KDE 4.1 - Preliminary testing, Plasma mainly

At long last, I decided to give KDE4 a try. After playing around with KDE 4.1 on Kubuntu 8.10 beta for around an hour, I had mixed views.

I have a decent laptop, so I installed Kubuntu in a VirtualBox VM. I gave it 800MB of RAM and 48MB of graphics, loaded the ISO, and fired up the LiveCD. When it got to the KDE splash screen, there was a severe amount of lag as it rendered the fancy graphics. Anyway, I let it load the desktop but found it impossible to do anything because of the lag. So I boosted the VM's graphics to 128MB and tried again. This time there were no graphics issues, and promptly I was presented with a very pretty desktop.

The LiveCD experience was a bit sluggish, but that's normal. Did I mention the desktop looked pretty? The Application Launcher (K Start menu) was decent too: snappy, well-organized. So I decided to install Kubuntu on the VM for some casual KDE4 testing.

I wasn't expecting it to be too responsive (in a VM) but it did fine. It only used about 180MB of RAM for a fresh desktop session and went up to about 240MB with 6 apps running. The processor wasn't being worked too hard either (Disclaimer: I'm a regular Vista user ;)

I got 2 app crashes soon after the desktop loaded (one was something to do with Python, and the other was the Hardware Drivers app), though I'm guessing this was really just a VM issue.

I wasn't running on full-fledged video drivers so I didn't bother to test Desktop Effects. I really just wanted to check out the overall usability of the new WM/DE.

So here's my preliminary take on it (pending more usage scenario testing):

The default widget set is mediocre, at best. Widget customizability is nearly nil. For example:

• What's with the centered resize? (can we get an edge-drag-style resize please?)
• The rotate function just feels silly.
• You can't move the Desktop widget by dragging it by its Title bar.
• Widget layering just isn't available: I put the Trash widget on top of the Desktop widget and it went below, and then I had to move/resize the Desktop to access the Trash.
• The System Tray widget (for one) is so buggy it's almost non-functional when used outside of a panel.
• I can't seem to find a way to lock individual widgets. !?
• There's no edge-snapping with the screen/panels/widgets while dragging or resizing widgets. So although moving/resizing widgets can be done pixel-perfect, it's a pain to get them all neatly placed and uniformly sized.
• While dragging to resize a widget, a static graphic of the widget is shown being stretched to size, instead of dynamically resizing the widget object itself in real-time. It's plain ugly. Aren't these supposed to be vector graphics?

Also, once, when I logged out and back in, all my widgets had been shoved off into the upper left corner; I wasn't able to reproduce the bug later though.

Panels are even more ridiculous:

• You can't stack a panel on top of another. Instead, panels just overlap each other. !?
• You can't drag-drop widgets from panel to panel. Or even panel to desktop, or vice versa. !!??
• In fact, you can't directly drag-drop to relocate a panel, or even drag-drop widgets within a panel, without having to open the panel's adjustment bar. This is just a click away, and so may be forgiven, but still.
• Resizing the panel length-wise is fine. But when you resize it breadth-wise, the contents don't always scale correctly. For example, I can resize the bottom Panel to a narrower height, but then the bottoms of the widgets get cut off below a certain height.

KDE3 has better panels, in my opinion. Heck, even Windows 98 had better panels ;)

Dolphin, the file manager, is pretty good. I didn't test it inside-out, but it feels stable and quick. I've never really liked Konqueror so I didn't bother checking it out; for now at least. Okular and DragonPlayer are good. I have no idea where KSysInfo has disappeared though. Not sure whether they've removed it in KDE4 or in Kubuntu. Does anyone know the new way to check my System Info. I tried the Hardware Drivers app but it crashed.

Overall, I was expecting Plasma to be a lot more usable by now. And even the eye-candy department needs quality assurance. I mean, it's already at 4.1! Do we wait till 4.5 or something now? I didn't test previous releases exactly because I knew they weren't going to be usable. Looks like I needed a reality check on how far KDE4 still has to go. Poor me. I really want KDE4 to do well, I DO!

I'm thinking I should install Kubuntu on my actual system and further test it for a day or two to see if I can generate an organized list of crucial usability/QA issues with Plasma, and present them to the KDE team. KDE4 has tried to implement brave new concepts. It has loads of potential. But the execution is still below par on the usability front, and that's what really counts. I don't doubt that it will change for the better, but how much longer do we have to wait.