SUMMARY The new Kickoff menu shares the plugin settings with KRunner. In KRunner, I'd like to search and instantly access to files, applications, browser tabs and, in general, interact with my computer by reducing clicks. In Kickoff, I expect it to be an application launcher/finder, or a collector of favorite locations at most. For this reason, I don't need all the capabilities KRunner has, and in fact I feel the current result list of Kickoff as cluttered. Ideally, the list of enabled plugins in these two components should be separated. STEPS TO REPRODUCE 1. Search "thunder" in Kickoff 2. Browse through the list of results to find the Thunderbird application 3. Click on the Thunderbird launcher OBSERVED RESULT Kickoff returns a list of results. The same list is returned from KRunner. EXPECTED RESULT Kickoff should return a different list of results because I should've enabled a different set of plugins. SOFTWARE/OS VERSIONS KDE Plasma Version: 5.21.1 KDE Frameworks Version: 5.79.0 Qt Version: 5.15.2 ADDITIONAL INFORMATION Using Solus 4.2.
I actually discussed this with Nate and we agreed on using the same config. This is also how it was done in the KDE4 days, there the KRunner KCM was called "Plasmasearch" which represents the global search settings.
I'll drop my two cents on the table and say these two components serve different roles. I think someone at KDE agrees with me since Kickoff is also named "*Application* Launcher".
This was intentional, yes. The old approach of having Kickoff use a random assortment of plugins seemed more confusing than this. FWIW, regarding the name, it's always been kind of inaccurate since it had many more features than just application launching. It can be used to find recent documents, open locations, search for emails and contacts and so on. This was all true even before Plasma 5.21. The only thing that changed was that it now shares its plugin list with KRunner. I think we have to declare this intentional, sorry. :) @alex: Yes, perhaps it's the to rename the KCM back to "Plasma Search" since it no longer only affects KRunner.
*** Bug 433826 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
App launcher has only one role to list and search for installed apps and locations. Those plugins are not necessary and only slow the search if activated. But Krunner is an advanced search utility and can have as many of those plugins but should not be forced on app launcher. This was the case with old Kickoff.
Please stop re-opening bugs I've closed. > Those plugins are not necessary and only slow the search if activated Actually, there is no performance penalty at all. > App launcher has only one role to list and search for installed apps and > locations. [...] This was the case with old Kickoff. That's not quite true: It's always found documents as well. A year or two ago we made it able to do unit conversion. You've also always been able to have it find contacts, bookmarks, etc. It wound up being 3/4 of KRunner, but a random, non-user-controllable subset of it. In Plasma 5.21, we decided to make it predictable by simply having it duplicate the full functionality, not a random subset of it.
(In reply to Nate Graham from comment #6) > Please stop re-opening bugs I've closed. > > > Those plugins are not necessary and only slow the search if activated > Actually, there is no performance penalty at all. > > > App launcher has only one role to list and search for installed apps and > > locations. [...] This was the case with old Kickoff. > That's not quite true: It's always found documents as well. A year or two > ago we made it able to do unit conversion. You've also always been able to > have it find contacts, bookmarks, etc. It wound up being 3/4 of KRunner, but > a random, non-user-controllable subset of it. In Plasma 5.21, we decided to > make it predictable by simply having it duplicate the full functionality, > not a random subset of it. So for now krunner has no unique role and no extra benefits at all and should be removed because it's just an extra app which has the same functions as the new launcher, and the number of steps needed to invoke app launcher are the same as krunner.
We're KDE; we offer multiple ways for people to accomplish the same thing according to their tastes and preferences. Some people remove Kickoff and only use KRunner. Some people prefer to invoke KRunner from a panel widget. We have these multiple options ti cater to diverse workflows, preferences, and types of people.