Preparing for Mint to drop the KDE distro

[banjo]

I did not work for the phone company. I don't remember the details of the PDP model numbers. I used the PDP-11's in the lab in grad school. One lab had a PDP-8. Yikes.

I got my Masters degree programming Algol on a Univac 1108.... using Hollerith cards. The Univac 1108 had one's complement arithmetic. When we were programming that beast in assembly language we had to check for two zeroes, positive zero, all 0's, and negative zero, all 1's. One's complement computers had two values for zero.

Anyway, that is enough of memory lane. Didn't mean to hijack the thread.

I might mount kubuntu again to see what it will do. I messed it up last time. I might take a look at Siduction as well, although the last time I tried to install Debian I could not get it done because I had to have internet access in order to download the drivers for the wireless to get the internet access.... a chicken and egg problem that I did not have the time or energy to work around.

Banjo
(_)=='=~

[o-l-d]

After doing a lot of research I think that my new KDE distro of choice will be KDE neon. The developers of the neon project have been quite surprised at the popularity of neon and are quite excited about the future of Plasma across all platforms. No disrespect to users of other non-Debian/Ubuntu based distros. I like the minimal install and being able to install only the programs that fit my personal needs was one of the major factors in my decision.

[sdibaja]

You should be very happy, I wish you well
to each their own

because KDE neon is Ubuntu-based it would be a deal killer for me.

[aes2011]

I like the minimal install and being able to install only the programs that fit my personal needs was one of the major factors in my decision.

I get the impression that KDE Neon is meant to be a showcase for the very latest developments in Plasma, etc. So, to some extent, its users will be testers of new-n-shiny stuff.

It's not clear when KDE Neon will move to being based on 18.04 instead of 16.04.

Another route to an even more minimal system is to start with the (truly) minimal option available at https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Insta ... /MinimalCD and then to add the plasma-desktop and whatever else you need.

Kubuntu 18.04 plans to have another minimal option in which you download the entire Kubuntu iso but then select the minimal option. I don't particularly care for that. See https://www.reddit.com/r/Kubuntu/commen ... 4/dwlndmg/ for a link to what possibly maybe excluded.

[o-l-d]

The developers at KDE neon are indeed planning a release based on Ubuntu 18.04 very soon after the "formal release". The development team is headed by Jonathan Riddell who, as many know, was the lead developer at Kubuntu until he was asked to join KDE full time. I agree that one could download a distro such as Kubuntu and use the "minimal install" option but you still have to download a full installation iso file. I am looking forward to the default action of creating a swap file vs a swap partition that is included in 18.04. These are personal choices and are meant not to influence anyone's decision as which distro is "right for them". If scripts are indeed developed as mentioned here to install KDE on Mint XFCE or MATE then I will also consider returning to Mint. I have tried Cinnamon but was very disappointed with the performance and it DOES NOT like another desktop environment installed with it.

I am not abandoning Mint and will keep vm with the different desktops to continue my experimentation until Mint devs see fit to add a KDE spin back to Mint(if they ever do).

[tovian]

Scratch another option (for me).

This week I downloaded NEON, NixOS, and SolydK and am in the process of trying them out.

The first one I tried, NixOS, has shot itself in the foot with a "Catch-22"...
The live session actually logs into root (at the console) and displays the command to start the GUI. No problem. But after you start the GUI you are still logged in as root. With KDE Plasma-5 running - when you try to start the file manager, Dolphin, it tells you that Dolphin cannot run as root (just as Kubuntu and almost every other distro running Plasma-5). Well, since there is no other user in the live session (without going to a lot of non-permanent bother) I cannot run the default (preferred) file manager in the live session. This means that I cannot even boot a live session on a client computer to manipulate damaged/corrupted files. In summary, I need to run the Dolphin file manager but the distro won't let me.

I may find this with EVERY distro that runs KDE Plasma-5 in its live session, but I had not run across it before.

I do not have the Linux skills to get around this issue, so NixOS is not an option for me.

BTW: NixOS is VERY MINIMAL for those who are interested in that feature.
It reminds me of Kubuntu with no pre-installed programs.

[tovian]

I am looking forward to the default action of creating a swap file vs a swap partition

In days of old (no pun intended ) that was a performance degradation. Having the swap file on a separate partition meant that only swapping action was occurring on that partition - no competition/contention from other activities (the channel, etc. was always free, no queued I/O, blah blah blah). In today's world the impact may be minimal, but almost since the beginning of the swap options inside Windows I have defined a separate partition in order to enhance performance (even if by a very small amount). I wasn't sure that was the reason for a separate swap partition in Linux, but I liked it that way.

[sdibaja]

Good point about the Swap. I will study it more.
swap is controversial... both as a file and as a separate partition. https://wiki.debian.org/Swap
I use it out of habit from days past (and installers always nag me), but it is actually not needed in any of the systems I currently maintain. All have 4 GB or more of Ram (one has 64), and none use Suspend or Hibernate.

SolydXK is a good one, they primarily focus on KDE, and support the Xfce version also.
I prefer Mate, and mixing desktops is messy. The SolydXK developer assisted me in stripping out Xfce after adding Mate, and it worked, but it is still messy.

It will be fascinating to see what xenopeek comes up with by adding Mate to LMDE3 Cinnamon. viewtopic.php?f=236&t=247865&start=80#p1459214

[jaymot]

Bah, humbug. After over a week of tweaking Mint KDE, working around outdated and in some cases semi-broken packages in the repo, and finally getting my system working stabley and properly (mostly) and 99% or the way I want it, I see this thread talking about no more KDE versions of Mint after 18.3. I am less than happy. Time to start all bloody over and go distro-hopping again, maybe. I can't trust Mint not to decide to switch to Unity or some shite and drop all support for any other DMs. I may go wrestle with Slackware, or maybe I'll just shuck Linux entirely and go check out Berserkely Standard Deviation in one of its free permutations. Heck, at this point I'd go back to Windows if it wasn't so insecure and 10 didn't have all the built-in tracking and monetising crap in it. I wish there would have been an announcement on the Mint KDE web page that this would be the last one there is. I'd have thought twice before downloading it and doing all this work, which right now I feel has been days of wasted effort. But not a word was said there. Less. Than. Happy.

I've tried almost all of the window/desktop managers there are, KDE, Gnome, XFCE, MATE, Cinnamon, LXDE, and warts and all, KDE is the best or at least least-bad of the lot, of the somewhat-Windows-like lot anyway (Gnome always reminded me of the old MacOS UI for some reason.) I like the primitive look and feel of MATE and LXDE (they remind me of early days with Linux, and they're simple but work) but they lack some of the functionality that I need (service menus to give me root right-click actions: open terminal as root, open file manager as root, right-clicking on a text file in /etc and being able to edit it as root, for example.)

I've test-driven several distros this month, including Kubuntu (the repository seemed chaotic, like it contained just any old thing whether it works properly or not: anything except half of the apps I need, that is), Manjaro couldn't even recognize my LUKS-encrypted external drive as having a valid file system on it so it went bye-bye, Fedora doesn't have Synaptic and just has their Discover GUI app manager which is similar to Mint's Software Manager except it likes to just run and run and not actually install anything, and I can't even remember the other distros I've tested.

So now I have just a year, after which I'll have to A) keep running an outdated and unsupported Mint 18.3 distro, B) back up, reformat and reinstall Mint again, this time choosing Cinnamon or something else that doesn't meet my needs and that I'm not used to and don't really want, or C) go distro-hopping all over again and settle on something else that doesn't work as well as Mint KDE. Great. Just great.

[chrisuk]

[...]( but they lack some of the functionality that I need (service menus to give me root right-click actions: open terminal as root, open file manager as root, right-clicking on a text file in /etc and being able to edit it as root, for example.)

Like this in Thunar? (the XFCE file manager):

[tovian]

I wish there would have been an announcement on the Mint KDE web page that this would be the last one there is. I'd have thought twice before downloading it and doing all this work, which right now I feel has been days of wasted effort. But not a word was said there. Less. Than. Happy.

It was announced back in (I believe) October. I heard it was in the blog. I missed it, too - but I found out from reading other threads. Your frustration is shared by MANY but not enough to keep the Mint-KDE iso alive. Also, not having been involved with Linux from the dawn of mankind I got my start with KDE. All that I know about Linux is based around my experiences with KDE distros. I'm currently distro-hopping to find a distro with KDE embedded so I don't have to get into the "Roll-Your-Own" game. I may not end up as happy as I am with Mint-KDE, but life goes on (and so will I).

SolydXK is a good one

I know you like Solyd. I've just booted to the live session and am having trouble you may be able to help with...
It says during boot that there is "no output" - I'm totally lost as to why they would do that. Everything seems to be running but the screen is completely blank. I get all the correct windows when I manually start something, but the screen tearing is awful.
Now, if I boot it in "safe" mode I get all the graphics (no screen-tearing) but the output resolution is bad (something like 800x600).
I'd bet all this clears up if I go ahead and install, but I'd also want to use the live session for diagnostics on client machines so it's important that it run properly.
Any suggestions ?

[sdibaja]

I wish there would have been an announcement on the Mint KDE web page that this would be the last one there is. I'd have thought twice before downloading it and doing all this work, which right now I feel has been days of wasted effort. But not a word was said there. Less. Than. Happy.

It was announced back in (I believe) October. I heard it was in the blog. I missed it, too - but I found out from reading other threads. Your frustration is shared by MANY but not enough to keep the Mint-KDE iso alive. Also, not having been involved with Linux from the dawn of mankind I got my start with KDE. All that I know about Linux is based around my experiences with KDE distros. I'm currently distro-hopping to find a distro with KDE embedded so I don't have to get into the "Roll-Your-Own" game. I may not end up as happy as I am with Mint-KDE, but life goes on (and so will I).

SolydXK is a good one

I know you like Solyd. I've just booted to the live session and am having trouble you may be able to help with...
It says during boot that there is "no output" - I'm totally lost as to why they would do that. Everything seems to be running but the screen is completely blank. I get all the correct windows when I manually start something, but the screen tearing is awful.
Now, if I boot it in "safe" mode I get all the graphics (no screen-tearing) but the output resolution is bad (something like 800x600).
I'd bet all this clears up if I go ahead and install, but I'd also want to use the live session for diagnostics on client machines so it's important that it run properly.
Any suggestions ?

"lost in the blog"

I do like SolydXK for being easy to install, not intimidating, and "all set up" like Mint. Their community helped me to transition to Debian (intimidating at first), that I much prefer. Many desktops to choose from, all ready to go. KDE version is robust, Mate is Spartan.

I don't know the solution to your problem, My suggestion: look and ask here> https://forums.solydxk.nl/index.php

[jaymot]

I wish there would have been an announcement on the Mint KDE web page that this would be the last one there is. I'd have thought twice before downloading it and doing all this work, which right now I feel has been days of wasted effort. But not a word was said there. Less. Than. Happy.

It was announced back in (I believe) October. I heard it was in the blog. I missed it, too - but I found out from reading other threads. Your frustration is shared by MANY but not enough to keep the Mint-KDE iso alive. Also, not having been involved with Linux from the dawn of mankind I got my start with KDE. All that I know about Linux is based around my experiences with KDE distros. I'm currently distro-hopping to find a distro with KDE embedded so I don't have to get into the "Roll-Your-Own" game. I may not end up as happy as I am with Mint-KDE, but life goes on (and so will I).

I wasn't here in October. I only started using Mint a week or two ago when my PCLOS started acting up to the point where I needed to reinstall (probably just too much cruft) and I figured as long as I had to reinstall anyway I might as well try other distros and see what's changed in them in the past few years, and found that other than the problems I've had with several of the apps in the repository and the annoyance of sudo making me type my password 200 times a day I like Mint KDE as much as PCLOS.

They need to say something on the Mint KDE web page, otherwise there will be a lot of disappointed and upset people when Mint 18.04 comes out, though I suppose an option that I just remembered would be to install any old Mint 18.4 then install Plasma from the repository. It would be glitchy at first until you've discovered and installed all of the KDE-related add-ons that come with the KDE releases of Mint. (Unless they plan to remove all Plasma stuff from the repository, and I can't see then doing that. Even if they did there are always Kubuntu and Debian repositories available.)

[jaymot]

[...]( but they lack some of the functionality that I need (service menus to give me root right-click actions: open terminal as root, open file manager as root, right-clicking on a text file in /etc and being able to edit it as root, for example.)

Like this in Thunar? (the XFCE file manager):

Yes indeed! That's exactly what I need: the ability to right-click and have choices to do X as root (edit a file,open a new file manager, open a terminal) in my current location. If I can get past my current issue with menus and the taskbar being too small to read due to the small but high-resolution display on my new ultrabook laptop I'll try Mint Xfce. I somehow missed it when I was testing the various live CDs.

[tovian]

Yes indeed! That's exactly what I need: the ability to right-click and have choices to do X as root (edit a file,open a new file manager, open a terminal) in my current location.

I want to encourage everyone who came "late" to this thread to take a few minutes and go back to the beginning - then read the entire thread like a book. There's the usual fluff, but there is also some IMPORTANT information about the future of Mint vis-à-vis KDE - and about KDE itself. The latest as well as future versions of KDE may prevent you from doing what you are wanting to do in many instances - and you probably need to know that now instead of later.

There are also some important differences in the functionality of Wayland vs the X Window system. Some of the things you may be used to doing up to now are going away when distros convert to Wayland. I'm pretty certain that conversion is on the schedule for Ubuntu/Kubuntu and possibly Debian as well.

I cannot describe - I cannot even understand - all of the things I have read about the future of KDE. But, everyone who uses KDE should at least be exposed to that same information so they don't get blind-sided by changes that are on the way.

If you want a little preview Download the current Kubuntu distro and run the live session a few times.

[catweazel]

... KDE may prevent you from doing what you are wanting to do in many instances - and you probably need to know that now instead of later...

I cannot describe - I cannot even understand - all of the things I have read about the future of KDE. But, everyone who uses KDE should at least be exposed to that same information so they don't get blind-sided by changes that are on the way.

You don't understand it so you spread FUD.

[sdibaja]

I see Wayland is already supported by Debian KDE (Plasma 5.4)
someday we will also get it in Debian Mate
https://wiki.debian.org/Wayland

[tovian]

You don't understand it so you spread FUD.

I didn't say the changes were good or bad - just changes from what we are used to. That's not FUD, but you are welcome to disagree.

[catweazel]

You don't understand it so you spread FUD.

I didn't say the changes were good or bad - just changes from what we are used to. That's not FUD, but you are welcome to disagree.

I know you didn't say that the changes were good or bad, but it was unequivocally implied in both of the statements that I quoted that it was bad. And that is FUD.

[tovian]

The whole purpose of getting acquainted with the changes now is to prevent more FUD in the long term. So, I respectfully disagree with you. But I won't go any further with this line - there's little to be gained and potentially a lot to lose. If you must have it "your way" I cave.