Arch Linux

lodolfo

Member

Registered: 2008-10-12

Posts: 7

Blank desktop in KDE 4.3

I've tried several different versions of kde on this installation. First kdemod3, then kdemod (4.2), and now the official repo's 4.3 version.
I stopped using kdemod3 because some update in extra broke it, so it's either 4.3 or gnome, which sucks for me.

The problem is that I have installed 4.3 and everything seems to go all right. The command I used looked like this:

sudo pacman -Sy kde-meta-kdeartwork kde-meta-kdebase kde-meta-kdebindings kdegraphics-okular  kdegraphics-svgpart   kdegraphics-thumbnailers  kdemultimedia-kioslave kdemultimedia-kmix kdemultimedia-strigi-analyzer kdenetwork-krfb kdepim-akregator kde-meta-kdeplasma-addons  kdesdk-kate kdesdk-kioslave  kdeutils-ark  kdeutils-kcalc kdeutils-kcharselect kdeutils-printer-applet kde-meta-kdeadmin

I only chose the packages I thougth I would need, but when I start it from kdm it plays the startup sound, and it shows the kde desktop, but the taskbars never appear and no menu comes up when I right-click on the desktop. I'm guessing Plasma is not running for some reason, but I don't know how to start troubleshooting. I've already deleted the .kde and .kde4 directories, but I get the same behavior. Nepomuk runs, and when I press Alt-F2, I get krunner, but it doesn't do anything when I press enter. The only way to get out is to press Ctrl-Alt-Delete, which brings up the logout dialog. It seems everything is running, except for plasma.

Where can I find some logs or anything to help me figure out what's going on? Can there be any remaining files from the older kde installations that might be causing trouble? Where else should I look?

flamelab

Member

From: Athens, Hellas (Greece)

Registered: 2007-12-26

Posts: 2,160

Re: Blank desktop in KDE 4.3

You must install kdebase-workspace in order to install plasma (the panels and the whole desktop are ran by /usr/bin/plasma-desktop)

lodolfo

Member

Registered: 2008-10-12

Posts: 7

Re: Blank desktop in KDE 4.3

I did that just before opening the topic, apparently the above command had installed kdebase-workspace, because it said it was just reinstalling. Right now, I'm doing a system update, and some kde packages are being updated, so I'll try after it finishes and report back.

Thanks, flamelab!

Update: Apparently, it was a bug, because plasma is running now after the update. Thanks for your help!

Last edited by lodolfo (2009-08-05 12:55:13)