Stroppytux

To all the KDE fans, the fourth major version of KDE has finally been released.

Originally scheduled for release sometime in 2006, KDE 4.0 promises to a major upgrade in the way we perceive our desktop environments.

The new version of KDE, which is based on the QT 4 library by Trolltech increases the speed of the desktop environment by an estimated 20%-30% over previous versions whilst reducing the cpu load and memory footprint.

Some of the new features built into KDE 4.0 include Plasma, a rewrite of kwin, Solid, a new icon set and sound theme called Oxygen, and Phonon.

Plasma

Plasma is a rewrite of several core KDE applications, like the desktop drawing and most notably the widget engine. Plasma allows for a more customizable desktop and more versatile widgets plus the ability to integrate all widgets with each other. eg. drag your clock from the taskbar onto the desktop or integrate applications like Kopete and Amarok directly into the desktop, taskbar, menu.

Oxygen

Oxygen represents a break with the cartoonish look of previous KDE graphics and iconsets, adopting a more photo-realistic style and better sound themes within KDE.

Kwin

Kwin has been remade from the ground up to allow KDE users to use window effects previously only available by installing external applications like Compiz. This includes true transparency, window animations. Kwin also hooks up to the new universal scripting framework (Kross) to allow unpresadented extension capabilities (think plugins).

And to ensure OSX and MS Windows users dont feel left out, KDE 4.0 can now also be installed on OSX and MS Windows.

Tags: gui, kde, kde 4.0, linux

This entry was posted on Friday, January 11th, 2008 at 2:35 pm and is filed under kde, linux. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.