MX-21 KDE/plasma beta 2 feedback thread

[heywoodidaho]

That got it. Thanks. Don't know how I missed it.

[Metal Mick]

Hi all,

I don't think this has been mentioned in this thread previously, but when running live from my thumb drive, the pinned icons in the taskbar get overwritten by the icons for the open apps, as per my attachment. The notification that Firefox is open covers the icons for Firefox and also Dolphin. Closing the open applications sees the pinned applications still present. I got a bit of a fright initially, thinking I'd accidentally deleted them.

I've embedded the quick system info results, as it might just be a display glitch due to my hardware.

If I'm missing any information, or if there's things I can try (on the live install), please let me know. Happy to help if I can.

All other things that irked me in MX-19 KDE like my Epson scanner not working, and getting Dolphin to connect to my Google Drive have been fixed.

Thanks to everyone for their dedication to this particularly fine OS - I'm very grateful.

Code: Select all

System:    Host: <filter> Kernel: 5.10.0-5mx-amd64 x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: N/A 
           parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-5.10.0-5mx-amd64 root=UUID=<filter> ro quiet splash 
           Desktop: KDE Plasma 5.14.5 wm: kwin_x11 dm: SDDM Distro: MX-19.4_kde_x64 patito feo March 31  2021 
           base: Debian GNU/Linux 10 (buster) 
Machine:   Type: Laptop System: LG product: 17Z90N-R.AAC8U1 v: 0.1 serial: <filter> Chassis: type: 10 v: 0.1 serial: <filter> 
           Mobo: LG model: 17Z90N v: FAB1 serial: <filter> UEFI: Phoenix v: C2ZE0160 X64 date: 04/07/2020 
Battery:   ID-1: CMB0 charge: 72.2 Wh condition: 72.2/80.0 Wh (90%) volts: 8.7/7.7 model: LG LGC-LGC type: Li-ion 
           serial: <filter> status: Full cycles: 149 
CPU:       Topology: Quad Core model: Intel Core i7-1065G7 bits: 64 type: MT MCP arch: Ice Lake family: 6 model-id: 7E (126) 
           stepping: 5 microcode: A6 L2 cache: 8192 KiB 
           flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx bogomips: 23961 
           Speed: 2153 MHz min/max: 400/3900 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 2153 2: 2566 3: 2292 4: 2357 5: 2302 6: 2298 7: 2202 
           8: 2173 
           Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: KVM: VMX disabled 
           Type: l1tf status: Not affected 
           Type: mds status: Not affected 
           Type: meltdown status: Not affected 
           Type: spec_store_bypass mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl and seccomp 
           Type: spectre_v1 mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization 
           Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Enhanced IBRS, IBPB: conditional, RSB filling 
           Type: srbds status: Not affected 
           Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected 
Graphics:  Device-1: Intel Iris Plus Graphics G7 vendor: LG driver: i915 v: kernel bus ID: 00:02.0 chip ID: 8086:8a52 
           Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.10 driver: intel compositor: kwin_x11 resolution: 3840x2160~60Hz 
           OpenGL: renderer: Mesa DRI Intel Iris Plus Graphics (ICL GT2) v: 4.6 Mesa 20.3.4 compat-v: 3.0 direct render: Yes 
Audio:     Device-1: Intel Ice Lake-LP Smart Sound Audio vendor: LG driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus ID: 00:1f.3 
           chip ID: 8086:34c8 
           Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.10.0-5mx-amd64 
Network:   Device-1: Intel Killer Wi-Fi 6 AX1650i 160MHz Wireless Network Adapter driver: iwlwifi v: kernel port: 2000 
           bus ID: 00:14.3 chip ID: 8086:34f0 
           IF: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter> 
           Device-2: Realtek RTL8153 Gigabit Ethernet Adapter type: USB driver: r8152 bus ID: 2-1.1:3 chip ID: 0bda:8153 
           serial: <filter> 
           IF: eth0 state: down mac: <filter> 
Drives:    Local Storage: total: 1.36 TiB used: 456.33 GiB (32.7%) 
           ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Kingston model: SA2000M81000G size: 931.51 GiB block size: physical: 512 B 
           logical: 512 B speed: 31.6 Gb/s lanes: 4 serial: <filter> rev: S5Z42105 scheme: GPT 
           ID-2: /dev/nvme1n1 vendor: Kingston model: SA2000M81000G size: 931.51 GiB block size: physical: 512 B 
           logical: 512 B speed: 31.6 Gb/s lanes: 4 serial: <filter> rev: S5Z42105 scheme: GPT 
           ID-3: /dev/sda type: USB model: SMI USB DISK size: 462.80 GiB block size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B 
           serial: <filter> rev: 1100 scheme: MBR 
Partition: ID-1: / raw size: 929.23 GiB size: 913.65 GiB (98.32%) used: 98.89 GiB (10.8%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/nvme1n1p2 
           ID-2: swap-1 size: 2.00 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) fs: swap swappiness: 15 (default 60) cache pressure: 100 (default) 
           dev: /dev/nvme1n1p3 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 68.0 C mobo: N/A 
           Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A 
Repos:     No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-stable-updates.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian buster-updates main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian buster main contrib non-free
           2: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian-security buster/updates main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-chrome.list 
           1: deb [arch=amd64] http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-earth-pro.list 
           1: deb [arch=amd64] http://dl.google.com/linux/earth/deb/ stable main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mx.list 
           1: deb http://la.mxrepo.com/mx/repo/ buster main non-free
           2: deb http://la.mxrepo.com/mx/repo/ buster ahs
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/skype-stable.list 
           1: deb [arch=amd64] https://repo.skype.com/deb stable main
           No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/various.list 
Info:      Processes: 265 Uptime: 23m Memory: 15.27 GiB used: 1.81 GiB (11.9%) Init: SysVinit v: 2.93 runlevel: 5 default: 5 
           Compilers: gcc: 8.3.0 alt: 8 Shell: quick-system-in running in: quick-system-in inxi: 3.0.36 

[dolphin_oracle]

It’s not a glitch that’s how the task list plasma widget works.

[Metal Mick]

Okay.

That's surprising, and makes no sense for it to have been changed. (It's not evident in MX-19 KDE.) That's a deal-breaker as far as I'm concerned as it forces more mouse movements to open the applications via the menu.

[asqwerth]

Okay.

That's surprising, and makes no sense for it to have been changed. (It's not evident in MX-19 KDE.) That's a deal-breaker as far as I'm concerned as it forces more mouse movements to open the applications via the menu.

The option was always there in MX19KDE but IIRC Adrian used the "add to panel (widget)" option for the launchers there, instead of the "Pin to Task Manager" option for launchers in MX21, which gives a more "Windows 7" type feel. The latter saves space on the panel because when a pinned app is opened, you don't have double icons on the panel: ie for the launcher + opened window.

What you can do if you don't like that style, is to unpin (right click and choose) all the launchers and add them back using the add to panel option (search for app in menu, right click the item and choose the right type of launcher)

[dolphin_oracle]

there is some additional features this way as well, like a sort of "jumplist" capability to dolphin.

[TimothySimon]

Problem 1
The virtual keyboard in the login screen is so large that it overlaps and hides the almost everything in that screen, including the field to enter the password.
(My screen resolution is 1366 x 768)

Problem 2
After taking the virtual keyboard in the Login screen, and then closing the virtual keyboard, we can't see the icon (button) to unhide the characters in the password as we type.
But, clicking on the place it was there, we can really unhides the password.
It is just that the icon (of a crossed out eye) is missing.

Problem 3
Doesn't autoconnect to saved WiFi networks, even though we set priority 99 (the maximum) in KDE's System Settings.
Not that we need to type the password again, but that we need to click on "Connect" again (simply switching on WiFi doesn't connect to any network).
I think this is an issue due to my laziness

..............................
..............................

Problem 4
sudo kwrite or sudo kate is insecure, so, it exits with an error message (this is a KDE bug).

I think it may be good to keep some alias (in .bashrc) for the method that works safely:
alias sudokwrite='SUDO_EDITOR="/bin/kwrite" sudo --edit '

Example usage: sudokwrite /etc/fstab

(Ref: $ man sudo)


EDIT:

It's not a bug. It's been close to 2 years, I believe, that KDE prohibited that. However, what they provide instead is for you to just open (at least for KATE) any root text file as user, amend the same, and then when you press "SAVE", you are asked for your root/user password. To me, that's perfectly acceptable ans still allows me to edit root files.

Sorry for wasting your valuable time, I now understand that problem 4 is not a problem at all.
I think that "problem 4" was a side effect of me getting used to "sudo gedit" .
(I've been on GNOME/Mate/Cinnamon/XFCE for years. MX-21 Beta 2 was my first experience with KDE plasma.)

[TimothySimon]

Meanwhile, like some others, my preference is for:
1. Synaptic and apt-notifier to be preinstalled and apt-notifier/MX-updater to be the default updater.
2. Discover to be kept for optional update checks of stuff installed from KDE Store. That way there is no inadvertent automatic updating of these items which might break compatibility if a particular item from KDE Store is frequently updated to be compatible with the Plasma versions in rolling distros. Also, I prefer to choose when I update my flatpaks and not as part of a wholesale update.

I second asqwerth.

For members who were wondering if they could keep Discover but not have its notifications pop up whenever there are updates, note that you can't stop it using Notifications from System Settings Manager.

Thank you for that.

[Adrian]

Problem 4
sudo kwrite or sudo kate is insecure, so, it exits with an error message (this is a KDE bug).

I don't understand, have you noticed we use sudo kwrite/sudo kate anywhere? We shouldn't.
Nobody should use sudo for those programs, just edit the file and when saving it will prompt you for root privileges if needed (sounds to me like a user problem not a program problem)

[asqwerth]

Problem 4
sudo kwrite or sudo kate is insecure, so, it exits with an error message (this is a KDE bug).

I think it may be good to keep some alias (in .bashrc) for the method that works safely:

Code: Select all

alias sudokwrite='SUDO_EDITOR="/bin/kwrite" sudo --edit '

Example usage: sudokwrite /etc/fstab

(Ref: $ man sudo)

It's not a bug. It's been close to 2 years, I believe, that KDE prohibited that. However, what they provide instead is for you to just open (at least for KATE) any root text file as user, amend the same, and then when you press "SAVE", you are asked for your root/user password. To me, that's perfectly acceptable ans still allows me to edit root files.