News, Tutorials, Howtos for Ubuntu Linux
Just a week since the last release, KDE announced the second maintenance update for the Plasma 6.3 Desktop.
Plasma 6.3.2 added support for fractional scaling with denominator of 120. According to this page, the appropriate denominator for the scale is 120. However, Display Configuration previously only allowed 5% increments. In the new release, it supports setting a scale of e.g., 174.167% (209/120).
KDE announced the first maintenance update for Plasma 6.3 just a week after it was originally released.
As you may know, Plasma 6.3 introduced new feature to resize or move the area of drawing tablet. However, some Linux Distributions are NOT supported due to outdated libinput library. The new release updated the UI to better handle the un-supported cases.
KDE Plasma announced new major 6.3 release today. See what’s new in the release of this popular Linux Desktop Environment.
First, the new Plasma 6.3 introduced “Clone Panel” option in panel configuration dialog, allowing to quickly make a copy of current panel with same settings and applets, and place in one of other 3 screen edges.
Plasma 6.3 Clone Panel
For KDE users on Ubuntu 22.04, meaning KUbuntu 22.04, Ubuntu Studio 22.04, etc, the latest Plasma Desktop 5.27 (5.27.11) now is available to upgrade through PPA.
KDE Plasma Desktop 5.27 was originally released in February. After more than 8 months of work, it has received 9 bug-fix updates and finally made into PPA for Ubuntu 22.04 LTS.
Plasma 5.27 features new window tiling system, that can be enabled “System Settings > Workspace Behavior > Desktop Effects“. It allows to Shift + dragging to tile windows, and Super (Windows logo) + T to edit tiling mode.
The release also features new Welcome dialog, allowing to learn about new features and how to tweak settings, etc, swipe gestures for volume and playback control in Media Player widget, power usage monitor detection for NVIDIA GPUs, new command activate “Do Not Disturb” mode.
For those who to install KDE’s Elisa music player, the official flatpak (containerised software package) is available for most Linux desktops including Ubuntu 18.04 and Ubuntu 16.04.
Elisa is a music player developed by the KDE community that strives to be simple and nice to use. We also recognize that we need a flexible product to account for the different workflows and use-cases of our users.
We focus on a very good integration with the Plasma desktop of the KDE community without compromising the support for other platforms (other Linux desktop environments, Windows and Android).
We are creating a reliable product that is a joy to use and respects our users privacy. As such, we will prefer to support online services where users are in control of their data.
Open terminal either via Ctrl+Alt+T keyboard shortcut or by searching for ‘terminal’ from application launcher. When it opens, run following commands one by one:
1. First install Flatpak framework if not exist (For Ubuntu 16.04, add the PPA first):
sudo apt-get install flatpak
2. Then add the flathub repository:
flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo
3. Finally install the Elisa music player:
flatpak install flathub org.kde.elisa
Once successfully installed, open the music player from application launcher and enjoy!
To remove the Flatpak package, simply run command in terminal:
flatpak uninstall org.kde.elisa
You may also remove the KDE platform runtime (sandboxed) via command:
flatpak uninstall org.kde.Platform
The first bug-fix release for KDE Plasma 5.12 LTS was released a day ago. And it can be installed in (K)Ubuntu 17.10 via PPA.
Plasma 5.12.1 adds a one week’s worth of new translations and fixes from KDE’s contributors. The bugfixes are typically small but important and include:
Kubuntu backports PPA has just built the packages for (K)ubuntu 17.10.
1. Open terminal via Ctrl+Alt+T or by searching for “Terminal” from start menu. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/backports
Type in your password when it prompts and hit Enter.
2. Then upgrade your system to get the latest Plasma Desktop via either Update Manager or command:
sudo apt update && sudo apt full-upgrade
After the upgrade process has completed, and assuming everything went well, reboot your computer.
For non-Kubuntu user, you may first install the kubuntu-desktop package either from Ubuntu Software or by running below command before doing the upgrade.
sudo apt update && sudo apt install kubuntu-desktop
How to Uninstall:
To undo the changes and restore to the stock version of Plasma Desktop in your main Ubuntu repository, purge the PPA via command:
sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:kubuntu-ppa/backports
The Mint Team finally announced the KDE release of Linux Mint 17.1 Rebecca. The XFCE release should follow shortly in the coming days.
Linux Mint 17.1 is Long-Term Support release features KDE 4.14, MDM 1.8, a Linux kernel 3.13 and an Ubuntu 14.04 package base.
For Linux Mint 17.1 RC users, launch Update Manager and install any Level 1 update available.
For Linux Mint 17 users, please wait for a few days while the Mint Team release a new version of the Update Manager to you.
The Linux Mint 17.1 KDE as well as other editions are available for download at the official download page:
And the release note is here.
The KDE Community has just announced the KDE Applications 4.14. The new release offers more software stability, with little emphasis on new and less-proven stuff.
The KDE Community announces the latest major updates to KDE Applications delivering primarily improvements and bugfixes. Plasma Workspaces and the KDE Development Platform are frozen and receiving only long term support; those teams are focused on the transition to Plasma 5 and Frameworks 5.
Changes in KDE 4.14 Applications:
Install / Upgrade to KDE SC 4.14:
KUbuntu Backports PPA has made the packages for Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and its derivatives.
Press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open the terminal. When it opens, paste the command below and hit enter to add the PPA:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/backports
After that, upgrade your system to get the latest applications:
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade
Or run below command if you don’t have Kubuntu desktop environment:
sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop
That’s it. Enjoy!
The latest release of KDE Software Compilation 4.13.2, which was released on June 10, now is available for Ubuntu 12.04 LTS in Kubuntu backports PPA.
According to the changelog, KDE 4.13.2 contains important fixes for Kopete:
Voice calls now works with GMail web plugin, old Google Talk windows client, telepathy-gabble and other Kopete versions. For more details, read the official announcement.
Install / Upgrade to KDE 4.13.2 in Ubuntu 12.04:
Press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open the terminal. When it opens, run the command below to add Kubuntu Backports PPA:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/backports
Then update package lists and upgrade KDE:
sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get upgrade
To install KDE 4.13.2, run:
sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop
To have a minimal installation:
sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install --no-install-recommends kubuntu-desktop
The second updates of KDE 4.13 series was release on June 10, 2014 with more than 40 recorded bugfixes include improvements to Kontact, Umbrello UML Modeller, the Desktop search functionality, Konqueror and Dolphin.
According to the changelog, this release of KDE Applications includes a number of important fixes for Kopete: a decrease in the exit time of Kopete with enabled statistics plugin, a fix for the compilation of jabber libjingle for non x86 architectures and another fix for voice call support in the jabber libjingle library.
Without this last fix, voice calls worked only with the old Google Talk windows jingle client. Now after applying the patches it was tested with GMail web plugin, old Google Talk windows client, telepathy-gabble and other Kopete versions.
Install / Upgrade KDE 4.13.2:
KUbuntu Updates PPA has made this release into PPA, available for Ubuntu 14.04 and its derivatives.
Press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open the terminal. When it opens, run the commands below one by one:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/ppa sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
If you don’t have KDE desktop, install it via:
sudo apt-get install kde-standard kubuntu-desktop
