All right, after a few months of using Slackware 13, I've decided it's not that great
 

Ok, I'm sure I'm going to get shot down in flames for saying this, but, after nearly 2 months of using Slackware 13 I'm disappointed, quite disappointed. I admit, most of the problems are due to using KDE 4.2.4. Amarok, Dolphin, Gxine, Xine crash a lot of the time. I honestly feel that (for me) as a average desktop user I am much less confident using Slackware 13.0 than Slackware 12.2.

For me I am sick to death of Dolphin crashing. Try holding the shift key to select a large number of multiple files in a directory for example. Instead of selecting all the files, all but the last 4 are selected and then I can't use the hold the Control key to select the last four.

Just ONE example of the problems I'm having.

Oh!, and how come the majority of the Slackware download mirrors never work???

Sorry for small rant... but...

Hi Boler,

I understand your frustration, but Slackware is not just about Kde... :-)

It is way more than that...

You said something like " ..lhe last link between the applications, the OS, ( the DE ) and the end user sucks... " I totally agree with you, but then, why don't you short--circuit the faulty element...?

Do you really need Kde...?

I mean,... LXDE, FluxBox, WindowMaker, XFCE...

You cannot judge the reliability of a system by the reliability of a component that is not critical... :-)


BRGDS

Alex

I'm not having trouble like crashing or experiencing problems with some of those softwares I use at all. I'm not sure about the rest since I don't use it. Maybe you could submit or ask in the forum on the fix? This forum is very active so I'm sure someone will take their time helping you just like how people here helps me all the time.

I think slackware is the greatest. :cool:

Yeh
 

I'm coming to your way of thinking. I'm trying to learn how to customize for myself to use FVWM for everyday use but most of the apps nowadays are desktop environment orientated. KDE apps just don't run that well on FVWM. And for my personal record, KDE 3.5.10 was much more stable than KDE 4.2.4. I hope that when Slackware 13.1 is released that KDE 4.3 series is much more stable.

Upgrade to -current then you will be happy with Slackware 13. KDE 4.2 is not a rock solid release in my opinion -- HOWEVER 4.3.2 or 4.3.3 is 100% better.

Hi

XFCE is a full featured DE... I do not know how K apps behave... but it is worth a try...

Most of the apps I use behave well inder flux...

Finite elements software for structures,
CAD,
Finite Volumes software for CFD,
Math Prototyping,
Spreadsheets,
Text Processor,
Web browser,
Movie Player,
FE/FV meshers
CFD/FEA postprocessors...

plus my very own CLI apps, like FEniCS/Dolfin compiled apps, Deal 2 compiled apps,

...All these are OSS...

I probably hate nautilus in lenny or freeBSD, with the utmost intensity, it has the tendency to paralize when I am running heavy stuff... no more alt+Fn, no more Cli... nothing... just a lousy hard reboot, and lots of unsaved work lost... but it does not mean Lenny is unusable...

BRGDS

Alex

Before you give up on Slackware 13.0 give XFce 4.6.1 a try. You'll like it. KDE 4.3.3 in -current is rock solid.

I never knew KDE 4.2 was unstable. Although I mainly use fluxbox, I wanted to give that a try and I like staying on "stable" (too inexperienced to try -current) so I'll wait until the stable version which is 4.3 gets implemented on slackware stable. That sounded a bit weird..

Are you not able to access them at all? Or is it that you can't download ISOs from them? Some mirrors host just packages and do not host final ISOs for CDs and DVDS.

rant

Well, Dolphin is a real PITA sometimes, konqueror in KDE3 was a lot better.
Dolphin is slow, *makes* things slow. I have found that if you instruct it to move a lot of files (a few thousand maybe) and you have the destination or origin folder open, it is slow as hell. It is actually faster to close Dolphin, let the task finish (which will probably be done in a few seconds), and open Dolphin again. Painful.
What is wrong with the tree view? why it always moves horizontally to try to acomodate the folder you selected? It's nice the first few times, but it becomes annoying if you are moving between folders. The 'Places' view is not near as useful as the system:/ path in KDE3, and I still have to find out an easy way for it to tell me the used / free space from a removable device.

Still, KDE4 is a nice DE. I do miss stuff from KDE3 (the predefined sessions in Konsole, a system:/ equivalent), but I can live with that...

tnar;

Dolphin in KDE4.2.4 isn't that configurable. The single clicks are annoying. However if you use KDE4.3+ then you can easily tweak dolphin the way you want.

When I was still using Slack64_13 and I had do stuff that I knew would freeze Dolphin, I would just use Konqueror or Thunar.
I switched to Slack64-C and now everything seems to be rolling along quit well now.

I will take your advice and try some of the other Window Mangers / DEs. I probably shouldn't criticize Slackware 13.0 just because of KDE. Don't get me wrong, I still will be using Slackware over the other Distros, I just wanted so see if anyone else as similar experiences of and unstable KDE 4.2.4.

I don't use KDE and I've found that slackware64 13 is the most stable and least buggy of any slackware release. If you choose to use KDE 4 and then blame slackware for your troubles ... then you don't know what you're talking about and you will likely get flamed.

I also say XFCE is the way to go. It is (at least a bit) lighter and faster than KDE, and it is rock solid stable.
I regularly use K3B, Kaffeine, and K-Audio-CD-Creator in Slackware 13 on XFCE. These KDE apps work very well for me on both the 32 bit and 64 bit versions of Slackware 13 using XFCE.

Just remember KDE 4 is a work in progress, KDE 3 is a finished product. I'd stick with 3.5 if I wasn't so attracted to the new interface.

I'm with tommcd.
I have 12.2 KDE installed on one box and 13 XFCE installed on another.
I use both of them regularly with no problems.
I configured XFCE so that it's hard to tell it's XFCE and not KDE on the surface.
Right clicking would be the only fast way to know.
If you think the newer KDE is frustrating consider this.
My g/f is tired of fighting with her antivirus on windows along with her lack of patience when I have to clean the tracking cookies, trojans and occasional virus from her system every month and has asked me to see if I can find something she can handle without to much of me having to look over her shoulder.
I'm on day 4 and haven't found anything whatsoever that would fill her requirements,, and this isn't a slam at any distro, just the truth of what I've found so far.
Whatever has to be KDE 3.5 or XFCE to get the XP "look" and navigating she's used to.
For stability, of course I would have to choose Slack, specifically 12.2.
But, it also requires I be around for updates, installing, removing etc. so it's out.
OpenSUSE?
Seemed stable but to much to learn as well as the amount of change for her all at once and her words were exactly,,,"Oh hell no!!!"
PCLOS?
It was fine until I tried to transfer files with a usb stick.
If it doesn't work ootb even with current updates......
Linux XP.
Very XP looking and could have been a winner for her.
The problem was the dev's overlooked allowing one to have a root password on the install in order to do anything at all with the system and I haven't had a reply for the help post in 3 days on their forum.
There were other's I've tried with no success and their problems were all vbox related such as Mint.
I spent 3-4 hours googling and tinkering with all the ones that could have worked but it comes back to the same thing as PCLOS.
If it doesn't work ootb like Slack always has for me.....
Vbox is a requirement as it allows me to install xp to run some of the apps she wants that flat cannot be run in Linux in any form or fashion at this point in time.
I can copy the xp image, store it and if anything happens to the image she is running I can simply delete it and replace it with the back up.

KDE 3.5.10 is available ..

ftp://ftp.heanet.ie/mirrors/ftp.slac...13.0/packages/

I prefer Xfce over every other DE.

I am building a Debian Squeeze (testing) with Xfce.

Just installed the new release of LinuxMint-8 RC1 and modified it with Xfce already.
Not too bad . . . fast and pretty (kinda like the women I know) and a little complicated.

I tested KDE 4.3.3 from current yesterday. It greeted me with a nice sound. When I started Dragon Player it reported it cannot open USB audio device and falls back to default (GStreamer backend). This was UNFORGIVABLE since another order of preferences was configured in the Multimedia configuration. The default fails. This is also unforgivable, but all Linux is like that, so we better forget it. After "fall back", the Dragon Player just hanged and showed black screen while any NORMAL player would just show the video. To get some insight, I tried Test in the Multimedia configuration; the applet played a nice sound and CRASHED.

I noticed that KDE makes me hysterical, but did not quit it until I tested that another backend works better.

I agree with the original post. A KDE distro cannot be called great at this time. Same with GNOME. The easy way for Slackware to get back to greatness is to do nothing and wait for KDE to recover. Considering the NATURE of the bugs I do not expect that to happen any time soon, though. If somebody proposes the hard way of switching to XFCE as the main or only DE, count my voice.

Some are not available or not synchronized anymore. Just try the Australian mirrors for example.

I don't understand what you're trying to say here...
Probably shouldn't use KDE, then. ;^)
Slackware is not a "KDE distro"...when you do a fresh install, you see a console login on bootup. Where you go from there is up to you. I don't like the new KDE either(or KDE3, and won't touch GNOME with a 10-inch pole), so...I don't use it(them). Opinions regarding desktops haven't much to do with Slackware, or its "greatness".
"Hard way"? XFCE's pretty decent, as DEs go, and it is part of the Slackware distribution; what's hard about using it?

Does anyone get this problem?

I too have to chime in here with a vote of support for Xfce. I could not use KDE4 on my Slack64 system... too buggy, too bloated, too... just too. ;) I've been a Slacker for most of my GNU/Linux lifetime. It's wonderful, sleek, and fast with Xfce! Enjoy! :)

Screenshots:

http://img513.imageshack.us/img513/2...xfceshot03.png

http://img513.yfrog.com/img513/8349/...hemeshot03.png

Xfce is MUCH BETTER than KDE4... but If you want speed... :-) better switch to FluxBox....

Compare an Honda CBR 1100 xx Blackbird to an Suzuki Hayabusa...

I mean, both are very fast, but... one is outstandingly and unearthly faster than the other... :-)

Alex

I run LXDE w/ OpenBox in Sidux64. That's about as "boxed" as I wanna' be right now. ;)

I've always admired and touted the virtues of Patrick's (and the rest of the team's) careful approach to new releases. Slackware has always been, for me, the most stable and reliable distribution I've used. That one factor is the primary facet of the distribution that has most endeared it to me and garnered my undying loyalty. I have no qualms about installing new slackware versions on test machines and even production machines because I trust that they will just work.

That being said, I do have to say that if I were pressed to list my favorite versions of past releases, none of them would end in dot-zero. I suppose it is the complex nature of the beast that not all things can be anticipated, and that the universe rarely lines itself up well enough such that all of the elements that are assembled into a linux distribution have a dependable stability at release time.

So far, I've not encountered any show-stopping problems with 13. It hasn't been perfect for me, some older VIA hardware chokes on the new KDE but I only installed it on that platform to see if I could -- I didn't expect it to work at all, frankly, and I was pleasantly surprised. Xfce performs well in 13 on that machine so it will probably remain a 13 box (even though I have no use for it, currently).

I've been a harsh critic of KDE4, but to be fair, I don't think KDE 4.2.4 is unstable. It is buggy, some features aren't working correctly, and customization is not what is was with KDE3. But it's not like KDE 4.2.4 is crashing and freezing up all the time (at least from my experience). The only thing really unstable about it is Akonadi.

Of course, there are always minor glitches with major version upgrades, but I think KDE4 has way too many. The end result: many less than impressed users. It seems all the refinement and wonderfully designed aspects of KDE3 were just thrown out the window. We have something new and shiny, but lacking in sophistication. I would have been nice if somehow the "wisdom" of KDE3 could have been carried forward into 4. It just feels to me (and many others) that everything in KDE4 is new but broken/immature/glitchy.

There is a good reason why defaults in Linux are never right: all systems are different and nobody puts the "average user" needs above personal comfort and habits. Consider RPATH problem in packaging or media player setup. The latter may have a bunch of options ideal for crashing the system or just no options like Dragon Player and its black rectangle video.

I do not use KDE, but I feel the advice is flawed. The next step is to advice not to use Linux. The usability and good design principles are universal and I believe a common feeling of what is acceptable exists. Thus, bad design of one project harms all the rest.
Slackware is a KDE distro since nobody considers Linux a command line OS any more. Thus, either a distro chooses what it is or people do that for it. Slackware is KDE, Ubuntu is GNOME. Ubuntu user rants I see in the Net suggest that KUbuntu is GNOME too (due to some missing features/polish KUbuntu looks like a GNOME distro where GNOME has been replaced with KDE).

If I recall correctly, it was well explained why Slackware dropped GNOME. If Slackware decides to stop being a KDE distro, it can be achieved easily: move KDE to pasture and comment on it.
Nothing. However, Slackware recommends full install and I believe that there are good reasons for it. For example, if I do not install KDE what a GUI CD burner will I have?

There are XFCE goodies that are not included. Personally I do not bother to install them, but without them Slackware cannot be called an XFCE distro.

Originally posted by titopoquito:
mirror.pacific.net.au was down from 12/11/2009 for server upgrade/improvement and is now back on line and working just fine.

@AGer: Thanks for your reply. While I don't entirely agree, I do see your point.

That's a tough one; how would you solve this issue?

(1) I'd have no problem with that, though I am sure many would.
(2)Very good point. I used K3b previously- that's been my only use for the kdelibs/base packages for some time. With 13, I've been using xfburn; it's working quite well for me.

The more I use 13, more I like it...

Someone above said that Slackware 13 shouldn't be judged by its inclusion of KDE4. I agree. The WM/DE is not the OS. There are choices. That's the one of the greatest things about GNU/Linux.

As far as needing a burner app when you're not running KDE... what's wrong with xfburn. I use it. It doesn't have all the bells and whistles of K3b, but it's stable and efficient. Try it...

http://www.xfce.org/projects/xfburn/

Here's a SlackBuild of it...

http://slackbuilds.org/repository/13.0/system/xfburn/

It requires libburn and libsofs. These are also available as SlackBuilds.

Have fun! :)

Nice to hear that - there can't be enough mirrors I think. :)
I clicked all of them some days ago just out of curiosity, at least some were apparently dead (like an offer "domain for sale" and the usual advertising).

I second other LQ members' opinions. KDE is not everything that slackware offers.
After using KDE 3.5 on 12.2 I had a brief encounter with KDE 4.2.4. Due to known issues with 4.2.4 I switched to XFCE and then fluxbox. Having used fluxbox for a while I decided to give KDE one more shot. This time it was kde 4.3 in slackware-current. It was noticeably more stable than 4.2.4, but it did have its shortcomings. Consequently, I returned to fluxbox. I configured LOTS of key shortcuts which makes operating it very quick and comfortable.

I'm not sure I buy the, don't judge Slackware by KDE's performance. The Slackware 'team' decided to put KDE in, so thus I feel fine judging them over this. 'They' decided not to include Gnome and go with KDE. 'They' decided to use KDE 4.x over KDE 3.5.x. If it was really felt that KDE 4.x wasn't ready they wouldn't have put it in.

All that being said... I've been a Slackware user since Slackware 10, and have hated every minute of using KDE when Gnome was taken out of the distro. I installed Slackware 13 the day it came out, and decided to try KDE4, and haven't looked back since. I've had some bumps in the road, but nothing like what I've seen on this board.

For a distro that doesn't include PAM for various reasons, you can't pass the buck on KDE.

Someone might have already said this but I don't wont to go through three pages to see... Anyway have you tried download a current ISO or upgrading to current? I have to finally say it aloud but I agree that KDE 4.2.4 is not that great, in fact I personally think it kind of sucks. That's why I switched to xfce. However 4.3.3 in current is quite nice and I have gone back. Might be worth a try for you.

Sadly, 4.2.4 really tainted my feelings toward KDE. I was a KDE user all along in my Slack installations all the way back to 10. I was so aggravated with the issues I was experiencing with KDE4(.2.4) in Slack64 that I just gave up. I went to Xfce and never turned back. Maybe I'll play around with KDE again when Slack 13.1 or .2 comes out.

I live quite harmoniously with KDE & Slackware 13.

With the current state of user - distribution maintainers -upstream relationships, nothing can be done. I guess the way out is to agree that:

1. A free end user general purpose OS cannot exist.
2. There can be at most one general purpose end user OS build with FOSS.
3. Stop laughing at Ubuntu or choose another candidate for that OS.
4. Make it clear for everyone that any other distro is not a general purpose end user OS.

Before: I started KDE in Slackware and it was no good. I am disappointed with Slackware. It contains crap.

After: I started KDE in Slackware and it was no good. I admire Slackware. It is so easy to estimate the current state of the KDE with it.

Both GNOME and KDE are bloated, have been for a long time. My slack installs are purely for servers and have no GUI functions even installed. Slack 13 is solid as a rock on multiple machines in my server farm.

If I had to pick a WM? Definitely fluxbox or possibly blackbox. Both are fast as lightning and configurable.

What am I doing wrong? I'm having no trouble at all with vbatts' KDE4.3.1 packages on 32 & 64 bit Slackware stable.

http://cardinal.lizella.net/~vbatts/...ackages/4.3.1/

You're not the only one brian. I didn't have any significant issues with 4.2.4 either. Yes, there were a few bugs here and there, but nothing that seemed show stopping in any serious way. In fact prior to using KDE4 on slackware, I was a die hard WindowMaker user who hated KDE 3.5.

All I'm waiting for now is for someone to write a plasma widget that acts like the WindowMaker dock and I'm a happy KDE4 bunny.

@AGer: I'll start with 3: I very much dislike Ubuntu. This is a matter of personal preference, and I am well aware that there are many who use it happily. That's their choice; if it works for them, that's great, I don't have a problem with it.
1: contradicts the others.
2 & 4: Why only one? And(based on point 3) why does it have to be Ubuntu?

I still think it doesn't make sense to be disappointed with Slackware just because you don't like the version of KDE that shipped with it.
As several people have pointed out, some are using KDE4 with few or no problems; they seem to be happy enough with it.
I didn't have any problems when I briefly had KDE4 running; I just don't like KDE- that is, again, personal preference, and not meant to reflect on the software itself, or anyone who uses it. I use Fluxbox; I think it's great, and for me, it is. I have no doubt, however, that if Slackware used Fluxbox as it's only GUI, there would be a lot of unhappy users.

I had no problems with KDE 4.2.4 in 13.0 or with KDE 4.3.3 in -current. I prefer using XFce and Fluxbox because they do what I want without using a lot of system overhead. You have a variety of DEs/WMs in Slackware to choose from.
Slackware is all about choice.
Ditching Slackware because you don't like KDE is over kill in my opinion, but, each to his own. If you try out other distros I guarantee you'll be back. They always come back. :)

@hitest,

I'm always coming back. :D I have been on many distros, but still Slackware is the best for my old PC. It just great for me on Slackware 12.2, but 13 is still buggy to work on. So, I just use the 12.2 with KDE 3.5.10..

I love it so much...

I'm glad that you keep coming back to Slackware. :) Slackware 13.0 and Slackware-current will work very well on older PCs. I've got Slackware 13.0 running with Fluxbox on my Plll 667 and Slackware-current running on my Celeron 850.

Hi there :)

When I first tried SL64 13, I was hesitating wether it could replace Debian Lenny...

So I tried it for nearly 3 months...

and I switched... 100% replacement...

BRGDS

Alex

Slackware 12.2 will be the end of the line for my old P3-800/128MB ram/Geforce256 box. I tried 13.0 on it but the performance differences with the newer kernel and xorg were just a little too much for this already borderline box, so I reverted it back down to 12.2.

12.2 also has the advantage of using the long-time-support 2.6.27.y kernel branch, which is also something that may mean 12.2 is a good one to stick with long term.

I'm very happy with Slackware64-current on my primary though. 13.1 (assuming it won't be a 14.0) looks like it's going to be a good'un.

Kde depend much from graphic resources, it could probably where some problem with graphic card, or another hardware malfunction. For me slackware never crash (!) it's true.
If you change from linux probably you have same problems, or not.
Slackware curent run fine fine