KDE Running on Mac OS X

GeoffP writes "AppleTalk Australia is running a story on running KDE on Mac OS X. For those that don't know, KDE is a graphical desktop environment used to access your computer's files. Finally, Mac users have a free (as in speech) approach to their filesystem."

Comments

Good article

[huwr]

A neat article.

However, I can't think really why you'd want to be running KDE on Mac OS X when you already have such a neat (IMHO) interface. I suppose it's good for a laugh, too.

Re:Good article

[i_like_spam]

The important question is....

Is it KDE 3.5 Beta 1?

Re:Good article

[DenDave]

Well there are some aspects of KDE which are not possible under OSX without significant tweaks or non-free software. For example, the browser, Konqueror will go everywhere, even below the "unseen line" of OSX and yes, you can tweak finder to go there to but not without non-free software and even then, you'r stuck with finder's interface.

You can have a variety of io-slaves under KDE allowing great integration with a variety of network services, yes we can do alot of that with OSX but again, interface and third party add-ons... (webdav over ssl???)

Furthermore, KDE is a development environment in itself and many developers will be happy to see that they can work two in one!

I am impressed that it works, I have tried many times to get Fink and the gang working with Tiger and I have borked on each and every occasion. So reading the australian exploits with expectation!!

Re:Good article

[boaworm]

Well, you could run the X-server rootless, and integrate KDE applications with your Aqua ones. That's pretty useful from time to time, you can run Konqueror, Kopete, Koffice, KMail and such.

Why you would want to do like in the article, run X in a small window, is hard for me to understand though...

Re:Good article

[Anonymous Coward]

I switched "temporarily" from OS X to Linux/KDE after a water spill fried my iBook. This was about 8 months ago. I haven't bought the replacement iBook (yet?) mainly because now I can't live without KDE's network protocol integration (sftp , webdav, smb, ftp, ... everything is supported!). I can transparently access folders with the (file browser, editor, image viewer, etc. etc. ) in multiple servers, seamlessly. OS/X is seriously lacking in this area. A native KDE port would be a useful addition. Better yet would be OS X itself natively supporting the most widely used network protocols. Tiger was a big dissapointment in this respect...

Re:Good article

[jaavaaguru]

Agreed, Apple's X servers for Panther and Tiger work fine with KDE, and I get to use nice applications like Konqueror (because Finder doesn't do sftp:// and Kate alongside my Mac apps. I'd suggest people stick with Apple's X server.

It's a good article, but it could be summarised in three lines:
1) Install Apple's X server from your OS X CD
2) Install fink from fink.sourceforge.net
3) type "sudo fink install kdebase3"

Re:Good article

[FidelCatsro]

Menu bar , GO ,Go to Folder , then type in the folder you want EG: /etc , /bin ETC. .

Simple as that for accessing low level folders

Re:Good article

[mikrorechner]

(webdav over ssl???)

I haven't tried it myself, but according to this, WebDAV over https is supported in Tiger.

Re:Good article

[FidelCatsro]

Oh I should also add to that You can also create sym-links from the terminal so you can access the folders .
for those who don't know how to do that :
in the terminal go to the folder you want to create the sym-link and type

ln -s /etc

for example

Or simply from any directory

ln -s /etc /*path*/

Re:Good article

[m50d]

It's good for making things more OS-independent and helping migrations. KDE runs on most unicies and now OSX, a windows port should happen with Qt4. Once that happens you have a complete suite of applications you can train your users with and then migrate them to whichever OS you like with hardly any noticable differences.

Re:Good article

[Onan]

Or there's the beautiful "open" command: open /etc/

("open" does whatever doubleclicking on its argument[s] would do. eg, if it's an application it launches it, if it's a document it launches the owning application and opens it, if it's a directory it opens it in a Finder window. It's one of the great examples of gui/cli synthesis that osx does uniquely well. Much like pbcopy/pbpaste: cli interfaces to the clipboard, something I wanted in linux for years.)

Re:Good article

[Onan]

... and yes, you can tweak finder to go there to but not without non-free software...

Hm. I'm missing the non-free software involved in typing "defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE".

I am impressed that it works, I have tried many times to get Fink and the gang working with Tiger and I have borked on each and every occasion.

Really? I guess I don't know who all the gang are, but I've been using Fink and Tiger together since the day Tiger was released, without even actually needing to upgrade it.

Re:Good article

[Guy Harris]

I haven't bought the replacement iBook (yet?) mainly because now I can't live without KDE's network protocol integration (sftp , webdav, smb, ftp, ... everything is supported!). I can transparently access folders with the (file browser, editor, image viewer, etc. etc. ) in multiple servers, seamlessly. OS/X is seriously lacking in this area.

Yeah, it really sucks that OS X lets you transparently access folders over FTP with ls. It'd be much better if it did it with ioslaves, so only KDE applications could transparently access them.

(Yes, I know that ftpfs is read-only. Implementing it as an NFS server, so that the FTP back-end has no way of knowing when an application is finished writing to the file, makes it difficult to support read/write access. And, yes, I really have accessed an FTP server with ls, egrep, etc., and yes, it was convenient.)

And the same goes for WebDAV and SMB (although WebDAV uses a gateway VFS rather than using NFS, so it does know when a file is closed and can upload its contents if it was written to, and smbfs is implemented as a kernel-level VFS and supports reading and writing). Unfortunately, there's no sftpfs, but, if there were, that'd be a lot more UN*Xy than doing it with an ioslave.

BTW, your Linux box probably has an smbfs, too, so you can access SMB servers from the command line as well as from KDE apps. (Or does KDE do the right thing on systems with smbfs/cifsfs, and just mount the damn server and let the underlying UN*X do the work?) Somebody might have implemented ftpfs, etc. with userfs, so you might have them as well.

Better yet would be OS X itself natively supporting the most widely used network protocols. Tiger was a big dissapointment in this respect...

Which ones are missing? (Other than read/write FTP, and sftp, which are already known to be missing.)

Re:Good article

[Guy Harris]

Menu bar , GO ,Go to Folder , then type in the folder you want EG: /etc , /bin ETC. .

/dev? (Not on Panther, as far as I can tell.)

Re:Good article

[Carthag]

There's also the .hidden file that the finder checks to see what files/directories it shouldn't show, but now that I read up on that it seems 10.4 doesn't use that anymore.

Re:Good article

[FidelCatsro]

You're right you can't .

I had never really tried to open dev in finder (in fact I never actually use this method, bar checking to see if it worked the first time I used OS X . I always use the terminal ) .
Everything else seems to work fine though . Seems like a sensible precaution though and there is no real need to open it in a file-manager

Re:Good article

[bani]

the problem with the way osx does ftp though, at least through finder, is that it mounts it as a filesystem, and when the remote ftp site goes out to lunch it sometimes takes osx with it. it also makes it impossible to parallelize tasks to a single remote site. the way ftpfs does it, everything gets serialized and blocks. a slow remote ftp site will make finder slow to a crawl.

ftpfs also groks an extremely limited dialect of ftp, it gets easily confused by various ftp server software that kioslave (or mozilla, camino, etc.) doesn't have any problems with.

no, kioslave really is the best way to do it.

Re:Good article

[neillewis]

I have run kde under X11 in the past to use the fish:// support in konqueror. To my mind this is preferable to any sort of ftp, with a key pair set up it's easy, and if you use ssh anyway, has no other setup requirements or firewall issues.

Re:Good article

[SlamMan]

Sure it does. It just also handles does it via metadata on the files themselves.

Re:Good article

[SecretAsianMan]

Furthermore, KDE is a development environment in itself and many developers will be happy to see that they can work two in one!

You might be surprised to discover that Apple's developer tools are available for free (as in beer) from here.

Re:Good article

[ilctoh]

Actually, that's one thing I wish OS X would take from KDE - the kio_slaves. I can't begin to describe how nice it is to open a file over SSH by simply typing fish://site.com/path/to/file where ever you would normally give a local file. Same with sftp, ftp, webdav - even the ones like tar, man, etc are awesome. It makes it easy to develop a website (using Quanta) on a remote site accessible only over SSH - just use fish://. OS X makes this kind of possible using 3rd-party programs like CyberDuck and compatible editors, but nothing has come close to what KDE currently has to offer.

Re:Good article

[Carthag]

What I meant that by default there's no longer a file at /.hidden, and so editing that will make no difference in the amount of files shown, only the amount of files hidden.

Re:Good article

[Zzootnik]

Seriously???
No more '.AppleDouble' files? no more '.ds_store' files?
(WOO-HOO!!!)
This --- I gotta see... Hands down, that's been the ONE thing about apple anything (even the Mouse thing) that's bugged the hell out of me for useability... Its Messier than I am fer chrissake! -->leaving all those dot-underscore-filename files hanging all over the damn server...

Re:Good article

[Octorian]

One thing I'd like to see is a HOWTO on running X11 as the native GUI system on MacOSX in place of Aqua/WindowServer/etc. Of course one could always run raw Darwin on the machine, getting most of MacOSX device support advantages, but that would be an unreasonable pain for people who want the two environment to co-exist once in a while, and/or not do a complete reinstall.

Re:Good article

[Megane]

Menu bar , GO ,Go to Folder , then type in the folder you want EG: /etc , /bin ETC. . Simple as that for accessing low level folders

Terminal, type in "open /etc", even simpler, and no need to install anything.

Not that I have any need for that, as I can just "open -e /etc/whatever.conf", and bypass any kind of Finder GUI whatsoever. Of course even that's only needed if you're allergic to vi.

If you keep a Terminal window aligned at an edge of the screen, it takes just one click, and it takes advantage of Fitts' Law just like the regular Mac menu bar.

Re:Good article

[DenDave]

Oh yeah, I forgot about fish... dang that is a good one!! You know what, I am gonnan retry to install KDE this weekend... I love mac but I my first love was KDE...

Re:Good article

[SlamMan]

The .hidden does the exact same thing is did in 10.3.

Re:Good article

[IdleTime]

There are people out there (i'm one of them) who can't stand Apple's GUI. I find it ugly and unintuitive, but that is me.

Porting KDE to OSX just goes to show how portable the architecture is. IMHO KDE is a great environment and this is just another feather in the hat for the Qt/KDE people.

Re:Good article

[Carthag]

In 10.3 there exists by default a file at /.hidden that has a list of files including all the UNIX-specifc directories. The file isn't there in 10.4 unless you create it. So the way to get them to show in 10.4 isn't by editing .hidden but by changing metadata...

Re:Good article

[Sentry21]

Well there are some aspects of KDE which are not possible under OSX without significant tweaks or non-free software. For example, the browser, Konqueror will go everywhere, even below the "unseen line" of OSX and yes, you can tweak finder to go there to but not without non-free software and even then, you'r stuck with finder's interface.

I'm going to go ahead and assume here that you're referring to things like dotfiles, /bin, /usr, and so on? Is there non-free software that does this 'tweaking' for you? Because it's actually pretty easy.

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool true

Then just restart Finder and off you go.

killall Finder

Do people really charge for this? Or do you mean non-free as in you can't get the source for 'defaults' (I think you can)?

Re:Good article

[macshome]

For example, the browser, Konqueror will go everywhere, even below the "unseen line" of OSX and yes, you can tweak finder to go there to but not without non-free software

For a long time now you have been able to turn on invisibles in the Finder.

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles ON

And then just restart the Finder.

yes we can do alot of that with OSX but again, interface and third party add-ons... (webdav over ssl???)

This was added in 10.4. It was sorely missing before.

Re:Good article

[swillden]

Which ones are missing? (Other than read/write FTP, and sftp, which are already known to be missing.)

The biggest one is the kioslave accessible as "fish://" which uses ssh and standard UNIX utilities (ls, rm, cp, etc) on the remote system to implement remote file access. Very secure, very convenient, very slick. Less important ones include imap, pop3 and mbox. Believe it or not, it's very handy to be able to browse a random mailbox without having to configure it in an e-mail client. Others I've used from time to time include finger, ldap, and nntp, not to mention all of the non-remote kioslaves like camera, fonts, gzip, bzip, man and all of the non-file kioslaves like vnc, rdp, mailto, news, print, applications, etc.

Of course, Mac OS X has ways of accomplishing all of the same tasks, but having gotten used to being able to get an any of this functionality so quickly and easily in KDE, I find OS X a little cumbersome to use.

-- End of on-topic post. Beginning of off-topic post. --

However, my *biggest* beef with OS X (this is an unrelated plea for help from anyone who knows) is that I cannot find a way to set up remote "raw" printers on OS X. I have a Linux print server, and I want CUPS on OS X to simply deliver Postscript to the CUPS server on Linux and let the Linux box render and print it. I can use the CUPS web admin interface on the Mac and set up the raw printer queues, and I can print test pages to them, but no OS X apps will print to them. I just get a generic error message (which I'd post but I don't remember it and I'm 2000 miles from the Mac at the moment). I found that I can sort of "trick" it, by using the Mac printer configuration interface to change the printers from raw to "Generic Postscript Printer" and then printing a document. What comes out of the printer is the raw Postscript, so this isn't useful, but then if I use the CUPS web interface and change the printer type back to raw, it will work properly! For a while. Then OS X seems to discover that I've tricked it and starts giving me error messages again.

Actually... it just occurred to me that I should try lying to OS X and telling it that those print queues are actually Postscript printers. Apple Laserwriters or something like that. Hmm.

BTW, the motivation for letting the Linux box do the rendering is twofold. First, the Mac drivers for one of the printers (HP Photosmart 7260) do not support printing to a remote printer. Not only that, but I think the drivers on Linux produce better-quality photos than the HP drivers for Mac, so it's actually better to get the Linux box to print stuff than to attach the Photosmart directly to the Mac. That one really surprised me. Second, the Linux box is much faster and I get the printouts faster when I can get the Postscript to printer-native-language translation done there.

Re:Good article

[SlamMan]

Ah! Ok, now I see what you were trying to say. I normally made use of the .hidden files to tuck extra stuff out of the way of my users (/System and /Library mostly). Hadn't thought about using it to increase what you could see.

Re:Good article

[The Infamous Grimace]

I have added 4 links to the Finder toolbar (not sidebar) - 'bin', 'sbin', 'private', and 'usr'. But that doesn't let me browse to '\Volumes\some_connected_ipod\iPod_Control\Music\' . Perhaps a folder action would do the trick.

(tig)

Re:Good article

[macshome]

In Tiger you can turn the .DS_Store files off when using network volumes, but the fork files will still be there as they are needed to store metadata on volumes that can't understand it.

defaults write com.apple.desktopservices DSDontWriteNetworkStores true

See Apple KB# 301711.

Re:Good article

[Anonymous Coward]

As a former KDE user I appreciate the efforts to make KDE run on OSX, but I'm sad that I have to install Fink and run it under X11. (in fact, I haven't done this!)
Qt is available for OSX, and it

• Runs NATIVELY in OSX (NO X11 needed)
• Integrates with other OSX programs (drag&drop, consistent look &feel)

Its very, very sad that there have been no updates for over a year for the native KDE on OSX http://kde.opendarwin.org/. Thats what the users want, NOT

• Having to read several How-to's, like this one
• Having to install Fink
• Having to use X11
• Lack of integration between KDE applications and the others

Re:Good article

[JFitzsimmons]

http://freshmeat.net/projects/xclip/

Re:Good article

[frodo from middle ea]

I would suspect that's because of it being implemented as NFS, that happens to me even on linux. i.e. when a NFS mounted disk goes down (the server goes down that is), it takes the client down as well.

NFS Sucks

Re:Good article

[Carthag]

Yeah sorry about being so vague but I am still hung over. I don't even know what the hell I am doing on slashdot heh. Good thing there's a party in an hour so I can get offline.

Re:Good article

[stevey]

And if you're not running KDE you can still do the same thing (mounting filesystems over SSH) which will work in all applications:

• Mounting filesystems over SSH with SHFS

Very useful.

Re:Good article

[radish]

It's neat, for sure, but hardly "unique". Try typing the name of a text file in XP - oooh look it opens notepad. Or a PDF file, there's Acrobat! Magic. And no "open" command required.

Re:Good article

[Midnight Thunder]

the problem with the way osx does ftp though, at least through finder, is that it mounts it as a filesystem, and when the remote ftp site goes out to lunch it sometimes takes osx with it

This actutally a big issue that needs to be fixed on MacOS X, and it is not just limited to FTP. Any network mount that goes off-line causes the Finder and any other open/save dialogues to block. In certain cases I have been gone 15 minutes and I still see the color-wheel spinning.

Re:Good article

[hackstraw]

However, my *biggest* beef with OS X (this is an unrelated plea for help from anyone who knows) is that I cannot find a way to set up remote "raw" printers on OS X. I have a Linux print server, and I want CUPS on OS X to simply deliver Postscript to the CUPS server on Linux and let the Linux box render and print it. I can use the CUPS web admin interface on the Mac and set up the raw printer queues, and I can print test pages to them, but no OS X apps will print to them.

I have no direct experience doing this through OS X, but that sounds like basic LPR/LPD printing where your using the Linux box as the print spooler. I have no clue what the "CUPS web admin" is, but if you go to File->Print, choose a new printer, choose IP Printing, and LPR/PPD, and Generic printer type, and aim it at the Linux box, it should work just fine. I've done this from Windows to a Linux box.

If that does not work, then yeah, something is wrong with OS X, but its a fairly normal thing to do, and being that CUPS is what is behind OS X's printing subsystem, I don't see where it _should_ be any big deal printing to another CUPS enabled box as a print spooler. The last time someone was blaming OS X's normal functionality and how it would not do simple stuff like display X on a Linux box, it was because the Linux box had its firewall denying all access except SSH.

Re:Good article

[hackstraw]

"open" does whatever doubleclicking on its argument[s] would do. eg, if it's an application it launches it, if it's a document it launches the owning application and opens it, if it's a directory it opens it in a Finder window. It's one of the great examples of gui/cli synthesis that osx does uniquely well.

Windows does this too with the start.exe program. I was very glad that OS X had a similar mechanism, I use it all the time.

Much like pbcopy/pbpaste: cli interfaces to the clipboard, something I wanted in linux for years.

wxcopy/wxpaste has been available for Linux for almost 10 years, maybe longer.

Re:Good article

[wordtech]

As I understand it, developing KDE-Darwin natively for OS X is more difficult than keeping KDE-X11 up-to-date, by a few orders of magnitude. Qt is cross-platform, but KDE is not. A lot of X11-related stuff in KDE needs to be patched/worked-around to work well in the Aqua environment. The main KDE-Darwin developer, Benjamin Reed, has chosen to focus on keeping KDE updated in the Fink/X11 environment. It's simply a matter of time: there are only 24 hours in the day, he has a full-time job, he does a lot of other things for Fink since he is one of the project leads, and (this is significant) he was really the only person doing work on making KDE native, on an ongoing basis, to begin with. Some people have helped out here and there, but there's not exactly a large pool of developers pitching in. In fact, I believe he's said more that once on his blog that if anyone wants to step up and take over leadership of the KDE-Aqua project, he'd gladly step aside.

Anyone interested?

*hears only the sound of crickets chirping*

Hmmm, thought so.

Re:Good article

[teh*fink]

I have no clue what the "CUPS web admin" is...

assuming cups is running on your comp:
http://localhost:631/

Re:Good article

[ArsonSmith]

I must say, as someone who has used NFS in several diskless client installations with 100s of clients running NFS root partitions, not only did the clients survive when there was an NFS server death, but they would just hang until the NFS server was rebooted. This is having the entire root filesystem crashed out from under the client and they would just pick up like nothing happend once the server rebooted.

NFS doesn't suck and over trunked gigabit lines it is faster than many raid arrays.

Re:Good article

[at_slashdot]

I would turn the question in the other direction, why would you use an OS under KDE that's not free (as in freedom, as in non-DRM, as in non-proprietary, as in not tied to one company) and it's also expensive?

Re:Good article

[aclarke]

This is one of my biggest issues with OS X. I don't understand why Apple doesn't incorporate built-in sftp and ftp read/write protocol support into finder. Heck, even Microsoft lets me mount a read/write ftp server in Windows XP.

Even the 3rd party graphical ftp tools are their own applications and don't incorporate into the Finder like I, at least, think they should. Like others have said here, this is why I occasionally fire up KDE via X11. Heck, on Windows I at least have Webdrive, a slick program for mounting ftp/sftp/etc. servers with drive letters. This seems like it might be one of the places in OS X-land where a small shareware developer might be able to make some profit.

Re:Good article

[goMac2500]

Log in as >console (either by enabling type in user to log in or by going to the login within and hitting the left arrow, then option enter (I think)). Log into an account when it prompts you. Type startx.

Re:Good article

[Overly Critical Guy]

Windows XP's equivalent is the start.exe command.

Re:Good article

[Guy Harris]

Of course, Mac OS X has ways of accomplishing all of the same tasks, but having gotten used to being able to get an any of this functionality so quickly and easily in KDE, I find OS X a little cumbersome to use.

And having gotten used to the notion of cding to a remotely-mounted FTP directory and grepping through files, catting them, firing them up in MicroEMACS, etc., etc., I'd probably find doing it only through KDE applications a little cumbersome to use.

Sounds like a job for userfs (and a mount_userfs command usable by ordinary users; an ordinary user would only, for example, be allowed to mount atop directories they own, as is the case in BSDs including OS X). Perhaps being able to cd to a tarball and look at individual files wouldn't be as useful as doing so over FTP, as you can fetch individual files over FTP without having to scan through a bunch of other files, but it still might be useful.

Re:Good article

[Guy Harris]

the problem with the way osx does ftp though, at least through finder, is that it mounts it as a filesystem

There are those who consider that a problem. As per the posting to which you're replying, I obviously consider that a feature.

and when the remote ftp site goes out to lunch it sometimes takes osx with it.

If a remote server hang can hang up your entire system, that's a problem with the system (or with some component of the system; if you can still do things in a Terminal window, the problem is probably at a layer above Darwin), not with the notion of an ftpfs, as there are other remote file systems in OS X - and in Linux, and various BSDs, and various other UN*Xes.

it also makes it impossible to parallelize tasks to a single remote site. the way ftpfs does it, everything gets serialized and blocks. a slow remote ftp site will make finder slow to a crawl.

Sounds like too little threading - again, a problem with OS X's implementation of the idea, not with the idea itself.

ftpfs also groks an extremely limited dialect of ftp, it gets easily confused by various ftp server software that kioslave (or mozilla, camino, etc.) doesn't have any problems with.

Again, an implementation problem, not a problem with the idea. What are some examples of FTP server software that ftpfs's client can't handle?

no, kioslave really is the best way to do it.

That assertion is not supported by anything you've said above, because that stuff just complains about a particular implementation of the notion of an FTP file system.

Re:Good article

[mollymoo]

If it takes the client down your client is broken. If it appears that the client has frozen and this is surprising to you, then you haven't read 'man nfs'. You can configure how it deals with lost connections, in particular I suggest you look at the 'soft' and 'intr' options.

Re:Good article

[bluGill]

being that CUPS is what is behind OS X's printing subsystem, I don't see where it _should_ be any big deal printing to another CUPS enabled box as a print spooler.

That is what I thought too, until a mac user in my house was unable to print. I've got cups running on a desktop, and my laptop (both running FreeBSD/KDE) can print to it just fine. I hit print, and my one printer shows up on either machine. After an hour of trying we still couldn't get it to work.

This should have been trivial, CUPS was already working, and telling the local network about printers. OSX should just work, but it doesn't.

Re:Good article

[zsau]

Uniquely well? I think not. Windows 95 introduced the command 'start' which I loved for the while I was using it. GNUstep has the command 'openapp' which is almost equivalent to MacOS X's 'open' because it's another implementation of OpenStep. ROX-Filer also has the rommand 'rox' which when called with no argument starts a filer window in your home, but when started with a filename will open that file, the same as clicking on it.

Re:Good article

[saintlupus]

However, my *biggest* beef with OS X (this is an unrelated plea for help from anyone who knows) is that I cannot find a way to set up remote "raw" printers on OS X.

Hold down "Option" when you click the Add Printers button to get an Advanced screen that will allow you to do this.

I swear, OS X must have a 30 life code hidden in it somewhere.

--saint

Re:Good article

[ErikZ]

Actually, I hated the "Neat" interface that came with Mac and if KDE was available a few months ago, I wouldn't have sold mine.

KDE != filesystem

[BlueMonkey]

Huh? KDE isn't a filesystem.

Re:KDE != filesystem

[Metteyya]

But it lets you browse & mangle your filesystem. Sheesh, even reading summaries became less popular ;>

Re:KDE != filesystem

[NumbThumb]

...that would be Konqueror. KDE ist a desktop environment, i.e. it's concerned with managing and decorating windows, drawing widgets and prividing basic services to applications, like ways to talk to other applications and manage reusable components. Describing it as a way to access files is not false, but completely meanlingless - one could just as well say it's a way to access your printer.

STUNNED!

[ceeam]

For those that don't know, KDE is a graphical desktop environment used to access your computer's files. Finally, Mac users have a free (as in speech) approach to their filesystem.

Is this an all-time low for a slashdot article? I can't imagine how it can be beaten.

Re:STUNNED!

[nihilogos]

I believe it was Feynmann who said

"That's not right. It's not even wrong"

Some statements are so bizarre that they defy comment.

Re:STUNNED!

[commodoresloat]

It's pretty bad. I had KDE running on my OS X system back under 10.2; how is it news now? For a while I was just logging in to >console and starting kde so there was no OS X -- but I came to my senses and now I use OS X exclusively. Either way though it's not news -- this artiKle is Komplete Krap.

Re:STUNNED!

[qubex]

It was Wolfgang Pauli: "This isn't right, this isn't even wrong."

Reference: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/wolfga ng_pauli.html

Re:STUNNED!

[Teilchen]

No, that citation goes back to Wolfgang Pauli. He made countless biting comments like that.

Re:STUNNED!

[Bastian]

1. Darwin
2. I'm pretty sure I had GNOME running on my OS X box years ago.
3. I'm pretty sure people have been running KDE on their OS X boxes years ago.
4. Oh wait, I know. KDE has been part of fink for a while now.

Re:STUNNED!

[bheer]

> Is this an all-time low for a slashdot article?

In terms of general asininity I'd say that honor goes to this story.

Re:STUNNED!

[Nasarius]

Okay, but this article isn't asinine. It's just that the submitter is bizarrely clueless.

This one wins for pure what the fuck? factor.

Re:STUNNED!

[justforaday]

BTW has anyone else noticed the changing Slashdot GUI lately?

Nope. And I didn't read the article yesterday explaining it either.

Re:STUNNED!

[cloudmaster]

The bad part is the description of KDE as a file manager. Not only is that wrong, it's a description given to people who mostly already know what KDE really is - a "desktop environment". Konqueror is a file browser that works with KDE - and is a web browser as well as something that makes icons on a root window. KWM is a window manager. Artsd is a sound server. Not to mention klipper, kinit, kded, kwrapper, kded, konsole, etc.

The length of time it took to make this revelation, that KDE apps run on X on OS X, well, that's just icing on the cake. :)

Re:STUNNED!

[whjwhj]

Quite frankly this is something that needs to happen more on Slashdot. Just because you know what KDE is doesn't mean everybody else does. Failing to explain technical jargon alienates many readers and fosters the false notion that the "technical elite" hang out at Slashdot. Which I find so repulsive it makes me want to puke.

Re:STUNNED!

[PygmySurfer]

Quite frankly this is something that needs to happen more on Slashdot. Just because you know what KDE is doesn't mean everybody else does.

That'd be all fine and dandy, if the summary was actually correct. As it stands, the summary will give someone the wrong correction of what KDE actually is. Being misinformed is worse than being uninformed, IMHO.

Re:STUNNED!

[nihilogos]

Much obliged

Goody?

[SultanCemil]

Honestly, this is just a silly post.

Does the poster even realize this is simply the X server with KDE running as a client app? its not like they've replaced the nice, flashy GUI with KDE. They've just compiled and run it! Look, I can run Ethereal on OS X. Look, I can run *name unix app* on OS X. Good grief.

Re:Goody?

[SpectreBinary]

Its not like they've replaced the nice, flashy GUI with KDE.

Yes. actually. Yes it is.

login to OSX as >console - then enter your normal login details at the text only screen that follows

type startx

enjoy KDE running on X running without Aqua/Quartz/Other OS X gui crap.

Re:Goody?

[SultanCemil]

Hmmm, *looks at powerbook*, that seems a bit silly doesn't it? OS X gui "crap" is what makes it usable (and I don't mean in the strict, literal sense). Why would I ever buy a powerbook and use kde with it? And, if I did want to do that - wouldn't I just install a linux distro on it in the first place?

Re:Goody?

[SpectreBinary]

Choice I suppose. If you ever needed a few KDE apps, then here's a solution. If you ever spent your time 50/50 in OS X and KDE, this is the best way to go - if only fink were a little more up to date with KDE packages in a consistent sense.

One of the parts omitted from the article was a demonstration by Si, the guy who wrote the article, of a KDE desktop running on one monitor and OS X running on the other - both controlled by the same G4. For him, it works well and documenting how it was done just makes sense. Not everyone has the complete knowledge needed to get this up and running if they DO need it.

It's certainly not going to suit everyone - nor even the majority of people using OSX/KDE, but it's going to make life just a little more comfortable for the few who need to use both regularly.

Re:Goody?

[KiloByte]

Hey, many many years ago I've ran Quake on ancient IRIX workstations. Oh wait... it was over X with the actual binaries running on a Linux x86 box. Oh, and I'm running KDE on Windows right now (Cygwin X server, of course, on a machine at work)! Hey, come, lookie, KDE for Windows!

How exactly running an X program over X can be considered a port? It just works as it should, but there is nothing special to it.

Re:Goody?

[m50d]

RTFA, the programs are running locally. True, all it basically shows is a) OSX can get a working X and GNU tools and b) KDE really is independent of the underlying OS and only relies on X and some GNU tools, as has always been its aim, but it's impressive and useful. Since it's still using X it's not really any better technically than the port of KDE to Solaris, but I think this will mean more to more people.

Re:Goody?

[KiloByte]

Locally, but not using any of OSX APIs. It's trivial to port calculation-only code: both X libraries and the GNU tools are already ported. Thus, the whole glory goes to the portability of GNU tools, but this is not what this article was about.

Re:Goody?

[m50d]

both X libraries and the GNU tools are already ported. Thus, the whole glory goes to the portability of GNU tools,

KDE deserves some credit for not depending on other aspects of its environment. Even when using a crossplatform API it's very easy to make non-portable assumptions about the underlying environment.

Re:Goody?

[KiloByte]

Doh, you're right. I forgot about this part: if you're developing something just on a single platform, it's very likely you'll subconsciously use platform-dependant ways to code things.

Re:Goody?

[nine-times]

Right, which I think is good to know, but not exactly *news*. OSX has been coming with X11 on the install CD (optional install) for a couple years now, and you can run Gnome and KDE. Of course, if you want, you could also just install Darwin or Linux on your Mac, and then you can replace the nice, flashy GUI with KDE, but then you wouldn't be able to run the nice, flashy OSX programs (MS Office, Photoshop, etc.) without running OSX within Linux.

All of which I thought was common knowledge for a few years now. You can run X11 apps is OSX, so long as they've been ported for PPC/Darwin. It's nice, but due to the slowness and ugliness, I would generally avoid it. It's much nicer to have native ports.

Re:Goody?

[sootman]

I've read about that for years (googling, I see a reference to it for the public beta) but never gotten it to work. you just set your mac up so you type username/password instead of showing a list of users, then to log in you enter '>console' for the user with no password and click 'log in'?

Re:Goody?

[PygmySurfer]

Yes. actually. Yes it is.

No, actually. No it is not. If you read the article, you'd see they're simply running KDE in a Window on an OS X desktop. While the method you posted certainly works, it's NOT the method detailed in the article.

Erm... Why?

[eericson]

Ummm... If I wanted to run KDE, why would I buy a Mac? I mean I love my Powerbook, but I know the Pentium M systems are faster, cheaper, and (if my experiences are the rule not the exception) more reliable.

Re:Erm... Why?

[fiftyfly]

Ummm... If I wanted to run KDE, why would I buy a Mac? I mean I love my Powerbook, but I know the Pentium M systems are faster, cheaper, and (if my experiences are the rule not the exception) more reliable.

Simply put... you wouldn't. At least not what the poster is sugesting. OTOH running something like konqueror natively without an xserver (not yet possible) would rock as the finder simply sucks.

Re:Erm... Why?

[rlanctot]

/puts on flame retardent suit

This just in! Mac OS X users can now poke themselves in the eye with a fork. When contacted for comment, the fork manufacturers said "We got no idea why anyone would want to poke themselves in the eye with a fork, but we're all for it! Anything that increases fork sales is a plus for us. Vive la Liberte!"

Re:Erm... Why?

[guildsolutions]

I have had nothing but pure success with my powerbook. I have had no mechanical failures or warranty issues. My powerbook 17" is much, much more reliable than my last 2 Dell PC based notebooks. Far more stlyish and far better in the overall design department. With my Dell notebooks I have had two LCD's go bad, 2 hard drives, 1 video card, 1 built in firewire port, 1 built in ethernet port. With the powerbook, nothing.. everything is perfect. PC notebooks are infact cheaper. Marginally faster, but never more reliable. I would trust my powerbook to be working, exactly as is in 4-5 years. I would never begin to want to even trust a PC notebook to work after the warranty expires.

Re:Erm... Why?

[megaversal]

http://wiki.befunk.com/tiki-index.php

They say it's pre-alpha level code, but I did try it (ages ago). I know a friend who switched from Linux to a Mac, but still starts up X + KDE just to use KMail to check his mail. It would be nice to see more KDE apps running natively.

Re:Erm... Why?

[FidelCatsro]

I would disagree that the finder sucks . It is a wonderful Luser level file manager .. Would be perfect if the included mouse gestures and a control click/right click arrange files option (which is located in the menu bar). It only really shows you what is required and sensibly hides a lot low level folders( though you can access them with the go command or Terminal) .
I do enjoy using Konqueror when I'm using Linux or Solaris , but a lot of the features i find rather redundant . I do however love the tabbed browsing .

Re:Erm... Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

And if you want x86, why would you buy Intel? Currently AMD runs rings around them architecture-wise and at competitive prices. Intel's and Apple's future lies in vapour-laden marketing material.

Re:Erm... Why?

[St. Arbirix]

My 400MHz G4 runs circles around my 2GHz P4 for everything except 3D gaming, which I've never tried. Civilization 3 runs easily twice as fast on the Mac.

Everyone I know with a Windows laptop has had their screens fall off or their batteries die. My PowerBook is over three years old and there's nothing wrong with it.

Re:Erm... Why?

[m50d]

Ummm... If I wanted to run KDE, why would I buy a Mac? I mean I love my Powerbook, but I know the Pentium M systems are faster, cheaper, and (if my experiences are the rule not the exception) more reliable.

If you look at any Apple thread (at least prior to the x86-switching keynote) where it comes up, you'll see 500 apple zealots saying Mac hardware is the same price, faster, and far more reliable than x86 systems, and anyone who replies denying it getting modded down as troll.

Re:Erm... Why?

[Kynde]

And if you want x86, why would you buy Intel? Currently AMD runs rings around them architecture-wise and at competitive prices. Intel's and Apple's future lies in vapour-laden marketing material.

I'm all for AMD, just about to purchase AMD based desktop box, but wasn't this discussion about laptops. I don't think Amd has anything comparable to pentium m for laptos, none that I'd know of anyway - the dothan is fast, cpu frequency scaling works like a charm (atleast in Linux) and most importantly it really doesn't suck much juice, which for me is everything in a laptop.

The HP nw8000 that I have has a 2nd battery in it's otherwise free 2nd multibay and it stays up about 8 hours and even more depending on screen brightness and what I do with it.

Re:Erm... Why?

[megaversal]

I think it renders fine in my Firefox, but that's neither here nor there.

If you do a Google search with words like: native, kde, osx (and/or "os x") you get various matches. Here's one. The links from here have a bunch of screenshots: http://dot.kde.org/1073009304/

Re:Erm... Why?

[WilliamSChips]

That would be if you ported the Windows GUI to OSX...oh wait, it's already been done? Nevermind.

Re:Erm... Why?

[cgenman]

Your experiences are the exception. While apple desktops are comparatively expensive, apple laptops are actually a good deal. PC notebooks are getting milked for as much money as possible by system builders to make up for the razor-thin margins on the desktop... Expect to spend 1-2.5k on a PM notebook, which is basically the same range as Apple's iBook/PowerBook line. I've seen a lot more problems with stability on PC laptops, but I generally see the lower end (1k models) or the experimental end (sony's Vaio). But iBooks are generally rock solid.

Linux-on-Powerbook is actually quite really popular. Tons of sysadmins and programmers buy iBooks and replace OSX with Debian (or red-hat, or install-of-choice). I'm guessing this has to do with the power architecture being the same as that of some of IBM's servers. Or maybe they just like the hardware. Either way I'd guess that half of friend's iBooks are running already running Linux.

Re:Erm... Why?

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

And if you want x86, why would you buy Intel? Currently AMD runs rings around them architecture-wise and at competitive prices. Intel's and Apple's future lies in vapour-laden marketing material.

Because AMD has nothing that can compare to the Pentium M. Neither does IBM with their PPC chips, that's why Apple is switching.

Re:Erm... Why?

[sammy baby]

If you look at any Apple thread (at least prior to the x86-switching keynote) where it comes up, you'll see 500 apple zealots saying Mac hardware is the same price, faster, and far more reliable than x86 systems, and anyone who replies denying it getting modded down as troll.

I've seen that argument made with their desktop systems - kinda suspicious that it was bullshit, but at least it made the point that the systems were comperable.

However, I've never seen anyone seriously argue that Powerbooks are price-competitive with, say, Inspirons, Latitudes, or ThinkPads. Because I'm sorry, they just aint. (I work all day on a Dell Latitude, and all evening on a Powerbook, and I can guarantee you that I still consider the PB preferable.)

Re:Erm... Why?

[Cro Magnon]

Your experience is probably the exception, at least based on my experience. I bought a Dell craptop years ago, and it earned the name "craptop". I've had my iBook less than a year, but it's already outlasted the craptop by several months with no sign of any problems. The only way I'll ever buy an x86 laptop is if it's from Apple.

Re:Erm... Why?

[guildsolutions]

a top of the line dell notebook, with a 17" screen, 100 gig hard drive, 1.5 gig of ram, dvd burner, built in wifi and gigabit ethernet would not cost 1/3rd of the cost. More like marginaly 15-20% less

Re:Erm... Why?

[MattHaffner]

However, I've never seen anyone seriously argue that Powerbooks are price-competitive with, say, Inspirons, Latitudes, or ThinkPads. Because I'm sorry, they just aint.

What does this mean anymore? If you rip them both apart and examine the junk piles, what they are composed of weighs similar, smells similarly, falls from large heights similarly, and you'd get similar money for the parts.

But...

I work all day on a Dell Latitude, and all evening on a Powerbook, and I can guarantee you that I still consider the PB preferable.

They are not put together the same, don't work the same, don't have the same headaches, don't look the same (on or off), and don't beep the same (well, out of the box...). By definition, if you are free to choose and decided to buy one, you think that one is the better buy, right? You don't bring your shiny new box home and fondle the parts (well, for long...), do you? Don't you turn it on a do something with it? For most of us, preference is more importantly applied to that part of the experience.

And hey, we're all different... except for that guy over there who needs to stop dressing like me. "Price-competative" applies to the whole gamut of differences in the experiences.

Re:Erm... Why?

[Overly Critical Guy]

Except that Intel-based Macs are confirmed for June next year, and AMD's line of low-power chips sucks compared to Intel's Pentium M line, so you're wrong on both counts.

This is not news

[spiralscratch]

This has been possible for a while now. It's quite easy to set up if you use Fink. You can even set it to use apple's own built-in X11 instead of installing XFree86.

http://fink.sourceforge.net/news/kde.php

Re:This is not news

[spiralscratch]

Did you or the AC above you even read the article? An X widowing system is used. The author of TFA replaced apple's X11 with XFree86. Note some of the section titles in big, bold type, such as "Part 3 - Removing X11 and replacing it with Xfree86", "Part 4 - Install Xfree 86", and "Part - 6 Setting Xfree86 to use the correct window manager"

To my knowledge, all *nix systems run KDE on top of an X windowing system.

Re:This is not news

[Knome_fan]

Read again, they used X11.
So this really isn't news and this really isn't newsworthy.

Re:This is not news

[quigonn]

No, as I wrote, "the article is currently unavailable", you know, slashdot effect and stuff. Anyway, if X is involved, then it's pretty lame.

To my knowledge, all *nix systems run KDE on top of an X windowing system.

Yes, _currently_. But since Qt is available for X11, Windows and OSX natively, a native port w/o any X11 involved would be really cute. Maybe next time.

news ?

[Tsiangkun]

*yawn*

I guess I should write up my tutorial on how to run fluxbox on OS X, and my follow up, setting environment variables to allow Terminal.app to interact with the X server.

Re:news ?

[SpectreBinary]

I guess I should write up my tutorial on how to run fluxbox on OS X, and my follow up, setting environment variables to allow Terminal.app to interact with the X server.

Do it. Don't put down documentation on any process that others might not have done - there are many MANY people who might not have the experience to come up with the solution on their own, but who may benefit from it.

The attitude that writing documentation on the simple stuff is pointless is the reason so many man pages, web pages, FAQs and howtos on open source software sucks dog nuts.

Not everyone is geek enough to know how to do some of the cool things - that knowledge comes about for those of us who are geeky enough to enjoy learning the ins and outs of everything for its own sake. Other people, the majority, need to see how something can work when set up well before they'll accept it.

Re:news ?

[dan the person]

Not everyone is geek enough to know how to do some of the cool things

Slashdot: News for non-Nerds, Stuff that's easy.

Re:news ?

[foniksonik]

If anyone wants to find out more tips on how to do things on OS X, go here:

"http://www.macosxhints.com/

Probably the most comprehensive and up to date list of tips/tricks/hints available and with an active community that discusses each and can help you find out why a particular hint, etc. isn't working perfectly on your machine.

Re:news ?

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

setting environment variables to allow Terminal.app to interact with the X server.

Do it. Don't put down documentation on any process that others might not have done

Even though I know a way to do this, what's the best way to? set in .*rc? defaults on Terminal.app? set in an RC when the OS runs? Getting X11 to somehow hook all the running apps and add the variables when it starts and take them out when it quits? This is just an example -- there's plenty of places to do things, but only one is right.

For example, there was a recent discussion on macosxhints wherein some people suggested replacing the xterm executable with a small shell script to launch Terminal.app (for whatever reason). Of course, replacing major executables is a Bad Idea. There was another suggestion to edit .xinitrc, which seems to be a more popular solution, but a lot of people said that creating a ~/.xinitrc overrides the standard file, so that's not a good suggestion either. So what's the right way to do stuff?

Re:news ?

[Tsiangkun]

I agree. Is there a wiki somewhere for this type of knowledge ?

Finally

[Anonymous Coward]

"Mac users have a free (as in speech) approach to their filesystem." I just can't believe this !!!! Exactly WTF does that mean............"free approach to the filesystem" And since when did running apps like KDE on OSX start becoming news ???? The bloody news' retardness ruined my day !!!! I'm gonna sue you for mental harassment !!

read it again...

[weighn]

KDE is ... used to access your computer's files. Finally, Mac users have a free approach to their filesystem.

> Huh? KDE isn't a filesystem.

Where does is say that?

Re:read it again...

[NumberOneFan]

GeoffP writes "AppleTalk Australia is running a story on running KDE on Mac OS X. For those that don't know, KDE is a graphical desktop environment used to access your computer's files. Finally, Mac users have a free (as in speech) approach to their filesystem."

That was taken from the article body itself, see.

{app} Running on {platform}

[Anonymous Coward]

{magazine} {country} is running a story on running {app} on {platform}. For those that don't know, {app} is a {category} used to {verb} your {noun}. Finally, {platform} users have a {adjective} approach to their {noun}.

Re:{app} Running on {platform}

[tktk]

{magazine} {country} is running a story on running {app} on {platform}. For those that don't know, {app} is a {category} used to {verb} your {noun}. Finally, {platform} users have a {adjective} approach to their {noun}.

This article is the biggest dupe I've ever seen!

Re:{app} Running on {platform}

[TheRaven64]

{app} is a {category} used to {verb} your {noun}

You can do that in software now? Is it legal?

Re:{app} Running on {platform}

[grammar fascist]

{magazine} {country} is running a story on running {app} on {platform}. For those that don't know, {app} is a {category} used to {verb} your {noun}. Finally, {platform} users have a {adjective} approach to their {noun}.

That would be teh BESTE APRIL FOOL'S JOKE EVAR. And link to Google searches - for "app," "platform," "category," "verb," and "noun."

That'd be WAY too clever for Slashdot - but I can dream, can't I?

Re:{app} Running on {platform}

[hcdejong]

In our day, we used to have to {verb} our {noun} manually, using a {obsolete device} and a hand-cranked {platform}. And we liked it that way. You {pejorative} have it too easy with your {adjective} {app}. With all this newfangled technology, {verb} is becoming a lost art.

Re:{app} Running on {platform}

[justforaday]

Go {verb} your {adjective} {noun}, gramps!

Re:{app} Running on {platform}

[Anonymous Coward]

You {pejorative} have it too easy with your {adjective} {app}. With all this newfangled technology, {verb} is becoming a lost art.

Sadly, the first thing I thought of when I read this was, "Shouldn't it be '{gerund} is becoming a lost art'?"

AC

Re:{app} Running on {platform}

[thumperward]

I {disadvantage}, you insensitive clod!

  - Chris

Re:{app} Running on {platform}

[Cow Jones]

Verbing nouns weirds language.

Lower Low Coming Soon...

[CaptainPinko]

Is this an all-time low for a slashdot article? I can't imagine how it can be beaten.

Simple, it'll be duped shortly.

Re:Lower Low Coming Soon...

[Anonymous Coward]

This article itself IS a dupe. A previous article on the subject is here:

KDE Ported to Mac OS X

(and there are probably several others...)

You're going to have to lower the bar lower than that if you really want to hit a new low. :)

Re:Lower Low Coming Soon...

[wdr1]

Damn, +2 Funny.

Re:Lower Low Coming Soon...

[jc42]

The parent message was quite a bit lower; it explained:

KDE is a graphical desktop environment used to access your computer's files.

It's hard to imagine a more clueless explanation of what KDE is about than that.

Myself, I access my computer's files by running programs that call open() and read(). I don't think you need KDE for that; just libc.

I mean, twm and fvwm both allowed programs to link to libc.

That's totally awesome

[Anonymous Coward]

BTW, in other news, you may want to check out this neat page (with pics!) where I describe how I retrofitted my Toyota Camry to be drawn by horses. The gas mileage I get now is astounding!

Re:That's totally awesome

[skiman1979]

Sweet! Make friends with enough stable owners and you can have your Camry running on 500+ horses! Might make some sports car owners jealous.

Finally?

[pelorus]

While it's nice to have "idiot-proof" instructions, I'm guessing there's a problem with a system that treats this as "News for Nerds".

Re:Finally?

[JPyObjC Dude]

I agree, I was finking it two years ago on my ibook and had kde running for fun as well. This is not news or at least they should not say `Finally`.

JsD

WHY?

[Anonymous Coward]

KDe, for all it's open source goodness, isnt a superior system to what OSX has. I dont get why you would bother - OSX is a delight to use.

Re:WHY?

[Fred_A]

Um, well, I might be in a minority there, but I find KDE (or Gnome for that matter) to be much more comfortable to use than the Apple UI.

I use my iBook daily nowadays, and the interface on my other machines is much more comfortable. Now the Apple interface is much nice than Windows, but I still like the X based ones better. Just being able to send a window at the back, or having sloppy focus... Or proper virtual desktops (although the little gadget that adds that on the Mac does help quite a bit). In the end it's probably a matter of taste and of what I'm used to.

And I do use quite a few X based apps on my iBook (on top of a few native apps) so being able to log directly into KDE every now and then would make things simpler (if only so that the top menu and the bottom dock didn't obscure the interface). I probably wouldn't make it my default interface though because it's unlikely that it would be as well integrated as the native one.

Re:WHY?

[Knome_fan]

"Um, well, I might be in a minority there, but I find KDE (or Gnome for that matter) to be much more comfortable to use than the Apple UI."

Minority? Certainly. But you are definately not alone in thinking this way.

This however goes against the /. mantra that OSX is a gift from the gods and without fail, so expect to be modded down if anyone actually bothers to moderate this stupid non-story, that is.

Don't get me wrong, I do like a lot about OSX, I think it makes a fine desktop and I can definately see the attraction, however, I prefer an other desktop, that's all.

Re:Why?

[ocelotbob]

Because KDE's network transparency beats the shit out of anything OS X has, perhaps? Things like fish are far superior to anything I've seen on the mac.

Re:WHY?

[Onan]

...or having sloppy focus... Or proper virtual desktops...

I can't live without good virtual desktops myself, and I've been really happy with the (unfortunately-named) CodeTek VirtualDesktop. It's actually a better virtual desktop implementation that I ever found in any X11 window manager, and it can do focus-follows-mouse.

(Yeah, it costs a few bucks. If the whole notion of paying money for software isn't antithetical to your religion, then the amount of time you spend using it will make the price completely negligible.)

Re:WHY?

[Fred_A]

Thanks for the tip. I was so far using Desktop Manager which was ok but not perfect. I see that the CodeTeK thing has a demo version so if it suits me i certainly won't mind buying the full version. Buying software that's worthwile isn't a problem for me (I buy games regularly for example). If it's something important, I'd rather pick something open source though (even if I pay for it). But a virtual desktop manager for a secondary machine, well, I can live with closed source commercial :)
After all the main application I use on my laptop is CopyWrite which also is closed source and commercial (it does save to clean formats though)...

Exactly what was missing

[EachLennyAPenny]

AT LAST a userfriendly GUI on Apple plattforms.

Sorry, could not resist.

Re:Exactly what was missing

[idlake]

I would like to see a formal usability evaluation comparing OS X to other GUIs. Even some Macintosh veterans have criticized the OS X GUI pretty strongly.

Personally, I don't see much of a difference between the major GUI environments (Windows, Gnome, KDE, and OS X) in terms of usability; familiarity seems to be a bigger issue.

Re:Exactly what was missing

[Tilmitt]

OS X is great apart from the Finder, which is an absolutly terribly designed interface. It's like something they'd make for Linux, except smack in the middle of all that OS X niceness. It's just terrible. It personally gives me a poor sense of spatial orientation when trawling through stuff in it. It deprives you of information about what you're looking at, you have to use the so called never needed right click to "get info" about files. This would not be a bad thing if you were given at least some information in at least one of the view modes about the files you are looking at (size etc) but no information is provided. Spotlight, as an extention of Finder, is just really not near what it should be. Again my complaint is tied to lack of information provided by the interface. Even when you expand your search to include all results you are still not told the filesize of the objects you are looking at. There are three folders named Music on my PowerBook, only one created by me which actually has Music in it. The rest are just folders created by certain apps which for whatever reason related to their function, think that you will be placing at least some music in those folders. When i type in the word "Music" into spotlight these three folders come up and no distinction what so ever is made between them despite one being massive and the others being empty or almost so. So I have to click through them hoping I hit my actual Music folder the first time. In short OS X is so so great and just works and wow yay! But Finder and by association Spotlight are shamelessly crap parts of OS X. OS X is in my oppinion way better than Windows or Linux or even BSD but it could be all the more so better if Finder and Spotlight were given a serious reworking, hopefully from scratch...and without that fugly Brushed Metal interface for Finder! :p

Re:Exactly what was missing

[vorpal22]

It deprives you of information about what you're looking at, you have to use the so called never needed right click to "get info" about files.

File Menu - Get Info
or
Cmd-I

This would not be a bad thing if you were given at least some information in at least one of the view modes about the files you are looking at (size etc) but no information is provided.

Go into the detail view, and you get "Date Modified" and "Size" fields. IIRC, you can also change this and pick which fields you'd like and in what order.

The rest are just folders created by certain apps which for whatever reason related to their function, think that you will be placing at least some music in those folders.

I totally understand your frustration here, but Apple can't be held accountable for folders created by applications that you install; furthermore, this is indicative of a shortcoming in those applications rather than a shortcoming in Finder. (I do agree that Spotlight should try to make some kind of distinction between them, though - perhaps displaying full path name relative to user dir if you hover over them.)

Re:Exactly what was missing

[idlake]

OS X is great apart from the Finder,

The Finder is most of the GUI that OS X has (all the rest is a bunch of applications).

OS X is in my oppinion way better than Windows or Linux or even BSD

I think OS X is better than Windows. It doesn't make much sense, though, to say that it's "better than Linux or even BSD". The proper comparison is to Gnome or KDE. And I don't think there is a clear winner among those.

I think what OS X mainly has going for it over Linux is hardware/software integration, and the fact that it comes with some very well-designed applications out of the box.

Re:Exactly what was missing

[vorpal22]

If you're in column view, it has the exact same behaviour; the panel on the right, when you click on a file, will give you a preview of the file if possible and tell you all the relevant information (size, date modified, etc).

No, you can't hover over a file to get the information. All I have to say is thank god for that. I hate the insanely large "tooltip" windows that Windows pops up over every mouse hover. It's distracting and messy.

Couple things

[BrookHarty]

I like to run vnc server and kde under that, so I can display VNC on another computer or monitor if busy with the main display (gaming/etc).

Also, i perfer darwinports to fink, not sure what the difference is, other than i like ports system. (go gentoo)

Last, isn't Apple's X11 optimized? Wonder if you miss any extensions running xfree's version. (Whats the diff?)

Running KDE on OSX..

[Francis85]

Cool? Yeah, sure.
Useful? Not really..

I guess it would be much more interesting to run it on a plain darwin setup than OSX.

Talk about old news...

[God of Lemmings]

A native KDE port for OS X has existed since the end of 2003.... http://dot.kde.org/1073009304/

Re:Talk about old news...

[wlvdc]

Indeed, but maybe not in Australia...

Re:Talk about old news...

[m50d]

Why is this funny? Not only is he right as far as I can tell, that's actually a true port rather than just using fink and X.

Damn...

[Hurricane78]

... i already tought about inventing a game where the guy with the baddest "article" posted on slashdot gets the most points, but *damn*! You already won before it even began!

Introducing our new format...

[NMerriam]

Slashdot: News for PHB and Marketing Drones.

Slashdot: Buzzwords arranged in an almost sensible order.

Slashdot: Computer News for People New to Computers

Re:Introducing our new format...

[One Childish N00b]

Slashdot: Computer News for People New to Computers

Ever think there are different levels of geekdom? I'm a music geek first and foremost, and a computer geek second. I didn't know what Fink was, yet I've been a Linux user and casual Sourceforge browser for nearly 3 years and an OS X user for almost a year. I found this article useful even if you didnt, just for novelty value rather than anything else.

Just because you already knew how to do something, doesn't mean everybody does. If this was a PC World 'How to Switch on your Computer' article, you might have a case, but this is a site for all geeks, not just computer geeks; all reasonably smart people - people likely to enjoy this site - should know how to turn their computer on, but not all of them are going to know about something like this, which they might find useful for any number of reasons.

Rant over. I just don't like people who assume just because something is of no interest to them, or simple to them, that it's boring or obvious to everyone else.

I liked this article, it's something I might try out when I've got a few hours to spare. You can read something else if you want.

Thank you, slashdot, for enlightening me as to this smart bit of kit. Keep it up.

Re:Experiment

[Snipes420]

I kind of wish i had a mac so i could try Ubuntu on it. (or Kubuntu if thats your thing)

http://ubuntulinux.org/
http://kubuntu.org/

Free (as in speech) doesn't mean better...

[node 3]

Finally, Mac users have a free (as in speech) approach to their filesystem.

1. KDE has been running on OS X for many years now.
2. cp, ls, mv, etc are open source, and have been available on OS X since the beginning.
3. KDE is nice, but I didn't buy a Mac so I could run KDE, I bought it so I could run OS X.

Which isn't to say it's not good to be able to run KDE if you want, just that I've never heard someone lament, "oh, that only there were some form of free (as in speech) approach to the filesystem on my Mac".

Totally off-topic

[Biotech9]

But when you take a screenshot in OS X you don't have to select and drag a box around the window you want as this author has done.

Press Apple-Shift-4, which changes your cursor to a cross-hairs, this lets you drag a box on any part of the screen and the contents are dumped to the desktop as a screenshot.

But! then press spacebar and the cursor changes to an icon of a camera, now click on the window you want to take a screenshot of, and the screenshot will be of that window only, pixel-perfect to the border.

So it looks like this and results in this.

Re:Totally off-topic

[eMartin]

Yeah, but his screenshots with borders ad shadows look nicer than yours, which shows the window with no border and no shadow.

Re:Totally off-topic

[SeanAhern]

Nice. So what did you use to capture the quicktime in the first link?

Re:Totally off-topic

[prockcore]

Press Apple-Shift-4, which changes your cursor to a cross-hairs, this lets you drag a box on any part of the screen and the contents are dumped to the desktop as a screenshot.

But! then press spacebar and the cursor changes to an icon of a camera, now click on the window you want to take a screenshot of, and the screenshot will be of that window only, pixel-perfect to the border.

Ah yes, I can see why this truly is the OS for grandmothers everywhere. It's just so intuitive.

Re:Totally off-topic

[BeanThere]

Ah yes, I can see why this truly is the OS for grandmothers everywhere. It's just so intuitive.

Yes, because grandmothers frequently want to take screenshots of their OS X desktops. It comes up all the time. Why just the other day my grandmother called me up asked me how to take screenshots, she needed them for the "how to install KDE on OS X" article she was writing. How I wish that such a commonly needed feature was more intuitively accessible, but alas, Steve Jobs has failed miserably on this one - the whole Mac is unusable, why, just totally unusable. Millions of grandmothers every day boot up their Macs and just stare at the screens not knowing what to do next - the touted usability, it seems, was all just marketing.

Etc. etc.

Re:Totally off-topic

[netzwerg]

Or just use Preview.app's File->Grab.

Atonement

[Anonymous Coward]

Choosing to run KDE over OS X?

Someone must have a huge sin they're trying to atone for.

Re:Experiment

[ArbitraryConstant]

"I am still pretty new to linux and one thing I have to say, Konqueror is awesome." ... you're not even using Linux.

This whole article makes my brain weep bitter tears.

Amazing!

[msormune]

Now you have a possibility to change your already unified and quite well designed Mac user interface with KDE! Now you have the freedom to make a really bad choice!

Re:Amazing!

[AZURERAZOR]

msormune's salient comment is not only funny but true. I like KDE as good as the next guy. But as a Mac guy who was converted to Win, then converted to Linux... I have to say that the OSX interface is way to slick to consider screwing around with...

Re:Amazing!

[Jeff DeMaagd]

As it is, while the overall OS X way of doing things may be the best, I think it needs a lot of improvement, and KDE seems to be a regression.

The #1 improvement that I want is the choice to sort folders first even if sorting by name or extension. I hate having to scroll down so much with the folders scattered among the files, because most of the time, I need something that's in a sub folder. I think this might be a UNIX/old MacOS carry-over, but I think the way Windows does this is the best way.

I think there is a way to do it, but I would like to have a "create new file here" in Finder, much like Windows explorer. I navigate to a folder and realize I need to add a new file, I'd like to right click and say "new text document" then edit it by double clicking it. The way it is now, I'd have to open a text editor and navigate to the same folder again to tell it to save a file there.

I would like a maximize button. I don't know what the green (+) button is supposed to do, but it behaves very differently between different programs. iTunes switches to full screen and mini player, the full screen ignores the dock, so I need to resize it so I can use UI elements covered by the dock. Finder either stretches only vertically, shrinks to fit the number of file item or some other irritating variation when all I want is a maximize.

Mouse buttons?

[spiff42]

So, if KDE runs on Mac, does it also support a mouse with more than one button? Or is that a hardware limitations. Come to think of it, if Mac mice only have one button, do they not have scroll-wheels? Or is it just me who haven't been following anything in the Mac hardware world for years.

/spiff

Re:Mouse buttons?

[SpectreBinary]

> Or is it just me who haven't been following anything in the Mac hardware world for years.

Yes. All macs since the late 1980s have supported multiple button mice. All macs shipping now come with a 4 button mouse with horizontal and vertical scroller.

Re:Mouse buttons?

[OrcaCSS]

Or is it just me who haven't been following anything in the Mac hardware world for years.

It's not just you. Plenty of people can't get over the single button mouse thing. I haven't used a single button mouse since my Mac IIsi, and that was about 10 years ago. Mac OS X has natively supported multiple buttons since its inception--this is easy to verify by referring to the documentation for NSResponder or Carbon Mouse Events. It's just that applications are generally written so as to not require extra mouse buttons. Apple even sells their own multiple button mouse!

Re:Mouse buttons?

[Celsius 233]

No... the Mighty Mouse does not ship with new Macs. It's $50.

Re:Mouse buttons?

[questamor]

Does that mean I have to send back the mighty mouse that came with my iMac? will I get $50 back, and will Apple send me a normal mouse in return?

Re:Mouse buttons?

[Celsius 233]

A Mighty Mouse came with your iMac? I've never heard of that before...

Re:Mouse buttons?

[Starxxon]

You know, as time progresses, things change :)

Yuck

[catdevnull]

Yikes. That's really ugly.

Now, if someone can get Vista working on MacOS X.... (ducks and takes cover)

Re:Yuck

[node 3]

Now, if someone can get Vista working on MacOS X....

If you watch the PDC video where Gates and Allchin show off Vista, you'll see that you already *are* running Vista on your Mac.

Re:Yuck

[iphayd]

We already had Vista running. We called it Jaguar, though.

No other free shell?

[lintux]

> Finally, Mac users have a free (as in speech) approach to their filesystem.

What? Did they remove Bash from 10.4 and put some non-free shell there instead? /still running 10.3...

Re:No other free shell?

[Mechcozmo]

No, I've got bash still under Single-User Mode and in the Terminal and xterm under Apple's X11. And you can install pretty much any shell IIRC... don't know how but I remember you can.

Re:No other free shell?

[headLITE]

You can use almost any shell. Originally, the default shell wasn't bash anyway, but csh. It's still included. So is ksh, they made a lot of fuss about that one since it's widely used in commercial Unices. There's zsh, and tcsh. All of these you don't even need to install yourself. Oh, and the included bash is a version 2 bash, but you can of course install bash 3, too.

News from Nerds would be nice, too

[Nice2Cats]

This is old, methinks, and not that spectacular, given Fink and a few other tools that have been out there for ages. It would be nice if the news was not only for nerds, but screened by nerds, so we don't get things like this on the front page. I love KDE and I haven an iBook, but really.

Re:Experiment

[Johan Palmqvist]

My experience is the opposite:

Desktop is very fast.

Haven't got any of my systems seriously messed up in 8 years (every system, including MacOS X, can be seriously messed up if you make an effort though).

Automatic USB mounts works perfectly.

WLAN, no idea since I don't use that.

Just because one Linux-based desktop is crappy like yours doesn't mean that all of them is. With more than 300 distros, at least 3 major desktop environments and quite a few window managers out there you have some choice... What made you choose something that didn't suit your needs?

Fink and DarwinPorts

[Mechcozmo]

http://fink.sourceforge.net/faq/relations.php?phpL ang=en

That's pretty much a summary. DarwinPorts is just like Fink essentially, just minor differences. Ironically, the KDE port is mentioned in the comparison of the two. (Bottom of page)

Great.

[dspisak]

Now I can make my Mac look ugly and like crap. Thats a hell of a choice in beer:

"Son you can have this here Bass ale or this here Budwiser"

Re:Experiment

[Spaceman Spiff II]

I have Ubuntu on my powerbook. Maybe six weeks ago I decided to take the plunge and partition my laptop to have a dual-boot setup. For maybe... a week ... after that I excitedly used Ubuntu all the time. But gradually I've started to use it less and less, and use OS X more and more. I hardly ever use Linux now, actually.

So, yeah, it was fun to do, ya know, but not all that useful. Wireless just works tons better in OS X. It just feels more solid and productive in Apple-land. I am tempted to install Ubuntu on my mom's PC for her, because Windows has gone kaput, more or less. And I may go back to using Ubuntu if I ever decide to get Enlightenment DR17 going for it. I have it on my FC4 machine and it's amazing!

laugh all you want

[idlake]

KDE isn't just for browsing files, it is dozens of well-integrated applications. Porting KDE to the Mac makes lots of shareware applications obsolete and brings lots of new, mature applications to the Mac. And even KDE's file browser has a lot of nice features compared to Apple's.

The only limitation of this port is that it is based on X11; since Apple refuses to integrate X11 better into the Mac desktop environment, that's not a good solution for regular users. However, since the Qt toolkit underlying KDE has a native Mac version, we can expect a native port of KDE to follow fairly soon.

Re:laugh all you want

[TheRaven64]

However, since the Qt toolkit underlying KDE has a native Mac version, we can expect a native port of KDE to follow fairly soon.

Muahahahahahahaha!

Hahahahahahahahahahahahah!

Haha?

Oh. You were serious. I take it you've never actually tried using a Qt app on OS X then...

Re:laugh all you want

[Joe Tie.]

QT is as bad as all that on OSX? Out of curiosity, what would you say is a viable cross-platform gui library if one wants, eventually, to support osx? Or would you say non-native isn't worth doing at this point?

Re:laugh all you want

[TheRaven64]

GNUstep. It builds and runs on *NIX and Windows, and the API is compatible with Cocoa so it integrates very well. Mac users tend to be the most compulsive about their user interfaces, while Windows and Linux users are much more used to a mish-mash of UI paradigms.

Re:laugh all you want

[Overly Critical Guy]

GNUStep is hardly "compatible with Cocoa." There are a few OpenStep basics that still cross over, but GNUStep is so far behind in catching up to the latest Cocoa APIs that to call it compatible is misleading.

Re:laugh all you want

[idlake]

Mac users tend to be the most compulsive about their user interfaces, while Windows and Linux users are much more used to a mish-mash of UI paradigms.

Mac users have lived through OS9/OSX hybrid desktops, they accept OfficeX on a Mac desktop, they tolerate metal/gumdrop interfaces, and they don't even notice that Apple mixes gumdrop and Windows buttons in the same application. Compared to OSX, something like KDE is a lot more consistent. Mac users may be vocal about demanding consistency, but they are pretty tolerant about what they actually use--as long as it's been blessed by Apple.

why would one do this?

[davids-world.com]

they ask me to install fink, which is a problem per se - fink is the package distribution system that usually breaks when you install a package, due to some compilation error or difficult dependencies, right?

Then they want me to get rid of Apple X11 in favor of Xfree86. That'll probably have consequences for other X11 applications.

In the end, I can run a sub-optimal GUI environment which doesn't really do anything useful I couldn't do otherwise, whose utilities/applications - in my experience - crash regularly. From a user-perspective: lost of wasted time.

It's not surprising that it runs on OS X -- OS X is Unix.

Re:why would one do this?

[poopdeville]

fink is the package distribution system that usually breaks when you install a package, due to some compilation error or difficult dependencies, right? What are you talking about? Fink is just a frontend to a port of Debian's apt-get. Once you have fink installed, you might as well type in "sudo apt-get install kdebase3" instead of "sudo fink install kdebase3". No need to compile anything, unless you want. And apt handles these kinds of dependencies easily.

Been using one for 6+ years

[green pizza]

I first used a three button mouse on a Mac before the Clinton administration, of course it used the ADB (Apple Desktop Bus) interface way back then. More recently I have used Logitech USB optical three button scroll wheel nice on Macs since 1999. They worked fine in Mac OS 8.5 and they work fine on Mac OS X 10.4.2.

How is this new?

[Digital Pizza]

I ran KDE under OSX via Fink years ago. Gnome too. It was kinda cool for a few minutes, then I never bothered again. I like OSX so much better. Isn't that why we pay extra for our Macs? If you don't want to take advantage of OSX then you might as well just get a cheap PC and put Linux or BSD on it.

Mod parent down

[dulff]

What was the point in changing the original text? Idiot.

Mac OS X GUI

[green pizza]

Even some Macintosh veterans have criticized the OS X GUI pretty strongly.
The Mac OS X GUI is great once you stop thinking in classic Mac terms and start thinking in NeXT terms. You also have to ditch list and icon views of your folders -- column view is the only way to fly.

"Apple didn't buy NeXT, they paid NeXT to take over"

"Mac OS X 10.4: The 'X' stands for NeXT"

Re:Mac OS X GUI

[Knome_fan]

"Mac OS X 10.4: The 'X' stands for NeXT"

Ah, so that's why they call it OS ten, isn' it?

Meh, go Ratpoison

[Moraelin]

Bah, fluxbox is for wimps. Write an article on running Ratpoison on Tiger. I'm sure every Mac user was sick and tired of having all menus, icons, overlapping windows, and indeed a GUI at all. Not to mention all that effort of reaching for the mouse and giving it a quick shove upwards to get to those menus.

With Ratpoison you too can have a free -- as in, "I have no fucking clue what the First Amendment actually says, so I'll pretend that it has anything to do with contracts and licenses" -- interface to your Mac's filesystem.

Plus, nothing says Real Man like using "ls", "cd" and hitting tab 20 times to launch your favourite app or copy a file, instead of clicking or dragging an icon like those GUI-user pussies. Think of it! You'll be the talk of the party. Heck, parties will be thrown in your honour once word gets out how hardcore your keyboard skillz are. Random women on the street will come begging to have your baby.

(And yes, I realize your post was sarcasm too. I just felt like adding my own "*yawn*" while we're in a "look, we're so l33t for running KDE on, umm, unix" thread.)

Yeah...

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

because no one's been able to get BASH to compile on a POSIX compliant system.

All of that stupid BeOS proprietary code. And those DirectX Direct3D calls too!

Seriously!? What's the deal?

Useless Info

[fbnas]

I've been using Mac OS X(.3) since January, which isn't too long (considering this is my first mac), and coming from a Linux/Windows background (and more CLI-inclined), I naturally was busy playing around with the Darwin aspect of the OS.
Then I tried to make my iBook boot like Linux and run Gnome and all that. 2 weeks after I bought the laptop, I accomplished that. Then I got bored... The Mac OS X interface is way sweeter and much easier to use. And I realized that all my attempts to truely crash Mac OS X (the graphical environment) weren't very successful. So besides the interface being sweeter, it's also more stable than KDE or Gnome (from my experience) on the iBook.
So besides the fact that the article is old news, I can't imagine it being of any use to run KDE on Mac. Of course, that's after I tried it, so then again for the curious, maybe it is worth it. But if you're curious enough, then I'm sure you've already tried it... Hence: Useless post... And the LAST thing I expected to see on slashdot... But then again...

(Had to say something)

Re:Experiment

[headLITE]

If I'm not mistaken, he only wrote TFA, he doesn't seem to be responsible for posting it to Slashdot.

I second the flame against Cowboy Neal.

Re:Experiment

[headLITE]

WLAN works too, with that special subset of available chipsets, and several different drivers to choose from, so definitely not out of the box. On the other hand, during my university time I've sometimes had my Linux notebook double as a (real) WLAN access point (using hostap for my Prism2 based PCMCIA card) when only one ethernet hookup was available, which is something other OSes (including Mac OS X) can't do easily and which is way more stable for large groups of users than access pointless (pun intended) WLAN. (Mac OS X probably can, but you'd need to learn how to use the command line tools...)

Re:Madness

[jdeluise]

I know, why run KDE on top of a hodgepodge, poorly retrofitted filesystem (HFS really sucks), an OS brimming with Finder crashes, self-corrupting preference files, constantly corrupted OS caches, and the list continues. I don't particularly care for KDE either, but at least you don't have to pay for upgrades to beta-quality software year after year.

Complete Mirror with Images

[Anonymous Coward]

http://mirrordot.org/stories/b7f526e888df446769526 ac59fee59fb/index.html

Re:Hasnt anyone tried out the latest Enlightenment

[Professor S. Brown]

How exactly does Enlightenment push any envelopes? Looks like a blind rip-off of Aqua (with some randomly added Windows 2000) made by people who don't understand that most of the eye candy in OSX is functional.

Re:Where the hell is my apple II and C64 desktop?

[zakezuke]

Well?

READY

Column view exists since May 1980!

[Jerry Smith]

The Mac OS X GUI is great once you stop thinking in classic Mac terms and start thinking in NeXT terms. You also have to ditch list and icon views of your folders -- column view is the only way to fly.

Column view was planned to be implemented BEFORE NeXT in the classic MacOS, Jobs took it with him to NeXT. They never implemented in the classic MacOS, it was deemed too complex for the original Mac. Column view exists since May 1980! David Pogue has nice screenshots on page 46 'Mac OS X second edition: the missing manual'. Good book by the way.

Nice idea to run KDE on MacOSX, A lot of people might think it redundant but it's alway nice to have alternatives.

Re:Column view exists since May 1980!

[Jerry Smith]

Column view exists since May 1980!

Yes, and Apple ripped it off from Smalltalk.

And Smalltalk (Xerox) was a rippoff from Sketchpad (1963) and Simula-67 (60's).
By the by: whenever Apple and Xerox (founded 1971) are mentioned in one sentence, it doesn't imply 'theft'. And 'columns' were already widely used in eerm.. newspapers etcetera. Tabbed browsing for instance also existed before the computer was invented.
Apple shoved column view in a mainstream OS user environment, you cóuld've read that between the lines.

Signs for windows?

[m50d]

Qt/Mac was made available under the GPL fairly recently, so this is an encouraging sign for the porting of KDE to windows (though that has to wait for the porting of KDE to Qt4). I also presume that they've managed to remove the dependencies on X, which should not only speed up windows ports but also makes it more feasible to run KDE apps on Qt/Embedded. Anyone with a Zaurus like to comment?

Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[csirac]

I'm running a mish-mash of Gnome components ranging from 2.6 - 2.12 with fink.

Darwinports also has a gnome and KDE distribution for X11 on Mac OS X.

The Gnome stuff has been a bit crazy recently, what with the menu files changing file formats and everything.

Why do I run Gnome? Simple: consistent keyboard shortcuts. On my iBook, I have too many different inconsistent ways to get home, end, pg up and pg dn - some use Fn+arrow, others use the command (apple) key. In Apple's terminal app, it's all backwards - you have to press shift+apple+arrow to get home/end, but for pg up/dn you just use apple+arrow, whereas on Linux/Solaris you use shift+pg up (which would be shift+Fn+pg up on this iBook). WTF?

Don't even get me started on the Finder's utterly, utterly useless "alt-tab" - what a pointless piece of crap. You simply _CANNOT_ switch windows with it, only applications! Great, you can switch focus to the most recently used window in one app or the most recently used window in another, but there is NO FUCKING WAY you can change amongst those app's windows without using the mouse and going to the "window" menu or using "expose" (all involve several distracted seconds on that bastard touch-pad mouse thing).

More frustratingly, apple+arrow in Apple's terminal switches between terminal windows - which is great - but I am either expecting this behaviour to get me home/end (like using apple+pg up/pg dn does), or trying to use apple + left/right arrows to switch windows in some other application that does not mimic this behaviour!

NeoOffice/J uses Fn+arrow for home/end, but Mozilla etc. use apple+arrow. Then apple's terminal uses shift+apple+arrow...

I still don't even know how to skip over words in a line of text (in Linux/windows it's ctrl+arrow, but this does nothing in most mac apps).

Sigh... I never thought I'd see the day... resorting to a gnome desktop instead of Finder. Finder has some great aspects to it; its network shares are reliable and good, and after I've installed the virtual desktops 3rd party app I feel mostly at home ... except for the bloody retarded keyboard shortcuts and lack of a usable alt-tab.

It's a bloody nightmare for keyboard users. Please stop trying to make me use the touchpad... argh

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[elfasi]

Actually with Finder and the 'alt-tab' issue, this too drove me mad, until a kind soul told me about the Apple+` shortcut, that's the Apple key and the grave accent key (just below the ESC key on my PC keyboard and on the bottom left of my Mac keyboard). This switches between multiple windows of a single application and saved me much gnashing of teeth.

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[Cloney]

Don't even get me started on the Finder's utterly, utterly useless "alt-tab" - what a pointless piece of crap. You simply _CANNOT_ switch windows with it, only applications! Great, you can switch focus to the most recently used window in one app or the most recently used window in another, but there is NO FUCKING WAY you can change amongst those app's windows without using the mouse and going to the "window" menu or using "expose" (all involve several distracted seconds on that bastard touch-pad mouse thing).

Try Apple+~ to switch between windows of the open application. Also, calm down, and drink less coffee. Finder is a bit of a mess, but the Apple-Tab is fantastic, simply for being able to Apple+Q to quit applications without giving them focus.

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[BurntNickel]

Don't even get me started on the Finder's utterly, utterly useless "alt-tab" - what a pointless piece of crap. You simply _CANNOT_ switch windows with it, only applications! Great, you can switch focus to the most recently used window in one app or the most recently used window in another, but there is NO FUCKING WAY you can change amongst those app's windows without using the mouse and going to the "window" menu or using "expose" (all involve several distracted seconds on that bastard touch-pad mouse thing)./P>

You do know about "alt-esc" to change windows within the same application?

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[micilin]

Don't even get me started on the Finder's utterly, utterly useless "alt-tab" - what a pointless piece of crap. You simply _CANNOT_ switch windows with it, only applications

You're not supposed to switch windows with it: Command-tab to switch applications. Command-` (i.e Command- backtick) to switch windows in the foremost application. And they're changeable in the System Preferences, as is every key board shortcut IIRC, even some application specific ones.

Your points about inconsistency in the Apple interface are valid, and a sore point to the pre-OS X purists (I'm kind of one of them, but OS X now gives FAR more than it ever took away compared to OS 9,8,7,etc.), but RTFMH (Read the fine mac help), or buy a book.

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[chrishnz]

Command (Apple key) - ` Cycle through windows in application or Finder (if more than one window is open). http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=754 59

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[delire]

Don't even get me started on the Finder's utterly, utterly useless "alt-tab" - what a pointless piece of crap. You simply _CANNOT_ switch windows with it, only applications! Great, you can switch focus to the most recently used window in one app or the most recently used window in another, but there is NO FUCKING WAY you can change amongst those app's windows without using the mouse and going to the "window" menu or using "expose" (all involve several distracted seconds on that bastard touch-pad mouse thing).

Well it's about time someone else said it. This alone makes OSX utterly frustrating to use. Apple really does have some nasty and bizarre assumptions about this thing called 'useability'. KDE is sensible out of the box but should it not suit you in any way you can massage it until the point it suits you. Now there's a useability idea.

Were there a single proprietary application I would want to run, I might have had a reason to retain OSX on my PPC machine. And if there was about anything about the dock and or Aqua itself I miss, I'm sure I could easily simulate/improve upon it using something like this or this or this.

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[treerex]

Don't even get me started on the Finder's utterly, utterly useless "alt-tab" - what a pointless piece of crap. You simply _CANNOT_ switch windows with it, only applications!

Others have pointed out Cmd-` to cycle windows within an application. There is also a third-party utility called Witch that allows you to switch to any window in any open application. It's what Cmd-Tab wants to be. Strongly recommended.

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[for_usenet]

> I still don't even know how to skip over words in a line of text (in Linux/windows it's ctrl+arrow, but this does
> nothing in most mac apps).

To skip over works, try option/alt (depending on your keyboard) + left/right arrow. To go to the very start or end
of a line, use command/apple/cloverleaf + left/right arrow. Pretty much everything I've tried (eg TextEdit.app and
Camino.app) obey this.

cheers

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[veddermatic]

Command-Right Arrow (or sometimes Command-Shift-Arrows) seems to switch between windows in lots of apps, FYI.

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[the_2nd_coming]

first off, it is cmd-tab. second, it gets you through all your apps with a nice icon popup, third, cmd-esc gets you through your app windows, fourth, cmd-tab ; hold cmd and hit q quits an application with out having to go to the app.

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[hackstraw]

but there is NO FUCKING WAY you can change amongst those app's windows without using the mouse and going to the "window" menu or using "expose"

Try fucking using the Apple+` (backtick, right above the tab key) for switching between windows in an application. I believe there is a similar thing in windows as well, maybe Alt+`.

A requirement for my OS is that I have to be able to do most anything from the keyboard or the mouse, OS X fits that bill the best of any OS I've ever used.

Re:Reasons for using KDE/Gnome on OS X w/Finder

[Cailin Coilleach]

> there is NO FUCKING WAY you can change amongst those app's windows without Yeah... Hi.. Have you met my friend [ alt ] [ back-quote ]? Because she's willing to do that special thing you've been asking about.

Re:WHY???

[Aqua OS X]

Aqua goodness, brushed-metal goodness, unified tool bar grayish-ness, the new iTunes post brushed-metal dark grayish-ness, etc. Basically, whatever shinny inconstant interface turd Apple thinks is cool this month.

And yes, I realize the irony of an Apple interface rant coming from some a-hole who's screen name is "Aqua OS X" ;)

Beats me...

[Alworx]

Beats me why one should want to run KDE on OS-X... let's talk about getting OSX (desktop, at least) on a common Intel machine!

"why have cotton when you can have silk"

Alex.

Or my favourite...

[Auraiken]

Slashdot: Slashdot ;)

Re:Hasnt anyone tried out the latest Enlightenment

[lightyear4]

..how does enlightenment push an envelope? Simple. It puts some complex and attractive eye candy where, for all intents and purposes, it was never meant to be. That is to say, it pushes the limits for X11 and the unices. X11 was designed as an extremely lightweight graphical windowing system for terminals over a network, not for graphics intensive aqua-esque-sexiness. For unix users who have lived for years in minimal graphical environments, its a very new development. Apple struck a home run with Aqua using brand new innovations, yet Enlightenment accomplishments are on running on top of a 25 year old graphics subsystem. Interesting in context, dont you think?

Yay! How Often I Lament...

[FFFish]

"oh, that only there were some form of free (as in speech) approach to the filesystem on my Mac".

My cries have been answered, huzzuh.

Thankyou!

[csirac]

I can't imagine how I didn't manage to research this earlier... I did ask several OS X fans/users but got no useful response!

Thanks!
(but still posting this within a Gnome/X11 desktop ;-)

Re:Thankyou!

[astrosmash]

You know, I used to feel the same way as you about the perceived lack of keyboard support in OS X (I'm a big fan of the keyboard accessibility Windows), but now that I've used OS X for a few months I've changed my mind. I think that while OS X generally stinks at providing universal keyboard accessibility, it does the best job of any system at providing keyboard shortcuts for commonly used commands, and I think that is more valuable and useful.

The Mac way is to provide a shortcut for every common menu command, but, most importantly, you can use the System Keyboard Preferences to assign keyboard shortcuts to any other menu common in any or all applications. I can't overstate how awesome that is.

Some examples of universal shortcuts:

• Cmd-Q: Quit Application
• Cmd-W: Close Window
• Cmd-H: Hide Application
• Cmd-Opt-H: Hide All Other Apps
• Cmd-M: Minimize Window
• Cmd-,: Preferences
• Cmd-L/R Arrow: Advance to Beginning/End of Line
• Option-L/R Arrow: Advance to Beginning/End of Word

Note that text fields also accept Emacs Ctrl-Key shortcuts.

And here are some Finder shortcuts and are hilariously missing from Windows Explorer, for example:

• Cmd-1: Icon View (Finder)
• Cmd-2: List View (Finder)
• Cmd-3: Column View (Finder)
• Cmd-Shift-N: New Folder
• Cmd-Shift-A: Open Applications Folder
• Cmd-Shift-U: Open Utilities Folder
• Cmd-Shift-H: Open Home Folder
• Cmd-Shift-C: Open Computer (root) Folder

Note that those keyboard shortcuts work in all open and save dialogs as well.

Here's one more tip. The option key is most often used to execute a variation of an existing command. Try mousing through an application's menus while toggling the option key to reveal alternate commands.

Parent is a troll, mod down!

[One Childish N00b]

We are now going to configure your eyeball to withstand Taco's gaping anus. Pin your eyelids back, Clockwork Orange style, and squeeze the eyeball into his rectum. Careful not to lose it in there! Fink to use the unstable application builds, now these wont crash all the time or anything like that it means that we will have access to newer versions of the software we will be using , specifically KDE 3.4

And others. Parent is a troll.

This will be of not much use...

[rdoger6424]

... because won't Apple be switching to Intel processors within the next two years? And then won't this will only be of use in legacy macs*?

*by legacy macs, I mean what will be legacy in a couple of years

I haven't either, what's it like?

[ChunderDownunder]

I understand that a Qt app mightn't behave as smoothly as a Cocoa one but how does Qt/Mac compare to using X11?

I've wondered how Lyx (for scientific papes) would perform under OS X if I ever switch to an x86-64 macmini. From your feedback not well?

Are there issues with native Qt on the Mac as opposed to the X11 version? Or are you just favouring the Cocoa/Carbon toolkits with your laughter??

Re:I haven't either, what's it like?

[TheRaven64]

Qt apps make the cardinal UI mistake of looking like OS X apps, but not behaving like them. As a trivial example, the key combinations for skipping forward or backward a line or a word are different in Qt apps to every single other app on the system. This is insanely irritating, since it's the kind of thing you don't even do consciously. An X11 version, at least, will look different and so give a visual clue that it is going to behave differently.

The best cross-platform software to run on OS X is the stuff written for GNUstep. GNUstep uses a very similar set of UI guidelines to OS X, and it implements the same OpenStep specification as Cocoa, so (once you have re-drawn the GORM files in IB) it is a quick re-compile and you get the benefit of all of the native widgets being used as they were designed to be used.

Re:I haven't either, what's it like?

[JabberWokky]

Does that apply to Qt 3.x or Qt 4? I know that Qt 4 has quite a few more "natural native" features.

--
Evan

Re:I haven't either, what's it like?

[ChunderDownunder]

Qt apps make the cardinal UI mistake of looking like OS X apps, but not behaving like them. As a trivial example, the key combinations for skipping forward or backward a line or a word are different in Qt apps to every single other app on the system. This is insanely irritating, since it's the kind of thing you don't even do consciously.

I see. Thinking out loud here, I'm wondering whether that's a limitation of the toolkit as such. Or, whether each application ought to specify key bindings and other platform specific localisation, e.g. X11 or OS X, through a configuration file.

An X11 version, at least, will look different and so give a visual clue that it is going to behave differently.

So, at least from knowing what to expect it's easier to have the overhead of an X11 server running than using native widgets which look but don't feel the same?

I guess that's the difference between a native port and a recompile. :(

What's you hay mileage?

[Rhinobird]

Do you get 40 furlongs to the bushel?

KDE is fine but Blackbox is better

[lunadog]

KDE must run like a pig on top of OSX.. KDE (standalone) is already a massive piece of software. Personally I use Blackbox to run X apps on OSX.. It loads in less than a second, and is entirely unobtrusive.. and much nicer than the tvwm interface (or whatever the default XDarwin window manager is).

On a slightly related note: for some reason, when I start XDarwin from the command line, with startx &, it loads about 50x faster than if I click the XDarwin icon. Anyone know why this might be???

Re:KDE is fine but Blackbox is better

[Sigg3.net]

KDE must run like a pig on top of OSX..

Pigs run very fast, mind you.

At least that's what I've heard.. *cough*

Here is why you might want KDE

[Budenny]

Its more configurable.

But it doesn't need any more configuring, you all say, its perfect as it is.

Weird, isn't it! Why don't they all see it?

Brushed Metal

[slashflood]

To confuse your co-workers, set up KDE on OSX and run this theme. Check out the screenshots.

Cowboy neal, please lay off the drugs

[a_greer2005]

OSX comes with BaSH, how the hell do you get more free (speech) than that?

OSX's gui blows KDE out of the water for all non-power users, and most power users I know would rather use BaSH anyway.

Re:Cowboy neal, please lay off the drugs

[Liam Slider]

OSX comes with BaSH, how the hell do you get more free (speech) than that?

By having a Free Desktop Environment, instead of a proprietary one, to go with it.

Reliable?

[Savage-Rabbit]

I know the Pentium M systems are faster, cheaper, and (if my experiences are the rule not the exception) more reliable.

I don't think that a system becomes inherently more reliable simply by having a Pentium M in it. The PPC CPU in my PowerBook does not cause the OS to panic any more or less than the Lintel/Wintel boxen all around me. If you are referring to the general reliability of PowerBooks vs Lintel/Wintel Laptops I can only point out that I work in an environment where alot of relatively high end IBM and Dell notebooks see service. Ok.... one can can split hairs over whether those qualify as high-end brands or not but in essence the list price for these PC laptops is about the same or in case of the Laptops the PHB's use it is even greater than that of a PowerBook and there is any number of cases of these PC Machines breaking down just as much or even more than my PowerBook. One of my colleagues has gone through two motherboards and a broken CDRW drive and is now working with a PCMCIA Ethernet card having given up on getting the one built into his Thinkpad repaired. That being said I am rather looking forward to seeing the Pentium M (or what ever other Intel CPU Apple chooses to use) installed in Powerbooks but I don't think the mere installation of this Intel CPU will magically make them any more reliable. I don't use Mac because they are colossally better hardware than PCs, I use them because they ship with the best Unix desktop OS on the market and because the hardware is usually more elegantly packaged resulting in PowerBooks that are usually smaller and lighter than most PC Laptops are.

Skipping over words

[5n3ak3rp1mp]

Option-arrow will skip over words in Cocoa apps. (Doesn't seem to work in Terminal, which sounds like it's where you live, though.)

The control key generally does nothing in OS X due to Mac historical reasons (early Mac keyboards never even had a ctrl key, function keys, etc.)

Re:Skipping over words

[hackstraw]

Option-arrow will skip over words in Cocoa apps. (Doesn't seem to work in Terminal, which sounds like it's where you live, though.)

In a terminal application, the key is to have ALL of the characters translated from the keyboard to the application that has keyboard input in the terminal.

There are to my knowledge, NO terminal commands in any terminal emulator that do anything besides send information to the end application (shell, editor, or whatever). Moving by word is a function of which shell you are using (if your at a prompt), or your editor, or whatever is accepting keyboard input, and they are different for most every shell (which can even be modified with an environment variable or changing the editing from vi or emacs or whatever).

The grandparent poster is a moron. I hate to be so strong, but thats MY FUCKING OPINION. I hope he gets moderated as such in the near future instead of "Informative".

Fink Can Be Problematic; Hasn't This Been Done?

[reallocate]

My experience shows that using Fink is, indeed, problematic. Just as using any dependency resolver to install pacakges from a variety of uncoordinated sources has been problematic for me on Linux.

I suspect "compilation errors" may refer to mistakes by the package creators, not errors that appear duing an install-time compile.

In any case, hasn't this been done before? This is hardly any more impressive than porting KDE to BSD.

Try Shift-Apple-G (as in "go")

[zalt]

For example, the browser, Konqueror will go everywhere, even below the "unseen line" of OSX and yes, you can tweak finder to go there to but not without non-free software and even then, you'r stuck with finder's interface.

Non-free software? Try entering "shift-apple-g" (as in "go") in a Finder window. A neat little box will fall down, asking you where to go. Here you can enter any path at all on your file system. (/etc/ etc).

Still, if you despise the Finder you probably should've gotten something else than a Mac. Lots of dollars could've been spent on better things if you just want to spend your days using Konqueror.

Cool! But why stop at a wm in wm - what of vm's?

[ACORN_USER]

Why don't we run virtual-pc in os-x, running Fedora, running bochs with windows 95, running RISC OS on an Archemedes emulator, running an XT emulator, running DR-DOS, running tetris?!

See, you were joking...

[Craig Ringer]

You're joking ... but it's not entirely a joke. The fact is that as a user who wants flexibility and customisation from my UI, in many ways I find KDE more friendly than the Mac OS X Finder. I find that Mac OS X's UI significantly hinders my ability to work quickly and effectively.

Yes, that's just a personal thing. Yes, most users are the opposite. Still ... my point is that "user friendly" to one person can be user hostile to another.

Free, open source approach!

[mindslip]

Oooh! FINALLY! 'Cause that's what we always wanted!

Ye Gads!

Maybe the submitter is confusing us, who paid good money for a quality piece of hardware and a quality OS, with those windows pirates who won't pay for their hw/sw 'cause it stinks anyways?

mindslip

DOS on Mac

[jpsowin]

In other news, you can how use a DOS command prompt as your window manager on your Mac! Who needs multi-tasking and fancy graphics anyway?

Finally?

[RustNeverSleeps]

Finally, Mac users have a free (as in speech) approach to their filesystem.

I was running KDE alongside Aqua using Fink and Apple's X11 about a year ago just for fun. At that time I had found an article that described exactly how to do it step by step. I don't really see how this is news. An interesting article, yes, but not news.

filesystem?

[An0maly]

last i heard KDE was a window manager/desktop environment not a filesystem.

It saves it as PDF

[snowwrestler]

Did you convert it to png or is there a preferences setting for the save type?

Re:It saves it as PDF

[alex_ware]

either 10.3 or 10.4 came with .png as default you can change it to png in earlier versions using Grab.

disagree

[diegocgteleline.es]

no, kioslave really is the best way to do it.

Maybe the quicker ftpfs implementation sucks, but that doesn't means the approach is less valid. Some of these things you mentioned can happen with NFS too. Quicker should reduce their timeouts, implement some kind of "congestion detection", allow user to parallelize tasks....is not that their approach is not valid, it's the implementation which seems to suck.

BTW Linux does allow you to have a ftpfs -and more - thing which works even with bash, ls & friends - it's called FUSE (kernel VFS userspace interface which you can use to implement userspace filesystems. It's included in 2.6.14-rc BTW)

Good Article?

[BrotherLouie]

What is the big deal? Mac OS X has shipped with XFree86 for years. Why is that news that you can run KDE in a window?

KDE big whoop

[djdavetrouble]

BFD, I run fluxbox on my mac all the time. For those that don't know, fluxbox is totally 1337.

xorg

[xwildph]

Hrm,

I'm trying to be helpful here.. honest.. Fink has packages for xorg, so I'm thinking that the article really ought to be directing people to install those.

Xfree have kind of shot themselves in the foot with their licencing & development practices.

XW

Re: Remote Printing

[ElitistWhiner]

We use Tektronics printers remotely by specifying just an IP address.

GS windows support

[mzs]

How is the Windows support for GNUStep? Somewhere I read that the Windows support for GNUStep was at a beta quality level. That was a while ago though. Does printing and threading work for example in Windows?

Any normal USB mouse!

[Roadkills-R-Us]

One of the first things we do with a new Mac here is plug a Microsoft or Logitech USB scroll mouse (user's choice) in, and we put the original mouse away. Probably oughta ebay those.

I don't know about all the apps, but all the basic stuff finder, browser, etc) make use of extra buttons if you do.

Re:BUT WHY???!!!

[puff the barbarian]

Because of Kate. Kate! That's why...

Kool Desktop Env

[mayhemt]

For those that don't know, KDE is a graphical desktop environment used to access your computer's files. Finally, Mac users have a free (as in speech) approach to their filesystem geez..i have been thinkin windows explorer was THE graphical desktop environment...thanks for 'Enlightening'...u look like that christmas 'gnome' ahref=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnomerel=url2ht ml-26639http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnome > to me... what about Nautilus & Konqueror, I use them to access files..

brought to you by the old-fucking-news dept.

[dionysian.mind]

Hrm... this article seems like old news -- I have been doing this since my brand-new 700mhz iBook on OS X 10.1. What's even better, that I didn't see when I skimmed through the article, is that you can drop OS X into console mode by entering the user >console at the login screen, with no password -- log in to the console and issue the 'startx' command. No more aqua, just kde (or gnome)...

This is kinda useful on the new iBooks that would like to run a more linux-y interface, but still want wireless support (the airport extreme cards use a closed-source broadcom chip-set that will never be opened due to FCC regulations). You can just run your qt / gtk programs in your respective window manager and run all the programs you can either find on fink, or anything else you can get to compile correctly (good luck). Obviously the down-side to this is that you can't run an OS X apps, but if you just log out it will throw you back to the OS X log-in screen.

What I would really like to see (calling out to the talended /. developer community) would be a way to initiate sessions on OS X, so that the ctrl-alt-F* would give you a different session -- one running quartz/aqua, and one running Xfree86/Xorg. Say hello to the best of both worlds -- the window manager of your choice right at your finger-tips!

All macs come with the Mighty Mouse?

[dtungsten]

What about the Mac Mini?

Mod parent up, not in a dumb way. Seriously.

[Marc2k]

I don't understand why this entire article is a big deal, because of what you just said. I had a Powerbook for awhile between 2002 and 2003, and I used this trick to run Enlightenment all the time.

re: CUPS-n-printer

[A.S.]

However, my *biggest* beef with OS X (this is an unrelated plea for help from anyone who knows) is that I cannot find a way to set up remote "raw" printers on OS X. I have a Linux print server, and I want CUPS on OS X to simply deliver Postscript to the CUPS server on Linux and let the Linux box render and print it. I can use the CUPS web admin interface on the Mac and set up the raw printer queues

My setup is similar, and this is what I do:

• Setup the print server such that the printer works when printer locally from it
• Configure CUPS thusly:
  • Location / => allow from the network the Mac is on
  • BrowseAddress => to the same netowork
• _Don't_ add a new printer on the Mac
• Look in the Printer Dialog, there will be a "Shared Printers" subsection in the drop-down menu with the remote printer
• Caveats:
  • on some versions of OS X—Panther, I think—you need to enable display of shared printers in Printer Setup
  • firewalls, etc. will get in the way, incosistantly

Re:WHY???

[Overly Critical Guy]

As opposed to the horrible interface inconsistencies of the Linux desktop? As if iTunes' smoothed look is ruining your desktop.

Re:Hasnt anyone tried out the latest Enlightenment

[Anonymous Coward]

No, not really.

sweet jesus

[marcusss]

i wish i could punch this post in the face. Seriously, why the hell would you want to do this? besides the fact that osx is so much sweeter in comparison, kde is just another garbage linux desktop

Kick Ass

[lullabud]

Awesome, that is so cool! I had no idea that something like that was already implemented. I'd been looking for something to solve that problem of securely mounting a remote filesystem from linux terminal, scp was getting tiresome. I can't wait until OS X gets support for this too. Good thing I use both OS X and Debian. :)

But Aqua Man

[Unski]

..you cannot marry a woman without gills.

It's of obvious importance to any geek but I put this in the top percentile of geek-necessity. What would have enticed a pseudo-geek or similarly self-dangerous person such as myself would have been the prospect of running KDE apps themselves within Aqua minus the KDE window manager. Hence 'a woman without gills' would be something along the lines 'KDE apps that run within Aqua minus the KDE window manager'. 'Aqua Man' would be Aqua. It's all straightforward really.

Or I could have Googled it. Dammit, the futility of posting to Slashdot knowing someone will already know that and therefore I should have said nothing, and driven right-by.

I'll tell you why -I- would do it.

[Rimbo]

I "get" to use Windows Explorer (who doesn't?), Konqueror (KDE 3.4) and Finder.app (10.3) all regularly.

I always, always feel like I'm fighting Finder.app. I've tried using every view. I've tried changing options. I've reconfigured the toolbar. It just doesn't do very easily the thing you'd think it would do best based on the name -- find things. One thing that would improve it instantly is a folder tree on the left-hand pane. After three years of daily iBook use, I'd think I'd be getting good enough at doing things, but it always seems like an uphill climb to get what I want.

All three file browsers have (as the default) split panes. The right-hand pane is always a view of files in a particular directory; the left-hand pane is always a place for shortcuts.

Finder.app's left-hand pane is only one thing: A shortcut to mounted filesystems and directories. There is no tree expansion (for rapidly dropping a file into another directory that may not deserve a shortcut -- the spring-loaded files option allows you to do this, but it requires holding that mouse button down for an extended period of time). There are no other kinds of shortcuts.

XP's context-sensitive shortcuts are neat, and you can manually switch to a Folders/History view, although there's a bit of UI inconsistency in how you switch.

Konqueror's left-hand side is consistent and the buttons for switching the view are right where they ought to be. Once I started using it, and the oft-mentioned-on-slashdot protocols (my favorites? man: and info:), I never, ever wanted to go back to Finder.app.

Finder.app is painful for me to use now that I've used Konqueror 3.4. I've tried to make it more Konqueror-like, but it is no Konqueror, and it never will be.

Right now, I feel like KDE 3.4 is the best GUI there is, and Konqueror is the reason. The Mac and XP are about the same overall -- Apple makes up for the suck of Finder.app with Exposé. KDE needs no Exposé; multiple desktops are a different means to the same ends of making limited display space work with multiple apps.

No, KDE on xfree86; also native KDE

[spage]

It's a good article, but it could be summarised in three lines:
1) Install Apple's X server from your OS X CD

No, RTFA. I ran KDE on Apple's X server, but the article recommends installing xfree86 using fink. (And probably should recommend `fink install xorg` to get X11 R6.8 instead of xfree86.)

The really exciting project is native KDE using Qt/Mac instead of Qt on X11. But Ranger Rick's progress on that has stalled while he does a great job maintaining KDE on X11 and a truckload of other projects for Fink.

Wake me up when the OS X interface works on Linux.

[Kazoo the Clown]

I wish they'd spend more time making a worthwhile GUI on Linux. I still use console/svgalib, as KDE/Gnome/X quite simply, sucks. Why these guys are so incessant in preserving "remote desktop" capabilities in a baseline GUI is beyond me. I hate "remote desktop"/"PC Anywhere"/"X Windows" performance. It sucks. Even if we all had guaranteed 100GB network performance, it'd suck compared to a direct frame-buffer based GUI. If I could run OS X on my existing PC hardware, I'd dump Linux for it in a minute. At that point I could forgo any need to dual-boot Windows-- the reason I dual-boot Windows now is NOT for application compatibility-- it's for PERFORMANCE. As long as graphics under GUI performance on the SAME hardware in Windows is so much better than Linux, Linux will remain just a second-class overdeveloped too-many-cooks dependency hell nightmare that only significantly differs from Windows in that it doesn't perform as well and you don't have to pay for it...

Yeah, and I know this is way incendiary-- but thick heads are resistant to reality...

-- You lose your push, when you beat around the bush. -- Don Van Vliet

I'll say it again...

[Albedo039]

I've scanned the threads and I can see that there are a few sane folks out there, but seriously folks what diference does it make? If you are a geek, and have more time on your hands than working folks, and you want to run something other than Apple's UI on a Mac; GO FOR IT. Keep in mind though that people, working people, buy Macs for the (I hate the phrase) "Apple expierience." With that comes a very inovative and reliable (oh I'm gonna get for this) platform for doing REAL WORK. (Do you see the theme here?) Trust me there are lots of ways to skin the whole GUI cat (and GUI the poor thing would be...), but few are as usable and powerfull as OS X. I expect to see the next uproar here be about the merits of having Apple put the Intel Inside logo on the new boxes (.. and Steve Jobs now... F^*K off, we have real work to do here!

Agreed: nice concept, sucky implementation.

[Kadin2048]

I agree, I've always thought this was pretty terrible.

It's so bad that if I have the option of mounting something as a NFS volume or FTP virtual volume in the Finder, or accessing it through 'ftp' using the terminal / CLI, I'll use the CLI every time. Having to type 'put' and 'get' beats the hell out of having my whole system (or at least the Finder) lock and need to be rebooted because the internet connection got dropped, or the server went down, or any number of other things. Plus it just sucks to have to stare at the spinning beachball while it connects to a slow server and wonder whether it's going to connect or keep spinning forever.

Actually, I've found the best and easiest way is just to use 'rsync -avz' to mirror a folder between my server and workstation, and make the modifications to the local volume and then re-sync them when I'm done. I keep the rsync command as a textclipping on my desktop, and when I'm ready to leave at night I just open a terminal window, drop the text clipping into it, hit enter, type my password, and away it goes. No interaction is needed on my part, and the connection shuts down when it's finished.

Plus, if you're using 10.4 and you use rsync between two Macs, you can use the -E switch to copy the resource forks as well as data. Obviously this errors if you're rsync'ing to anything other than another Mac (in which case you lose the resource forks).

Advanced printer prefs in OS X

[Magura]

However, my *biggest* beef with OS X (this is an unrelated plea for help from anyone who knows) is that I cannot find a way to set up remote "raw" printers on OS X

Have you found the "Advanced" option when adding a new printer?

In System Prefs -> Print & Fax, add a new printer (the '+' button), and then the trick is option-click on "More Printers..." and then the top dropdown list in the dialog will have an "Advanced" option. Hitting that will let you choose things like talking to remote LPR queues and more.

Re:Advanced printer prefs in OS X

[swillden]

In System Prefs -> Print & Fax, add a new printer (the '+' button), and then the trick is option-click on "More Printers..." and then the top dropdown list in the dialog will have an "Advanced" option.

How obvious!

Thanks for the tip. I'm going to try it out as soon as I get my print server back (PSU cooked off and took out the mobo...).

Re:WHY NOT???

[Starxxon]

Funny how these days I read those same examples everywhere about Mac OS X interface inconstancies.

Think about it, seriously... These are just changes in the way some buttons and windows look. Do you really imagine people being confused by this? "Oh no! this window has a grayscale gradient on it while this other window as some metal texture! What will I do, what will I do!!!".

Compare that to the web: just about every site uses a different look and layout for buttons, background and content!

Consistency doesn't supersede everything in human interface design. I think that OS X is consistent in the right areas (or at least tries to). I don't want every single app and window to always look the same and use the same set of standard buttons and widgets, that would result in a bland interface, and it would slow down innovation in interface elements.

Re:WHY NOT???

[Aqua OS X]

Ehh, not really, there are actually differences in usability between the window styles.

And as for the web. Well good sites have consistent interfaces throughout the site. And at the very least, the browser doesn't change in appearance for every site.

And why was that not considered funny?

[ACORN_USER]

boom boom.