The Flaming Experience With KDE 4.5
I have time and time again heard that KDE 4.5 sucks badly and KDE only got worse. Well.. i have no freaking clue why people are saying that. In my own experience, i have not had any problems with KDE yet. I may not.. KDE 4.5 runs like a dream for me. It uses less RAM than KDE 4.4, it has faster system performance, it is extremely stable, and everything is still just as easy to use! I dont know why many people are having problems with KDE 4.5, but it may just be my own experience. I have replaced my xfce desktop with KDE on Arch Linux. If you agree with me that KDE 4.5 works quite well, or disagree with that, feel free to comment back! Preferably if you have used KDE long term though...
Thanks- FlamingLinux
What i think Canonical needs to fix in Ubuntu
Canonical has for a long time since October 2004, been working on their Debian based linux operating system, Ubuntu. Well, Ubuntu is the most popular of the linux distributions, but i think it has one big problem. I believe it is the way Canonical is managing the Ubuntu release cycle. When 10.04 Lucid Lynx was released, it nearly had a major GRUB bug in the default install. To me, that is unacceptable for a LTS release. The way i see it, a lot of adjustments should be made. For the October releases (x.10), they should add new features that they want to add to Ubuntu, and in the April releases (x.04), they should make those the bug fix releases since it is in line with the LTS releases every two years. Also, i believe they should work on the LTS releases at least a year ahead of the release. This type of schedule would give Canonical more time to develop the LTS releases and to build on the features they want to implement in the LTS releases.
Also, as an addition, I think they should put in the multimedia codecs and flash and have the LTS releases as paid editions for Ubuntu to help support development, pay for the legal rights to distribute the codecs, and earn a little profit from it. Then, once Ubuntu becomes really stable, I might have faith in it going mainstream again.
Now using XFCE
With all the speculation and consideration that I might be switching to KDE 4.5 next month - and I just end up switching to XFCE instead? Yes, that is true.
But wait a minute... that looks a little like how I had GNOME configured. Thats one of the things I love about XFCE, its lighter weight, however, it packs a huge punch. It uses the GTK Themes that you may have installed in your GNOME configurations, and although you may not see it in the screenshot, I'm using the metacity Window borders by using Compiz Fusion. another thing I would like to mention about XFCE that I like, is they actually pay attention to those who use dual monitors, and have options in simple things like Panels or the wallpaper configuration to either have something on monitor 1, or 2. In XFCE I can set a different wallpaper per monitor, without having to create an image in GIMP. I absolutely love it.
However, I am running into a few small issues here and there. Adobe Air apps rely on KDE or GNOME's Keyring applications, which don't automatically run in XFCE, so I had to set that up to be able to run Tweetdeck in XFCE. Another thing I'm getting used to is the different applets in XFCE panel, especially when I have gotten used to the ones I have used in GNOME-Panel. For example, the default clock applet in XFCE, when you click on it you don't get a calendar where in GNOME/KDE you do. However, there is a way you can put GNOME applets on the XFCE panel, so I might do that for a FEW applets.
So overall, I'm going to try using XFCE for a week or so and see how it goes, and see if I go back to using GNOME or not. Today's question for you all to answer in the comments is: Which desktop environment do you use, and why?
Anyway, thanks for reading Today's post, sorry for not having one Monday or Wednesday, share this post with anyone that might be interested, subscribe to this blog with your favorite RSS client, check back Monday for a new post and have a great Weekend! 
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Fun w/ Synaptic and KDE 4.5
Today's post is going to be me more or less venting a little bit about Synaptic and the Kubuntu PPA. So earlier this week I read about the KDE 4.5 Release Candidate and I decided to give it a little spin. I added the Kubuntu Beta PPA repositories and installed the KDEBase packages, etc. etc.
I guess I should first talk about my experience with KDE 4.5. From the probably 4-5 hours of me using it I can definitely see that this is going to be a release focused heavily on fixing bugs and stability. I noticed a few changes here and there to features, but I haven't really seen any new SIGNIFICANT features in KDE 4.5 RC. I would also like to say that the problems I had previously w/ Audio in KDE 4.x, where if you use a GTK app in KDE it would try to take control of the audio and not let any KDE apps use the Audio, is actually fixed, and I can now actually have the really annoying result of listening to a Youtube video in Chrome and Amarok at the same time, or just simply be able to hear an IM notice from Pidgin or Emesene while listening to music in Amarok. I did noticed a few bugs here and there, since it is a release Candidate, however, the issues I have previously with it have been fixed, and once its finally released next month I will heavily consider going from GNOME over to KDE!
Soo... if you managed to get anything from that mess of a paragraph, you can probably guess that I am still using GNOME for now. So, earlier Today I decided to try and install KVIRC, and this is where the troubles began. The .deb package was looking for older versions of the KDE packages and not the version that indicated it was the Release Candidate, so I just decided "hell with it" and started to remove the KDE packages anyway since I don't plan on using it until the final release of 4.5 anyway. Well, first I removed the repository, and I had to keep going from Dependency to Dependency until I found the one package that was still using the version from the repository. Needless to say, I finally managed to get it removed, but to remove that package it did ask me of one bizarre thing, that I had to remove fglrx. In the end I was able to reinstall my ATI drivers, but that was a bit weird (I haven't rebooted yet, so I hope nothing screws up). In the end I was actually able to install KVIRC, but that did take up about half an hour of my time trying to fix it and find out which packages I needed to remove/downgrade.
In the past 4 years of me having used Ubuntu (off and on of course), this is the first time where removing a repository and downgrading/removing packages from it has really given me any issues like this. But I guess it happens to most people at one point or another.
Oh, and while typing this I just thought of another thing I might do is ask a question at the end of each post in relation to what the topic was, so for example Today's question is:
So, have you had an issue w/ any repositories like that? And have you been able to fix them, find the root of the problem, or did you just say hell with it and reinstall Ubuntu?
Please leave a comment answering the question, or just what you think of the post in general. Also, if you like what I write, please subscribe to me using your favorite RSS reader. Have a great Weekend and Check back for a New Post Monday!
- Tyler J. Brown (Condoulo)
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Lekhonee – A blogging Application for WordPress Blogs
Ok, so the first piece of software I would like to touch upon this month would be the piece of software I've started to use for this blog this month called Lekhonee. There is both a KDE and GNOME version, and the UI is essentially similar on both versions (though I think there may be some favoritism towards KDE). You can easily find Lekhonee in the Ubuntu Software Center/Synaptic Package Manager for Ubuntu!
Lekhonee (Click for Larger Image)
So, to start off with the Basics, Lekhonee's UI is pretty straight-forward. You have an area to input your blog's message, a right sidebar for selecting categories, area to add your tags, and to include a Title. One thing I would like to mention is formatting is kinda limited to a few options, such as bold, Italics, including a link or Image, however, you do have the ability to include HTML formatting as you like. Overall I have to give the UI a 7/10, although it is very straight-forward and easy to use, you do have limited formatting options in the toolbar.
Now some of the not so obvious features of Lekhonee include being able to browse through and edit older posts (Edit > Old Posts), The Last Post (Edit > Last Post), or you can actually upload files as well (FIle > Edit) which I actually just learned about when writing this post.
Now, there have been a couple differences I've noticed between the KDE and GNOME versions of Lekhonee, one of which is how the Categories are selected on the right sidebar. On the GNOME version, if I want to select more than one Category, I have to press Ctrl (like I would in the file manager), while in the KDE version I can just select more than one w/o having to press Ctrl. Its a tiny annoyance and wouldn't prevent me from using the GNOME version of Lekhonee, however, it was a bit annoying when I when from first testing the KDE version to using the GNOME version. Another difference is probably due to the KDE version is ahead in development compared to the GTK version, but the bottom area in the GNOME version where it has the WordPress Tab it just says "For Future Use", whereas in the KDE version I see a button that says "Add Page". Although the button does nothing when pressed, I just found that interesting (as well as the fact that the KDE version had another tab at the bottom that was faded out that had the text "Future Work").
So overall I would have to say that Lekhonee is a pretty good, straightforward application for Blogging using WordPress, although it could use more options, it definitely does the job I need it to do. I would personally give Lekhonee a 8/10.
Anyway, thanks for taking the time to Read Today's Blog Post, Subscribe and Check Back for Friday's Post in a couple days, and tell your friends about my blog as well. Another thing I would absolutely appreciate is Feedback in the comments section, whether you liked the blog post, disliked it, etc.
- Tyler J. Brown (Condoulo)
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