Does Plasma setting an app to one acivity / other just not work?

[woodsmoke]

Ok,
I have tweaked my desktops for a LONG time, especially the Compiz cube etc.

One can find,or at least used to be able to find, the huuuuge (sic)! lol posts that I made on how to do it.

Lately using the KDE desktop, because I just do not do the heavy duty online stuff I have just basically used the folders etc.

But, using Neon and also Xenial, I just cannot seem to find the correct combination of tick boxes in two parts of KDE to get a simple thing done: tie an app to an application.

And I can understand why reviewers say that KDE is "complicated"! lol

Now, actually that is just part of it, .... I want to basically resize the Plasma Media Center, which I can do, except...... it only works AFTER the initial run of the app and then kind of "randomly"?? :0

I can tick "do not start full screen" in as many places as are possible and it still opens full screen!

So.... Is this just a "bug" or what?

woodsmoke

[GreyGeek]

I don't see ~/Desktop/*.desktop files serving a useful purpose in most cases. Even though they are in the Desktop folder, with the implication that they would appear as icons on the desktop, they do not. I have two that are in my desktop that connect to a Windows exe run under WINE, and the command line in the Menu item points to the IQUAN.desktop file. In that file is the "exec=" line which points to the executable in the .wine/C:\\ directory.
I added a SageMath desktop file to the Desktop folder and pointed at it with a menu item but it failed to run Sage. I can enter a menu item pointing directly to /home/jerry/SageMath/sage and it works perfectly.

Here is what SageMath.notebook looks like:

[Desktop Entry]
Name=SageMath
Comment=Sage Math Engine
Exec=/home/jerry/SageMath/sage /home/jerry/SageMath/notebook.sage
Icon=/home/jerry/SageMath/sage.png
Path=$HOME/SageMath
StartupNotify=true
Terminal=true
TerminalOptions=-T "SageMath Notebook"
Type=Application

and notebook.sage contains

notebook(openviewer=True)

It doesn't work.

But, this menu entry works fine:

[claydoh]

part of the problem may be that PMC is both still under development with the move to more recent version of Plasma, and is a qml app, as opposed to an executable application so it may not follow all the rules a traditional program does. I can get PMC to open to a specific activity but not (yet) have it force open in windowed mode.


When you resize PMC from full-screen, right-click on the titlebar, then go to M ore Actions >> Special Application Settings and change the Activity section to "force" and select the desired location.

There are a huge amount of settings in there, and one set of them may be what you need.

I may have the combo shortly. I am playing hookey from work so I may be delayed though

[claydoh]

I got it



I didn't think about forcing the "no" option for full screen

[woodsmoke]

Hi thanks guys!

lol well, I thought that maybe i had FIDDLED with all that stuff so much that I had conflicting stuff buried somewhere so I purged and re-install the desktop and...would not reboot! lol

Well, I don't keep any data on the OS itself, I use a usb and also external drive so I just installed the latest and greatest Kubuntu 16.10

And, it did indeed, hold the settings, in addition I was very pleased that the new version brought ffmpeg stuff with it.

Sometimes it pays to go with the latest and greatest!

Neon, however, is still giving me fits but at least I have leanred to NOT purge the desktop and try to reinstall! lol

lotsa fun!

again, thanks!

woodthankfulsmoke

[woodsmoke]

Well if it isn't one thing with PMC its another.
I just tried to play a "video" particularly an mpeg4 and an mp4 with it and....nada....it pops the "screen" but nothing plays.

It SEES the things just fine, but when clicked the "player screeen" which USED to be Kmplayer is just clear.

grrr

woodsmoke

[woodsmoke]

Well this just gets stranger and stranger.

PREVIOUSLY, Plasma Media Center had defaulted to "Kmplayer" for video and music.

Well, sooooo, I ....stoooopid woodsmoker, very blithely installed KMplayer ( and Mplayer the back end) without TESTING Plasma Media Center and

Since PMC uses Gwenview for viewing pics, etc. and I had installed all the salient codecs for ffmpeg etc. well.....I assumed....

So...........I DID YET AGAIN ...........a complete REinstall of Yakkity and installed PMC and DID NOT install Kmplayer and ....

lo and behold everything works automagically!

The devs coulda at least kinda mentioned that they changed the default player someplace...but oh well.

I was thinking of saying that this thread could be removed by a mod but, considering that there are probably other people that might have been thinking the same thing, maybe it oughta stay for at least a little while.

woodsmoke

[GreyGeek]

Never heard of PMC (plasma-medieacenter) before. What capabilities does it offer that I don't already have with vlc, dragonplayer, gwenview and the rest?

[claydoh]

Think of it as an extremely slimmed down, extrememly basic version of Kodi, so it is designed for use on televisions; the interface is supposed to be remote-control-friendly and viewable from a distance and presents your videos, photos without needing to browse a file system for them.

Very early, in terms of Plasma 5 support but has been around for a few years, though with slow development.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XebZIwB2dSE - from 2012, shows how it was looking in KDE4

[woodsmoke]

Hi guys
unfortunately that info is rather old.
they have taken it a different, and rather interesting, direction for tablets but also for televisions.

woodsmoke

[GreyGeek]

Hi guys
unfortunately that info is rather old.
they have taken it a different, and rather interesting, direction for tablets but also for televisions.

woodsmoke

Got a vid?

[claydoh]

I know, I did not find any decent video for plasma 5 versions

https://youtu.be/EpS4MqYobCM?t=77

[woodsmoke]

I have come to the conclusion that Yakity Yak is unstable in terms of full plasma useage.

using the plasma docker

setting up activities, if I make more than three the last one is labled "stopped" and doesn't work.

This had appeared a year or more ago in that I could set up activities and several of them would be "stopped".

i ASSUMED that it was a preset thing for saving battery on a laptop or a tablet, now I don't know.

THERE IS A SETTING in "power settings" / "activities", where in one sees a tab for all of the activities and one can click the second button for a "special setting" and tick "never shut down".

Sometimes all of the added in wallpapers just disappear and one is back to the purple diagonal thing.

Sometimes it works, and sometimes it does not.

I use the right click change activities and if the fourth activity did work it suddenly disappears.

If I go to window rules the fourth activity is not there.

If I remove the activity by clicking the little ban sign and restart i may or may not be able to add another activity and have it work.

I now only have PMC and Dragon player on the machine.

There are window rules for PMC and Dragonplayer which I can interact with but any kind of "remember" or "force" or any of that stuff does not last after ok / apply . Either in the session or restarting.

Before Dragon player disappeared it played videos, etc.

PMC played videos, assumedly with Dragon player.

I've wasted hours on this and this is one of the few times in my history of using Linux that I am using the term "wasted". and no i'm not wasted "like that"! lol

It may be that PMC just isn't going to work like predicted.

Although it DOES work on KDE Neon, but I had just not figured out the "useage" of the terms "force" and "remember" again, this is something that NEEDS to be "addressed" SOMEBODY has to, at some time, write a simple list in single sentences that is in a help file that is OBVIOUS and permanently attached to the OS about what a term means in "window rules" etc.

Otherwise, there will continue to be reviewer after reviewer say, over and over again, if they really DEAL with the backend that KDE or Kubuntu Plasma settings are "just too complicated".

I really DID NOT KNOW about this for the last few years because I was using Kubu to work and basically used a couple of activities for writing and such and invoked on the activity not trying to do it somewhere else and have it appear on an activity.

I can UNDERSTAND the frustration of so many people who try to get this to all work as advertised.

There is a lot of "waving of hands" by the KDE Plasma people and I think that the average person realises it.
I have to install it through Synaptic it is not in Discover so it may be unstable and they just aren't saying anything because there is no obvious pattern.

the instability really does seem to be random.

woodsmoke

[woodsmoke]

A) This has been resolved in a MOST unexpected manner.



B) Since BObillary will be elected I have one more semester of teaching physics. Yes, the college will GLADLY give me Biology and Environmental science again, but, I will be depressed for quite a while.

C) After I work my way through this I have a small "pay it forward" for Kubuntu and KDENeon; date to be determined.

D) Other things have recently multiplied in importance.

woodweneedvolunteerssmoke