ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

Zod · 2020-10-26 23:53:10

I got this old dell inspiron 1750 core 2 duo something or other that was running win10 home.

Windows had become so ponderous for this laptop that I was considering linux and a full DE. So I was just surfing and reading about KDE Plasma and opinions about which distro had the best KDE integration.

And like all these threads go, it was Kubuntu this and KDE neon that and I'm like OK. This isn't really going anywhere.

And then I was reading one and the guy said he should do Arch for one reason.

He(she?) said because of arojas maintaining plasma and I thought to myself, you know, s/he's right.
Then I remembered the threads on the forum where arojas is helping out with plasma problems. So I thought lets give it a go.

I got it all installed and I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. It looks great and it runs great and it's better integrated with Arch then I thought it would be.

Anyway, I don't remember where it was I saw that but I thought it was pretty cool that arojas has a good rep out there.

ArchChem · 2021-01-08 19:45:30

Arch generally works well with every desktop environment, no matter it is KDE or Gnome or any "tinier" solution. The simple reason is that Arch will give you the Vanilla versions of the environments and not a patched one like Ubuntu and many other distros are doing it.

wadk · 2021-02-15 10:23:06

ArchChem wrote:

Arch generally works well with every desktop environment, no matter it is KDE or Gnome or any "tinier" solution.

Deepin was pretty buggy for me, LXQt and LXDE/Xfce required too much setting up. Although, old laptop will benefit from either of these two. Here's a comparison of desktop environment performance from 2017 that I found useful:
https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page= … tops&num=1

Zod wrote:

So I was just surfing and reading about KDE Plasma and opinions about which distro had the best KDE integration.

Right now Plasma is running fine for me, but a word about Add-ins/Widgets. In my case latte-dock from AUR broke it in a way I had to reinstall the whole Arch. Why reinstall whole thing? Plasma creates some files into your system that pacman is not tracing, so if those are bugged you either trace them all or reinstall. And they are all over, I even tried making a new user but the bugginess remained. So be cautious about installing Add-ins, I guess.

I ended up doing
Install Arch (Arch wiki installation guide)
pacman -S xorg sddm plasma kde-applications
Selecting some kde-applications I needed out of the box
systemctl enable sddm

Zod wrote:

He(she?)

"They" is a lifesaver

Last edited by wadk (2021-02-15 10:50:07)

murffatksig · 2021-03-03 05:24:05

I'm a long time gnome user and recently have been trying out plasma on my Arch boxes. It's clean and I'm liking it. There's still some things I'm getting used to, but I've yet to think about returning to gnome.

d_fajardo · 2021-03-03 08:03:34

I'm a long time KDE user having also tried Gnome, Cinnamon and XFCE in other machines. Arch offers the most up-to-date software versions so the likes of Neon and other KDE variants are really irrelevant. I find KDE to be light. The only caveat for me is that Kwin has always had a love-hate relationship with Nvidia graphics and occasional updates of either could trigger temporary problems.

wadk wrote:

Plasma creates some files into your system that pacman is not tracing

How did you know this?

Awebb · 2021-03-03 08:36:48

In the past, there was a KDEmod repository, because people were not satisfied with the KDE4 packaging (or was it KDE3?). This project has become Chakra, which (don't quote me on that and maybe look it up) started as an Arch spin-off and is now its own distro, that still has a lot of Arch-y stuff going on. I have no idea how good it actually is, but if you're interested in a KDE platform, have a look at https://www.chakralinux.org/.

wadk wrote:

"They" is a lifesaver

Oh no. I find the information whether I'm talking about a single person or a group way more important than what kind of dangly parts people carry in their pants and blouses, so "they" is the absolute worst-case scenario. I'd rather keep pissing people off or stop using pronouns for individuals altogether, than giving up the ability to identify groups and individuals in daily speech. I know it's here to stay and has become the norm, but I really don't like it.

Last edited by Awebb (2021-03-03 08:38:33)

claudecat · 2021-03-04 06:20:31

Awebb wrote:

In the past, there was a KDEmod repository, because people were not satisfied with the KDE4 packaging (or was it KDE3?). This project has become Chakra, which (don't quote me on that and maybe look it up) started as an Arch spin-off and is now its own distro, that still has a lot of Arch-y stuff going on. I have no idea how good it actually is, but if you're interested in a KDE platform, have a look at https://www.chakralinux.org/.

Chakra has been dormant/dead for a long while now. If memory serves, Phil M, one of the main devs at Manjaro started at Chakra. Perhaps his leaving had something to do with Chakra's slow slide to oblivion. It was a rather strange distro actually - aggressively qt-centric, to the almost complete exclusion of GTK apps. You could get some things (e.g. Firefox), but you had to sorta do it outside the main package management protocol.

The thing closest to it now might be Kaos, also Arch-ish in that it uses pacman. It's got only one (Plasma) version, and is less vehemently anti-GTK. Maybe the most Plasma-focused distro currently. Too bad their default desktop is so bizarre (main panel along the right edge, etc.)

I'll take Arch's vanilla KDE implementation over that of any of the other strange distros that base themselves on it but mess with it so much that it's almost unrecognizable (Bluestar, Nitrux, even Garuda.) At least Chakra (and Manjaro KDE for that matter) were/are recognizably KDE

Last edited by claudecat (2021-03-04 06:20:55)

cfr · 2021-04-04 03:07:32

wadk wrote:

Right now Plasma is running fine for me, but a word about Add-ins/Widgets. In my case latte-dock from AUR broke it in a way I had to reinstall the whole Arch. Why reinstall whole thing? Plasma creates some files into your system that pacman is not tracing, so if those are bugged you either trace them all or reinstall. And they are all over, I even tried making a new user but the bugginess remained. So be cautious about installing Add-ins, I guess.

So not Plasma creating them? Still, pacman should know if they were installed. Of course, if they are later generated, I guess not. (But should an add-in be doing this?)

Bit worrying, if true?

GaKu999 · 2021-04-04 04:33:14

Probably derped configuration files in the user home.

I mean, placing junk on /usr requires root privileges anyways, it’s not that plasma can start trowing garbage there willy nilly.

jbonez50 · 2021-10-10 21:04:38

I use Arch and KDE 5.22.5 on a daily basis and am very happy with it. KDE has always been a favorite of mine, I have used Gnome, Cinnamon and XFCE and I always seem to come back to KDE.

im1st · 2021-11-02 07:31:20

Personally figure out that Gnome works better with Debian and its derivations and KDE works better with Arch (I exactly use both of these monsters this way )
btw, didnt try other distros for long time to generally talk about them but I think every distro works better with its default desktop (since arch doesnt have one and kde is also bleeding edge a bit, they can mate better)

Arch Linux

#1 2020-10-26 23:53:10

ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

#2 2021-01-08 19:45:30

Re: ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

#3 2021-02-15 10:23:06

Re: ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

#4 2021-03-03 05:24:05

Re: ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

#5 2021-03-03 08:03:34

Re: ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

#6 2021-03-03 08:36:48

Re: ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

#7 2021-03-04 06:20:31

Re: ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

#8 2021-04-04 03:07:32

Re: ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

#9 2021-04-04 04:33:14

Re: ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

#10 2021-10-10 21:04:38

Re: ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

#11 2021-11-02 07:31:20

Re: ArchLinux and KDE Plasma

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