KDE Plasma 5.7

[NoWorries]

Hmm.. looks like the author of the softpedia article didn't check the actual release very hard, as that new login screen/greeter has been reverted for now. 5.7 still has the same Breeze style for the time being.

I had realized that the login screen use with Kubuntu is the same as with 5.6.5 except the background is the new one.

For ref, the actual proposed plasma release schedule can be found here: https://community.kde.org/Schedules/Plasma_5

I have checked the softpedia article with the one we have both found and the release dates for 5.7.1 through to 5.7.5 are the same and correct.

[acheron]

I have checked the softpedia article with the one we have both found and the release dates for 5.7.1 through to 5.7.5 are the same and correct.

Yes, but as the official one says, it is subject to revision. So that is the more reliable reference, not just now, but if any changes should be made.

Softpedia is not great at updating their 'articles'.

[FSandefur]

Anyone want to hazard a guess when Plasma5.7.x will show up for kubuntu 16.04? I would assume it to be a backport as 5.8 was.....

[NoWorries]

For projects there are two possible ways to handle release dates.

The most stringent is to state what goals have to be achieved by a particular date and then if the goals are not achieved by the stated deadline the date has to be shifted. That is, the project goals rule.

The second it less stringent and starts with the stated goals and if they are not met by the chosen deadline, what has been accomplished is readied for release by the deadline date. That is, the deadline date rules.

You night find it interesting to read martin graesslin's blog at https://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/kategorien/kde/. In this he states

Last week we released the beta version of Plasma 5.7 which means we know what this release will have for better Wayland support. First of all I need to mention what didn’t make it: unfortunately I missed the freeze of Frameworks 5.23 to land support for xdg-shell. I have a working implementation, but was not yet satisfied with the API. This is a difficult interface to provide an API for due to the unstable nature of the interface. Due to lack of xdg-shell support GTK applications are still going to use X11 on Wayland (like the Firefox window I’m just typing this blog post in).

From reading this I get the impression that they are working their butts off and they let the deadline dates rule. What we get, we will have to wait and see for each release.

[acheron]

Anyone want to hazard a guess when Plasma5.7.x will show up for kubuntu 16.04? I would assume it to be a backport as 5.8 was.....

Did you mean 5.8 there, or was that a typo?

Regardless, plasma 5.7 for Xenial will not be immediate if it happens.

Plasma 5.7 requires a backport of Qt 5.6.1 or greater, but also having that in a PPA in a way that doesn't break or render un-installable some other Qt dependant but non kubuntu packages in the main archive.

(Neon can use a newer Qt and choose to just let those packages not work, as long the their Plasma desktop and selected kde applications work, as that's what neon is about)

Plasma 5.8 - approx October release - is provisionally set by plasma developers to be a LTS release for plasma, with up to 18 months worth of updates, so if can get that into Xenial backports that would be ideal.

[FSandefur]

Did you mean 5.8 there, or was that a typo?

Regardless, plasma 5.7 for Xenial will not be immediate if it happens.

Plasma 5.7 requires a backport of Qt 5.6.1 or greater, but also having that in a PPA in a way that doesn't break or render un-installable some other Qt dependant but non kubuntu packages in the main archive.

(Neon can use a newer Qt and choose to just let those packages not work, as long the their Plasma desktop and selected kde applications work, as that's what neon is about)

Plasma 5.8 - approx October release - is provisionally set by plasma developers to be a LTS release for plasma, with up to 18 months worth of updates, so if can get that into Xenial backports that would be ideal.

Yes, 5.8 was a typo, I meant 5.6.

I'm aware of the complexity of the task, and almost completely unaware of the details in this instance. If I came across as impatient, I didn't mean to be. Eager, yes, but perfectly aware this could easily be something that takes a couple months, rather than days or weeks.

I have several machines running on kubuntu 16.04, and ..well I'm too entrenched in that to have any desire to switch to a different distro. I'd love to get to the newer Plasma (I'm on 5.6.5 currently) simply to cure some of the nagging clitches.

In the end, I was just curious if there was an informed guess about a time frame, or even if anyone had chosen to actually work on a backport or not.

[acheron]

I'm aware of the complexity of the task, and almost completely unaware of the details in this instance. If I came across as impatient, I didn't mean to be. Eager, yes, but perfectly aware this could easily be something that takes a couple months, rather than days or weeks.

You didn't, so don't worry.

In the end, I was just curious if there was an informed guess about a time frame, or even if anyone had chosen to actually work on a backport or not.

Yes, the kubuntu packagers are working on it. Just no ETA as yet.

[acheron]

Regards what I said about Plasma 5.8 LTS, Jonathan Riddell has now posted on what was decided yesterday

See: http://jriddell.org/2016/07/08/plasm...d-performance/

[NoWorries]

Yes, but as the official one says, it is subject to revision. So that is the more reliable reference, not just now, but if any changes should be made.

Softpedia is not great at updating their 'articles'.

I find it interesting that Softpedia also cited the 5.8 development at: http://news.softpedia.com/news/kde-p...e-506124.shtml.

Also, you indicated, the schedule at https://community.kde.org/Schedules/Plasma_5 has now changed with 5.8 included in the list and the previous 5.7 releases remain as before.

[acheron]

Also, you indicated, the schedule at https://community.kde.org/Schedules/Plasma_5 has now changed with 5.8 included in the list and the previous 5.7 releases remain as before.

Yes, I know. I was in the IRC meeting.

[NoWorries]

I have just been updated to KDE Plasma 5.7.1. The developers were certainly fast in getting it out after the official release date.

Unfortunately the external display "features" that were in 5.7.0 are unchanged in 5.7.1 on my system. I fondly remember my son commenting that it takes 3 versions to get problems solved. So I am looking forward to 5.7.3 to see if his idea is correct or not.

[GreyGeek]

I find it interesting that Softpedia also cited the 5.8 development at: http://news.softpedia.com/news/kde-p...e-506124.shtml.

Also, you indicated, the schedule at https://community.kde.org/Schedules/Plasma_5 has now changed with 5.8 included in the list and the previous 5.7 releases remain as before.

Consider the
Team

• Jonathan Riddell
• Harald Sitter
• Valorie Zimmerman
• Michał Zając
• Jens Reuterberg
• Ken Vermette
• David Wonderly

When I was writing docs and visiting launchpad and the IRC those people were the heart & core of the old Kubuntu dev team, IIRC (Claydoh would know)
Jonathan writes in his blog:

About Me


Jonathan Riddell, Canoeist, Quaker and Computer Person.
I make a Linux operating system called KDE neon and I currently work for Blue Systems. I previously made Kubuntu, a flavour of Ubuntu. I am the largest contributor to Ubuntu by uploads in the last decade.

[vinnywright]

ya ,,, I have that "Plasma-5.7.1" @hear as well ,,,

started with Kubuntu-16.04 then added the "deb http://archive.neon.kde.org/stable/ xenial main" to my /etc/apt/sources.list

it works well enough for me .

VINNY

[GreyGeek]

I decided to explore KDE Neon so I used mkusb to make a 32GB persistent LiveUSB. Fast, stable, Plasma 5.7.1. About 57K packages in the repository.

[dequire]

I decided to explore KDE Neon so I used mkusb to make a 32GB persistent LiveUSB. Fast, stable, Plasma 5.7.1. About 57K packages in the repository.

I'm thinking when 16.04.1 comes out, it might be time to drop Neon onto bare metal here, since the "stable LTS base" of 16.04 should be approaching rock-solid by then! I'm really thinking Neon is onto something here, as the biggest drawback of using an LTS is pretty rapidly outdated Plasma Frameworks and Applications packages after the next few Ubuntu releases. Once your video drivers are well baked-in and stable as well as other various hardware, having a bleeding-edge underlying base becomes far less important to me than having the latest Plasma goodness. I feel there's a real market for this out there, and I'm glad Riddell and others are on it regarding Project Neon.