On KDE 4.x.x you can set an image for every desktop (ie. System Settings => Workspace Behaviour => Virtual Desktops => Different widgets for each Desktop). On 5.1.1 this option is gone so every time you change your wallpaper it affects all of your desktops. I searched the option high and low to no avail, simply gone :-( Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: Just try to set a wallpaper on any desktop, it replaces all others. Actual Results: A single wallpaper is set on every desktop. Expected Results: You should be able to set wallpapers on every desktop, this simple things in one the best features in KDE.
yes, the feature has been removed and due to the huge problem and added complexity it gave, is not going back. different workspaces with different containment/wallpaper can be done with activities, and that's what's supported.
>yes, the feature has been removed and due to the huge problem and added complexity it gave, is not going back. Then close the bug.
With all due respect but, "added complexity" ?? Come on guys, this feature is not only a KDE's signature but also present and working fine for many years now. I'm still trying to cope with Activities but sometimes a single image to differentiate every desktop is all you need. Regards.
As of this moment I still have a different wallpaper on each desktop. The "different widgets on each desktop" box exists and is checked. I like it that way. Perhaps if that checkbox is being removed, someone can post instructions on how to achieve that effects as easily as possible using activities and not using any other aspects of activities.
I'm also using different wallpapers on each desktop. If that's gone in 5.x I will not migrate.
I keep updated my Kubuntu 15.04 beta with the hope that maybe they change their minds and bring the feature back. So far, I see no evidence nor intention to do it. Plasma 5.3 (5.2.95) is still not reflected in the official repos and the snapshot doesnt have any option, checkbox, etc. that allows me to set differents wallpapers without using Activities.
According to Reddit user kbroulik: > You want a hacky workaround? Sure. There's now a KWindowSystem QML import which gives you access to the number and name, among other windowing system related information, of the current virtual desktop. You could then write a wallpaper plugin in QML (the image wallpaper is just a simple QML file itself) that stores an image URL per virtual desktop. Profit. So is that possible? Is another wallpaper plugin all it takes? source: http://www.reddit.com/r/kde/comments/2z8ric/any_hacky_workarounds_to_get_different_wallpapers/cpq1l6y
I really cannot add something constructive as it is too shocking sad. I hope someone will re-implement it nonetheless. No different wallpapers anymore, no screensavers anymore - for me KDE's desktop isn't feeling comfy anymore :(.
I haven't found activities to be useful so I don't use them. ButI'm just hoping that by using activities in the right way, one can get the same effect as we have now: a set of desktops each with its own wallpaper. I also use Folder View, so that the same applications show up on each desktop. Is it possible to achieve that effect with activities, I wonder? I'm assuming that this requires using activities in a style not intended by their designers but still possible. Sorry, KDE wizards, but I'm not getting with this program.
I agree with the above comments the wallpaper per desktop option is wanted. It is the ssecond thing I set up on any new installation (after reverting to classic menus). This was a feature of 3.5. If this feature had been considered at the start then you may have got it right. The fact the effort has been spent trying to shoehorn it back into 4 shows how big the demand for it was. I suspect there was no significant survey of users (not developers) requests for features. I understand that many (if not all) developers are volunteers doing the work in their spare time but you will only encourage more people to join in and help if the product also caters for there needs and wants. As others above I don't have a need for different activities but I do use desktop switch all the time and find the different wallpapers useful Please Please Please reconsider
This drop of two of KDE's highlights is desastrous. No communication before removing this with the users is called «überheblich» in German. This should not happen to a team which writes «Community» on its flag. I muss both features and can not find any new features to compensate for this. Until a change, I will continue to use 14.04 LTS and 14.10. 15.04 has already been deleted. I will use this partition to try out non-kde-distros. Also, I am convinced, that Mint and other KDE-competitors are soon jumping on the bandwagon to develop such a possibility. And I tried Activities, but more Desktops is (for me) Miles Better.
I *maybe* could live with not having different wallpapers on different virtual desktops. But not having different widgets on different virtual desktops kills my productivity. Please consider reopening the bug.
Your best bet will be to argue this line with a valid reason. >different workspaces with different containment/wallpaper can be done with activities, and that's what's supported. So far the only argument I've seen is "I don't see a reason to use them" which doesn't stand up as a reason when it solves exactly what you're asking for.
Problems and complexity perhaps for Plasma 5, because before I have always used without problems 4 virtual desktops with different wallpapers and plasmoid in each of them. I can easy memorize every desktop with the custom wallpaper and easily remember plasmoids have there. For example on the desktop 4 I have plasmoids to monitoring hardware and system. It is also much easier to interact between desktops than activities. This is not just cosmetic issue, it's about productivity (as Nikola Schnelle said). To me this is one reason to not move to Plasma 5. So I hope this is really resolved.
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #13) > Your best bet will be to argue this line with a valid reason. > > >different workspaces with different containment/wallpaper can be done with activities, and that's what's supported. > > So far the only argument I've seen is "I don't see a reason to use them" > which doesn't stand up as a reason when it solves exactly what you're asking > for. I'm using desktops instead of activities because in the desktop pager I can see every open window and on which workspace it is. I need to have everything visible to not forget something. How do I know which window is open on which activity wihout peaking? I also use the desktop pager to drag windows to other workspaces (that is to regroup when I feel the need for it or need more place in one area - I ofen move windows that way) and I can easily switch to groups of applications with just a move of the mouse wheel. I see all groups and I can interact between them in an easy visible way. And when I use application windows fullscreen I also use the always visible desktop pager to switch between these applications with the wheel. On every desktop I also have the widgets and a wallpaper that both match the usage of the desktop. The latter can be accomplished with activity but not the usage, the interaction, the visibilty. I totally agree with YAFU, it is not a cosmetic but a productivity issue, besides that it is a matter of comfort. I just feel as lost on activities as I feel lost with too small icons because of bad eyes - and on virtual desktops without unique wallpapers and widgets.
Thanks, that's the sort of feedback I need. To summarise You can't use activies because: - there's no pager - no scroll on desktop to switch Therefore it's not a suitable drop in replacement to achieve the same thing.
*** Bug 347015 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #16) > Thanks, that's the sort of feedback I need. > > To summarise > > You can't use activies because: > - there's no pager > - no scroll on desktop to switch > > Therefore it's not a suitable drop in replacement to achieve the same thing. I would add no screen edge "desktop grid" effect for activities. It would be great if "activity grid" screen edge (hot corner) effect would be available in plasma 5. That way you can easily see all active activities, which window is open on which activity and moving windows from one activity to another would be easy and elegant.
Nikola, this has nothing to do with this bug. We are complaining about missing possibilities to configure each desktop individually.
@David Edmundson, in the next video I show a more complete summary. I also explain some things in the description below the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOLG722muUQ
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #16) > To summarise > > You can't use activies because: > - there's no pager > - no scroll on desktop to switch That's a correct summary for me for not using activities and you can also add the grid as a third reason, as Nikola Schnelle mentioned (I have the desktop overview grid on the bottom screen edge so I quickly can move the mouse some pixel below the pager if I need a bigger overview. Fast access with wheel (over desktop, over pager), instant and permanent overview (pager, grid), easily moving windows between working groups (pager, grid), that's why I use desktops instead of activities; all is in one layer, all is visible, no unnecessary clicks, minimal mouse/hand/finger movements. For me using activities is not "achieving the same thing" compared to desktops. See, let's say I wear sandals because I want to have free toes and heels. And you say that's not supported anymore but you can wear loafers instead, they are a suitable drop in because they also have a sole and you can walk in them and you can even use inserts... I don't need inserts, I need to have free heels... Or when I prefer flip-flops because I can easily slip in and out you cannot recommend sandals because sandals don't allow to slip in and out easily because of the straps ;). For me the grouping of application windows and moving them on the fly (and back) when I temporarily need an application in another context (e.g. dragging browser with graphics tutorial from internet desktop to gimp desktop, then back to internet desktop) is bundled with having different desktop backgrounds and different widgets on the desktops, matching, supporting and even providing the context. With activities I can only have the application grouping and the wallpapers/widgets (let's call it usage) but not the handling. With desktops I had everything, now only the handling remains but not the usage. For productivity reasons you cannot separate both. Different users have different preferred working methods (apart from feeling well requirements).
I am also strongly against this decision. Whilst plasma5 seems to be an improvement in some regards, not having multiple widgets/wallpapers per desktop is one of those things that a) Is easy to use b) Is inituitive. c) Adds a level of "finesse" to the desktop that makes using it more enjoyable. Personally, I can say that the reason that I started using kde4 was that at the time, it allowed transparent wallpapers that allowed compiz to draw multiple wallpapers on different workspaces. If gnome were to support a desktop cube with multiple wallpapers, I would consider switching to it. I suspect that I am not the only one that values a "nice-looking" desktop. Window and desktop management are what is important to me in KDE. KWin seems to finally have gotten its act together. It does everything that I want from it (Except for the fact that keyboard-shortcuts still cannot be triggered by mouse events). Plasma4 seemed to work quite well too. However, the fact that Plasma5 does not allow desktop wallpapers makes my desktop far more boring than it used to be. This is not something critical in the sense that it prevents actual work being done (except for when it causes posts like this one whining about it to be written), but given that the reason I use plasma is that it makes my desktop cooler (and easier to use), the fact that now my desktop is more boring than it used to be is more significant that it seems. Now, as for the question of why activities are not (yet) a replacement for virtual desktops. 1 - They do not allow a way of switching between them that shows all activities and open windows (as far as I know). Having something like this is essential for being able to work on multiple things at once. There is also the psychological factor of "windows simply disappearing" when switching between activities. Maybe it's just me, but to me the fact that virtual desktops can be put onto a "grid" or a "cube" makes me feel like I know where the windows actually "are". Of course, this is completely illogical given that it shouldn't matter how windows disappear of the screen, but the fact that I do not know where my wind wows "are" when switching between activities and I have no way of getting an overview as to which windows are where makes it much more comfortable to use workspaces instead of activities, as I like the illusion of the windows "existing" somewhere in 3d space. 2 - The aesthetic factor. Workspaces have a lot of kwin niceness that activities don't. Switching between workspaces with the cube plugin just looks nice. It's how a desktop *should* look. A lot of work has gone into making plasma look nice. So I don't think this is something only I care about. Of course, there is not reason why activities couldn't get the same kind of treatment. It shouldn't be too hard to create a compositor for activities that allows you to switch between them using a cube animation (though please not some stupid hack that simply takes a picture of the activity and then applies some sort of transformations to it, those days should be long gone). With this goes the fact that changing between activities is very fast, so fast that the closing of all windows in between etc... makes it feel abrupt for me, which is distracting. 3 - Moving windows between activities. Now this goes with point (2). There exists a way to move a window to a different activity. As far as I know, there is no easy keyboard shortcut for this. It doesn't look as nice as e.g. dragging it to a different workspace so one "knows where it is", or having a keyboard shortcut that switches to a different cube side when moving the window. Given these points, activities are not (yet) a replacement for virtual desktops. And I think that this might be a design decision in that they *should* not (in someone's opinion) replace virtual desktops given that virtual desktops are by their nature "close" together and very similar, whereas activities (if I understand correctly) should be more "separate". The "separate" paradigm works for those who want to have several things open that they are working on, with these things strictly separate. I, however, want the ability to quickly (and quietly) change between things that I am doing. The fact that changing between virtual desktops using a cube is continuous rather than abrubt makes this transition less forceful for me, even when there are multiple different wallpapers. I would have nothing against using "activities" instead of virtual desktops if activities had the features (and polish, including desktop-effects) of virtual desktops. However, given that I do not think that reinventing virtual desktops (I feel like virtual desktops are themselves a reinvention of workspaces) is what the plan is, I feel like allowing people to combine the two concepts would give people the best of both worlds. One could even do something like allowing you to bind activities to virtual desktops. This binding could even be non-injective, allowing e.g. 3 virtual desktops to be used for activity 1 and 2 for activity 2. This would create a way of joining activities, whilst allowing them to remain separate for those who would want that. Lastly, I would like to mention that ugly hacks like "make a wallpaper plugin that gets the current workspace from kwin and then use that" defeat the purpose of having multiple wallpapers - having a prettier desktop. I remember hacks like this from the days in which compositors were new. The discontinuity caused by wallpapers switching is so annoying that it completely invalidates the "niceness" of having multiple wallpapers. The same is generally true of everything that pretends to be a compositor by taking still images and then doing something with them. Please don't go this road with plasma. I have nothing against hacks that work like intended (probably the way this issue was dealt with in plasma4), just against hacks that "almost" achieve their stated purpose but not quite. Given that I've spent a paragraph ranting about ugly hacks, It seems fitting for me to propose one: allow plasma wallpaper plugins to draw transparent backgrounds, and get kwin to draw wallpapers. Is this something that could work, or are the plasma devs against something like this? The last time this came up they seemed to be against it, arguing that the wallpaper shouldn't be the job of the window manager. Whilst this may be true, I could imagine that something has changed in the plasma5 libraries that could allow such a wallpaper plugin to exist. Does anyone know whether or not this is the case?
For me, having different wallpapers on different virtual desktops was a *great* feature of KDE, as was having different widgets on different virtual desktops. IMO it certainly helped with productivity. Also these features set KDE apart from the other desktop environments. Please consider reopening the bug.
I applaud the decision to reopen this bug. I just got a new laptop and actually started the installation of 15.04. But I thought better of it, aborted the installation, and went back to 14.10. The "different wallpapers" issue was my main reason, although I've discovered other regressions such as the loss of window numbers in the window list widget.
I'm very glad, that you have decided to reopen this Bug and hope, you will fix it in due course. Thanks for considering our wishes.
Having different widgets on different virtual desktops was very usefull for me so I hope you will bring it back
I'm just about to switch to KF5 (as it becomes more stable), and this issue really stops me. I've been using this feature since my first Linux DE's. Please, bring it back!
Over the years I've tried various Linux distros and always gone back to Windows in the end because something was just too difficult, inconvenient or impossible. When I started using KDE 4 I fell in love with it principally because the different widgets/wallpapers on each desktop was so useful, and I have stuck with it. Now I've upgraded, and that's all gone! Activities are no substitute as has been said because of the inability to use the switchers and overviews, etc.
Thank you for reopening this bug.
I have to concur with all the comments, except with the one that this should be included in 'wish-list'. If it was possible in KF4 and not in KF5 it is a bug by omission.
I have to add my name to those that want and NEED multiple wallpapers
I have used KDE for over 10 years, precisely because it offers customization's in easy and seamless ways - Genome always lacked the finesse and was a pain to configure (often using multiple separate tools) . Virtual Desktop customization as many others have said is a productivity issue. But larger than that, it is one of the few features that truly distinguishes KDE from other desktops. Now I see little difference in KDE from any of the other multitude of available desktop options. I suppose I will be trying out many new desktops now, hopefully one is as beautiful and configurable as KDE used to be.
"But larger than that, it is one of the few features that truly distinguishes KDE from other desktops. Now I see little difference in KDE from any of the other multitude of available desktop options." +1 I'll also try to install XFCE or LXQt in addition to my current Plasma 5 openSUSE system, just to compare. I loved this KDE 4 feature we're discussing here so much that it's been a long time I've not tried any other DE. I've read somewhere that XFCE would allow different wallpapers at least, will see. If KDE don't have this kind of features anymore, for sure a few desktop environments will offer it soon: nature abhors a vacuum, open-source community too. My real problem with this issue is that it makes me so much remember the disappearing of Start Menu in windows 8 when the developers forced their users to follow their vision and preferences. That's why I like Linux and open-source, because I find in it the freedom state-of-mind that I'll never find in the 2 big companies products, indeed. KDE should keep that state-of-mind up, not just for the users but also for the project to don't see them go, it would be so sad. At least this ticket has been reopen, it means a lot: there's still some hope :) Open your 'chakra' (hihi, name of a KDE distro)... having the choice would be the best, just like KDE 4 I'm sure that you'll find a way to make every kind of uses possible with Plasma 5.
I just tried to upgrade to plasma5 from a kde4 . Based on the discussions it appeared to me that if you apply plasma5-session + plasma5-workspace + change /etc/configsys/diaplaymanager to sddm ..everything will go as simple like ...... reboot, select plasma5 and .... voila.... plasma5 ! Oh ! In my case I got a black screen and no way to go back . Lucky of me that I was using a sand-box pc for this ...... smooth test . So, I decided to install a brand new opensuse 13.2 ; Because we were told that OpenSuSE 13.2 has already plasma5 .... "available" I used that route ... : KDE + customize software selection to use plasma5 . After I selected plasma5, I had a strange sense that something is not quiet right ..... default KDE patterns were gone. Finally the install is done, logon on with plasma5 and voila ...... wait a moment it is not KDE is Genome !!!! I was dismayed that everything was ..... GNOME-ish . Logout, login selecting KDE plasma [ ??? ] and I got something that resemble the good-old-kde . Trying to reconfigure [ system settings ] I got one surprise after another : 1. in some options an icon telling me that the settings stopped, ... restart it . So I told myself .... hey this plasma is more windose than a linux 2. workspace appeareance ...... almost all goodies from KDE4 are gone ..... 3. try multiple desktops ...... no way to handle the desktops differently ..... 4. try to see if that option was moved somewhere ..... and I got here .................... Sad to find out that after using KDE for more than 20 years this KDE "5" upgrade .... removees all the goodies that has made made KDE famous . This is very similar to what Coke did with its ..... New Coke .... [ customers unhappy, switches to something else ...] ; The attempt of coming back to the "Classic Coke" did not solve the initial blunder. The developers comments such "yes, the feature has been removed and due to the huge problem and added complexity it gave, is not going back. different workspaces with different containment/wallpaper can be done with activities, and that's what's supported." is scarry . It seems that KDE has stopped being open and has become ..... proprietary . If you don't like the "new" KDE ... bad luck .... what you see id what you get ! Sorry KDE guys ..... If you believe that you are the alpha aand the omega in Desktop Management then is better to close your doors ..... your loyal KDE users will find something else BUT they will never come back . So KDE it is time to decide what to do : design for the users OR design for yourselves . From options point of view, the "new" KDE5 looks like a downgrade of the good-old-KDE4 ! I just started the process to compare other Desktop Managers and decide what to use in the future [ for sure not KDE5 , nor Genome ] In the fairness, many thanks to all who created KDE and nursed it till KDE Plasma 4. For the new KDE5 team , I believe that Ecclesiasts:3 will be something to think about . It seems that for KDE4 the time to die is ...... the release of KDE5 [ aka Gnome-Plasma5 ] What a Pity ! All the best ! ..... Ecclesiasts:3 To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh a time to mourn, and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; A time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.
I have gone back to Kubuntu 14.04 because it's a long-term release and will give me a few years of breathing space. 15.04 as it stands is unacceptable to me because of the lack of different wallpapers on different desktops, plus the weirdness that the window list widget inexplicably doesn't display the window numbers as it does in 14.04. Kubuntu 14.10 is probably a better system than 14.04, but its support expires this month (7/15). The situation reminds me of what happened to Windows Vista -- Windows users shunned it, either sticking with XP until that ship took on too much water, or eventually advancing to Windows 7. Windows 8 has a similar story, though Windows 8.1 made it more acceptable. Windows 10 is looking pretty good -- although of course it's not Kubuntu.
Adding myself in favor of re-implementing different wallpaper and widgets on each virtual desktop. I use it for organization. It is an important feature to me and I'm disappointed to find it missing from Plasma 5.3 after an upgrade from KDE 4.14.
"But larger than that, it is one of the few features that truly distinguishes KDE from other desktops. Now I see little difference in KDE from any of the other multitude of available desktop options." +1 I came here to add my voice to the choir of KDE afficinados who won't feel at home on their own machine with separate wallpapers and different widgets on each virtual desktop voided out. I built my way of working around those features and I'm not going to drop all that and start from nought. And I don't want to be force fed activities. Besides, whenever I want to impress someone and showoff how cool it is to run linux and KDE I turn my mousewheel and run the cube animation of very individual desktops, each with it'ss own folderview and other widgets. Stripping this from KDE looks like self-gelding to me. Fortunately my distro allows me to stay on KDE 4.1x and that's what I will do. Visiting this bug in intervals to check if the time is right to change.
The title of this bug is actually quite reductive since it involves also the issue of separate widgets per virtual desktop. Since, between different threads, we're actually not so few, I'd suggest to converge all to one thread, either this (but change the title) or #343246. I link other threads talking about this: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=348493 https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=349486 https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=343246 https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=155150 (it is quite peculiar that the very same issue happened in KDE3 -> KDE4 migration)
The whole time I've used KDE4 I have had about 4 desktops and one of them has a weather widget on it (called "yawp").. Occasionally I switch to that desktop really fast to see things like temperature or forecast for tomorrow.. But I only need it on one desktop, not all of them.. I don't want it to interfere with my main desktop wallpaper.. If plasma5 is unable to do some thing so basic and integral as remembering which widgets and wallpapers you had on which specific desktops (which plasma4 could do flawlessly) then it almost feels like plasma5 isn't an upgrade, but a downgrade.. Feels like a goldfish is trying to remember my settings, and can only remember only 1 single wallpaper and 1 single set of widgets no matter how many desktops I have (possibly up to 20).. It is like some one showing you their wardrobe, but when they open their closet, they have 100 of the exact same shirt, 100 of exact same pants, and 100 of the exact same pairs of shoes.. Any one's natural reaction would be "Why the hell are all of your clothes exactly the same??"
You stated months ago, that the question is reopened. WHEN do you have a defintive decision? Thanks for an answer as soon as possible.
When there's time.
Well, this is really helpful. Do you really think this is good policy for arguably the worlds best desktop environment, having a feature you close without any common discussion among the users and then when opposition emerges not informing about progress? You make me feel to play the Kohl-trick: no decision and sit it out until it gets forgetten.
I didn't close it in a way that blocked comments. If I had wanted to that, I would have explciitly done so. If you must know; I brought this up at Akademy. I proposed a solution which would merge the activities and virtual desktops, in a way that solves this giving everyone what they want. It wasn't met with a very positive reaction; but I might do it anyway. If you want this fixed, help triage some of the other bugs, and then we can all get some more time to work on this.
Yes, merging activities and virtual desktop is a good idea. As a user, I never understood why two such similar concepts exist.
Plasma 5.4 is being "cooked" right now. Any hope a change could be introduced regarding this issue? Thank you.
I am holding back on openSUSE 13.1 for now, refusing to upgrade, because I have built my entire workflow around having different widgets and different wallpapers on each desktop, plus on having the cube and the pager, and I am severely irritated by the prospect that I will have to try to redesign my methods of working and then go through a retraining curve on my instinctive and automated methods with the hope I will again reach the level of production I am at now once I am forced into the "new" methods. My way of working with the desktops is now deeply ingrained. Changing it now would be the same as if the hardware manufacturers suddenly switched the relative positions of every key on the keyboard and used a unique keyboard connector so that everyone is forced to learn the new positions of the keys. As a high production touch typist for 45 years, such a move would make me extremely furious. This issue is about serious production for some of us. Fix it!
I support Fraser-Bell's words 100%. It is now nearing 8 (eight) month since this bug has been arised. If you are not prepared to fix it really soon and give us a clear indication of finishing that job, you betray a large part of keen KDE supporters and users. My last properly working system is now Kubuntu 14.10 which has no support any longer. This is more than just totally unacceptable. Do you really want a million of users to go back to Windows? Not that it would offer this feature, but of contempt to your behaviour. Fix it! With all due haste and as a first priority.
(In reply to Arran from comment #47) > Do you really want a million of users to go back to Windows? Not that it > would offer this feature, but of contempt to your behaviour. Just tested Win10 today and was so suprised to see that they've added the multiple desktops feature, so they copy Linux at least on this point. It will not take so much time to find a freeware that will allow scrolling-switch or screen-corner accessible grid. For sure I will not go back to Windows for sooooo much reasons that will be too long to list here, and Win10 adds some to the list (f***ing M$ store + all the integrated apps that you can't remove without tweaking the whole Earth, for example). Anyway without the separately managed desktops feature the mess is huge. Ok I follow opinions here about diff wallpapers but the most important for me remains the different widgets on each desktop. I agree everything said here about productivity compared to activities like the desktops grid, scrolling switch, pager, hey guys it's a so cool feature. How can you create such genius things without seeing yourself that it's one of your strength to end-users? Unfortunately I'm not skilled enough to be admirative on the code lines that KDE teams have optimized here and there, maybe it's wonderful but I can't see it ;) From my pov even if Plasma5 is less stable, has problems with some (many ?) systray icons, lacks some useful systemsettings menus present in KDE4 but I'm sure everything will be improved. Version 5 is young after all, I could find workaround for most of my issues, and I could be patient before seeing this changes coming, no prob... BUT please give us our so cool KDE desktops back in a hurry! I had to go back from openSUSE Tumbleweed to 13.2 just because of this, even my issues with gcc5 were acceptable compared to the absence of our dear desktops. No, no way for me to go back to Windows, lol. But I have to admit that I've recently visited the Cinnamon/Mint community websites more than I ever did before. But I still want to believe that those changes will not be planned for 2016 or 2017, even if I very respectfully understand the lack of time from volunteer developers working on their free time. Free time means "nothing else more important to do in real life at that time" and it's as hard to find as gold sometimes ;)
"Do you really want a million of users to go back to Windows?" Very sorry. Forgotten to say: when you have tasted the open-source, community driven, free and good state-of-mind feelings provided by the Linux project, do you think one second about switching to Windows? Really? xP
FeniX No, not really. But as a threat is looks good. My problem is, I am too dependent on KDE, my bookkeeping is based on KMyMoney, my satellite TV runs with Kaffeine, all my music hangs on Amarok, i am trying to understand KDE's Office Suite to get rid of LibreOffice, I browse about 50% with Rekonq, my pictures are stored with digiKam, and so on. I am nover 70 and really do not want to start with all this at zero once more. We here in Scotland learned in the last two years, what peoples power can achieve. The whole «class public» has, or has to, learned to listen to what the people want and not what the politicians want. The result at the last General Election was really telling: from a total of 59 seats in the London Parliament, 56 went to the only party who interacted intensively with the people, the other three parties made each just 1 single seat. KDE can and must also learn from this lesson, sitting in a glashouse without LISTENING to its clients, users, fans, whatever will lead slowly but surely to a great decline.
Good example. So true.
For many years now, whenever there's a new OS release or a new desktop comes out I try the new desktop, set up multiple desktops, go to set different backgrounds on different desktops, and then switch right back to KDE. I'm another person who can't understand why we need both features. How about adding a pager for activities, allowing us to switch off the weird animation where the windows appear and then the background slides in behind them, and changing the name to Desktops?
Awesome that this has been reopened. Thanks for that. I for one don't want to see multiple desktops and activities merged. I think multiple desktops is a concept that is simple and intuitive. Please don't take that simplicity away by making us jump through a bunch of activities hoops. I assume that the KDE devs like activities (else why would they be there) but there are so many of us users that rely on the virtual desktop system for productivity. It would be a shame to make this unnecessarily complex just for the sake of combining it wit activities. Virtual desktops and having different wallpapers/widgets on each should be a standard feature that stands on its own and doesn't need activities for it to be accomplished. It should just be part of the way the desktop works.
(In reply to Arran from comment #47) > Do you really want a million of users to go back to Windows? Not that it > would offer this feature, but of contempt to your behaviour. Not much of a threat, really. Most of the Devs, and most Linux users, do not care at all if you -- or I, or anyone else -- "goes back to Windows". Such threats do not help the objective of trying to get the point across that some of us have our productivity and workflows deeply entangled in this feature and that losing it is a disaster. We are appealing for help from talented Volunteers who are not making a fortune through sales of this free product. We simply need them to understand that this is no small "bug" to us, but is instead a huge problem and a severe kick backwards with KDE.
(In reply to Danny Tamez from comment #53) > ... I for one don't want > to see multiple desktops and activities merged. I agree. Keep the separate widgets & backgrounds feature in desktops for those who prefer it. There are also many who like activities, so keep that for those who want it. That will take KDE back to the "Freedom" it spouts on the home page.
What if we got rid of virtual dsktops entirely, replaced them with activities. Put activities in pager, and make screen borders switch activities, along with all "desktop switch" animations. Would this work? Is it even feasible?
(In reply to Danny Tamez from comment #53) > Awesome that this has been reopened. Thanks for that. I for one don't want > to see multiple desktops and activities merged. I think multiple desktops > is a concept that is simple and intuitive. Please don't take that > simplicity away by making us jump through a bunch of activities hoops. I > assume that the KDE devs like activities (else why would they be there) but > there are so many of us users that rely on the virtual desktop system for > productivity. It would be a shame to make this unnecessarily complex just > for the sake of combining it wit activities. Virtual desktops and having > different wallpapers/widgets on each should be a standard feature that > stands on its own and doesn't need activities for it to be accomplished. It > should just be part of the way the desktop works. How very true.
I endorse the comments others have made, and deplore the decision to reduce the capabilities of Plasma 5 by dropping a useful and popular facility. I find multiple desktops with varied characteristics simple and intuitive to use, and am less happy with activities. I ask that they be allowed to coexist, or to be merged in a way that allows the best features of both to be accessible.
This is the single issue that has kept me from switching to plasma5 Activities are NOT the same as virtual desktops. I look forward to once again being able to tell everyone once again that KDE is the desktop that allows users to work the way they want.
At least the powers that be have reopened this bug. Does anyone here have a sense of what it would take to get our "different wallpapers" back?
Code wise: Main class in ShellCorona plasma/workspace/shell/corona.cpp has a list of containments this class takes that list and puts the right one on the right screen/activitiy Currently there's a multi layered map with screen -> activity -> containemnt this needs to become screen -> activity-> VD -> containment Containment.cpp needs to track number of virtual desktops changing and delete views / create views / create containments as appropriate. DesktopView.cpp is to be on all Virtual Desktops. That would need turning off, but that's a one liner. That's currently super tricky as that class is super fragile; it's all based around QScreen which we want, yet we needed to get a signal that was broken in QScreen so it's a combo of two different screen managements systems - which get updates are out of sync \o/ We've fixed that in Qt , but we're not getting that till Qt 5.6. Then that class can half in size. Dashboard would probably need some tweaking. Politics Wise: One dev says he doesn't want this feature saying "activities cover it" which I would agree with if we made an effort on making activities not suck. Personally, I want to kill activities and virtual desktops being two separate things as right now it's a mess. Taking the best of both. Not everyone is on board, and I don't want to just pull rank.... but dunno Also please stop wtih the "me too comments", especially the snarky ones. That'll just put anyone off from working on it.
Thank you David for the thorough explanation and thanks to you and other devs for your work. The activities as a task-driven way of customizing your workspace can be useful but I am not convinced of them being a container for many identical VDs and that you switch the whole activity with another one. Probably this already came up, but this concept is the one that for me seems reasonable: Activity as a one-desktop setup, which it actually currently mostly is: you can customize bg, widgets, folder and other things, just like now. You do not have VDs inside an activity. Instead, VDs are orthogonal containers and you can attach and change activities per each VD. So you can have N VDs, and attach and switch activities on each one separately. So you can end up with some VDs being same activity, and others being different. You can add new VDs or delete them as needed. It would be like having a variable (horizontal) stripe of VDs and each VD showing one element of the (vertical) stripe of activities what do you think? Thank you, Loop
I am happy to see this bug re-open. Having removed the capacity to have different plasmoid on different desktop has a funny effect in plasma5 that the dashboard is ... totally useless since it is not possible to put any plasmoid on it (at least not different that the one on the desktop). I didn't like the activity as it was presented for plasma5 because it was just the same way than gnome is presenting their own activity so why using a half backed system which will be a copy of another one more stable and more mature? I am waiting for this feature to be back and also to have the panel to be recover by a window (and rise correctly) before leaving kde4. Thanks to try to keep our beloved KDE as it is : different.
Plasma 5.4 is released and no changes, no news :(
Please allow for different widgets / desktop wallpapers (per the original bug description) for Plasma 5. I would not have installed Plasma 5 if I had known about this in advance. Now I have to uninstall this and reinstall KDE 4. This is a productivity feature and the sole reason why I prefer KDE to any other DE. I use the same computer for work, play, uni, and creativity, etc. For work I set a folder view to my work folder and it has neutral (non-offensive or distracting, e.g., muted colours) wallpapers. My netbook uses a netbook view on my main virtual desktop and a desktop view for my transparent terminal virtual desktop, my school desktop is a folder view linked to my uni files and a terminal window and links to the apps I use for school, and my play folder is a desktop view with my "fun" wallpapers and widgets for music/video etc. My set up allows me to focus easily when I need to and to only have to customise my desktops once. I have tried activities before and I find them unintuitive and a bit of a time vampire. I think Plasma 5 looks great and I look forward to using it in the future. I hope that the dev team will be able to restore this feature. Now off to uninstall.
just one question: Will they include otion: different graphical components for each desktop ?. I do not speak of activities. I wonder if I have to go looking for another desk. (simply say that is my favorite KDE desktop and use from KDE 1 but need that option). PS: I am not speaking Spanish and English, translators use. Thank you
@Diego, comment 66: If you find another desktop environment with that feature please share. But i guess you won't, that was, besides the gazillion configuration options (alas a lot of them gone too) THE feature of the KDE desktop, the one that made this desktop environement really outstanding. Therefore I really hope it will be reimplemented because Plasma 5 is still a nice desktop environment though not that outstanding anymore. @Comment 56: That would mean activities would become virtual desktops ;). Fine for me, if they behave like virtual desktops I don't care about the name. I just want to have different wallpapers and different widgets for my virtual desktops and maybe a different set of widgets for the dashboard (which for me is useless without a different widget set) and I just wan to switch between those virtual whatsovevers with a slight move of the mouse wheel over the desktop and over the pager and I also want to move windows from desktop to desktop via the pager.
@Jane, I know no other desktop as good as KDE, so I use it because for me it is the best, and I am using it since the first version, what happens is that Plasma five are several steps back. I use different funds for different things and different on every desk widge. I do not understand is how KDE remove things and ignore what users need. We are asking them to return these features and see how plasma 5 pull version new but not returning the two options that all claim (funds from various desktop and widge disitntos on every desk) say they give a lot of mistakes, because in my case I assure you it works very well and I have no problems. I'm really looking forward is to return these options. And if they do not return anyone to take a fork of KDE 4. It's that simple. It is a pity that KDE ignore the needs of their users, whether to the best of us forget that we move from KDE and seek another option. I do not think what others use me for that already imposed are other software companies. We only ask to rejoin those options. but I ask is that we are clear and meet us: they will re-incorporate or will move us? because the life of KDE 4 has an expiration date. Regards.
I would really like the different wallpaper/widgets per virtual desktop, and I do use Activities a lot - they are just different things. In my work, it is common to have several visualization tasks, related to different projects. I also very often need to have Eclipse IDE and SQL client windows. Having all of these on the same screen just does not work, and I used to have several different virtual desktops, one for the queries, one for the development, one for the results and another for the servers terminal windows. Different widgets, icons and similars were common for me at each virtual desktop. That was my configuration for one activity, and then I'd have several different activies for different stacks, and a separate activity for stuff like email, messengers, etc. The whole thing would have over 20 different screens, and having each with its own look and customized widgets was a major productivity booster, as I configured shortcuts for very quickly navigating between desktops and activities. With this design decision, all this is gone now. I don't see how I could do that with only activities or only virtual desktops. The major thing which made me choose KDE was that it had both. That is now gone for me, and I don't know if I'll stick around Kubuntu anymore if it does not come back.
Created attachment 94828 [details] Highlight current desktop in Virtual Desktop Pager I use virtual desktops because they are reliable, have just enough features but not too much, and they are really easy to setup and use. To maneuver I use the mouse wheel (Vertical-Scroll). I have the Virtual Desktop Pager in a Panel on the lower right-hand corner with "Shows Desktop" enabled. The main reason I use different desktop wallpaper is to quickly identify which desktop I am currently on... without further action or thought. This could also be achieved if the Virtual Desktop Pager distinguished the *current* desktop from all others, perhaps with a customizable background color. For example, please see the image virtual-desktop-pager.jpg. Whichever desktop is returned by "qdbus org.kde.kwin /KWin currentDesktop", the Pager would visually indicate it is the current desktop that is being viewed on the screen. Currently if no application is running on any desktop or applications are minimized all Virtual Desktops on the Virtual Desktop Pager look the same.
I'll throw my 2 cents worth as a general FYI. Like many people here, I (and my coworkers) kept using KDE 4.1X due to missing KDE 5.x feature (This issue, chief among them). In the last couple of weeks we moved the bulk of the KDE 4.12 machines to KDE 5.4 (due to Fedora 21's pending EOL), moving many users to activities. On the up side, once you get used to it, activities behave more-or-less like v.desktops, its fairly easy to setup different widgets/wallpapers per activity and keyboard switching is fairly easy.. On the down side, activity switching is measurably slower than v.desktop switching and the lack of activity pager is a *major* pain in the back side. All in all, activities is an acceptable alternative to "different wallpaper/widgets per v.desktop".
(In reply to Gilboa Davara from comment #71) > On the down side, activity switching is measurably slower than v.desktop > switching and the lack of activity pager is a *major* pain in the back side. Exactly. > All in all, activities is an acceptable alternative to "different > wallpaper/widgets per v.desktop". Without pager, and without automatic session restore (automatic native app restart, even when app versions increase after updates), and with the littering of its config files directly in ~/.config (rather than ~/.config/ksomething-or-other), no, it's not. And, the whole of K*5 is an immensely slower and bigger resource consumer than KDE3 and TDE.
(In reply to Gilboa Davara from comment #71) > I'll throw my 2 cents worth as a general FYI. > Like many people here, I (and my coworkers) kept using KDE 4.1X due to > missing KDE 5.x feature (This issue, chief among them). > In the last couple of weeks we moved the bulk of the KDE 4.12 machines to > KDE 5.4 (due to Fedora 21's pending EOL), moving many users to activities. > > On the up side, once you get used to it, activities behave more-or-less like > v.desktops, its fairly easy to setup different widgets/wallpapers per > activity and keyboard switching is fairly easy.. > On the down side, activity switching is measurably slower than v.desktop > switching and the lack of activity pager is a *major* pain in the back side. > > All in all, activities is an acceptable alternative to "different > wallpaper/widgets per v.desktop". I'm glad that it is working our for you (aside from the *major* pain you mentioned). I have not been able to make that switch and respectfully disagree that it is an acceptable alternative. I've tried activities many times and it's just not as elegant, quick, useful or flexible for me and the way I work. And without the different wallpapers and widgets I find I end up using fewer desktops and everything ends up crowded or lost. I'm still holding out hope as the bug has been reopened. Maybe there is a chance we'll get this great feature back - I sure hope so! Without it I feel like I'm using one of those other operating systems I've always felt sorry for since they were missing out on all these cool features.
Here we are again calling options include: graphics components other on every desk. Not to mention activities, we know that are wonderful for some. But for many users it is wonderful: graphics components other on every desk. Just hopefully incorporate again we ask, "different graphics components on every desk" we are many users who demand this option.
Different Wallpaper on every desktop!!!!!!!!!!! +1
(In reply to Gilboa Davara from comment #71) > On the up side, once you get used to it, activities behave more-or-less like > v.desktops, its fairly easy to setup different widgets/wallpapers per > activity and keyboard switching is fairly easy.. > On the down side, activity switching is measurably slower than v.desktop > switching and the lack of activity pager is a *major* pain in the back side. If you feel like experimenting (and can build stuff) you can try https://quickgit.kde.org/?p=scratch%2Fmart%2Factivitypager.git it's just that: a pager that uses activities
(In reply to Marco Martin from comment #76) > (In reply to Gilboa Davara from comment #71) > > On the up side, once you get used to it, activities behave more-or-less like > > v.desktops, its fairly easy to setup different widgets/wallpapers per > > activity and keyboard switching is fairly easy.. > > On the down side, activity switching is measurably slower than v.desktop > > switching and the lack of activity pager is a *major* pain in the back side. > > If you feel like experimenting (and can build stuff) you can try > https://quickgit.kde.org/?p=scratch%2Fmart%2Factivitypager.git > it's just that: a pager that uses activities Thanks. I'll give it a try. - Gilboa
Different Wallpapers and widgets per virtual desktop is a feature I used rather heavily on kde4. Switching virtual desktops is one of the easiest ways to switch between arrangements of a few windows, if you have a small screen. I usually used the wallpaper as a hint, on which desktop I currently was and would use one desktop with a few folder views to open files and a different desktop, if I was compiling one of these projects and entertaining myself, while keeping a watch on cpu and ram usage as well as the compilation output via widgets. I really liked this setup and activities are not really a solution to this. I can use those, if I want to switch to a different workflow, like graphics editing, gaming or browsing. Virtual desktops are more about arranging my windows. Nonetheless are different widgets and especially different wallpapers a useful feature, that I really miss. If someone makes the effort and implements it, I will really be grateful!
On Friday evening one of my best friends visited me. One and a half year ago he changed the PCs of his family with my help from MS Windows to OpenSuSE 13.1/KDE like ca. 20 friends of me did too in the last 2 years. He asked me, if it would be difficult to upgrade the Distro when the support for OS 13.1 will stop. Therefor yesterday I decided to take a first look at the new OpenSuSE 42.1 beta Version. After installation everything seemed to be ok. But then I tried to setup my different desktops like I always do and recognized the missing of "different widgets.../unterschiedliche Miniprogramme...". After asking Googgle about this I read in several threads that it should be a WONTFIX. This really shocked me, because this feature is my primary reason for using KDE. And not only for me. Half of the persons from above made their decision because of watching me working with the different desktops/workspaces. Later I phoned some of my friends and told them about it. They were not less shocked like me and asked me what to do. I told them that it would be enough time until the support for the KDE 4 versions will end. Enough time for me to create a (perhaps xfce-based) workaround, if the developers of KDE won't change their decision to delete this feature. It would mean, like we say in german: KDE ade! Please, my dear KDE-Developers: Think, what you are trying to do to us! Please, think! P.S. The activity-feature won't be a solution for me and the others. It's usefull for SmartPhones but not for the PC-Desktop. Never!
(In reply to Marco Martin from comment #76) > (In reply to Gilboa Davara from comment #71) > > On the up side, once you get used to it, activities behave more-or-less like > > v.desktops, its fairly easy to setup different widgets/wallpapers per > > activity and keyboard switching is fairly easy.. > > On the down side, activity switching is measurably slower than v.desktop > > switching and the lack of activity pager is a *major* pain in the back side. > > If you feel like experimenting (and can build stuff) you can try > https://quickgit.kde.org/?p=scratch%2Fmart%2Factivitypager.git > it's just that: a pager that uses activities i 've tried it and it's working. Is it easy to implement number of rows and effect switching like vd pager ? Thanks.
> i 've tried it and it's working. > Is it easy to implement number of rows and effect switching like vd pager > ? > Thanks. Number of rows should be easily implementable, a switching effect is instead a bit more difficult/less likely
Hello, I am disappointed that the team kde is removed the ability to have a wallpaper workspace because by this customization allows memorizing easier location of open windows. I personally use four virtual desktops associated with 4 wallpapers representing each of the 4 seasons; so I can open kontact in spring, summer dolphin etc. The removal of this possibility seems to me to be a regression that will complicate my life and for the first time since I left w ****** for linux. I think it would be better to delete the dashboard which seems to be of no utility. Perhaps the dashboard of Gnome Shell could inspired changes to Plasma5: a new dashboard, providing a tab "workspaces" showing a stack of virtual desktops and a statement of the open windows on the current desktop and an "activity" tab, could improved man-machine interface and user productivity ? I hope soon regain the ability to customize my interface a little better, because I remain very attached to kde, and I should be sorry that it continued to move in the wrong direction as to convert me to the worship of Gnome! regards Olivier
Hello, I am disappointed that the team kde has removed the ability to have a wallpaper per workspace because by this customization allows memorizing easier location of open windows. I personally use four virtual desktops associated with 4 wallpapers representing each of the 4 seasons; so I can open kontact in spring, dolphin in summer etc...For me it is a simple and elegant mnemonic way to use many windows on multiple virtual desktops. The removal of this possibility seems to me to be a regression that will complicate my life and this for the first time since I left w ****** for linux. I think it would be better to delete the dashboard which seems to be of no utility. Perhaps the dashboard of Gnome Shell could inspired changes to Plasma5: a new dashboard, providing a tab "workspaces" showing a stack of virtual desktops and a statement of the open windows on the current desktop and an "activity" tab, could improved man-machine interface and user productivity ? I hope soon regain the ability to customize my interface a little better, because I remain very attached to kde, and I should be sorry that it continued to move in the wrong direction as to convert me to the worship of Gnome! regards Olivier
(In reply to Olivier BELLEUX from comment #84) > Hello, I am disappointed that the team kde has removed the ability to have a > wallpaper per workspace because by this customization allows memorizing > easier location of open windows. > > I personally use four virtual desktops associated with 4 wallpapers > representing each of the 4 seasons; so I can open kontact in spring, dolphin > in summer etc...For me it is a simple and elegant mnemonic way to use many > windows on multiple virtual desktops. > > The removal of this possibility seems to me to be a regression that will > complicate my life and this for the first time since I left w ****** for > linux. > > I think it would be better to delete the dashboard which seems to be of no > utility. > > Perhaps the dashboard of Gnome Shell could inspired changes to Plasma5: a > new dashboard, providing a tab "workspaces" showing a stack of virtual > desktops and a statement of the open windows on the current desktop and an > "activity" tab, could improved man-machine interface and user productivity ? > > I hope soon regain the ability to customize my interface a little better, > because I remain very attached to kde, and I should be sorry that it > continued to move in the wrong direction as to convert me to the worship of > Gnome! > > regards > Olivier I 'm using this : "https://quickgit.kde.org/?p=scratch%2Fmart%2Factivitypager.git" from Marco Martin. With 4 activities, one virtual desktop and 4 different wallpapers, it's perform like virtual desktops. The main difference is that i can't select the number of rows ( lightly too big in the dashboard), and the desktop effect when switching. (Sorry for my english i'm french) regards.
(In reply to eddy.pilon from comment #85) "The main difference is that i can't select the number of rows ( lightly too big in the dashboard), and the desktop effect when switching. (Sorry for my english i'm french) regards." And that's the main reason why this 'workaround' can't ever substitute the free configurable workspaces. I wonder why the KDE developers didn't delete the desktop cube too. It seems to be absolutely useless now. Like dozens of users described it before: paging/spinning cube by mousewheel, recognizing the right workspace by the different wallpapers. It's fast, it's exact, it's elegant, and last but not least soooooooooooo awesome. And KDE was the only DE, that offered it. For more than 10 years I didn't need to ask me what DE I should install. Now I don't know at least one DE, that could be he right for all machines I use. For the older machines xfce could be a solution, but for the others, which I use as Cinema or Music Machines with SoundVisualization? It's a real desaster, i'm sure, not only for me. With exception of the beginning time with OpenSuSE 13.1 I noticed a little problems (f.e. plasma desktop loss) with the feature (diff widgets), but only for a short time. It worked on 7 PCs, on older hardware as good as on newer - the oldest is a medion pc (32bit), the newest a packard bell easynote_lx86-jp-215ge. Delete the dashboard like Oliver Belleux wrote in comment 82, or the activities, I won't ever use them on a PC. It's not important to have different wallpapers an d widgets alone - the switching between them is the point, that decides the useability. For me this works best with the cube. Sorry for my bad english, too. I'm german.
@David Edmundson, you seem to be the only KDE dev to have responded (sorry if I've missed the others). Thank you for that, and thank you that this bug has been reopened! Is there anything we can do to help with this getting done? You mentioned triaging bugs and the like. I know we're all busy people with full time jobs and responsibilities but if it would help I get the feeling many of us would be willing to pitch in when/where we can. This is obviously a big pain point to many of us and we really want to see it resolved. What can we do? and has there been any further discussion amongst your fellow developers on this? Thanks again!
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #61) > Code wise: > Main class in ShellCorona > plasma/workspace/shell/corona.cpp has a list of containments > > this class takes that list and puts the right one on the right > screen/activitiy > > Currently there's a multi layered map with screen -> activity -> containemnt > > this needs to become screen -> activity-> VD -> containment > > Containment.cpp needs to track number of virtual desktops changing and > delete views / create views / create containments as appropriate. > > DesktopView.cpp is to be on all Virtual Desktops. That would need turning > off, but that's a one liner. > > That's currently super tricky as that class is super fragile; it's all based > around QScreen which we want, yet we needed to get a signal that was broken > in QScreen so it's a combo of two different screen managements systems - > which get updates are out of sync \o/ > > We've fixed that in Qt , but we're not getting that till Qt 5.6. Then that > class can half in size. > > Dashboard would probably need some tweaking. > > > Politics Wise: > One dev says he doesn't want this feature saying "activities cover it" which > I would agree with if we made an effort on making activities not suck. > > Personally, I want to kill activities and virtual desktops being two > separate things as right now it's a mess. Taking the best of both. Not > everyone is on board, and I don't want to just pull rank.... but dunno > > Also please stop wtih the "me too comments", especially the snarky ones. > That'll just put anyone off from working on it. Dear David! Did I understand correct that the problems with the vds depend on problems in qt5.6? Does that mean that it is also a problem of the developers of qt? Although I wrote programms in Assembler on the 6502 as a pupil in the 80s I don't have any experience in C++-Programming, so I can't help fixing this bug myself by now. But I had some lessons in C last year (self-study). Now I think of self-studying C++ to become able to help fixing those or other problems. You suggested it in a further comment. Also I don't only want to cry my lamento in dev's ears. But that will take some time. One last question: Is there any hope that the qt-devs will solve the problems in qt 5.6? Is there a qt-bug-report I can look at? Once more, sorry for my bad english... Best wishes from Hanau/Germany
I've found the Qscreen Class Documentation on http://doc.qt.io/qt-5/qscreen.html (qt5.0). Though I didn't do those things until now, I don't know where I can find the Source Code Files (corona.cpp, containment.cpp, DesktopView.cpp). A path like plasma/workspace/shell/corona.cpp doesn#t exist on my OS 42.1 beta. Also I don't know if the Source Code can be found on the installation. Either, where can I download it? Are the names of the cpp's in KDE 4.3 the same? Because I should be able to take a look at the old Sources too. I know, that I must be weird to thin I can take this, but (think of A. Merkels words: We can take it! ;-))) After reading the Documentation, I think I should try it.
I've found the Sources for Plasma 5.4.2. If you could give me (of course on occasion) some more detailed informations this could be helpful. I'm on holiday next week and will use this time on it.
I like using virtual desktops and it turns out that having a different desktop image on each one is an important visual cue to understand where you are. Looking constantly at the pager to see where you are is really annoying. Please bring back this feature.
Add me to the list of dissatisfied users. I, as others above used the different backgrounds as a clue to which desktop I was on. I have used Linux, Kubuntu for a couple of years (I also run 4 Windows machines) as my primary development computer. Switching desktops while working on one of the several websites I administer made the workflow smoother. I am a user...I only learn enough about Kubuntu to do the tasks I need. To hear "activities cover that" is a kinda' slap in the face to a user that is not a Linux Guru. So now I have to learn 'activities' too to get the work done the way I did in 14.xx. I like 15.10, but I am not happy with you dropping a useful feature.
Im not going to go into the whole details but like so many I found out about this regression AFTER I installed it. Luckily, I knew what to expect and just like when going from KDE3>4 when I decided to wait until 4.3 when KDE was starting to be usable, this time around I again did not install KDE on a work or home machine. You know the expression:10 times bitten.... I have 4more LTS years not to worry about having to change MY way of working to suit someone's vision of the desktop. I also have over 15 family members for whom I installed Linux for whom the virtual desktops are important (and to be honest, was a big selling point). The big selling point of KDE is that it allows me to use the desktop how I WANT, not how someone else thinks I should do it (I hate all defaults like Oxygen and themes but it takes 20secs to find those I like). The frustration in being told "we know better than you how you should work" especially from KDE which always had a reputation of allowing users to decide is totally understandable. If anyone is surprised at the reaction, then they havent being paying attention to what users want and use. It reflects a clear disconnect between devs and users. Heck, the wallpapers/widget thing is a very important part of the look of KDE (this isnt 'where are the screensavers?). Im not going to say its a signature but its damn close. But lets be clear, I am NOT in any way, shape or form surprised at this. Simply because this is the 2nd time now in 7-8yrs that we move to a 'better' framework and while bugs are expected, to be told that the new framework cant do something that was done 10+yrs ago makes you wonder about what 'better' means. But worse than that, this is THE EXACT SAME REGRESSION as we had in 2008. That makes 2015 even more frustrating Take a look at the first sentence and date on a similar bug report to this one: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=155150 -Jan Wolf 2008-01-05 17:04:01 UTC Version: (using KDE Devel) Installed from: Compiled sources -It would be nice if it was possible to assign different wallpapers to each virtual desktop again, -like it was in KDE 3. SAME REGRESSION. SAME RESPONSE. Except in 2008, Aaron told people that " everything to do with reaching REAL user needs. and no, setting a wallpaper per desktop is not a critical user need." Back then, it wasnt considered a REAL user need. Now, it is once again. THIS is where you start to get people being pissed off. Pissed off that the EXACT same regression happens 8 years later and pissed off that its once again dismissed as irrelevant (question: do they poll users to decide what users think are critical user needs or do devs do that on their own?) Having gone through the same thing in 2008, no one thought that the response about major workflow changes not being announced was going to be the same? Isnt that worrying that procedural mistakes like that happen over and over? (i know, I know... thats not devs, thats bad management and communications) But a coworker seems to believe that were going to have this going on for another 6 to 10months and then finally it will be solved, just like it was last time. And Im sure 7 years from now when Plasma6 comes out we will again be faced with lack of communications about changes, then anger, then it will be fixed and the anger will subside. Because if your methodology and communications are flawed 8years ago as well as today, there is nothing to stop this from happening again 8 years from now. And more than the bugs-regression redux, its that last thought that has me worried. Being a community is more than sharing source code. Its being able to communicate to users and devs and have them work together instead of putting users in front of a fait accompli and then let things sort themselves on their own.
(In reply to zeke123 from comment #94) > The frustration in being told "we know better than you how you should work" > especially from KDE which always had a reputation of allowing users to > decide is totally understandable. If anyone is surprised at the reaction, > then they havent being paying attention to what users want and use. It > reflects a clear disconnect between devs and users. Heck, the > wallpapers/widget thing is a very important part of the look of KDE (this > isnt 'where are the screensavers?). Im not going to say its a signature but > its damn close. Why is there such a disconnect between devs and users? Has there ever been an attempt to ask/poll users what is essential? I certainly would put this feature there. It's always the first thing I set up on a new install. Still hoping this gets addressed sooner rather than later as I really rely on it. theovobia@gmx.de any word on how it went? Did you get a chance to work on it? @kde developers. Thanks for reopening this regression. Please let us know what's going on if you get a minute.
(In reply to Danny Tamez from comment #95) > theovobia@gmx.de any word on how it went? Did you get a chance to work on > it? > > @kde developers. Thanks for reopening this regression. Please let us know > what's going on if you get a minute. Hi Danny! I've taken a look at the source code files of plasma 5 and also on the documentation of QScreen Class. But like I wrote in upper comment, I must have been weird to think I could handle this with only basics of C-Coding. And like David wrote in comment#61: "That's currently super tricky as that class is super fragile; it's all based around QScreen which we want, yet we needed to get a signal that was broken in QScreen so it's a combo of two different screen managements systems - which get updates are out of sync \o/ " the grade of difficulty a little bit :-)))) to high for me. I'm sorry for raising wrong hopes. But I would like to add your last words once more: "@kde developers. Thanks for reopening this regression. Please let us know what's going on if you get a minute." In another comment on bugs.kde.org I read, fixing this bug would mean to recode the whole plasma desktop. Nevertheless, I hope they will get it work.
(In reply to theovobia from comment #96) (( fixing this bug would mean to recode the whole plasma desktop. Nevertheless, I hope they will get it work )) Perhaps don' t understanding difference between activities and virtual desktops , but adding a pager (or ...) and desktop effects to activities ... might be a " easier " solution . I wrote upper that i'm using 4 activities with a pager , different widgets and wallpapers "like vd in my beloved kde4" . A little " difference" is can't get my desktop cube effects ....! I m not a programmer , i can just code a dozen of line , but like you i'm trying to find a solution. Thanks for your trials.
>Perhaps don' t understanding difference between activities and virtual desktops , but adding a pager (or ...) and desktop effects to activities ... might be a " easier " solution . Certainly has advantages as you don't end up with two features with such a massive overlap in goals. Simpler code and simpler more consistent UI with everyone getting their features back. Anyway the pager like you said has been done by Marco recently; https://quickgit.kde.org/?p=scratch%2Fmart%2Factivitypager.git There's a discussion on plasma-devel if you search the archives for "RFC: activity pager in kdeplasma-addons"
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #98) > Anyway the pager like you said has been done by Marco recently; > https://quickgit.kde.org/?p=scratch%2Fmart%2Factivitypager.git > There's a discussion on plasma-devel if you search the archives for "RFC: > activity pager in kdeplasma-addons" I'm using this pager ! I ' ve seen the discussion between Marco and Ivan Čukić about this pager after my post. Seem 's that Marco could find a compromise about this bug. regards.
Given that this bug gives me emails every day, I thought I would post my (albeit ugly) hack for having multiple wallpapers on different viewports with plasma 5. If you (like me) don't really care about plasma other than the fact that it should manage panels, what you can do is use feh and some kwin rules to draw separate wallpapers on different viewports. It works okay-ish. I can give anyone that is interested details about my setup.
Thank you, Nathanael, for this effort. However I personally am not happy with a «ugly hack». I have another suggestion: keep plasma 4 for at least another 3 years security upgraded, but no more developped with new features. And call it «KDE Traditional» instead of Plasma. I actually change all plasma pictures with my own fotos usualoly as one of the first jobs when a new version appears. For my eyes, the plasma pictures are horrible; the ones in P4 too, by the way. Am 03.11.2015 um 22:26 schrieb Nathanael Schilling via KDE Bugzilla: > https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 > > --- Comment #100 from Nathanael Schilling <nathanaelschilling@gmx.net> --- > Given that this bug gives me emails every day, I thought I would post my > (albeit ugly) hack for having multiple wallpapers on different viewports with > plasma 5. If you (like me) don't really care about plasma other than the fact > that it should manage panels, what you can do is use feh and some kwin rules to > draw separate wallpapers on different viewports. It works okay-ish. I can give > anyone that is interested details about my setup. >
I find that every time I'm forced to use a workaround like this it ends up getting broken wherever there are updates. For instance when tiling got removed from KDE I used the script that someone was kind enough to contribute but I recall it was never stable for too long. I don't think this is a good solution long term although I do appreciate and respect the work that went into producing it. I really don't want to go back to plasma 4 as I would rather have the latest updates. But it really does bum me out that this great feature is gone. There's got to be a way to fix this.
Nathanael I'm interested by your hack. Thank's
(In reply to Danny Tamez from comment #102) > I find that every time I'm forced to use a workaround like this it ends up > getting broken wherever there are updates. For instance when tiling got > removed from KDE I used the script that someone was kind enough to > contribute but I recall it was never stable for too long. I don't think > this is a good solution long term although I do appreciate and respect the > work that went into producing it. I really don't want to go back to plasma > 4 as I would rather have the latest updates. But it really does bum me out > that this great feature is gone. There's got to be a way to fix this. I am back to KDE4 and it is more stable than plasma 5 a lot more stable and still have the traditional feature expected from a KDE desktop.
(In reply to humufr from comment #104) (( I am back to KDE4 and it is more stable than plasma 5 a lot more stable)) . Im running fedora rawhide plasma 5 ; and compiled all my qt applications to qt5 ( kde-baseapps,qastools, avidemux ,calligra etc..). No crash , seem 's to be usable, just sddm sometimes long for logging. But i understand you ,different wallpapers and widgets features missing , is a little annoying.
Perhaps this might be a solution that pleases all? We are told that we can have different wallpapers and different widgets on each activity. So, why not some good programmer(s) enhance the cube by adding the setting to choose which desktop and on which activity for each of its positions? Should be possible, should it not, to just add extra settings on the on the Virtual Desktops panel in the settings? Then, I -- for example -- could choose position 1 to be VD#1 on Activity 1, position 2 to be VD#1 (or any other I might prefer) on Activity 2, position 3 to be VD#1 on Activity 3, and position 4 to be VD#1 on Activity 4. Then, if you prefer, you can just go traditional with 4 desktops on 1 activity (would then all be the same, which is what most of the people in this thread do not want, but the Activities fans are okay with), or for those, like me, who want the different wallpapers and widgets, could set the cube as in my example above. It would then give us the appearance and feel of what we are accustomed to, without changing the current Activities setup. Is that possible?
(In reply to Fraser_Bell from comment #106) > Perhaps this might be a solution that pleases all? > > We are told that we can have different wallpapers and different widgets on > each activity. > > So, why not some good programmer(s) enhance the cube by adding the setting > to choose which desktop and on which activity for each of its positions? > Should be possible, should it not, to just add extra settings on the on the > Virtual Desktops panel in the settings? > > Then, I -- for example -- could choose position 1 to be VD#1 on Activity 1, > position 2 to be VD#1 (or any other I might prefer) on Activity 2, position > 3 to be VD#1 on Activity 3, and position 4 to be VD#1 on Activity 4. > > Then, if you prefer, you can just go traditional with 4 desktops on 1 > activity (would then all be the same, which is what most of the people in > this thread do not want, but the Activities fans are okay with), or for > those, like me, who want the different wallpapers and widgets, could set the > cube as in my example above. > > It would then give us the appearance and feel of what we are accustomed to, > without changing the current Activities setup. > > Is that possible? Try to suggest that >Which for most user means abandon to the virtual desktop and this is to push the activities. Why not but in this case there are some adjustment to make like having an option to get the activities visible when going in a corner of the screen (only virtual desktop available), having a possibility to see all the activities as a grid, having shortcut available to move from one avtivities to another very fast. In this case that will be more or less the same things than the virtual desktop just a change of name. If this is implemented I am pretty sure that most of the critics will go away. Obviously there are also the dashboard wich is still here for no real reason since there are no posibility to get different widget on it. The solution will be to attach it to an activities and modify the shortcut and the corner to show the “dashboard activity”. but got that answer from a dev: > I don’t use activities, I use virtual desktops (normally 4), I never put different widgets or different wallpapers on different virtual desktops. So not sure that this solution will be take into account. They doesn't seems to be very listening to the users. In a sens I understand them, they try to provide the best desktop they can but some functionality are missing and user are making a fuss because of that. The devs are feeling that all the work they put are not reconised and start to be on a defense mode and everything go to hell. They did an amazing job but, and it is normal in a big project like that, there are things missing.
I did not read the arguments above, but to me this is a terrible regression. Some say it is one of the best KDE features avaiable, but the feature goes back to CDE (on Unix) in the 1990s where every desktop has his own colour as a background to see the difference. At that time it was seen as very important. And that still is the case. (Having an image instaed of just a colour might be seen as progression). It is crucial to see where you are nd whaa you are doing for already 10s of years.
Awesome that this has been reopened. Thanks for that. I for one don't want to see multiple desktops and activities merged. I think multiple desktops is a concept that is simple and intuitive. Please don't take that simplicity away by making us jump through a bunch of activities hoops. I have tried to use activities but are very, very dissatisfied ... it is like groping around in a dark labyrinth !!! I have used KDE for over 10 years, precisely because it offers customization's in easy and seamless ways. Virtual Desktop customization as many others have said is a productivity issue. But larger than that, it is one of the few features that truly distinguishes KDE from other desktops. Now I see KDE on the way out. Probably I move back to 4.x
Then we fix activities to be as simple as virtual desktop and job done? The logic of "I really care about which xprop is used internally or the name the exat same functionality is given" literally makes no sense.
Created attachment 95517 [details] attachment-10295-0.html Someone who has swapped to KDE 4, can you post a tutorial for us noobs? What is the downside? Does it get overwritten every time an update happens? GranPaSmurf from Galaxy Mega 6.3 Smartphone On Nov 15, 2015 6:32 AM, "David Edmundson via KDE Bugzilla" < bugzilla_noreply@kde.org> wrote: > https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 > > --- Comment #110 from David Edmundson <kde@davidedmundson.co.uk> --- > Then we fix activities to be as simple as virtual desktop and job done? > > The logic of "I really care about which xprop is used internally or the > name > the exat same functionality is given" literally makes no sense. > > -- > You are receiving this mail because: > You are on the CC list for the bug. >
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #110) > Then we fix activities to be as simple as virtual desktop and job done? > > The logic of "I really care about which xprop is used internally or the name > the exat same functionality is given" literally makes no sense. Would it really be the exact same functionality? Is it somehow easier to get to this functionality using activities rather than just putting it back into virtual desktops?
*** Bug 349486 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
@David You forgot one thing - patching Plasma is not enough. You would need to patch kwin as well and a couple of its effects that are able to show multiple desktops at the same time (cube and friends, present)...
I'd like to see this feature back as well. I don't actively use activities but I routinely use virtual desktops and want to have a different wallpaper on every desktop (like I can have on Xfce for example).
Since I didn't see this during a quick search of the page or skimming through it and plasma 5 in Debian isn't stable enough to keep plasmashell going, so I haven't used activities there yet: With plasma 4 there was a problem where borderless windows (chromium, steam, windows forced to be borderless in some KDE settings) were always visible across all activities, which made it impossible to use them as VD replacements. Does this work properly in plasma 5?
I have been on KDE 4 so far, and I am waiting until this HUGE regression is fixed.. However, it has been 1 year since it was reported, and not only is it not being worked on, but no one has even stated that they plan to work on it in the future.. I think I am going to bite this huge bullet and just upgrade (or is it downgrade?) to KDE 5 since I don't see this regression being fixed any time in the fore-seeable future.. We might be lucky to see the feature again in KDE 6.. It is sad that even KDE 3 had this feature, but yet we can't have it now.. Any way, I want to ask you all: When/If I move to KDE 5, is it already possible right now to use activities in some way to semi-emulate desktops with seperate wallpapers?.. And if so, what current draw-backs does that method have compared to having a genuine seperate-wallpaper feature?..
> And if so, what current draw-backs does that method have compared to having a genuine seperate-wallpaper feature? Forgot the Dashboard, forgot the access through screen edge configuration and desktop grid...
@devs Is there really any chance of this getting fixed? The status of the bug is reopened but it seems that the preference is to just let it be. Is that accurate? Is it more a matter of time and resources or is this some kind of political thing that's holding it up? If an end user took the time to get familiar with the codebase and this issue in particular, code up a fix and submit a pull request would it even be considered? Is that the only way this is going to get fixed? A real response would be greatly greatly appreciated!
>@devs Is there really any chance of this getting fixed? Yes, >The status of the bug is reopened but it seems that the preference is to just let it be. Is that accurate? No. Though this is not as high as a lot of other things on bugzilla right now. Crash > slightly disrupted workflow. >Is it more a matter of time and resources or is this some kind of political thing that's holding it up? A bit of both. See comment at end, but time is a huge factor too. >If an end user took the time to get familiar with the codebase and this issue in particular, code up a fix and submit a pull request would it even be considered? See #61 where I describe what needs doing. If it was done in a way that didn't turn shellcorona.cpp into a complete mess, I'd maybe merge it. Though I think you're looking at a refactor that'd take me 2 weeks of evenings. >Is that the only way this is going to get fixed? A real response would be greatly greatly appreciated! Note that 5.5 brings an activity pager, which is one step closer to solving the real issue of: 1) we have duplicate functionality in both activities and virtual desktops 2) we "dropped" containment virtual desktop support in favour of activities (where dropped == didn't rewrite support for) 3) activities and VDs are not interchangable in workflow patterns. I'd rather continue that pattern of fixing point 3 rather than go back to the shoddy 4.x state of a half thought through half-duplicating features system, which readding this would be
Thanks so much for the really helpful response :D
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #120) > See #61 where I describe what needs doing. > If it was done in a way that didn't turn shellcorona.cpp into a complete > mess, I'd maybe merge it. Though I think you're looking at a refactor that'd > take me 2 weeks of evenings. note that in order to do it properly an abi incompatible change would be needed in plasma-framework as well, as the resolution of what containment is on what screen is in upstream Corona itself. So yeah, solving #3 is definitely preferable
Hallo, I'm not sure, that a missing feature is part of different virtual desktops / different wallpapers. The point I miss, is that my session is not recovered, when I close it, e.g. I opened two konsole sessions, and after relogin (next day) those konsole windows are NOT appearing. Also the KSYSGUARD, which I have been opened and always remembered in my KDE 4.14 (another laptop) is no more remembered from my last session in Plasma 5. However, without different wallpapers I could live, but when every widget is on every virtual screen, that is confusing, and on a small screen (15 inches or less), all widgets then use much space. Btw, some words of encouragement: You developers do a great job, and it seems, that Plasma-Shell does no more 'suck' so much memory in Plasma 5 then it did in KDE (4.14.4). I will watch it. But to be honest, I still use my working laptop with KDE 4.14.4 and no more upgrades (Sabayon repo) and my 'testing' laptop with Plasma, until I will be content. Thank you for your interest...
+1 for separate wallpaper / pager / desktop simplicity, and for the same reasons elaborated by others. I'd simply vote for the bug but it appears that voting is not enabled. At least in my own mind, I don't have workflows and "activities". I do 95% of my work in a variety of konsole windows, in a nearly static layout, and the other 5% is in a browser. I use the VD, pager, and wallpaper to keep them organized, and myself located and oriented. I will wait... (or perhaps experiment with other DE's, but I don't especially want to have to build from from scratch with a building-blocks WM, either.)
Can someone please enable voting for this bug?
They are deliberately disabled for plasmashell as they provide no value. Bugs should be rated on severity not who can drum up a fuss on social media.
>They are deliberately disabled for plasmashell as they provide no value. The fact that 126 people have commented on this (and the contents of said comments) so far strongly suggests that wallpapers on multiple desktops provide value for quite a lot of people. Then again, understanding that value can be subjective seems to be something that the plasma devs fail to understand so far with this issue....
Devs are scared that if voting was enabled, this bug would shoot to the top, and then they would have to actually do like....real work and stuff.. ＞＿＞
It's my free time, I don't *have* to do anything. It's probably in your interest not to piss me off.
It's true that the devs have no obligation to do anything. Given the fact that no progress has been made on this issue for over a year, it seems beyond hope that anything will actually change though. So not pissing off the devs is simply a matter of politeness, I wouldn't expect anything to change by doing so. Also: You may be taking the comments on a bug too seriously if you're going to change how you deal with a bug with 70 CC-ed users just because a comment pisses you off.
Some progress has happened. The activity pager was merged in 5.5 Also I have a kwin branch.
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #131) > Some progress has happened. The activity pager was merged in 5.5 > Also I have a kwin branch. Thanks for working on this!
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #126) > They are deliberately disabled for plasmashell as they provide no value. That is obviously false, though I'll grant that the feature provides no value for you. If it provides no value, why would so many folks be complaining that they miss it? > > Bugs should be rated on severity not who can drum up a fuss on social media. I don't think that bug reports really count as social media like Facebook. In any event, the rationale for disabling separate wallpapers was that it was very difficult to implement them well in the context of Ubuntu 15, not that they were worthless.
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #126) > They are deliberately disabled for plasmashell as they provide no value. > > Bugs should be rated on severity not who can drum up a fuss on social media. ------ I totally disagree with your approach to customers' needs / requests ..... Those who are successful know very well who their REAL customer is as well as their real needs and their real options. When you nix them you nix your future ..... BTW..... could you point us to any of user requests to discontinue the different wallpapers because they have no value to them ? Please find below how, some of them approached customers' needed ........ ------ The best customer service is if the customer doesn't need to call you, doesn't need to talk to you. It just works. Jeff Bezos The golden rule for every business man is this: 'Put yourself in your customer's place.' Orison Swett Marden Our DNA is as a consumer company - for that individual customer who's voting thumbs up or thumbs down. That's who we think about. And we think that our job is to take responsibility for the complete user experience. And if it's not up to par, it's our fault, plain and simply. Steve Jobs It is so much easier to be nice, to be respectful, to put yourself in your customers' shoes and try to understand how you might help them before they ask for help, than it is to try to mend a broken customer relationship. Mark Cuban There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else. Sam Walton The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself. Peter Drucker It is not the employer who pays the wages. Employers only handle the money. It is the customer who pays the wages. Henry Ford
plasma is an open source project. Whilst I think that the decision to discontinue multiple wallpapers is stupid, I think it's a stretch to compare plasma to an actual company that produces things people pay for.
Congratulations guys. You pissed off the only kde dev who was working on that problem... I think that now we can forget having this feature back anytime soon...
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #129) > It's probably in your interest not to piss me off. I don't need this feature so I'm not emotionally involved on his disappearing. I profoundly respect and admire your work but the fact is that is you that pissed of the users by removing a feature they loved without even asking them ;)
It's like giving a candy to a kid and, a little later, take it back ! You will only make it cry :D
As I've said before, I really miss the "different wallpapers" feature -- enough so that I'll stick with v14.04LTS until its end of life until and unless the feature is restored. At the same time, I appreciate all the hard work that David has put into KDE. I may disagree with his judgement, but ultimately he and the other devs are the bosses here. I never forget that he who pays the piper calls the tune.
yes, different wallpapers are cool, but what about the marble globe background or the search and launch layout? The were cooler! ok, not really essential, but cool.
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #129) > It's probably in your interest not to piss me off. Plasma is nice, but useless comparing to the final KDE 4.14.11 with it's main, outragous features. So, my question to the devs is: Why did you begin to create a Plasma, if the intention is not to build a better environment than KDE 4 was? I mean, if you feel pissed off by the users, who really know to value KDE 4, if you won't intent to give them at least the same in Plasma (you might announce in the long run). I really, really admire your work (for KDE 4), but if in the end Plasma will not offer the specs, which made KDE 4 outragous, then my suggestion: Stop going on working on it. Let it be, if you will only disappoint the real users of KDE. I feel very sad to say this, but I am honest, I am in the customers place here. And for me, I see no reason to change from a reliable, rather good featured, older model (KDE 4) to a still experimental and even less useful new model (Plasma).
>Note that 5.5 brings an activity pager, which is one step closer to solving the real issue of: ... but, it is *not* the cube. ;-)
>I totally disagree with your approach to customers' needs / requests ..... Those who are successful know very well who their REAL customer is as well as their real needs and their real options. When you nix them you nix your future ..... Uh, we are not "customers", we are "users". This is not a Commercial Enterprise, it is a Community of Programmers (Devs) who volunteer their time and efforts to create something *they* want. If we want to use it -- become users -- they let us. They do not try to *sell* it to us or push it on us. We get what they give us, unless we want to develop our *own* desktop. Since there seem to be so many here who want the different Wallpapers and -- especially -- the different Widgets, and since most seem to want it back in Virtual Desktops the same way it was in KDE4, why not do the same as was done with OpenOffice? When they could not agree, when politics got in the way of development, they split out into LibreOffice. KDE4 could be forked to an alternative desktop.
(In reply to Fraser_Bell from comment #143) > > KDE4 could be forked to an alternative desktop. In effect, it has been forked to an alternative desktop -- 14.04LTS. At least it's good until 2019. I'm sticking with that unless "separate wallpapers" reappears in Plasma -- which they might by 2019. I wonder if any other issue has aroused such passions in the KDE community as this one.
I have my free software projects myself, and I understand that you occasionally want to rewrite something from scratch. Usually, when the main features have been bolted on later, and make the whole thing a maintenance nightmare. So you think about the feature set and how to solve that clean and lean. In the discussion about multiple backgrounds in KDE4, I suggested to have two frameless unraisable windows underneath the other windows: root (for the background) and activity on top of root. These windows would be screen-sized, and either you have n of them for n virtual desktops, or one, and it's attached to all virtual desktops. Answer was "well, it doesn't fit into the current framework, but we can think about it next time". Obviously, the people who did the next redesign ignored the last discussion about multiple backgrounds for multiple windows completely. I mean, this is not really something cunningly new, fvwm has FvwmBacker, which also supports per virtual-desktop backgrounds. I don't know since when, but I'm pretty sure it's 20 years or more. This is not a rocket science thing.
As a longtime Plasma user I heavily suggest moving up the ladder and using Plasma 5. If you find bugs report them; if you find missing features let the developers know. .... Swapnil Bhartiya http://www.linux.com/news/software/applications/865760-opensuse-leap-421-review-the-most-mature-linux-distribution/ --- Compare that recommendation [ "if you find missing features let the developers know." ] with how the KDE dev-team handles the reported KDE-4 forgoten features ....... openSUSE Leap 42.1 Review: The Most Mature Linux Distribution ============================================================== by Swapnil Bhartiya .... During the installation process you can choose either Gnome, KDE or others and it will install that particular desktop environment (DE). KDE’s Plasma 5 is the default DE of openSUSE. Once installed you will see both KDE ‘4’ and Plasma 5 in the login screen and you can choose whichever one you prefer. As a longtime Plasma user I heavily suggest moving up the ladder and using Plasma 5. If you find bugs report them; if you find missing features let the developers know. .... In any case whether you want a mature and stable OS or a rolling release OS, openSUSE has you covered. Go ahead take a leap of faith. http://www.linux.com/news/software/applications/865760-opensuse-leap-421-review-the-most-mature-linux-distribution/ Commentaries to the above article =================================== Svnset : 23 Nov 15 Guys what u don't get is, that the problems come with KDE plasma. Cannot recommend it even so i liked KDE 4 alot. Moved to leap xfce and no issues at all, works perfect, smooth and sooo fast. It looks just awesome once u're done customizing. Opensuse fully supports xfce lile KDE and GNOME :) In my opinion the author is right it was a big leap! wbm : 12 Nov 15 After a machine died I installed Leap 42.1 on a couple of machines with opensuse 13.1, including a vm. Installation is smooth - HOWEVER, the kde plasma (both 4 and 5) crashed multiple times requiring reboot - definitely not enterprise stable. Fortunately, LXDE works very well, and allows me to actually get work done. Moreover, it allows different wallpapers on different desktops, which KDE removed. I have been years with KDE and it just gets worst. I would not recommend KDE to anybody who needs to use the computer for work rather that submitting kde bug reports. I also has some sound issues which pulse audio after fiddling solved. I would recommend leap 42.1 with LXDE. Ali : 10 Dec 15 Good comment. I confirm that KDE 5 crashes multiple time Shrivathsa Acharya : 13 Nov 15 A very nice distribution. But KDE is pathetic.. They have suggested change of OpenGL or removal of Baloo indexing tool. Still no improvement. SuSE team need to really work hard to correct this... joncr : 14 Nov 15 It's a nice piece of work, but the current refusal to provide live images is a self-inflicted wound. Why can't OpenSuse do what pretty much everyone else does? Why should anyone trust OpenSuse enough to risk their current system by doing a physical install simply to evaluate the product? Expecting people to use Suse Studio to build their own live image is simply clueless, something one would expect from a product manager who thinks all his customers are engineers. Or wishes they were.
developers could be clear and answer this question and not give more bluntly: are you going to continue to ignore this request or going to re-add we ask? Components virtual desktops with different graphics for each desktop. Yes or NO Thank you PS: I do not speak English translators use to read and write in the forum, sorry if I do not fully understand
Justification: Have both working Virtual desktop (in the sense they worked in 4.X) and Activities. There is wonderful synergy between virtual desktops and activities Scenario: A Manger manages several projects. each project has several sub jobs that may be different in details. In 4.X we could assign an activity to Job/project then use virtual desktops to sub divide the various functions need to do the work. Each VD would need different widgets to address that part of the job each VB needs a different back ground to allow easy recognition of at which section of the job is fore front. At this time only KDE 4.X can do this no other desktop including Plasma 5 can now do this. The synergy of virtual desktops + activities make the above possible. I know that the developers have a hard on for activities over virtual desktops but we really need both. Downgrading virtual desktops breaks the synergy and reduces the functionality we had in 4.X . If activities are the cats meow how can one use them in the above scenario without a KDE 4. style virtual desktop???
Here is a summary of my comment in bug 343246 (duplicate one with the crazy status "RESOLVED WONTFIX") : This missing feature is a really bad regression. I did enjoy KDE4 for that superb feature that KDE3 didn't have. No other desktop environment did have it except KDE4. In KDE4 I was using different virtual desktops that looked different (wallpapers, widgets, folder view on the VD1, desktop view on VD2, widgets and apps links on VD3, and then notebook view in VD4). I did not find any need to use Activities feature which is a confusing feature and I don't understand what it does best/more than Virtual Desktops ! To me, in KDE 5 you should have dropped Activities feature and keep Virtual Desktops. OR, if you really want Activities to replace it, you should make it as easy to use, with cube transition effects-like, and less buggy than Virtual Desktops (these used to work perfectly in KDE 4). Commercial companies copied KDE4 : - Apple OS X manages it within its Spaces feature : independent virtual desktops with different wallpapers, dock icons and apps links icons). - Microsoft Windows 10 has a similar feature but not as good as KDE4 and Spaces. - For God's sake why did KDE 5 shell design drop it ? At least the ability to set different wallpapers for each virtual desktop should exist. Under KDE4 I never had any bug related to virtual desktops with different widgets/icons/wallpapers... It was gorgeous ! Hopefully you guys will change your mind and fix it. Conclusion : every desktop update/upgrade should never drop TOP FEATURES that users LOVE !
Seem 's kde-dev David is working on this bug but is lacking time because of more critical bugs, Perhaps it would be better to be a little more patient , or ask how to help.
>Seem 's kde-dev David is working on this bug If I'm not mistaken, he's working on making activities more compatible with kwin (he mentions an "activity pager"). Which is nice, but I wonder whether or not this will actually work with compositing or not. Cynical me suspects that we will not get actual compositing with this but that the end result will be manipulations of still images rather than actual compositing (i.e. if there is a desktop cube with activities and you are watching a video, you won't see the video move while you rotate). I remember plenty of programs like that from the compiz era, and all of them sucked. If the devs go as far as to reinvent virtual desktops (which I hope), then maybe the stuff that the kde-dev is working on will solve this bug though.
> wonder whether or not this will actually work with compositing or not. Kde-dev Marco Martin posted that desktops effects can be implemented in activity pager,not easy but possible. So staying optimist for compositing.
Just back from a very wet and rainy Scotland Highland (mostly indoors) week. We all had laptops and I convinced three friends to change to KDE (Kubuntu 4.04). 1 Windows, 1 Fedora and one Ubuntu users. The deciding USP's I used were the various Desktop backgrounds (all three), KMyMoney (1), digiKam (1). The big runner was definitively the different backgrounds. I told them all about the present situation of incertainity and to have to use the 14.04 LTS and explained in depth the use of the PPA system. 3 more were sort of interested, but a bit disappointed that with Plasma 5 it will no longer be available; I think they will not change. The last 3 did were happy with what they had. Altogether we had 4 Linux, four Windows and 2 Apples (unsurprisingly for me none of them wants to change).
...for what my opinion can count I don't know nothing about what technology lead activity or multiple desktop, but, I love multiple desktop with different background as they behave like in KDE 4 and I use it productively, so, as in Italy says "franza o spagna basta che se magna" activity or multiple desktop, the important is that I can have different background and all the other features as today in KDE4. ..hope that the devs think that these features are more important than others :-) :-)
First to the developers; thanks. You have devised an OS like to use on my primary, most stressed, computer. Thanks. Again, Thanks. Now to everyone else: Back off a little. A free OS that just works. It doesn't take the almost daily tweaking that goes with my Windows machines. State your case, without the threats and slurs. MORE: Does anyone remember if Ver. 4 allowed Screen Savers? It seems so to me, but I'm not going to back up just to research it. This morning I had the bright idea to set up one of my 'activities' (I have 4 and 2 Virtual desktops for each) to have a screensaver. I was thinking, "look at the pretty picture, then just wriggle the mouse and check my email." So, my qx: Is screensavers another feature that was deprecated in Ver.5? (Though this is probably not the place to ask that question)
This is not a place for discussions, use the development mailing list instead. Thank you
Maybe or maybe not. But with over 150 comments this bug report has mutated as such. And just to the idea of some developers to act in their own playbox, what with the thousands of users like me who often support KDE with a financial contribution? Would we not count as «Clients»? Despite my frustration of Plasma 5 I have continued with my contributions in 2015, but I do reserve to change my opinion if I will be continuedly apostrophed as a «Take-what-We-give-you, be thankful for that and keep quiet». (In reply to Germano Massullo from comment #156) > This is not a place for discussions, use the development mailing list > instead. > Thank you
Yes please bring the feature of different wallpaper back, we really like it.
I think further "discussion" here is all rather moot. Check this bug's history and you'll see that around Comment 135 David Edmundson was indeed truly "pissed off" and removed himself from the cc list... I wonder why? (Rhetorical question...)
(In reply to Donald Krebs from comment #155) > So, my qx: Is screensavers another feature that was deprecated in Ver.5? Offtopic, but short answer: alas yes. If you want to use a screensaver you have to use xscreensavers. You might want to search for the corresponding bug report ("resolved" WONTFIX IMHO).
I read this before going to bed last night. I dreamed I was in the not too distant future and I upgraded my desktop. When the upgrade concluded I rebooted my laptop. To my amazement all functionality and features had been completely removed except for and in favor of activities. I was really confused but found that it was not a big deal as the 4 remaining KDE users were absolutely in love with the new streamlined interface. I woke up in a cold sweat. Alas, it was but a dream. But wow, it felt so real!
Perhaps a work-around ? I've assigned to each activitie the same number of virtual desktop in kactivitymanagerd-pluginrc. Now i've desktop number, cube effect with different wallpapers and widgets with the activitypager like vds. Look 's weird.
*** Bug 358294 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
I also care for this feature and I am disappointed it has been removed. But the reason I'm chiming in is that reading this bug report, I think it makes a good case for a feature bounty feature, it would allow users to add to the bounty instead of posting droves of unhelpful comment and would give incentives to developers to fix some issues according to popular demand. Though the drawback is that it would also give incentives to abuse the system, say by removing features people rely on so they'd pay to have them back, even worse this could become a cycle. Also reading this report, it is painfully obvious that there is a discrepancy between what dev do and what user want. Had there been a communication channel to ask user beforehand it would have been clear that this is a feature people actually use and rely on and that it ought not be remove. Why after all these years KDE doesn't offer a channel of communication between users and devs directly inside KDE is beyond me. You know along dolphin and other kde programs a kdepoll to poll users or a kdefeedback to provide public feedback or something along these lines. Anyways, hopefully this issue will eventually be fixed and will not make a comeback in a few years with kde 6.
Update: I met with Martin G (kwin maintainer) and Marco to come up with a solid plan moving forward. - We make ShellClient virtual desktops contain an ID not merely a stack index. - ShellClient VD cardinality is changed to match activities. - DesktopGrid Effect gets rewritten in QtQuick (we need a change in there for the cardinality changes, and Martin G has had a rule since 2014 that it needs a rewrite before any edits..) - I invert the DesktopView mapping logic in ShellCorona from Activity -> Physical Screen to Physical Screen -> Activity. (possibly refactoring into ScreenCorona class: Rule of Dave - if you have nested maps, you're missing a class.) - KWin activity code gets dropped completely. - 1 DesktopView is created per VD. Bam everyone wins, and we get this feature without any config migrations needed. Will take some time, so please continue to be patient. Note: This is a bug tracker for devs, not a public forum. I do not want to be flooded with off topic comments. It makes my job harder, as I need to find my notes. Do so and I will close this bug.
You should make Walk Through Desktops do this http://az648995.vo.msecnd.net/win/2015/04/Clip3.gif or something similar that makes dragging between desktops easier.
Wow! Thank you so much, David. Some of us (most?) do appreciate your willingness to remain involved in this. If you have any idea how I might be able to help with this, contact me. -Gerry (In reply to David Edmundson from comment #167) > Update: > > I met with Martin G (kwin maintainer) and Marco to come up with a solid plan > moving forward. > > - We make ShellClient virtual desktops contain an ID not merely a stack > index. > > - ShellClient VD cardinality is changed to match activities. > > - DesktopGrid Effect gets rewritten in QtQuick (we need a change in there > for the cardinality changes, and Martin G has had a rule since 2014 that it > needs a rewrite before any edits..) > > - I invert the DesktopView mapping logic in ShellCorona from Activity -> > Physical Screen to Physical Screen -> Activity. (possibly refactoring into > ScreenCorona class: Rule of Dave - if you have nested maps, you're missing a > class.) > > - KWin activity code gets dropped completely. > > - 1 DesktopView is created per VD. > > Bam everyone wins, and we get this feature without any config migrations > needed. > Will take some time, so please continue to be patient. > > Note: This is a bug tracker for devs, not a public forum. > I do not want to be flooded with off topic comments. It makes my job harder, > as I need to find my notes. Do so and I will close this bug.
> Will take some time, so please continue to be patient. Thank you very much David and the others Kde devs.
Thank you. I am not sure to understand everything from the technical part :) but for what I understand that is great!
Bump. Please bring back this feature, as this is why I migrated to KDE4 about 4 years ago.
Thank you for your decision on bringing back this feature. Is this ticket assigned to any version? :) Sorry for spamming.
Many thanks to David and KDE-DEV group for their willigness of solving our request . With KDE will continue being very good but also different in its class .
Request to change the title of this report to include the widgets. Both go together, different wallpapers and different widgets on the virtual desktops. And maybe someone can set Bug 343246 to RESOLVED DUPLICATE of this one instead of a WONTFIX? Please? And many thanks for investigating and contemplating the issue.
I just went through a forced distribution upgrade and am now using KDE 5.5.4. I would very much like a prognosis on when. A "fuzzy notion" so I'd know if this were imminent or maybe something that would languish for a decade. In other words, it would take a lot of effort to switch to another window manager, but I'd do that if this were to take terribly long. Just a fuzzy notion so I can set my expectations. Thank you!!
Just to remind of the outragous features of KDE 4.x, where selective virtual desktops and also monitors can be configured: https://www.linux.com/learn/how-use-kde-plasma-desktop-pro . Here a quote of: ... "A multi-monitor bliss Plasma is bliss for those with multiple monitor setups. Plasma gives each monitor a personality of its own - which is quite limited on other DEs. You can give each monitor a different wallpaper (you can actually set different wallpapers for virtual desktops and activities as well.) Each monitor can have its own desktop layout and panels. The widgets on these panels and desktops can be configured differently which means, if you work with clients who are in different time zones, you can change the time of each desktop to that particular time-zone. ******No other DE, in my knowledge, is capable of doing that.****** Panels and widgets Two core components of the Plasma desktop experience are panels and widgets which enhance the user experience. .... To access the extra features of the panel, click on the cashew icon on the right hand side of each panel and then configure it. I don't really know why they use 'cashew', a gear icon may be more appropriate so a user gets a hint of what it does. If you want to add more panels, just right-click on the empty desktop and choose 'add panel' from the context menu. KDE’s widgets take the customization of the desktop to the next level. These widgets allow you to access information quickly on the desktop, as well as on the panel. These widgets, embedded on panel are not mere icons to open that app - they work like the widgets you have seen on Android. Widgets can also be added to the desktop - the way you do with Android. Depending on the distro, a Plasma desktop comes with a set of widgets, but you can always install more widgets which are being developed by the community. I installed a couple of widgets such as Play Control (which allows me to control the music player), RSS reader, Weather, etc. Go ahead, explore and you will find something new. ..." So, to emphasise, what were the very special of KDE 4.1x, and what is the lack of Plasma 5(.6), these Plasma featues really matter. (-> see ****)
@linuxfluesterer Please read the bug report before starting a new flameware. A solution is now discussing to solve that. Yes there are feature in kde4 which was promoted a lot and not continued in kde5, paradigm change, developer change, some things which seems cool at the time proved to be not so cool, mistakes happen... If you are reading my comments you'll see that I am for that feature to come back for the following reasons: - having different wallpaper on different virtual desktop - having different widget/plasmoid on different virtual desktop - to not copying Gnome behavior (which is ... not useful in my point of view) - being able to leave kde4 and going to kde5 (I am trying on VM kde5 but my main desktop is still kde4) and I am probably missing some reasons. Thanksfully KDE developers are willing to find the good solution in term of codes and users. Thanks again to them.
Are there any news on this one? Just to make sure it hasn't been thrown at the bottom of the trash...
I'm sorry, I don't see a schedule... anyone have an idea when this might be fixed?
First Comment 2014. Now it's July 2016. I don't think there will anything happen in this case. So I stay with the really fantastic KDE4 as long as possible and when there are no more updates I switch to some other Desktop Environment. And the main reason is not so much, that the developers are not able to implement this technology but their attitude against the people who wanted it back. So for me: RIP KDE. I used you from 1997 to 2016. But no it seems to be over. So sad. Good bye.
Hi aschne. The small desktop Xfce can do that. I too have given up any hope to be able to use the once worlds best Desktop again, as I would have liked. Try it with Manjaro Xfce, this is light Distrubution, or to continue with the Goodies from *buntu, install Xubuntu. You can also install Xfce over your 14.04, I think. however, I did not dare to try it on my working program. If you speak German, join us with www.kubuntusers.de
Created attachment 99805 [details] attachment-564-0.html Well this totally sucks On Jan 11, 2016 2:49 PM, "eddy.pilon via KDE Bugzilla" < bugzilla_noreply@kde.org> wrote: > https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 > > --- Comment #164 from eddy.pilon <eddy.pilon@orange.fr> --- > Perhaps a work-around ? > I've assigned to each activitie the same number of virtual desktop in > kactivitymanagerd-pluginrc. > Now i've desktop number, cube effect with different wallpapers and > widgets > with the activitypager like vds. > Look 's weird. > > -- > You are receiving this mail because: > You are on the CC list for the bug. >
(In reply to Danny Tamez from comment #183) > Created attachment 99805 [details] > attachment-564-0.html > > Well this totally sucks > On Jan 11, 2016 2:49 PM, "eddy.pilon via KDE Bugzilla" < > bugzilla_noreply@kde.org> wrote: > > > https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 > > > > --- Comment #164 from eddy.pilon <eddy.pilon@orange.fr> --- > > Perhaps a work-around ? > > I've assigned to each activitie the same number of virtual desktop in > > kactivitymanagerd-pluginrc. > > Now i've desktop number, cube effect with different wallpapers and > > widgets > > with the activitypager like vds. > > Look 's weird. > > > > -- > > You are receiving this mail because: > > You are on the CC list for the bug. > > Hmmm.. and what do you want to tell us? I can not follow your intention. -Linuxfluesterer
Sorry Linuxfluesterer, What I meant was, we've waited patiently for a long time on the promise that this would be fixed, and it seems that it's not going to happen. That's what totally sucks. Which seems so strange when so many users really want this back. I guess waiting patiently didn't work :(
Tried my luck with Opensuse Leap 42.1 . After install it looks a very , very bad REGRESSION ..... It seems that the "new" plasma5 KDE is worse that windose 1.0 . You get messages like .... "the kwin failed" and gives you two options "Restart appl" and/or "close" to windose of 1998 ! AS for the much promoted plasma5, the panel disappears, the palsma stops and give you the "black" screen. That's an improvement over windose ! Over all the "leap-plasma5" combination is a disaster . Quo Vadis ..... Leap/KDE developers ? This Leap/KDE disaster reminds me of 1. A.Cooper's 1999 book " The Inmates are Running the Asylum [ Why High-Tech Products Drive Us Crazy and How ro Restore the Sanity ] " and 2. T. Winograd's 1996 book " Bringing Design to Software ". Sadly, I recommend both of them to the team[s] who p*ssed off the KDE Community , and retired the good OpenSuse 13.2 and KDE 4 replacing them with very badly designed "better products" . They just replaced a Cathedral and forced us into a bazaar ! What a pity ! Good riddance Leap and and good riddance KDE5 with your plasma ! I
(In reply to Danny Tamez from comment #183) > Created attachment 99805 [details] > attachment-564-0.html > > Well this totally sucks > On Jan 11, 2016 2:49 PM, "eddy.pilon via KDE Bugzilla" < > bugzilla_noreply@kde.org> wrote: > > > https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 > > > > --- Comment #164 from eddy.pilon <eddy.pilon@orange.fr> --- > > Perhaps a work-around ? > > I've assigned to each activitie the same number of virtual desktop in > > kactivitymanagerd-pluginrc. > > Now i've desktop number, cube effect with different wallpapers and > > widgets > > with the activitypager like vds. > > Look 's weird. > > > > -- > > You are receiving this mail because: > > You are on the CC list for the bug. > > Sorry, my english is light and don't really understand what you want to say by " Well this totally sucks" !! I just wanted to say that since my distro switch to plasma5 i've had enough to wait and tried my wallpapers and cube effect to come back with config files. But i understand you . My distro just switched to plasma 5.7, same issue and no commits about this bug.
After a two-year try to convince the developers, I have to state this is no longer a Bug. Instead it has become battle between an group of developers who wants to develop what they want and hundred of millions of users. KDE post plasma 4.x is now definitively not on my fare and I suppose even with a plasma 6 I shall never return. Xubuntu (Xfce desktop) can do it, so I am switching to them, well knowing, that I loose some dear routines. other Distros have a Xfce-Desktop version too. So, why get heated about something we can not influence due to sort of «Chinese Stubbornness» of the producers side. If Mercedes would suddenly only build three-wheel-cars, they would very soon realise, the regular customer find valuable alternatives (Audi, Jaguar, Chryslers, etc) and get financially bankrupt. In this case the result will be, that less and less users will use KDE. That's my last post in this depressing discussion. Bye to all, you disregarded Users and arrogant Developers. Stay happy and use Linux. Just on afterthought: this situation resembles the European Union. If a majority of the EU-PARLIAMENT (min. 376 MEPs) make by vote a decision, this result has no binding value to the 28 Commissars nor to the 28 head of States. They can decide whatever they want. Democracy at its best??? Am 03.07.2016 um 08:13 schrieb eddy.pilon via KDE Bugzilla: > https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 > > --- Comment #187 from eddy.pilon <eddy.pilon@orange.fr> --- > (In reply to Danny Tamez from comment #183) >> Created attachment 99805 [details] >> attachment-564-0.html >> >> Well this totally sucks >> On Jan 11, 2016 2:49 PM, "eddy.pilon via KDE Bugzilla" < >> bugzilla_noreply@kde.org> wrote: >> >>> https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 >>> >>> --- Comment #164 from eddy.pilon <eddy.pilon@orange.fr> --- >>> Perhaps a work-around ? >>> I've assigned to each activitie the same number of virtual desktop in >>> kactivitymanagerd-pluginrc. >>> Now i've desktop number, cube effect with different wallpapers and >>> widgets >>> with the activitypager like vds. >>> Look 's weird. >>> >>> -- >>> You are receiving this mail because: >>> You are on the CC list for the bug. >>> > > Sorry, my english is light and don't really understand what you want to say by > " Well this totally sucks" !! > I just wanted to say that since my distro switch to plasma5 i've had enough to > wait and tried my wallpapers and cube effect to come back with config files. > But i understand you . > My distro just switched to plasma 5.7, same issue and no commits about this > bug. >
Ok guys, please stop useless bashing of the devs. While I also am impatient to see the features back, I realize it is not a trivial matter but actually a quite complex architectural change. David said they are working on it so please be patient. As a side note however it is becoming more difficult updating different systems as kde 4 has been deprecated on many and new packages are requiring 5. David, when you have a rough estimate of time schedule please let us know. Thank you
(In reply to loop.rw from comment #189) > Ok guys, please stop useless bashing of the devs. While I also am impatient > to see the features back, I realize it is not a trivial matter but actually > a quite complex architectural change. David said they are working on it so > please be patient. > > As a side note however it is becoming more difficult updating different > systems ... Hmm, ok, the fundament of Plasma 5 may be more difficult than the one of KDE... But only if the fundament is well, the building can should be started. I will not offend any dev here, but maybe Plasma could be compared with our German airport BER, an absolute desaster and in the end nobody is really content. I agree to Arran (com ment 188), who said: >Just on afterthought: this situation resembles the European Union. If a majority >of the EU-PARLIAMENT (min. 376 MEPs) make by vote a decision, this result has no >binding value to the 28 Commissars nor to the 28 head of States. They can decide >whatever they want. Democracy at its best??? I am rather sure, Plasma devs could have prevented this trouble situation. As I said before, I am still using KDE version 4.14.10. Anyway, lost time for every Plasma users, who have a serious demand for lost features (and, much more important, broken functions!). -Linuxfluesterer
Thanks for the flowers (Danke für die Blumen), linuxflüsterer. What really brought my temper to overflow, the doctor racing home and sedating me for four days, was the moment I was told, that the Xfce desktop has done that feature in a couple of weaks, after read the first comments here. I don't have much time until September, but then, unless...» I swith to Xubuntu. Am 05.07.2016 um 12:59 schrieb linuxfluesterer via KDE Bugzilla: > https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 > > --- Comment #190 from linuxfluesterer <linuxfluesterer@gmx.net> --- > (In reply to loop.rw from comment #189) >> Ok guys, please stop useless bashing of the devs. While I also am impatient >> to see the features back, I realize it is not a trivial matter but actually >> a quite complex architectural change. David said they are working on it so >> please be patient. >> >> As a side note however it is becoming more difficult updating different >> systems ... > > Hmm, ok, the fundament of Plasma 5 may be more difficult than the one of KDE... > But only if the fundament is well, the building can should be started. I will > not offend any dev here, but maybe Plasma could be compared with our German > airport BER, an absolute desaster and in the end nobody is really content. > I agree to Arran (com ment 188), who said: >> Just on afterthought: this situation resembles the European Union. If a majority >> of the EU-PARLIAMENT (min. 376 MEPs) make by vote a decision, this result has no >> binding value to the 28 Commissars nor to the 28 head of States. They can decide >> whatever they want. Democracy at its best??? > I am rather sure, Plasma devs could have prevented this trouble situation. > As I said before, I am still using KDE version 4.14.10. Anyway, lost time for > every Plasma users, who have a serious demand for lost features (and, much more > important, broken functions!). > > -Linuxfluesterer >
We will not see the return of this functionality un 5.8 either: https://phabricator.kde.org/tag/plasma/ Still on a mix of kde4 and kde5 but I am starting to have more and more problem. Dolphin is basically unasable now (konqueror still working fine thanksfully).
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #167) > Update: > > I met with Martin G (kwin maintainer) and Marco to come up with a solid plan > moving forward. > > - We make ShellClient virtual desktops contain an ID not merely a stack > index. > > - ShellClient VD cardinality is changed to match activities. > > - DesktopGrid Effect gets rewritten in QtQuick (we need a change in there > for the cardinality changes, and Martin G has had a rule since 2014 that it > needs a rewrite before any edits..) > > - I invert the DesktopView mapping logic in ShellCorona from Activity -> > Physical Screen to Physical Screen -> Activity. (possibly refactoring into > ScreenCorona class: Rule of Dave - if you have nested maps, you're missing a > class.) > > - KWin activity code gets dropped completely. > > - 1 DesktopView is created per VD. > > Bam everyone wins, and we get this feature without any config migrations > needed. > Will take some time, so please continue to be patient. > > Note: This is a bug tracker for devs, not a public forum. > I do not want to be flooded with off topic comments. It makes my job harder, > as I need to find my notes. Do so and I will close this bug. At the risk of polluting the thread, I just want to add a gratuitous (!) thank you, not just for your willingness to do the hard work to resurrect the feature, but for your work on the project in general. I've used KDE for several years because it is feature-rich, perhaps to a fault. It draws criticism from many corners by people who prefer "lightweight." But it's my personal preference. KDE does not force me to adapt to a predetermined work style. It adapts to me. I can appreciate that the functionality that was removed is effectively available via Activities and arguably in a more logical presentation, but the metaphor is different. As someone who has used Activities and Desktops simultaneously for years, I have developed a particular work style and set of habits such that the removal was jarring. It was antithetical to what I have always regarded KDE to represent. Sure, I can adapt, but that misses the point, and frankly, the imperious rejoinder to objections that "it's not needed" smacks of arrogance and invites the observation that KDE is not needed. As the developer, one is entitled to their arrogance, and as a person one is entitled to their irritation. But it surprised me. Sorry, but that's how I see it. Please affirm that the functionality will be restored and that users have not been abandoned due to pique. I can wait, and I don't look a gift horse in the mouth. But tell us we have a reason to wait, OK? A very few words will suffice. Just as a courtesy.
I add to this painful debate with huge caution. I use 3 screens, 6 virtual desktops (obviously of 3 screens each) On three of the virtual desktops I have a dual screen virtual machine, and each of the 3 dual screen VMs has 4 virtual desktops. I keep track of where I am by wallpaper. I move between the virtual desktops with mouse scroll. I move stuff between the virtual desktops, also with mouse scroll. Mostly I am moving data between the desktops so data from one can be input to or compared with another. Sounds complex but the VMs simply contain the risks and the multiple virtual desktops metaphor allows me to move things around easily to visualize and see patterns. I agree with @Janet #21 and @Nathanael #22 on usability. I really tried activities multiple times, I wanted to love them. But, and it may be a reflection of my poor upbringing, just hate them. I may have a longer memory than most, (except @loop.rw #38 and @zeke123 #94 who raised the same point) or may just be older, but we had the same issue in going from the beautiful, magic kde3 to the initially non-functional kde4: devs also then attempted to force users to use activities and did not have different wallpapers / desktop So I did not upgrade from Kubuntu 8.04 until 12.04, when kde4 finally reached feature parity with kde3. I bought another machine last week, and installed kubuntu 14.04 on it, not 16.04, *only* because of this. So now I am on kubuntu 14.04, and obviously will be staying with it quite a while longer Hopefully not past 14.04's end of life, but I will if I have to. How I work is too important too me to mess with, and I can manage the security. Plus the beauty of kde4, like the beauty of kde3 before it, is really hard to part with. finally, @David Edmundson, you are a hero - not just for getting stuff done but for the feedback to users. Hope this has been a positive contribution.
(In reply to mc from comment #194) >... > So now I am on kubuntu 14.04, and obviously will be staying with it quite a > while longer > Hopefully not past 14.04's end of life, but I will if I have to. > How I work is too important too me to mess with, and I can manage the > security. > > Plus the beauty of kde4, like the beauty of kde3 before it, is really hard > to part with. > > finally, @David Edmundson, you are a hero - not just for getting stuff done > but for the feedback to users. > > Hope this has been a positive contribution. Yes, KDE4 is absolutely fantastic. I just moved from Ubuntu 16.04 to 14.04 because of similar reasons. There are many issues with KDE 5 that I was just trippng over. I could not simply right-click and use icon settings to change application parameters conveniently. I cannot use window tabs to drag and regroup windows. The omissions were just killing my workflow. I have started a kvm server running 16.04 in the new machine in order to make use of ZFS in the Linux kernel as supplied by the distro. Support for legacy features are critical in the commercial software world. Promoters of FOSS often claim that it is superior in part because of increased flexibility, options and community support. Yet I was practically ridiculed and taunted for suggesting I would move back to KDE4 over on Freenode #plasma. Ironically, I was informed that it is no longer "supported." Some community!
Thank you for the information on XFCE. After being a KDE user since KDE2 I am giving up. This bug is open for a long time and nothing seems to happen on the subject. If I want to use Gnome, I will have go to it. Now probably because of the mixed of kde4 and kde5/plasma5 I am experiencing weird appareance with dolphin which is totally different than all the other KDE applications. This problem will probably disappear with a full kde5 desktop but unfortunately I am totally unable to adapt to the new paradigms. Since I have to adapt to something different so be it, but I will do it for a desktop that will be more or less adapted to my workflow. Thanks for KDE, it was a pleasure to use for years but it is time to move somewhere else now. Good luck. (In reply to Arran from comment #188) > After a two-year try to convince the developers, I have to state this is no > longer > a Bug. > Instead it has become battle between an group of developers who wants to > develop > what they want and hundred of millions of users. > > KDE post plasma 4.x is now definitively not on my fare and I suppose even > with a > plasma 6 I shall never return. Xubuntu (Xfce desktop) can do it, so I am > switching > to them, well knowing, that I loose some dear routines. other Distros have > a > Xfce-Desktop version too. So, why get heated about something we can not > influence > due to sort of «Chinese Stubbornness» of the producers side. If Mercedes > would > suddenly only build three-wheel-cars, they would very soon realise, the > regular > customer find valuable alternatives (Audi, Jaguar, Chryslers, etc) and get > financially bankrupt. In this case the result will be, that less and less > users > will use KDE. > > That's my last post in this depressing discussion. > > Bye to all, you disregarded Users and arrogant Developers. Stay happy and > use Linux. > > Just on afterthought: this situation resembles the European Union. If a > majority > of the EU-PARLIAMENT (min. 376 MEPs) make by vote a decision, this result > has no > binding value to the 28 Commissars nor to the 28 head of States. They can > decide > whatever they want. Democracy at its best??? > > > > > > Am 03.07.2016 um 08:13 schrieb eddy.pilon via KDE Bugzilla: > > https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 > > > > --- Comment #187 from eddy.pilon <eddy.pilon@orange.fr> --- > > (In reply to Danny Tamez from comment #183) > >> Created attachment 99805 [details] > >> attachment-564-0.html > >> > >> Well this totally sucks > >> On Jan 11, 2016 2:49 PM, "eddy.pilon via KDE Bugzilla" < > >> bugzilla_noreply@kde.org> wrote: > >> > >>> https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 > >>> > >>> --- Comment #164 from eddy.pilon <eddy.pilon@orange.fr> --- > >>> Perhaps a work-around ? > >>> I've assigned to each activitie the same number of virtual desktop in > >>> kactivitymanagerd-pluginrc. > >>> Now i've desktop number, cube effect with different wallpapers and > >>> widgets > >>> with the activitypager like vds. > >>> Look 's weird. > >>> > >>> -- > >>> You are receiving this mail because: > >>> You are on the CC list for the bug. > >>> > > > > Sorry, my english is light and don't really understand what you want to say by > > " Well this totally sucks" !! > > I just wanted to say that since my distro switch to plasma5 i've had enough to > > wait and tried my wallpapers and cube effect to come back with config files. > > But i understand you . > > My distro just switched to plasma 5.7, same issue and no commits about this > > bug. > >
Any news for this function? KDE devs? If you don't like this function, say that to your users, and close all relevant ticket, as wontfix. But this? Maybe, and working this problem, and bla-bla. ~2 years! It is the time to say yes or no!
Strongly agree it is time to say YES or NO. answer is a simple answer. Yes or NO
@kikadf and @Diego to be honest - developers have already said "No" in December 2014! - but this "No" was not accepted. And yes, I would like to have it back too; but you can't say, there was no decision
(In reply to Wulf from comment #201) > @kikadf and @Diego > to be honest - developers have already said "No" in December 2014! - but > this "No" was not accepted. > And yes, I would like to have it back too; but you can't say, there was no > decision Nope, David realised this is useful and he got onto it. It is taking time but I believe the guy: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143#c167 Still guys, stop spamming. If you are interested in the bug, get in CC and wait. If you got time get into code and help the devs rather than spamming.
So to give some update (to show I'm not ignoring this) From me in #61 >That's currently super tricky as that class is super fragile; it's all based around QScreen which we want, yet we needed to get a signal that was broken in QScreen so it's a combo of two different screen managements systems - which get updates are out of sync \o/ We've fixed that in Qt , but we're not getting that till Qt 5.6. Then that class can half in size. If you've done the maths, you'll realise that got done in Plasma 5.7 (~6 weeks ago). However it exposed some other startup bug, and now some extra complex layer of multiscreen stuff got added on top - so it's moved forwards, but still not in quite an ideal state. Though I will re-itterate, please don't type opinions in a bug tracker. They just make it harder for me to find useful comments.
Still an issue in Plasma 5.7.5 and upwards. Activities don't provide an alternative ; for example if I want to refer back to content on another desktop, - I can't alt-tab to it if it's in a different activity. The delineation between activities makes that pretty much impossible unless I switch back to the previous activity with one command, and then source the content with another, - from my own experience it's markedly slower than just using a virtual desktop and visually identifying it with a different wallpaper and widget set.
(In reply to Canoe from comment #204) Hi guy From comment 204 David dev seems mostly made the job . Wait ... , may be in two months our christmas present ... Otherwise , i dimly remember Aaron Seigo commit about the same kde4 issue on his blog: After implemented this future , tells user how to configure plasmaappletrc for testing and report bugs before validation. Hope that kde dev will make such. Sorry for my english.
> I can't alt-tab to it if it's in a different activity Sure you can. System settings -> Window Management -> Task Switcher There's a checkbox for activities just like there is for the VDs.
Why not just enable different wallpaper on each virtual desktop like KDE3? Choose the virtual desktop, set the wallpaper for that desktop. I have no use for activities, and could care less about widgets. To me that nonsense has been nothing but a 9 year waste of time that should be an optional package, but I do like a different wallpaper on each desktop. There is no reason anyone should have to set 10 different activity and widget settings just to have a different wallpaper on each virtual desktop work and have the task manager and desktop switcher still continue to function correctly. As of Frameworks 5.28.0 and Qt 5.7.0, there is still no simple way to put a different wallpaper on each virtual desktop in system settings.
(In reply to David Rankin from comment #207) David said it perfectly.
Except that they cannot be 'just enabled'. The code for that is simply not there, and it is not trivial to add it. Prove me wrong, if you want.
I don't care any longer if this negative aspect to KDE's clients, the users, continues. I have found PClinuxOS with Trinity as desktop environment. It bases on KDE used before the first Plasma, but steadily developed to keep up to their users demands. I am now, after a short trial of 2 weeks, prepared to install it as my new bread and butter distribution and I do not have to bother with KDE any more. What a releave.
How many users will lose KDE for not implementing this characteristic that we have been asking for a re-incorporation for years. "Thanks" KDE for ignoring your users. a greeting.
I couldn't do without the wallpaper switching any longer, and so implemented a quick solution. It doesn't address the ability to have different widgets on each virtual desktop, as was possible before, but at least allows separate wallpaper. It does so by tricking the slideshow background into changing its image. Anyone is welcome to try it out - code is at https://github.com/martenjj/wallpaperswitch Please don't comment on this bug report or bother the Plasma developers about this - it is unofficial and nothing to do with the Plasma project.
(In reply to Jonathan Marten from comment #212) > Please don't comment on this bug report or bother the Plasma developers > about this - it is unofficial and nothing to do with the Plasma project. Sorry, but I just can't help posting a THANK YOU for this Jonathan. Very cool. I've been waiting for over 2 years. Thank You.
There is a work-around that does not require any installation, just configuration. Tested on Debian Stretch with KDE 5.8 (which will be used for a while, so the w/a may be useful). At the end, you will have a pager with N "screen", Ctrl-FN will switch to "screen" N, and the mouse wheel will also move between "screens". Except that technically each "screen" will be an activity of 1 virtual desktop (VD). Let's start: 1) switch the pager from a VD to an activity pager: - unlock the taskbar - right click on the pager - select the "Alternatives..." menu entry - click "Activity Pager" and then the "Switch" button => now the pager tracks activities While there, right click on the pager again, select "Activity Pager Settings..." and configure to taste. 2) Move to a single VD, so each activity = 1 VD = 1 screen - System Settings => Desktop Behavior => Virtual Desktops, reduce to 1. 3) Create as many activities as you need "screens" (same number as the qty of VDs you used to use); - System Settings => Desktop Behavior => Activities, create and name as needed. Now you see the activities in your pager, and from the pager point of view it's as before except activities replaced VDs. 4) Enable the mouse wheel to switch between activities - Right click on the desktop background => Configure Desktop - Select the "Mouse Actions" tab - Item "Vertical-Scroll", select "Switch Activity" IMPORTANT: this setting is per activity. So you need to repeat this for all the created activities. 5) Enable Ctrl-Fn to switch directly to screen (= activity) n The first thing I tried (and it didn't work for me) is in System Settings => Shortcuts => Global Shortcuts. In the "Components" list, select the "Plasma" entry. Here you can see the created activities, but there are two problems: - instead of their nice, user chosen name, it's a UUID based name - assigning a keyboard shortcut "Ctrl-Fn" is possible, but does not work for me => Could someone confirm this on latest KDE? So I know if I need to file a bug on KDE or on Debian. Thanks. The alternate method, which works, uses "Custom Shortcuts" under the shortcut system settings too and is a bit more complicated. For each screen/activity: - click on "Edit" and select New => Global Shortcut => D-Bus Command - Name the new keyboard shortcut, for example "Go to screen N" - In "Trigger", set the shortcut. For example Ctrl-F1 for the 1st screen - In the Action tab: * For "Remote application", use "org.kde.ActivityManager" * For "Remote object": "/ActivityManager/Activities" * For "Function": "org.kde.ActivityManager.Activities.SetCurrentActivity" * For "Arguments": the UUID of the activity (see below). (no quote in any field) And to get an activity UUID: * click on "Launch D-Bus Browser" * in the "search" field, enter "activity" * select "org.kde.ActivityManager" * in the methods tab, select ActivityManager => Activities then: org.kde.ActivityManager.Activities * click on the "Method: ListActivitiesWithInformation" entry Now in the bottom field, you have the method output listing all the created activities with their nice user name and their UUID. Select the UUID (only, not the "Argument: (ssssi) part nor the quotes) and use it the shortcut "Arguments" field as is. * Apply. Now Ctrl-Fn will switch to the activity/screen n. There is a slide animation that doesn't seem to be configurable. If anyone knows how to disable it, I'd appreciate the info (but I can live with it). Done! And of course, because each "screen" is now an activity, you can configure different backgrounds and widgets. As I don't use other fancy VD tools (cube, etc.) for my limited use it's functionally equivalent to the VD features I used to use under KDE4. For others, you may loose some features. If anyone knows how to improve on this, feel free to share.
(In reply to an.inbox from comment #214) > There is a work-around that does not require any installation, just > configuration. > Tested on Debian Stretch with KDE 5.8 (which will be used for a while, so > the w/a may be useful). > > At the end, you will have a pager with N "screen", Ctrl-FN will switch to > "screen" N, and the mouse wheel will also move between "screens". Except > that technically each "screen" will be an activity of 1 virtual desktop (VD). > > Let's start: > > 1) switch the pager from a VD to an activity pager: > - unlock the taskbar > - right click on the pager > - select the "Alternatives..." menu entry > - click "Activity Pager" and then the "Switch" button > => now the pager tracks activities > While there, right click on the pager again, select "Activity Pager > Settings..." and configure to taste. > > 2) Move to a single VD, so each activity = 1 VD = 1 screen > - System Settings => Desktop Behavior => Virtual Desktops, reduce to 1. > > 3) Create as many activities as you need "screens" (same number as the qty of > VDs you used to use); > - System Settings => Desktop Behavior => Activities, create and name as > needed. > Now you see the activities in your pager, and from the pager point of view > it's as before except activities replaced VDs. > > 4) Enable the mouse wheel to switch between activities > - Right click on the desktop background => Configure Desktop > - Select the "Mouse Actions" tab > - Item "Vertical-Scroll", select "Switch Activity" > IMPORTANT: this setting is per activity. So you need to repeat this for all > the created activities. > > 5) Enable Ctrl-Fn to switch directly to screen (= activity) n > > The first thing I tried (and it didn't work for me) is in System Settings > => Shortcuts => Global Shortcuts. In the "Components" list, select the > "Plasma" entry. Here you can see the created activities, but there are two > problems: > - instead of their nice, user chosen name, it's a UUID based name > - assigning a keyboard shortcut "Ctrl-Fn" is possible, but does not work > for me > => Could someone confirm this on latest KDE? So I know if I need to file a > bug on KDE or on Debian. Thanks. > > The alternate method, which works, uses "Custom Shortcuts" under the > shortcut system settings too and is a bit more complicated. For each > screen/activity: > - click on "Edit" and select New => Global Shortcut => D-Bus Command > - Name the new keyboard shortcut, for example "Go to screen N" > - In "Trigger", set the shortcut. For example Ctrl-F1 for the 1st screen > - In the Action tab: > * For "Remote application", use "org.kde.ActivityManager" > * For "Remote object": "/ActivityManager/Activities" > * For "Function": > "org.kde.ActivityManager.Activities.SetCurrentActivity" > * For "Arguments": the UUID of the activity (see below). > (no quote in any field) > > And to get an activity UUID: > * click on "Launch D-Bus Browser" > * in the "search" field, enter "activity" > * select "org.kde.ActivityManager" > * in the methods tab, select ActivityManager => Activities > then: org.kde.ActivityManager.Activities > * click on the "Method: ListActivitiesWithInformation" entry > Now in the bottom field, you have the method output listing all the > created activities with their nice user name and their UUID. Select the UUID > (only, not the "Argument: (ssssi) part nor the quotes) and use it the > shortcut "Arguments" field as is. > * Apply. > > Now Ctrl-Fn will switch to the activity/screen n. There is a slide > animation that doesn't seem to be configurable. If anyone knows how to > disable it, I'd appreciate the info (but I can live with it). > > Done! And of course, because each "screen" is now an activity, you can > configure different backgrounds and widgets. As I don't use other fancy VD > tools (cube, etc.) for my limited use it's functionally equivalent to the VD > features I used to use under KDE4. For others, you may loose some features. > If anyone knows how to improve on this, feel free to share. Hi from comman(In reply to an.inbox from comment #214) > There is a work-around that does not require any installation, just > configuration. > Tested on Debian Stretch with KDE 5.8 (which will be used for a while, so > the w/a may be useful). > > At the end, you will have a pager with N "screen", Ctrl-FN will switch to > "screen" N, and the mouse wheel will also move between "screens". Except > that technically each "screen" will be an activity of 1 virtual desktop (VD). > > Let's start: > > 1) switch the pager from a VD to an activity pager: > - unlock the taskbar > - right click on the pager > - select the "Alternatives..." menu entry > - click "Activity Pager" and then the "Switch" button > => now the pager tracks activities > While there, right click on the pager again, select "Activity Pager > Settings..." and configure to taste. > > 2) Move to a single VD, so each activity = 1 VD = 1 screen > - System Settings => Desktop Behavior => Virtual Desktops, reduce to 1. > > 3) Create as many activities as you need "screens" (same number as the qty of > VDs you used to use); > - System Settings => Desktop Behavior => Activities, create and name as > needed. > Now you see the activities in your pager, and from the pager point of view > it's as before except activities replaced VDs. > > 4) Enable the mouse wheel to switch between activities > - Right click on the desktop background => Configure Desktop > - Select the "Mouse Actions" tab > - Item "Vertical-Scroll", select "Switch Activity" > IMPORTANT: this setting is per activity. So you need to repeat this for all > the created activities. > > 5) Enable Ctrl-Fn to switch directly to screen (= activity) n > > The first thing I tried (and it didn't work for me) is in System Settings > => Shortcuts => Global Shortcuts. In the "Components" list, select the > "Plasma" entry. Here you can see the created activities, but there are two > problems: > - instead of their nice, user chosen name, it's a UUID based name > - assigning a keyboard shortcut "Ctrl-Fn" is possible, but does not work > for me > => Could someone confirm this on latest KDE? So I know if I need to file a > bug on KDE or on Debian. Thanks. > > The alternate method, which works, uses "Custom Shortcuts" under the > shortcut system settings too and is a bit more complicated. For each > screen/activity: > - click on "Edit" and select New => Global Shortcut => D-Bus Command > - Name the new keyboard shortcut, for example "Go to screen N" > - In "Trigger", set the shortcut. For example Ctrl-F1 for the 1st screen > - In the Action tab: > * For "Remote application", use "org.kde.ActivityManager" > * For "Remote object": "/ActivityManager/Activities" > * For "Function": > "org.kde.ActivityManager.Activities.SetCurrentActivity" > * For "Arguments": the UUID of the activity (see below). > (no quote in any field) > > And to get an activity UUID: > * click on "Launch D-Bus Browser" > * in the "search" field, enter "activity" > * select "org.kde.ActivityManager" > * in the methods tab, select ActivityManager => Activities > then: org.kde.ActivityManager.Activities > * click on the "Method: ListActivitiesWithInformation" entry > Now in the bottom field, you have the method output listing all the > created activities with their nice user name and their UUID. Select the UUID > (only, not the "Argument: (ssssi) part nor the quotes) and use it the > shortcut "Arguments" field as is. > * Apply. > > Now Ctrl-Fn will switch to the activity/screen n. There is a slide > animation that doesn't seem to be configurable. If anyone knows how to > disable it, I'd appreciate the info (but I can live with it). > > Done! And of course, because each "screen" is now an activity, you can > configure different backgrounds and widgets. As I don't use other fancy VD > tools (cube, etc.) for my limited use it's functionally equivalent to the VD > features I used to use under KDE4. For others, you may loose some features. > If anyone knows how to improve on this, feel free to share. Hi !. from comment 164, got same result a few months ago with cube effect by kactivitymanagerd-pluginrc config, (activity uuid and screen number). But now i using Jonathan Marten switcher for different wallpapers. Sorry for my english.
(In reply to an.inbox from comment an.inbox@free.fr #214) > There is a work-around that does not require any installation, just > configuration. ... Thank you for your 'workaround'. I'm sorry to say, I'm not able to follow this workaround, those steps, because I'm not a native English speaker / user. So the phrases and expressions are not easily able to be translated. You can call it: I'm too stupid, it's ok. And second, it sounds too complicated for me to distressing to make it possible handling with independent Virtual Desktops. And i'm sure, I'm not the only one. I'm will go on to work with KDE 4.14.10 until realisation of a basic, essential feature in Plasma, which made it rather most worth to use KDE.
Hi Linuxflüsterer I totally agree with you. I have realised, that perhaps leaving KDE is (for me) the real future, as I am all for democracy also in OpenSource products. What we experience since more than 10 years from KDE is a blatant dictatorship. I have found out that «xfce» can do all that, what I wanted. Out of the Box. I'm just a bit too busy and have the outlook that by end of the month I have a fast internet connection (about 70+) I then will change to installing a distribution with xfce. And then, KDE kann mir die Hosen herabrutschen und gestohlen bleiben.
Hi Everyone, I just wanted to add that I would very much love to have the virtual desktops with the customizations and features they already had in Plasma 4 including custom wallpapers and widgets per virtual desktop in Plasma 5.x for all the good reasons that have been detailed in this post's thread. And as others have mentioned, If you can also get Plasma 5's Activities to function the same way with all the features of Plasma 4's virtual desktops, or some easy to use working combination and integration of Virtual Desktops and Activities, that would be great as well. Thank you to the KDE developers who are working on bringing this to us KDE users. There are a lot of people including me and other Linux Mint KDE users that want this and are waiting for this before upgrading to KDE Plasma 5. What is the progress, please?
Hmm, in Sebastian Kuegler's blog (https://vizzzion.org/blog/2016/10/plasmas-road-ahead/). I read this: "One new feature which we want to offer in our Wayland session is support for scaling the contents of each output individually, which allows users to use multiple displays with vastly varying pixel densities more seamlessly. There are also improvements planned around virtual desktops under Wayland, as well as their relation to Plasma’s Activities features. Output configuration as of now is also not complete, and needs more work in the coming months. Some features we plan will also need changes in QtWayland, so there’s some upstream bug-fixing needed, as well." ... I am not sure about the meaning. Does it mean that in Plasma 5.9 individual Virtual Desktops will be (maybe?) realised by activities? I really hope, not. Or will individual Desktops with individual wallpapers and plasmoids the KDE 4 way will become true?
*** Bug 374077 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Like the many many others who have commented here, I was devastated and rather indignant that the different widgets, different wallpaper feature had been removed from the Virtual Desktops. However, thanks entirely to the very useful reply by an.inbox@free.fr (Comment 214, on 2017-01-03), I am now personally very happy, having replicated the functionality I require using Activities instead of Desktops. The critical thing is to change the Destop Pager to an Activity Pager and to change to just one Desktop per Activity, followed by a bit of customisation of the Activities. Indeed, as far as I can see, Desktops now, without the differnt widgets/wallpapers facility, are pretty useless and just a misleading distraction. I was "forced" to upgrade to OpenSUSE 42.2 (with Plasma 5) since OpenSUSE 13.2 is now supported, and as usual after each upgrade, one of the first things I set about doing was changing the Desktops to use different widgets. I couldn't believe it when I searched and searched and still couldn't find the facility anywhere, and after a lot of Googling I found my way here. Although I am now perfectly happy with the Activities solution, I think lots of other people will have the same problem and it would be worth doing more to direct people to Activities and tell them how to use them.
(In reply to Caoimhín Ó Donnaíle from comment #221) > personally very happy, having replicated the functionality I require using > Activities instead of Desktops. The critical thing is to change the Destop Can I make an "Activity Cube" with one Activity on each side, and does switching between activities use the compositor (kwin)? Last time I checked this was not the case. The reason I (and others I know) initially switched to Linux around 10 years ago was the fact that it had compiz and you could do stuff like this. The reason I switched to KDE around 5 years ago was that plasma could paint a transparent background on the Desktop, letting you get a different wallpaper on each Desktop. It seems like every time this feature appears, someone decides "nobody is using this" and soon there is a bug report with 100 CCs with the standard answer being "our desktop paradigm that uses activities is better than yours so just change". Eventually someone writes a hack that doesn't really fix the problem but just changes the wallpaper whenever the desktop is changed, and we're back to what people were doing 10 years ago. The state of multiple wallpapers on the linux-desktop remains pathetic.
As I said before. Xfce does offer exactly this.
(In reply to Arran from comment #223) > As I said before. Xfce does offer exactly this. With kwin as the compositor?
@ Nathanael Schilling I do not think this Bug report is on Activities. This is about wallpapers on the virtual desktops. Also, I think you have a question, but not a bug report. So either report a new bug (with all evidence and material that should go with it), or go to the KDE forums to ask for help/explanation about your subject.
(In reply to hcvv from comment #225) > @ Nathanael Schilling > I do not think this Bug report is on Activities. This is about wallpapers > on the virtual desktops. I am very much aware what this Bug report is about. The (or at least a) reason why this Bug has not been fixed is that plasma devs feel that "activities" should be able to replace virtual desktops. The point I am making (and others also have made) is that activities currently do not have the necessary functionality to replace virtual desktops. My question was in reply to a comment that claimed that xfce had the functionality in question (multiple wallpaperes on virtual desktops, including compositing).
(In reply to Nathanael Schilling from comment #224) > (In reply to Arran from comment #223) > > As I said before. Xfce does offer exactly this. > > With kwin as the compositor? I don't give a penny what is is called. And even less who makes it. The only important thing for me is, that I have again the different Backgrounds on different Desktops without any twistings, tricks and cheats. Whether this is based on Plasma or Moon or Hell does not count for me. I am not married with KDE, not at all. They lured me away from Mint due to exactly the different backgrounds and now they tell me I am daft to not find Activities attractive. Best, you try it out for yourself on any of the distros with XFC€.
(In reply to Nathanael Schilling from comment #222) > (In reply to Caoimhín Ó Donnaíle from comment #221) > > > Can I make an "Activity Cube" with one Activity on each side, and does > switching between activities use the compositor (kwin)? Last time I checked > this was not the case. The reason I (and others I know) initially switched > to Linux around 10 years ago was the fact that it had compiz and you could > do stuff like this. The reason I switched to KDE around 5 years ago was that > plasma could paint a transparent background on the Desktop, letting you get > a different wallpaper on each Desktop. It seems like every time this feature > appears, someone decides "nobody is using this" and soon there is a bug > report with 100 CCs with the standard answer being "our desktop paradigm > that uses activities is better than yours so just change". Eventually > someone writes a hack that doesn't really fix the problem but just changes > the wallpaper whenever the desktop is changed, and we're back to what people > were doing 10 years ago. The state of multiple wallpapers on the > linux-desktop remains pathetic. This. I don't really care how it's done, and yes, it's a fairly non-utilitarian pretty, but this is one of the things that drew me to Linux as a full-time OS. I tried Cinnamon, and it's a nice desktop, but at the time not quite mature. I went to KDE 4.x and was happy, but there were problems (still are) with little things like bluetooth implementation that I could never solve. I went to LM 18 xfce, with a wonderful mass-rename function in thunar, but bluetooth still wouldn't work and to my chagrin I couldn't get PHPMyAdmin to work either! Sure, the cube is there, kinda, but not the pretty function we had all the way back in the Gnome 2 days. I mean, the transition between desktops looked cubelike, but we used to be able to see and manipulate a whole cube, see where each desktop sat in relation to the others: pretty, and high-tech! But that was almost a decade ago. KDE 5.x solves those problems I had with xfce, but then I lose the one utility that I had gotten so comfortable with: quickly switching between virtual desktops with each desktop having different widgets and different wallpapers... with each wallpaper I know which desktop I'm on and therefore which work I am doing in each. I am on KDE 5.x now, using the Activities workaround, trying to get everything set up the way I like (haven't got my ctrl-alt-arrow switch working yet), but my pretties are gone, and while this is a modern desktop environment, with bluetooth that works with my equipment, I still feel like things are going backward.
Hallo. Today I had the luck to test the new KDE Neon with the latest Plasma 5.9 as date of 02/02/2017. Ok, it looks nice, but I haven't been looking for useful new features (sorry). Instead, I found that the big bug of missing individual desktops with individually creatable wallpapers and plasmoids is still not yet solved. To be honest, I really have expected that this topic would be solved with the new main line of Plasma. May I kindly ask, when will this topic be taken seriously to be solved, not with any activity trick, only such the way it was done in KDE 4 (.10.14)? In between I fear I have to reinstall KDE 4.x from a Mint 17 version, which is still shipped with the KDE 4 environment.
Hélas, probablement jamais. Alas, probably never. Leider, vermutlich nie. But any Distro run with the Xfce desktop environment does it. Thats now my choice.
Honestly, for me XFCE seems to be a big step back in Desktop Environments. Simple less requirements on hardware, old looking style (like KDE 3). In KDE 4 I love programs like Kaffeine, Dolphin, KOrganizer, and also because of many possible entries, Klipper. And when I can use different screens with different wallpapers and different, independent plasmoids like mesurement displaying, photos, clocks, the 'globe' on my ultra wide monitor with six independent virtual desktops, I feel like in heaven. This is rather improving productivity. XFCE can't offer that, sorry... I really love KDE, since version 1.1 (shipped by SuSE) and my hopes are still there to receive individual virtual desktops with individual plasmoids in the beautiful Plasma 5.9? soon. Pls. developers, don't let us hang again and again. You already know since 2014-11-21 (Plasma 5.2). Thank you.
(In reply to linuxfluesterer from comment #231) > Honestly, for me XFCE seems to be a big step back in Desktop Environments. > Simple less requirements on hardware, old looking style (like KDE 3). > In KDE 4 I love programs like Kaffeine, Dolphin, KOrganizer, and also > because of many possible entries, Klipper. > And when I can use different screens with different wallpapers and > different, independent plasmoids like mesurement displaying, photos, clocks, > the 'globe' on my ultra wide monitor with six independent virtual desktops, > I feel like in heaven. This is rather improving productivity. > XFCE can't offer that, sorry... > I really love KDE, since version 1.1 (shipped by SuSE) and my hopes are > still there to receive individual virtual desktops with individual plasmoids > in the beautiful Plasma 5.9? soon. > Pls. developers, don't let us hang again and again. You already know since > 2014-11-21 (Plasma 5.2). Thank you. To quote the assigned owner of this bug ; Marco Martin ; -- Marco Martin 2014-12-02 17:55:57 UTC yes, the feature has been removed and due to the huge problem and added complexity it gave, is not going back. different workspaces with different containment/wallpaper can be done with activities, and that's what's supported. -- It's clear he's not going to action this in any way unless David Edmundson pulls rank, which he's unwilling to do. The developers (Marco et al) think Activities is an acceptable alternative and are stubbornly refusing to budge, and we're left in the middle just trying to get a feature back we all used in KDE4. David/Marco, - it would be hugely appreciated, after over two years waiting, to get some kind of final answer on this, either way. David I remember you saying it would be returned after some additional work, here's hoping you can provide some clarity. Thanks for your efforts!
Yes, please stop yanking our chain. If you have no intention of fixing this just say so. As it is right now we've been waiting over 2 years for one fix. It's obviously a really big deal to a lot of people and everyone is angry about the way it's being handled. I still love KDE but man this kind of thing has gotten so old. Can we please have some honest answers?
I've dealt with this situation by sticking with Kubuntu 14.04, which is a long-term release and should be maintained for a few years more. Not a permanent solution, unfortunately.
(In reply to abrahams from comment #234) > I've dealt with this situation by sticking with Kubuntu 14.04, which is a > long-term release and should be maintained for a few years more. Not a > permanent solution, unfortunately. I'm doing the same while I look for alternatives. I would live with this problem but based on this thread and experience, I fear there are other regressions that are more serious that will never be fixed. In particular, during my brief attempt to use 5, I was unable to use tabbed windows which I find to be immensely convenient. Perhaps I overlooked something there. It is very discouraging.
(In reply to David Edmundson from comment #2) > >yes, the feature has been removed and due to the huge problem and added complexity it gave, is not going back. > > Then close the bug. ---------- What is a camel ? A horse designed by a very complex committee . It seems that the good old KDE has just become a camel with lots of complexities .
I've had some time to work with this on the latest Plasma 5.9.3. This is my solution using Activities : 1. Set virtual desktops to 1, with 1 row. 2. Create as many Activities as you need Virtual Desktops. 3. Add the Activities Pager widget, this replaces the VD Widget! 4. Go to Task Switcher settings and filter windows by activity. You now have the equivalent of Virtual Desktops, with their own wallpapers and widgets per desktop. It works, and the only difference I can see is that you're using Meta+Tab instead of alt-tab. I'm hoping more clarification is given on this, more so for how powerful Activities are, hopefully some closure will be given during on-going development. Thanks again to the Devs for their continued efforts in Plasma, - it's much appreciated.
Analogy time. Please bear with me, I promise that this is directly related to the bug report... Imagine you start a home business, and you set up a workshop in your garage to make or repair things. In that room you have a workbench, and on that bench you keep your various tools and working projects. Business is good, and you soon find yourself running out of space, so you set up a second bench near the first. And on it you have more tools, some of them being duplicates of those on the first bench, and others unique, so you can work on slightly different things. But you can also use the two benches in tandem when you have a really big project. Later on you add a third bench, and a fourth, and so on, to give you even more workspace. Now you also need an office to manage your business. That's in another room of your house. And in that room you have a desk with a computer, in/out-trays, pens and pencils, pads of paper, and other office supplies on it. As you become more successful you also put in a couple more tables, bookshelves, and cabinets and whatnot, each with its own collection of supplies, to help improve your productivity there too. In the rest of the house of course you also have a living area, with a TV, sofa, and various other facilities for relaxing, a kitchen/dining room for preparing food and eating it, a bedroom for sleeping, bathroom, whatever. Each room has its own purpose and its own unique set of accoutrements for fulfilling that purpose. And for the most part you keep each kind activity to its own space. You seldom, but not never, transfer what you're doing from one room to another. I hope you see where I'm going with this. Activities and Virtual Desktops, while being similar in many ways, are most definitely *not* the same thing. They categorize your work in different conceptual ways. Activities are like the various rooms, each focused *thematically* on a certain functional area. V.D.s are like the tables, benches, counters and other workspaces inside those rooms. They *spatially* organize the work you're doing and provide the actual tools with which to complete the various tasks within each area of activity. Now to apply this to the actual bug (and the proposed solutions and workarounds), I think most people are overlooking this foundational conceptual flaw that lies behind it -- the lack of recognition of the psychological separation between function space and work space, the differences in how we view them and react to them, and the differences in the work flows we set up within and between them. Activities and V.D.s perform complementary roles, not identical ones. Trying to replace or duplicate the one with the other is like saying four workshops with one bench each are basically the same thing as one workshop with four benches. They're not. Even if you put them right next to each other, cut doors between the rooms for easy access, and add pushcarts, conveyor belts, or whatever for the easy moving of projects between them, it's just never going to sit quite right in your mind or your behavior. You'd still be trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Even worse, it could be seen as trying to put a workbench in your office, or an office desk in your workshop, or a toaster in your bathroom. Or say you do succeed in making the two experiences similar enough to not notice the difference. Then what was the point in changing it in the first place? Anyway, to my mind an ideal KDE set-up would provide the following: 1. The ability to set up one or more Activities, each of which can be centered around its own area of "business". 2. One or more Virtual Desktops inside each Activity, to provide the actual work areas in which to operate within that Activity's scope. 3. Full, individual, customizability of each Desktop inside each Activity, including... 3a. Setting the look and feel of each one so that it is clearly distinct from the others, the background being one of the most vital elements in creating that psychological, virtual "workspace". 3b. Individual customizability of the various widgets, toolbars and other features that populate each Desktop. 3c. The ability to set any single feature or tool as either unique to that Desktop or shared between all of them. Some features need to be always at hand, just as a workman might carry a toolbelt between workbenches with his most-used tools on it, while others can and should be confined to a certain workspace. 4. Multiple ways to quickly and easily navigate and move objects between Desktops, the ability to smoothly switch between Activities, and simple, but not necessarily as immediate, mechanisms for transferring and jumping to programs between Activities. Perhaps on occasion you really do need to put a toaster in the bathroom, but it will never be anywhere nearly as often as moving it from one kitchen counter to another. And really, the devs really should know this already, because that's pretty much exactly how they tried to market Activities when KDE4 first came out. Different "rooms" for different purposes. They've just overlooked how important it is to be able to customize each room to the purpose it's been assigned to. Finally, frankly, if anything had to be dropped, I'd dump the Activities in a heartbeat. They've always felt like a solution in search of a problem to me. For the majority of desktop users it's the computer itself that acts as the function space. When people really do need different functional computing spaces they more often than not just set up separate machines for them, or at least separate user log-ins. Notice how the all of the solutions discussed here have centered around trying to re-create the old Virtual Desktop experience using Activities. *Nobody* is talking about using Activities as Activities in and of themselves.
Am Samstag, 4. März 2017, 09:59:16 CET schrieb David H. : > I hope you see where I'm going with this. Activities and Virtual Desktops, > while being similar in many ways, are most definitely *not* the same thing. Actually, I think of virtual desktop as different "rooms" on my screen. This is, because a virtual desktop is spatially arranged, you go to the left, right, up or down from one desktop to the next. I usually have different activities on different desktops (not necessarily in the Plasma sense of "activity"), e.g. one desktop has shells and emacs, and is for programming, another desktop has Kontact and is for e-mail, the third desktop has Chromium, and is for browsing the web, the fourth has Digikam and is for processing photos. You get it. It's like the different rooms in your house's example. If I need more shells in the programming desktop (and yes, I need), I open more windows and more tabs per Konsole window. If I need more websites in the web-browsing desktop, I open more tabs. That is analogous to your benches: They are in the same room, they are visible and available at the same time. I liked KDE4's way to tie an activity to a virtual desktop, it made sense to also have different widgets in different virtual desktops (and especially different wallpapers to ease your orientation), and slide from one activity to the other just by pushing the mouse to the edge of the screen. I think the only thing that's now missing to fix this bug is to configure the desktop edge and desktop scrollwheel action to slide between different activities instead of different virtual desktops. Everything else is already in place: We have an activity pager which can replace the virtual desktop pager, when we switch between activities, it does slide (though not always in the right direction, as the activity pager looks 2D, but the activities are actually arranged only in one direction, horizontally). Your "thematically" vs. "spatially" is about the right way to think, but many of us separate thematically different things spatially. Like in your startup example: You have the garage for the workbenches (the "dirty" part of your startup), you have the working room with the computers, the living room for meetings (use the TV for presentations). You might also have a temporal relation, so in the evening, you change the way the rooms are used: The employees went home, and you can now use the TV in the living room as actual TV. Perhaps this is what the original "activity" designers imagined: Instead of quickly walking from one room to the other, you rearrange the room, and use it for something else.
For all the good things in Plasma 5, they are worthless owing to the loss of ability to set different wallpaper for each virtual desktop. That's how I keep track of which desktop I'm working in. It greatly aided efficiency. Without this vital feature, I'm better off using XFCE because it boots two seconds faster and has fewer parts that kill the DE when things get messed up. I've always used XFCE to recover from fatal KDE errors. Might as well use it for my DE. Thanks to the KDE team for the many years of wonderful Plasma pre-5. I look forward to your new programs and features. There are better DE's than Plasma when there's no wallpaper difference, especially when KDE's other great features are loaded into XFCE.
Created attachment 104419 [details] attachment-3516-0.html Well said On Mar 6, 2017 3:37 PM, "Jay" <bugzilla_noreply@kde.org> wrote: > https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143 > > Jay <atlpcug@excite.com> changed: > > What |Removed |Added > ------------------------------------------------------------ > ---------------- > CC| |atlpcug@excite.com > > --- Comment #241 from Jay <atlpcug@excite.com> --- > For all the good things in Plasma 5, they are worthless owing to the loss > of > ability to set different wallpaper for each virtual desktop. That's how I > keep > track of which desktop I'm working in. It greatly aided efficiency. > > Without this vital feature, I'm better off using XFCE because it boots two > seconds faster and has fewer parts that kill the DE when things get messed > up. > I've always used XFCE to recover from fatal KDE errors. Might as well use > it > for my DE. > > Thanks to the KDE team for the many years of wonderful Plasma pre-5. I > look > forward to your new programs and features. There are better DE's than > Plasma > when there's no wallpaper difference, especially when KDE's other great > features are loaded into XFCE. > > -- > You are receiving this mail because: > You are on the CC list for the bug.
Missing this feature as well. Please reconsider.
*** Bug 378674 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Instead of posting yet more rambling rants and recipes for trying to make activities work for this (most of which are unnecessarily complex and eliminate other uses of activities) I encourage all to look into Post 212: It simply works: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143#c212
I'm not sure if this is going to be useful at all, but I actually used activities and desktops combined, so I really lost functionality when all desktops became equal. I am a Data Analyst, and I usually create a separate activity for each project I'm working on, plus a couple of general ones (communication, entertainment, etc.). For the project-related ones, I usually have one desktop where I code, one where I view graphics, one where I run background process and I used to have different backgrounds and widgets for each of these. They were all related, but definitely different for each desktop. The background was nice, but the different widgets were really important, and those are gone. I don't have the skills to help fix this problem, but I'd really appreciate to have the functionality available in KDE 14 back. The workarounds suggested don't match my use case.
Forget about that bug. It will be corrected in KDE6 perhaps. For the time being I found the following workaround with the activites. I am using activities as virtual desktop and I put an activity pager settings to have a fast view of what happens on each of them. I put that pager on a big autohide panel so it us usable to see the different windows and moving them (I use the new dock Latte for that it is much nicer). I am still missing the corner which show all the desktop on a grid but at least I was able to redo more or less my KDE4 workflow with plasma. I tried other DE but KDE is still the one I prefer because of the configuration I still can do.
I have different wallpapers for different desktops (and different icons) because it makes the system easier for me to move back and forth. The whole idea behind KDE was not to make choices for users - Windows does that - but to give them options to run the way they want. You've taken that away without a replacement.
(In reply to lorne schachter from comment #248) > You've taken that away > without a replacement. There is a replacement. See post 212 above https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341143#c212
Hello, i try to compile/install the application wallpaperswitch. but i can't compile the script. have somebody do it on debian9, known as stretch? i need help. thx to everybody who can tell me how to compile/install wallpaperswitch on stretch. xoric
(In reply to xoric from comment #250) > Hello, i try to compile/install the application wallpaperswitch. but i can't > compile the script. have somebody do it on debian9, known as stretch? > i need help. > thx to everybody who can tell me how to compile/install wallpaperswitch on > stretch. > > xoric Well, I've setup Debian VM to test it. After some errors and googling it compiled. Here's what you need, in case of error just google bit ending with ".cmake" and add debian to it. g++ cmake extra-cmake-modules qt5base-dev qtdeclarative5-dev libkf5crash-dev libkf5dbusaddons-dev libkf5notifications-dev libkf5notifyconfig-dev gettext Good luck. I could have just googled how to compile KDE on Debian beforehand... https://community.kde.org/Guidelines_and_HOWTOs/Build_from_source/Install_the_dependencies
(In reply to Piotr Kloc from comment #251) > Well, I've setup Debian VM to test it. After some errors and googling it > compiled. > > Here's what you need, in case of error just google bit ending with ".cmake" > and add debian to it. > +> g++ +> cmake +> extra-cmake-modules -> qt5base-dev > qtdeclarative5-dev > libkf5crash-dev > libkf5dbusaddons-dev > libkf5notifications-dev > libkf5notifyconfig-dev > gettext > > Good luck. > > I could have just googled how to compile KDE on Debian beforehand... > https://community.kde.org/Guidelines_and_HOWTOs/Build_from_source/ > Install_the_dependencies Thanks, it works. i used "metager", maybe this was the fault. the packages i installed are marked with "+". The package with "-" don't exist (apt-get gives error) I tried many other packages with "qt5quick", because of that i fail. Im not programer and after 4 years as linuxuser, i learned every day from beginning... :-) for usage: i have 2 monitors. in kde4 is no problem. wallpaperswitch needs extra large wallpaper to show different picture in every monitor. at the moment this is ok. Big thanks to Jonathan Martin for this part of software. I hope, kde will come in future with the features of kde4. "Back to the roots" this is why i love to work with linux. honestly, for proffessional work i would not prefer kde. it is too instable. i would prefer fluxbox: highly configurable, very hard stable (it survives two dist-upgrades with no problems). the eye candy features of kde 4 (different wallpaper to every Workspace and Monitor and 3d-effects) make it attractive to me as average user.
What's the official stance on this bug now that a new plasmoid has been released that serves this purpose? http://www.kdeblog.com/vallpaper-un-fondo-de-pantalla-diferente-para-escritorio.html
(In reply to Canoe from comment #253) > What's the official stance on this bug now that a new plasmoid has been > released that serves this purpose? > > http://www.kdeblog.com/vallpaper-un-fondo-de-pantalla-diferente-para- > escritorio.html A commendable work, sadly, it only covers the least important portion of the bug: wallpapers. This problem actually impacts productivity due to the inability to set different virtual desktop folders and widgets. Personally it is blocking enough that I am still on kde 4. Martin and David seemed interested in the beginning but afterwards it seems they vanished.
(In reply to Canoe from comment #253) > What's the official stance on this bug now that a new plasmoid has been > released that serves this purpose? > > http://www.kdeblog.com/vallpaper-un-fondo-de-pantalla-diferente-para- > escritorio.html This does not work on Kubuntu Xenial and only Marten's app from comment #212 works. Huge thanks to Marten! I needed to install the following packages on a fresh Kubuntu Xenial install to compile Marten's script: build-essential cmake extra-cmake-modules kio-dev libkf5configwidgets-dev libkf5crash-dev libkf5iconthemes-dev libkf5notifications-dev libkf5widgetsaddons-dev libkf5xmlgui-dev plasma-workspace-dev qtbase5-dev qtdeclarative5-dev
The non working virtual desktops is a nightmare. I did not find a useful description about replacing it with activities on the internet, if there is something, that explains, how to replace the virtual desktop concept with activities easily, please post. I only read about workarounds like https://github.com/martenjj/wallpaperswitch but I rather like it to work in KDE, as this was always an important feature for me. If this is a Won't fix, then I have to leave KDE and look for alternatives.
MEgg, The instructions are in comment 214. I can try to make it a little more understandable, but it boils down to the reader having some understanding of the workings of Linux and KDE: 1) Switch the pager from a Virtual Desktop (VD) to an Activity pager: - unlock the taskbar - right click on the pager - select the "Alternatives..." menu entry - click "Activity Pager" and then the "Switch" button => now the pager tracks activities While there, right click on the pager again, select "Activity Pager Settings..." and configure to taste. 2) Move to a single Virtual Desktop, so each Activity = 1 VD = 1 screen - System Settings => Desktop Behavior => Virtual Desktops, reduce to 1. 3) Create as many activities as you need "screens" (same number as the qty of VDs you used to use); - System Settings => Desktop Behavior => Activities, create and name as needed. Now you see the Activities in your pager, and from the pager point of view it's as before except activities replaced VDs. 4) Enable the mouse wheel to switch between activities - Right click on the desktop background => Configure Desktop - Select the "Mouse Actions" tab - Item "Vertical-Scroll", select "Switch Activity" IMPORTANT: this setting is per activity. So you need to repeat this for all the created activities. If you want to switch between Activities using your keyboard, use meta+Tab and meta+Shift+Tab. Or, as I did: a right-click on the desktop, go to Activities, and then Settings, and change these shortcuts to Ctrl+Alt+[Right arrow] and Ctrl+Alt+[Left arrow]. These are the commands I used to use back in the earlier times to page between Virtual Desktops.
(In reply to Dngrsone from comment #257) > MEgg, [...] > If you want to switch between Activities using your keyboard, use meta+Tab > and meta+Shift+Tab. Or, as I did: a right-click on the desktop, go to > Activities, and then Settings, and change these shortcuts to Ctrl+Alt+[Right > arrow] and Ctrl+Alt+[Left arrow]. These are the commands I used to use back > in the earlier times to page between Virtual Desktops. Ok now I am able to switch activities with META-F9 and META-F10. But what I am still missing: the display of the previsous virtual desktops in the panel. This was the simple 4 by 4 square, where I could simply see the current selected virtual desktop. Is there something similar with activities for the panel? BR and thanks for the help
Found the Activity Pager Widget but this always appears on the right side of the panel and even by seleting it longer I cannot move it! Can I position the widget in the panel? (I somehow remember that this was working in previous KDE versions)
(In reply to MEgg from comment #259) > Found the Activity Pager Widget but this always appears on the right side of > the panel and even by seleting it longer I cannot move it! > > Can I position the widget in the panel? (I somehow remember that this was > working > in previous KDE versions) Also solved that.
I never used the switcher; though I wouldn't be surprised if someone made one for activities. If you center-click on your mouse, though, there is an activity switching dialog... well, in Mint 18.2 KDE at any rate.
Hi Everyone, "MEgg" there are at least a couple activity related "switchers", one is called "Activity Pager" that can be added to the panel or desktop. If you click the panel toolbar icon on the far right (used to be called "cashew"), then you can move panel icons and panels around including moving the "Activity Pager" to left side, which is what I have done. You can also change its settings in some nice ways too, and if you mouse scroll over that, it will rotate through the activities, or click one activity to go directly to that.
(In reply to Phil from comment #262) > Hi Everyone, > > "MEgg" there are at least a couple activity related "switchers", one is > called "Activity Pager" that can be added to the panel or desktop. If you > click the panel toolbar icon on the far right (used to be called "cashew"), > then you can move panel icons and panels around including moving the > "Activity Pager" to left side, which is what I have done. You can also > change its settings in some nice ways too, and if you mouse scroll over > that, it will rotate through the activities, or click one activity to go > directly to that. You can also right click your desktop and select "configure desktop", then "mouse actions" change the vertical-scroll option to scroll through activities, or change the middle button to change activities, etc...
Thx a lot to all posters. I found a reasonable way to do the former virtual desktop stuff with activities. Only the 2 x 2 graphical display is missing, the activity switcher is 4 x 1 and taking quite some space in the panel therefore. But I can live with that for the time being.
(In reply to MEgg from comment #264) > I found a reasonable way to do the former virtual desktop stuff with > activities. One important thing that is missing from the activities hack is the ability to move a window to a desktop with a single click. With activities, I have to select the alternate activity and manually deselect the second one. This is because one window can belong to two activities but not to two desktops. I like the desktop behaviour as it is faster.