[SOLVED] Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

[lmilano]

Update: this has been solved. The idea is a clean command line desktop, plus kde-minimal, plus whatever you need. I got a full KDE 4 desktop I can boot into in about 25 seconds (Dell Vostro A90 8G SSD, 1GB RAM). There are two similar recipes:

• Fintan's: start with a barebones server. More here:
  http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...9913#msg199913
  
  
  
• Mine: start with a net install (even more barebones but a little more work). More here:
  http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...9939#msg199939
  

Original Post:

Hi all

I am planning to replace the default Ubuntu 8.04 on my Vostro A90 (=Dell Mini 9) with some sort of Karmic. The question is what?

• The netbook edition is still at the "preview stage", it will be ready for 10.04
• Default Kubuntu takes forever to load in netbook (at the login stage, it takes forever to load a session)
• 
  I only need, really, a few things on the netbook:
  • Firefox + Flash
  • NoMachine Nx
  • Some Kiddie games (Frozen buble, etc)
  • VLC
  • Skype
  • Digikam
  • Dolphin
  • Plasma Dektop + cool widgets
  • Fast boot
  • hotkeys, wifi and resume working
  
  

So, you see, I only need to load a light KDE Desktop, no need to have all of KDE, and I am thinking what is making KDE Login so slow (once loaded it works just fine). Is it KNetworkManager? Is it akonadi? Or some of the initial services?

My first attempt (I will play on a USB stick before overwriting the SSD, and yes, I know it will be much slower than the SSD) would be to simply install Kubuntu 9.10 and :

• Remove Akonadi and anything that needs it
• Use wicd instead of NetworkManager

Any ideas out there? Is there any better solution for this? Since hotkeys, wifi and resume are all working in the netbook edition, I might as well customize that if the regular edition has issues with those. Anyways, the netbook edition (albeit being booted from a USB slow drive) seems to take forever to load the desktop, just as theregular Kubuntu 9.04 on my eeepc 701.

Any ideas are greatly appreciated, I'll try to keep this thread alive.

[Rog131]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

Maybe with the kde-core ?

> Moving from Kubuntu to kde-core

Why kde-core?

You may not have a reason to run kde-core. You might be perfectly satisfied with kubuntu-desktop. If so, go on your merry way—you don't really need this page. Some people are attracted to kde-core because they want more control over what gets installed (they'd rather build from the ground up than remove unwanted packages one at a time). Others want to try kde-core because it might run more lightly (i.e., faster) on their systems than the standard Kubuntu.

Old > Topic: installation & program selection

[lmilano]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

Thanks Rog,

It seems as if kde-core is no longer a metapackage in karmic (according to packages.ubuntu.com). But something along these lines could work: text install plus some basic KDE.

I still wonder what is the bottleneck for KDE Startup time on cold boot.

Thanks again!

[NormanF]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

The Kubuntu Netbook Edition Beta is stable and runs fast on my netbook. It'll be ready later this month although a lot more work is needed to implement more netbook-centric features. It looks and feels much better than Ubuntu Netbook Remix.

[Fintan]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

Just a thought.

Get the karmic server edition and do a barebones install (no servers) then do something like:

sudo apt-get install kdelibs kdebase-workspace kdm

and take it from there.

[Rog131]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

It seems as if kde-core is no longer a metapackage in karmic (according to packages.ubuntu.com).

What the... Where did it... A-haa...

=> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+s...de/+bug/404845

Christian Mangold wrote on 2009-07-26:

meta-kde (5:50ubuntu2) karmic; urgency=low

* In debian/control for package kde-devel change dep from kde-core to
kde-minimal, it was renamed (LP: ##404845)

So it is now: kde-minimal

the K Desktop Environment, minimal applications

KDE, the K Desktop Environment, is the powerful, integrated, and easy-to-use
Free Software desktop platform and suite of applications.

This metapackage includes the core official modules released with KDE. This
includes just the basic desktop (browser, file manager, text editor, control
center, panel, etc.) and important libraries and data.

[lmilano]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

@Rog Thanks for the rename info.

@Fintan Yes, that's another alternative. Thanks!

@NormanF Thanks! What netbook is that? How long does it take you from the grub screen into a fully loaded desktop? In my Dell Mini it is looking great, but:

• Login into KDE is slow
• X does't start. I need to do a recovery boot, and launch sudo startx manually
• One in X, there is no sound
• The regular boot is reallly slow, it seems to hang for a few very many seconds after you click the entry in grub.

Of course many of these things might be fixed for final, there were other issues that were solved already with updates on the USB drive I am testing in. Maybe I'll just try another fresh install into the USB drive later on, perhaps when RC is out.

In any case, I think akonadi is a bit of a burden for a netbook (it start a mysql server, etc), and I am still puzzled that KDE4 takes so long to login and logout.

[The Liquidator]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

You can disable (the very irritating) Akonadi startup by following the advice here

http://techbase.kde.org/Projects/PIM...adi_startup.3F

Hope this helps

ian

[lmilano]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

Thanks Ian, it does! (It gives an alternative to just removing it)

[Fintan]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

No problem. I am actually going to try it on my laptop and see how it goes.

I let you know

[lmilano]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

No problem. I am actually going to try it on my laptop and see how it goes.

I let you know

Thank you! If you have a running kubuntu in that laptop, could you please benchmark the difference in "from cold boot to full desktop" times? Many thanks!

[NormanF]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

Kubuntu Netbook Edition rebooted in two minutes. I was amazed.

[Fintan]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

Thank you! If you have a running kubuntu in that laptop,........

Glad to. will be doing that tonight (swiss time is not running out )

[Fintan]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

Okay, I got it working nicely:

Installed karmic server barebones.

Did:

sudo apt-get install kde.mininal

thankx Rog

which gave me 7 Updates and 282 new packages

as:

sudo apt-get install kdelibs kdebase-workspace kdm

gives 7 updates and 276 Packeges.

It boots from grub to log in in 30 sec. and from log in to screen (first time) in 15 seconds.

It is very minimal.
You have to onstall basic stuff like kate and kdesudo and kubuntu-firefox installer.

The first thing I did was get synaptic

But seems fast.

enjoy

[lmilano]

Re: Building a light KDE4 desktop for a netbook, off of Karmic

Excellent Fintan, thank you! Do yuo know how it compares with the previous install?

Many thanks!