KDE 4.7.0 Released

jrepin writes "KDE 4.7 releases provide many new features and improved stability and performance. Lots of visual polishing took place with an update to the Oxygen icons, and improved consistency between panel items such as clock and notification areas. The window manager KWin brings a new shadow system and can now run on OpenGL ES supporting hardware, making it better suited for mobile devices. Network management widget is much improved. Navigating through applications and recent files is easier with the addition of breadcrumbs to the Kickoff application launcher. Kontact groupware solution rejoins the rest of the KDE software, with increased stability, better connection to new services and sharing of communication information between more applications. Dolphin file manager has a cleaner default appearance. The menu bar is hidden, but easy to reach and restore. The file searching interface has been improved. Marble the virtual globe now has voice navigation support and a map creation wizard. Gwenview image viewer now offers the ability to compare two or more pictures side by side. Digikam photo management app brings face detection and recognition."

Comments

Quit whining

[pinkeen]

There will always be something that doesn't work as it should or as you would like it to be. KDE 4 is a stable, solid desktop environment. I used KDE as my day-to-day working dekstop since 3.x. I jumped the wagon when they ironed out showstoppers in SC4 and don't look back.

BTW I wonder why there is so much complaining about KDE when it comes to some minor features? Such scale is unseen in windows world. Maybe windows users don't complain so much because ms doesn't care about fixing and improving things anyway? Here you can discuss and have things fixed or even redesigned in a matter of weeks or months.

Re:Quit whining

[RobbieThe1st]

Isn't there an old quote that states that when soldiers stop complaining, they've lost hope(or something like that?

It's exactly that here: With KDE, it's possible to make change happen. Windows? No way!
So, people complain. Because it might get better.

Re:GTK integration?

[Anonymous Coward]

How's that coming?

As a Firefox user who's children love Flash games, that's a /sine qua non/.

Integration of GNOME/GTK+ applications in KDE is very good.

http://kde.org/announcements/4.7/plasma.php

Recognizing the modular nature of KDE software and the ability to mix and match applications from many different sources, KDE has also improved the Oxygen GTK themes, making applications from GNOME (and other applications using GTK+) blend seamlessly with KDE applications in your Plasma Workspace.

It would be fair to say that integration of GNOME/GTK+ applications under the KDE SC 4.7 Plasma desktop is orders of magnitude better than integration of KDE applications under the GNOME desktop of any variety.

Re:GTK integration?

[siride]

Don't forget QtCurve, which I find to be considerably better than the ugly and garish Oxygen theme.

Re:Personal review.

[PeterBrett]

conclusion:

it's pretty but it's not exactly the same as GNOME 2.x so I don't like it, and I can't be bothered to type trivial questions into Google.

FTFY.

Re:Each major release is taking longer

[BlackCreek]

> Also, you say you tried a few releases. my guess is you haven't tries in a year. Which is an enormous amount of dev time. So you maybe should keep trying :)

You see that is what many FOSS devs (specially Linux Desktop devs (specially KDE devs)) don't seem to get.

Trying out a desktop takes time and effort. Most people have better things to do in life than "trying out KDE/Gnome/XFCE/etc every 3/6/12 months" to see which are the latest (mostly useless) desktop new effects and integration gimmicks.