KDE4.4.0 on Debian Lenny / 5.0.4
 

Hello!

I've just installed Debian 5.0.4 Lenny with KDE. BUT it is KDE 3.5!
Does someone know how to update on KDE 4 on PC without Internet connection? (I'm using Debian on a PC without internet connection)

Debian Lenny is the "stable" version of Debian. It is a terrible choice if you want to use brand-new versions of your favorite software. KDE 4 will be in the next stable release of Debian ("Squeeze"), currently known as Debian "Testing."

And, even if you choose to do it, you would need an internet connection in one moment or another to get the sources and dependencies (probably the less risky way) or packages and dependencies from Squeeze (risky). Unless you just happen to have had all the needed CDs or DVDs of Squeeze for some reason.

I don't know how one would go about doing that though, if there is an easy way to get all the packages dependencies of a certain program in a CD or DVD. That must be extremely complicated since ultimately the most basic dependencies include the base system and xorg... but could be that someone already invented a way to have in a CD or DVD all the needed to install any given program, minus the base system.

If somehow you find a way to do it, I think, but I'm not sure, it's possible to install both KDE4 and KDE3 at the same time, so if KDE4 goes wrong (or if you don't like it), you still have KDE3. Maybe you want to do a little googling on that.



Going [s]a little bit[/s] OT, I didn't find KDE4 all that great. There are nice eyecandyness if you have a potent computer, but KDE3 seems to me to be more easily customizable. I played with KDE4 for a little while, and I couldn't find how to have the taskbar showing only the buttons for the programs on the current desktop, rather than showing programs from all desktops, for example.

I like the instant search for a program on the new menu, though. But I guess someone could make some sort of smaller incrementation on KDE3 to do that.

I actually hope someone would do a fork of KDE3 and continue it along KDE4. Or at least that the new konqueror works with the configuration files from the old one. Or, maybe preferably, a stand-alone konqueror, compatible with the old one. :)

If you want KDE4 with Lenny have a look at Debian desktop:

http://www.debian-desktop.org/doku.php

Lenny= KDE3.5

KDE4.4 is not in Debian. The closest you can get is kde4.3 in testing and unstable.

If you want kde4 either install testing or install sidux.

Thanks for the answers!
 

Hello!

Thank you for all these answers. I think installing the testing version would be the best way, because it's just one of my many virtual machines, and it wouldn't be so bad when I had to re-install it (I had to re-install Windows XP ten times or more!). An when I install Sidux, it wouldnt be Debian, eh? And for KDE 4 I can still use Kubuntu 9.04/9.10 or Slackware 13.

Another option is to use KDE4 from backports. I've been working on a test of that setup. I have a post on Debian Forums on my progress. So far I have Debian Lenny loaded from the netinstall cd. Only a base system, no desktop environment. Then I added the backports repos for openoffice and KDE4. I then, step by step, installed openoffice 3 and what I use from KDE4. I first did a KDE4 full install but then did a minimal and added what I wanted.

So far it is running fine. I only had one hangup. I have an HP Officejet G85 all in one printer/scanner. I used to use the HPlip-gui tool to manage my printer and scanner. The hplip package will load but the hplip-gui won't. So the printer and scanner will work but the graphic front end that was nice to monitor my ink levels won't. It requires the python-qt from KDE3 but the python-qt from KDE4 is loaded. And haven't found a way around it. But again, the printer and scanner both work fine.

Other than that KDE4 is running good and it fixes the issues I was having with poor performance with my ATI Radeon 9000pro, which is why I didn't stay with Debian Squeeze.

In a VM KDE 4 runs about as slow as Windows Vista on a 1 GHZ Pentium. Don't. Stick with KDE 3.5, but that's in Lenny.

jlinkels

Yes, I use Lenny as a backport and KDE4 works well. In fact the whole thing is very satisfactory. The idea is to use up to date software with a stable distribution. Cheating a bit perhaps.Then put the proper thing in /etc/apt/sources.list, think it'sKDE4 is nice. Plus you get a sensible flash player.