When I installed Slackware, I deselected a few software sets like KDE and TCL, but now I would like to install KDE (btw, what is TCL for? Is it something important that I should have installed, or is it something like "if you don't know, you don't need it"?). What would be the best way to install the KDE software set and even have a menu to deselect a few packages I know I won't use? Running:

produces a list of kde packages (including the kde language packages), but I don't know if that's everything in the kde set. It seems like it's not, since it's transcending the software set boundaries to provide options for the internationalization packages, too.

just returns an error that no packages of this name exist. Eventually I decided to just try to run

and then deselect some of the software I don't want. Alas, this returns an error that there are no packages with the name "slackware", even though this command is documented in the slackpkg man page as the proper way to install all missing official slackware packages.


So what do I do? I still have my installation DVD, but I don't know how I would get the KDE packages from that installed, and I don't know if slackpkg will maintain those packages (will it?) since I use slackpkg to keep my base system up to date.



Thanks for any help. It will be greatly appreciated.

smiply put;
mount the install dvd
cd there, then slackware/mde and run install-packages as root. it will give you a menu to choose from.

secondly slackpkg should accept package series so slackpkg install kde would bring you he kde package series (packages in kde dir).

thirdly slackpkg will update as needed every packege as long as it's in the stock slackware. so don't worry.

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Thanks, ozanbaba! I installed KDE successfully and it works like a charm (except it's really slow, but that's probably because I have a crappy intel graphics card). At least now I have access to all the awesome kde apps out there!

I ran slackpkg upgrade-all and was a little worried to see that none were available, but then I realized there are probably no updates for the KDE set since it's still on 4.2.4 for slackware 13. Hopefully that works out fine.


I wonder if the later releases of KDE are any snappier. That would be great!

Slackware as a rule only updates things when secrity fixes or security patches are applied. This is a good thing unlike some distros that update everything as soon as new versions are released regardless.

That's a really cool rule to go by. It does help to explain slackware's perpetual stability. Too bad slack 13 is still stuck with KDE 4.2.4, though, even though 4.3.4 or something is far more stable and a bit snappier from what I've heard. No worries, though, since I'm not using KDE as my primary GUI; I just wanted some of the apps.

a little reference for form searchers;

slackpkg update
slackpkg upgrade-all

is correct way to upgrade whole system.

Slackware 13.0 was somewhat a victim of circumstance/timing when it comes to KDE4 versions. KDE 4.3 came out after Slackware 13.0 had hit release candidate status and versions of included software were already frozen at that point. I believe that lack of ongoing upstream support for KDE3.5 was also a contributing factor to moving to KDE4 earlier than would have normally happened in Slackware).

Expect normal service to be resumed with 13.1 whenever that releases. (please don't ask!.. "When it's ready" is the answer. )