I have been away from slackware for a while, what do I need to upgrade?

TroN-0074 · 11-12-2015, 08:23 PM

Hi guys.
The laptop I had died last year leaving me no way to work with Slackware. This year a generous person gave me another laptop so I remove the harddrive from the dead laptop and inserted into the new one with the previous Slackware installation and now is back online. I did run all the updates from the repos but I was wondering if there are other software that I need to upgrade. I know some KDE base distros released this year are using Plasma 5 so I wonder if that is available for 14.1. currently I am on KDE 4.10.5

Any other recommendation you guys have will be appreciated. By the way my old laptop was 32bit architecture but this one is 64bit capable.

cwizardone · 11-12-2015, 09:10 PM

IIRC, Alien Bob provides KDE 5 packages for -current only, BUT he does have packages of KDE-4.14.3 for Slackware-14.1.

http://alien.slackbook.org/ktown/

If you are interested in KDE 5, you might want to read Alien Bob's blog entries on the subject. Here is the most recent,

http://alien.slackbook.org/blog/kde-...ngs-telepathy/

KDE-4.14.3, which is now part of -current, is certainly an improvement over 4.10.5, but regardless of which way you go, make sure you read the "readme" files and follow the instructions therein.

TroN-0074 · 11-12-2015, 09:52 PM

Thank you very much.
I would be interested in upgrade the desktop environment. I would image newer KDE would have better support for Android, currently I cant transfer files between the computer and my phone, I can only think old Dolphin doesnt have the newer gvfs-mtp pluggins. Do you know if there is a whole file I can download then install it with upgradepkg --install-new So I can upgrade the entire KDE to 4.14.3
I appreciate your advice, thank you.

cwizardone · 11-12-2015, 10:20 PM

As previously mentioned, you need to read the README file, which includes, among other things, some information about communicating with your smart phone.
Here,

http://alien.slackbook.org/ktown/14.1/4.14.3/

Quote:

KDE4.14
=======

This is the KDE Software Compilation 4.14.3 for Slackware 14.1!
Now you'll be able to work with the same KDE version as in -current.

What's new:
-----------
This release includes the latest version of the Plasma Workspaces (4.11.17)
which was taken from KDE Applications 14.12.3. Other Long Term Support (LTS)
packages were also taken from Applications 14.12.3: kdelibs and kdepim.
Kactivities was taken from the KDE 4.13.3 sources because that is not shipped
as part of KDE 4.14.
This set of packages includes the most recent versions of the Calligra office
suite (2.9.1) and Kdevelop (4.7.1) packages.
There were some other noteworthy updates and additions in the 'extragear'
department: k3b and partitionmanager were updated and kdeconnect-kde, libmm-qt,
libnm-qt and plasma-nm were addded.
And I sneaked some stuff in, which may not be of interest to everyone. I added
a phonon-vlc package, which of course will only work if you also install my
vlc package - some people prefer the vlc backend for phonon to the gstreamer
or the ancient mplayer backend.

Package changes:
----------------
The upgrade from Slackware 14.1's own 4.10.5 will be relatively easy, see
further down for instructions.
The following Slackware packages outside KDE (the 'deps') need an update:
- akonadi, attica, grantlee, libssh, libwpd, phonon, phonon-gstreamer, qt,
shared-desktop-ontologies and soprano.
One new dependency was introduced in KDE 4.12:
- LibRaw.
Three new packages have been added for KDE 4.13:
- eigen3, qt-gstreamer and xapian-core.
Six new dependencies for KDE 4.14:
- gstreamer1, gst1-plugins-base, gst1-plugins-good, libfakekey, libodfgen,
librevenge, orc and qt-gstreamer1.

Four KDE packages have been removed since the KDE 4.10.5 of Slackware 14.1:
- kdeadmin, kdetoys, kdesdk and kdenetwork have been split up into smaller
individual packages in 4.11.
Two packages were renamed in 4.12:
- kwallet is now called kwalletmanager.
- kdnssd became zeroconf-ioslave.
New packages were added too, in KDE 4.13:
- artikulate, baloo, baloo-widgets, kfilemetadata and kqtquickcharts.

If you have installed the slackpkg+ extension to slackpkg and added my 'ktown'
repository, then "slackpkg install ktown" should show you a list of new
packages to install.

Changes to Slackware's KDE:
---------------------------
Noteworthy additions since the KDE 4.10.5 of Slackware 14.1 are:
- kdeconnect-kde, which is the counterpart of the Andriod application
kdeconnect-android. KDE Connect allows your Android smartphone to
interact with your KDE Desktop.
- baloo, which is the next generation of the nepomuk project. It's responsible
for handling user metadata such as tags, rating and comments.
It also handles indexing and searching for files, emails, contacts, and so on.
Automatic migration from nepomuk to baloo has been added to KDE 4.13.
- plasma-nm: you have a choice of NetworkManager GUI now.
The original 'networkmanagement' widget will ultimately be replaced by
the new QML based 'plasma-nm' applet. The packages required for the
Plasma NetworkManager applet are: libmm-qt, libnm-qt and plasma-nm itself.

NOTE:
The artikulate package requires gstreamer-1. Slackware still comes with
gstreamer-0.1 and therefore I added the gstreamer1 package to the 'deps'.
The gstreamer 1.x and 0.1 versions can co-exist on the same system,
so it should not be an intrusive addition.

NOTE:
About the language packs (KDEI) - for Slackware 32-bit as well as 64-bit:
* KDE localizations (language packs) are available in the "kdei" subdirectory.
You only need one package (for your own language).

NOTE:
If you decide to install these packages on top of a fresh installation of
Slackware 14.1 and have excluded all packages in the 'KDE' package series
during installation, you will be missing several add-on packages, some of
these are essential to the proper functioning of KDE!
If you excluded the complete Slackware 14.1 'KDE' series, then you
will have to install the following essential Slackware 14.1 packages
at a a minimum:
* bluedevil
* polkit-kde-agent-1
* polkit-kde-kcmodules-1
And optionally install these as well:
* amarok
* kaudiocreator
* kdevelop-pg-qt
* kplayer
* ktorrent
* libktorrent
* wicd-kde

NOTE:
Sources and scripts have been separated from the packages in my 'ktown'
repository starting with KDE 4.9-rc1. If you want the sources for
4.14.3, run the following command to download them:

# rsync -av rsync://alien.slackbook.org/alien/ktown/source/4.14.3 .

First, you need to take care of new/updated dependencies:
# cd 4.14.3/deps
# ./updates.SlackBuild

Wait a long time, and you will find the new packages in /tmp/ .
Note that the packages will already have been installed by updates.SlackBuild !

Then if you want to compile the KDE packages on your computer, run:
# cd -
# cd 4.14.3/kde
# ./KDE.SlackBuild

Wait a long time, and you will find the new packages in /tmp/kde-build .
Note that these packages will already have been installed by KDE.SlackBuild !

But if all you want is the *packages* I created, then you can skip all of that.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In order to install or upgrade to KDE 4.14.3, follow these steps:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Make sure you are not running KDE or even X ! If you are running an X session,
log out first, and if you are in runlevel 4 (graphical login) you first have to
go back to runlevel 3 (console) by typing "init 3".

To make it easy for you, here is a one-line command that downloads the whole
4.14.3 directory (excluding the sources), with 32-bit and 64-bit packages
(and be careful of the 'dot' at the end of that command, it is part of the
commandline !!):

# rsync -av rsync://alien.slackbook.org/alien/ktown/14.1/4.14.3 .

Or else, if you want to download packages for just one of the two supported
architectures, you would run one of the following commands instead (note that
there is a dot at the end of these commands!).

If you want only the 64-bit packages:
# rsync -av --exclude=x86 rsync://alien.slackbook.org/alien/ktown/14.1/4.14.3 .
If you want only the 32-bit packages:
# rsync -av --exclude=x86_64 rsync://alien.slackbook.org/alien/ktown/14.1/4.14.3 .

Assuming you just downloaded the bits you want from the directory tree
"4.14.3", you must now change your current directory to where you found this
README (which is the directory called '4.14.3'). If you used one of the
above "rsync" commands then you can simply do:

# cd 4.14.3

From within this directory, you run the following commands as root (note that
some of the old KDE package names are obsoleted now, they have been split up,
renamed or integrated and that is the reason for the 'removepkg' lines):

On Slackware 32-bit:
# upgradepkg --reinstall --install-new x86/deps/*.t?z
# upgradepkg --reinstall --install-new x86/kde/*.t?z
# removepkg kdeadmin
# removepkg kdenetwork
# removepkg kdesdk
# removepkg kdetoys
# removepkg kwallet
# removepkg kdnssd

On Slackware 64-bit:
# upgradepkg --reinstall --install-new x86_64/deps/*.t?z
# upgradepkg --reinstall --install-new x86_64/kde/*.t?z
# removepkg kdeadmin
# removepkg kdenetwork
# removepkg kdesdk
# removepkg kdetoys
# removepkg kwallet
# removepkg kdnssd

If you already have one or more non-english language packs installed:
# upgradepkg x86_64/kdei/*.t?z

If you want to have a non-english language pack installed but none is
currently installed, substitute your country code instead of the 'XX'
in the next command:
# upgradepkg --install-new x86_64/kdei/kde-l10n-XX-*.t?z

Check if any ".new" configuration files have been left behind by
the upgradepkg commands. Compare them to their originals and decide
if you need to use them.
# find /etc/ -name "*.new"
A graphical (ncurses) tool for processing these "*.new" files is slackpkg:
# slackpkg new-config

Then reboot your system.

==============================================================================
Eric Hameleers / alien at slackware dot com / 07-apr-2015

BCarey · 11-13-2015, 09:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TroN-0074

currently I cant transfer files between the computer and my phone

It may not be your ideal solution, but if you enable ssh or ftp on your slackware computer then you can use an android app like AndFTP to transfer files. I actually prefer it to having to plug in my phone to the computer.

Brian

mralk3 · 11-13-2015, 10:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TroN-0074

Thank you very much.
I would be interested in upgrade the desktop environment. I would image newer KDE would have better support for Android, currently I cant transfer files between the computer and my phone, I can only think old Dolphin doesnt have the newer gvfs-mtp pluggins. Do you know if there is a whole file I can download then install it with upgradepkg --install-new So I can upgrade the entire KDE to 4.14.3
I appreciate your advice, thank you.

Have you tried Bluetooth file transfers? Works fine for me with my Samsung Galaxy S5 on Slackware-current.

Tonus · 11-13-2015, 10:45 AM

I would suggest kde connect. Needs only a wifi network.

For Android, in F-Droid repo (and Play Store)
For Slackware in the current tree

cwizardone · 11-13-2015, 11:21 AM

Sigh.... It appears no one reads anymore.... from Alien Bob's "readme" posted in message #4 above,

Quote:

Changes to Slackware's KDE:
---------------------------
Noteworthy additions since the KDE 4.10.5 of Slackware 14.1 are:
- kdeconnect-kde, which is the counterpart of the Andriod application
kdeconnect-android. KDE Connect allows your Android smartphone to
interact with your KDE Desktop.

mralk3 · 11-13-2015, 11:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cwizardone

Sigh.... It appears no one reads anymore.... from Alien Bob's "readme" posted in message #4 above,

My comment was more for people who use Xfce or other DE's. When using KDE I make heavy use of KDE connect. To me it seems pointless to use KDE connect, which launches all sorts of KDE background processes, when running Xfce. So I use Bluetooth to save on system resources in Xfce. Both work just fine.

TroN-0074 · 11-13-2015, 02:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cwizardone

Sigh.... It appears no one reads anymore.... from Alien Bob's "readme" posted in message #4 above,

In my defense, I just got this laptop booting up Slackware last night and the original posts on this thread was first thing. I was planning on read some of Eric's blogs to see what was new for Slackware since its been a while since I last used it. And yes I will definitely upgrade KDE.

Thank you!

cwizardone · 11-13-2015, 02:53 PM

@TroN-0074,
The sigh wasn't directed at you.