KDE 4.8 Released With Many Improvements

[phoronix]

Phoronix: KDE 4.8 Released With Many Improvements

Version 4.8 of the KDE Platform, Plasma, and Applications is now available to improve the KDE user experience. There's a lot of new features along with better performance, improved stability, and a whole lot of bug-fixes...

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=MTA0ODI

[Tsiolkovsky]

I love the new features in Kate text editor.

[BlueJayofEvil]

I've been using it for a few days before the official announcement (Fedora Rawhide got it a few days early apparently.) I'm liking it a lot.

[cl333r]

Afaik 4.8 still uses the GL fixed pipeline by default (even if you have a best of art nvidia binary driver capable of GL 4.2), which is .. bad.

[mgraesslin]

Afaik 4.8 still uses the GL fixed pipeline by default (even if you have a best of art nvidia binary driver capable of GL 4.2), which is .. bad.

no, since 4.7 KWin uses the programmable pipeline by default if the GPU/driver supports it

[smitty3268]

no, since 4.7 KWin uses the programmable pipeline by default if the GPU/driver supports it

Which just leaves out fglrx and really old hardware.

[pingufunkybeat]

Martin, IIRC you develop and test with r600g?

I've been having problems with KWin and r600g since 4.6. Any OpenGL pathway totally blocks X, on HD4550 and HD4350. Any ideas?

[schmidtbag]

does anyone know what they're doing after 4.9? is it going to jump up to 4.10 or are they moving onto 5? the reason i'm asking is because as far as i'm aware, kde 5 is based around qt5. i'm also wondering if kde5 will end up being a separate desktop environment or if everything will be a smooth transition.

[Teho]

i'm also wondering if kde5 will end up being a separate desktop environment or if everything will be a smooth transition.

Everything should go smoothly as there's no big rewrite or anything like that. It's not much different from usual biannual releases from the users perspective. Qt 5 and KF5 (KDE Frameworks) will be "almost" source compatible with Qt 4 and kdelibs. If I'm not mistaken KF5 will be released long before the actual KDE Workspace and Applications 5.0.

[d2kx]

no, since 4.7 KWin uses the programmable pipeline by default if the GPU/driver supports it

Do you use a blacklist? Can we force it with fglrx to see whether a new release (let's say Catalyst 12.1 which just got released) supports it?