? Whast that monitor thing ? Are those screenlets ?
 
Thanks for the compliment.

I will try the arch community repo for themes and post my results tomorrow.. too tired tonight.. will give nero a try too.

Clock and date applets are called "3D clock" and "3d date" on kde-look. Monitor is tied to amarok to display cd album art with full controls (stop, play, next & prev tracks - see tiny buttons in bottom right corner of the monitor frame). all three are karamba files. You will need to d/load superkaramba (see the blue sphere in my kde panel) for that.

Dock is regular KDE 4.2 panel shortened.
 
^^Which plasma theme ? Transparent panel :S Kwin composite is on ?

Pass on the wallpaper please..

P.s : What have i been doing :| Man this python and articles taking creativity out of me :p
 
Pat said:
^^Arch looks beautiful as ever :)
Click to expand...

Yeah nice desktop configuration... So that blue "A" start icon is for Arch eh?

A lot of the KDE developers use Arch I believe. I was reading through Arch info and apparently their 64 bit packaging may not be up to the mark yet... other than that I am waiting for the day we get fast broadband then I'm planning to try out Arch too :)
 
I think so.. will have to look around on the home machine in the evening and post it here later.

I don't need to look at open windows all the time and if I want to switch windows, i have cover flow effects in Alt+Tab for switching. if i want to peek at all open windows and select a particular one, i have a custom keyboard shortcut for that (ctrl+super+P). And if I want to minimize all windows and go to the desktop, i have another keyboard shortcut.(ctrl+super+M) why to waste unnecessary space in the bottom panel with window lists and switchers? :)
 
vishalrao said:
Yeah nice desktop configuration... So that blue "A" start icon is for Arch eh?

A lot of the KDE developers use Arch I believe. I was reading through Arch info and apparently their 64 bit packaging may not be up to the mark yet... other than that I am waiting for the day we get fast broadband then I'm planning to try out Arch too :)
Click to expand...

There is no need to have A for Arch only. My icon set (hydroxygen) allows me to set up any menu icon that I like. Icons of all major distros (kubuntu, fedora, gentoo, arch, mandriva etc) are included and I can set up a custom image as well.

Gimme a CD and I will burn all the kde arch packages from my kde installation onto it. I think all kde packages total about 700MB. Copy that CD to the /var/cache/pacman/pkg folder on your arch setup and you can have the latest build in just 5 minutes. I did the same thing last week - downloaded everything to my home PC and set up, then copied everything to the pacman cache folder on my laptop and arch+kde was installed and running on my laptop in less than 10 mins.
 
Yep, in KDE 4.3 you can just right click the "start" button and choose an icon :) I've cut the Kubuntu "bling" logo to use just the circle part for my desktop...
 
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