My thoughts on Slackware, life and everything

KDE 5_15.02 release for Slackware-current

qt-kde-620x350I have released an incremental upgrade to my ‘ktown’ package set for KDE 5 aka Plasma 5. I have decided on a version tag for my packages, consisting of MajorRelease_Year.Month. Therefore, this package set carries version 5_15.02.

The KDE 5_15.02 increment contains the KDE Frameworks 5.7.0, Plasma 5.2.0 and Applications 14.12.2. Also present is a bunch of the “good old” KDE 4: most of kdebase, kdebindings and all those “extragear” packages like k3b and kdevelop which were missing in my 5_15.01 release.

This blog post will re-iterate some text of my previous Plasma 5 post, which I also encourage you to read, because it offers a lot more detail on the migration from KDE 4 to Plasma 5.

These KDE 5 packages of mine are going to be your only KDE desktop. There is no choosing between KDE 4 and Plasma 5 – KDE 4 will be mostly replaced. The “kde-workspace” package which provided the well-known KDE 4 workspace has been stripped down to the bare minimum, and has been replaced by “plasma-workspace”. The KDM graphical login manager has been retired and replaced with SDDM. While you will be presented with a pretty Plasma 5 workspace, most of the KDE applications you’ll be using are the familiar KDE 4 versions (with updates and bugfixes), nicely blending in to the new Breeze theme.

The highlights of this incremental release are:

  • KDE Frameworks have been updated to 5.7.0
  • KDE Applications have been updated to 14.12.2 (bugfix release, no new KF5 ports)
  • For two applications, kate and konsole, that have already been ported to KF5 (KDE Frameworks 5) it became apparent that the KDE 4 embeddable component (or “part” in KDE terminology) was still needed. So, a katepart4 package has been added so that kdevelop works again, and konsolepart4 was added to bring back the embedded terminal in dolphin. These two packages don’t share any files with their KF5 alternates.
  • The kde-workspace package has been re-added after stripping it so it no longer shares any files with plasma-workspace. The package is still needed by kget and kdeartwork.
  • The sddm-theme-breeze package has been removed because the Breeze theme files are actually part of the plasma-workspace package now… and the sddm-theme-breeze package was mostly empty already in the KDE 5_15.01 release.
  • In Applications 14.12.2, to date the only KF5 ports are still kate, konsole, analitza, gwenview, kalgebra, kanagram, khangman, kig, parley, kapptemplate and okteta. Apart from bugfixes to these and the KDE 4 based applications, the Applications 14.12.2 collection also contains updates for kde-workspace, kdelibs, kdepimlibs, kdepim and kdepim-runtime.

Testing Repository URL

I still consider KDE 4.14.3 the “latest stable” version for Slackware-current, and therefore the repository URLs http://taper.alienbase.nl/mirrors/alien-kde/current/latest/x86_64/ (for 64-bit) and http://taper.alienbase.nl/mirrors/alien-kde/current/latest/x86/ (for 32-bit) will keep pointing to KDE 4.14.3. You can use this repository URL for slackpkg+ or slapt-get or whatever package manager you use.

The URL http://taper.alienbase.nl/mirrors/alien-kde/current/testing/x86_64/ (for 64-bit) and http://taper.alienbase.nl/mirrors/alien-kde/current/testing/x86/ (for 32-bit) is pointing to my KDE 5 testing ground. I consider Plasma 5.2.0 a “testing” release, with potential to be your next stable desktop, but with some caveats and reservations. The URL itself will remain permanent, even when the versions of the software components get updated. Currently “testing” points to version “5” in the repository because versions of Frameworks, Plasma and Applications are not co-ordinated and package updates may appear in the next months for these sub-sets. The “5” is a good middle ground. You should use this “testing” URL when you configure slackpkg+ or slapt-get if you want to upgrade to Plasma 5.

You must use only one of these URLs!

Enabling SDDM in runlevel 4 instead of KDM

Runlevel 4

If you want to see the new graphical session (login) manager SDDM in action, add the following lines to the Slackware file “/etc/rc.d/rc.4” right after the line: echo “Starting up X11 session manager…”

# — 8< ————————————–
if [ -x /usr/bin/sddm ]; then
exec /usr/bin/sddm
fi
# — 8< ————————————–

… and then switch to runlevel 4 by typing at the command prompt (as root):

# init 4

Select “Plasma” from the SDDM session dropdown. Alternatively, if you prefer good old runlevel 3, you can type this at the command prompt (logged in under your own regular user account):

$ xwmconfig

… and select “xinitrc.plasma” as your default window manager for X11. Then run:

$ startx

To enter your desktop session.

Installing or upgrading Frameworks 5, Plasma 5 and Applications

As always, the accompanying README file contains full installation & upgrade instructions. Note that the packages are available in several subdirectories below “kde”, instead of directly in “kde”. This makes it easier for me to do partial updates of packages. The subdirectories are “kde4”, “kde4-extragear”, “frameworks” “plasma”,  “plasma-extra” and “applications”.

Upgrading to this KDE 5 is non-trivial. You will have to remove old KDE packages manually. If you do not have KDE installed at all, you will have to install some of Slackware’s own KDE 4 packages manually. I can not guarantee that there will be no deal-breakers for you (missing functionality or persistent crashes).

Note:

If you are using slackpkg+, have already moved to KDE 5_15.01 and are adventurous, you can try upgrading using these four commands, this seemed to work (assuming in this example that you tagged my KDE 5 repository “ktown_testing”):
# slackpkg update
# slackpkg install ktown_testing
# slackpkg upgrade ktown_testing
# removepkg sddm-theme-breeze

If you are completely new to KDE 5 for Slackware, I urge you to also read my previous post about KDE 5_15.01 in its entirety. There was a follow-up article about the changes in system tray support in the Plasma 5 desktop which is mandatory reading material as well if you are using Dropbox, Skype and other non-Plasma 5 software that wants to dock an icon in the system tray.

Where to get the new packages for Plasma 5

Download locations are listed below (you will find the sources in ./source/5/ and packages in /current/5/ subdirectories). If you are interested in the development of KDE 5 for Slackware, you can peek at my git repository too.

Using a mirror is preferred because you get more bandwidth from a mirror and it’s friendlier to the owners of the master server!

Notes

  • First, read all of the Notes at the end of the previous KDE 5 article, they still apply.
  • If you want your shutdown/reboot options back:
    • Solution: a simple patch which removes the use of “kwrapper5” to start the KDE services will bring back both options. Kwrapper is meant to speed up the start of the Desktop Workspace and be a bit friendlier on resource usage but if you really do need shutdown and reboot options present, then apply the following patch to “/usr/bin/startkde”:
      --- /usr/bin/startkde.orig     Notes  2015-01-31 18:09:25.744173291 +0000
      +++ /usr/bin/startkde    2015-01-31 17:49:18.938578280 +0000
      @@ -380,7 +380,7 @@
       # lock now and do the rest of the KDE startup underneath the locker.
       KSMSERVEROPTIONS=""
       test -n "$dl" && KSMSERVEROPTIONS=" --lockscreen"
      -kwrapper5 ksmserver $KDEWM $KSMSERVEROPTIONS
      +ksmserver $KDEWM $KSMSERVEROPTIONS
       if test $? -eq 255; then
         # Startup error
         echo 'startkde: Could not start ksmserver. Check your installation.'  1>&2
  • I can not find how to bring back the “Suspend” option for my laptop. Any help on this is more than welcome!
  • Please report any other issue you encounter and I will add it here if it is serious enough.

Have fun! Eric

48 Comments

  1. Ryan P.C. McQuen

    Quote:
    “`
    # slackpkg update
    # slackpkg install ktown_testing
    # slackpkg upgrade ktown_testing
    # removepkg sddm-theme-breeze
    “`

    Is it better to run `slackpkg install ktown_testing` before `slackpkg upgrade ktown_testing`?

    It seemed to me that `slackpkg upgrade ktown_testing` pulled in most of the KDE5 ‘deps/’ section, so it seems logical to perform that first.

    I don’t know for sure, I’d just like to know the ‘best practice’.

    Thanks Eric!

  2. Francois Lavoie

    I would like to install your plasma your latest kde 5 plasma testing installation over the KDE Development Platform: 4.12.3 or KDE 4.14.3 of porteus (slackware). Would there be some special instructions?
    Thus this is not:
    Slackware’s default KDE 4.10.5
    or
    ktown’ set of KDE 4.14.3

  3. alienbob

    Ryan, in case of a 3rd party repository it does not matter what order of execution you choose. THe “install” line will install any package in the repository that is not yet present on your computer, while the “upgrade” command will only upgrade those packages that are already installed on your computer and for which a different version exists in the repository.
    However when upgrading original Slackware packages, it is mandatory that the order of execution be “slackpkg install-new” followed by “slackpkg upgrade-all” to avoid the danger of breaking your system halfway during the upgrade when incompatible library upgrades are introduced.

    • Ryan P.C. McQuen

      Thank you Eric!

  4. alienbob

    Francois, why don’t you just install Slackware-current then.
    I do not support other distros with these packages.

  5. Michelino

    Thanks very very much (as usual)

    I want just point you out that yakuake (framework git version) works perfectly compiled against the new packages….and the same the “embedded” dolphin konsole (but I guess you already know it!).

    Michelino

  6. alienbob

    Hi Michelino, good to hear 🙂

  7. Ricardo J. Barberis

    Thank you Eric!

    I’ll have to setup -current in a VM or in my old laptop to start testing Plasma 5, wish days had more than 24 hours…

  8. lems

    Hi,

    translations are working now, mostly (tested dolphin and konsole as well as okular). Only sddm is still in english. Cool update, Eric. Thanks a lot!

    lems

  9. Willy

    Thaks, erick 🙂

  10. Owen Greaves

    Hey Eric,

    I did a clean install of -current without KDE, then installed your packages. I had the same issue on first run of KDE (startx) – the Desktop Effects are disabled – pressed ALT+SHIFT+F12 to turn them on and everything works fine. Is that a default setting?

    Secondly, I opened Calligra Author, closed it and go an error…is that possibly a KDE problem or a Calligra problem? the Error:

    Executable: calligraauthor PID: 1561 Signal: Segmentation fault (11)

    Just curious if you have come across this stuff.

    Thanks again for the packages.

  11. Skaendo

    Thanks for the update Eric!

    I’m still having the (somewhat) same issues,

    -sddm is still going into negative numbers when trying to shutdown or restart.

    -dark theme, K-menu color issue has been resolved, but is not changing the taskbar color now, and everything becomes invisible in the taskbar.

    I know these aren’t your issues Eric, but issues for the KDE devs, just thought I’d mention them to ya.

    Thanks again!

  12. alienbob

    Hi Skaendo

    I had looked at a possible update for sddm however there was none, so there was no updated package for sddm-qt5 in my release. I noticed you filed a bug on this issue: https://github.com/sddm/sddm/issues/355 so let’s see if they resolve that.

  13. alienbob

    Hi Owen

    The KWin window manager determines the computer’s graphical capabilities when the Desktop starts and apparently in your case it decides that Compositing should be disabled. I assume that if you enable compositing using Shift-Alt-F12, that KWin remembers your choice on subsequent logins?
    About Calligra, no idea. The segfault message is pretty non-descriptive.
    I looked at the bug database and it could have to do with https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=341639 for which a fix was added to calligra-2.8 in git three weeks ago in http://quickgit.kde.org/?p=calligra.git&a=commit&h=388219fca6990bb258ff9a5c3f2cf2b2cadb8cc4

  14. Robby

    Hi Eric

    Besides one or 2 kwin/plasma oops, I’m starting to like this KDE5. Still some issues with gwenview and other but on the whole, very nice.

    I have an issue compiling owncloud client now ( and maybe other kde4-dependent apps:

    Could NOT find Qt5Keychain (missing: QTKEYCHAIN_LIBRARY
    QTKEYCHAIN_INCLUDE_DIR)
    Call Stack (most recent call first):
    /usr/share/cmake-3.1/Modules/FindPackageHandleStandardArgs.cmake:374 (_FPHSA_FAILURE_MESSAGE)
    cmake/modules/FindQt5Keychain.cmake:30 (find_package_handle_standard_args)
    CMakeLists.txt:114 (find_package)

    Is this something that has been removed from KDE5 and not replaced, or am I missing a package or have an incorrect path?

  15. Michelino

    @Robby,
    if you don’t want to build against qtc/qt5keychain you have to use the
    “BUILD_WITH_QT4=ON” option in cmake
    Read in “mirall-1.7.1/doc/building.rst” for further information.
    Michelino

  16. Michelino

    “/qtc/qt5keychain”=”qt5/qt5keychain”
    Sorry for typo.

  17. Robby

    @Michelino thanks very much! Do you have any more info on what the issue is when compiling against qt5?

  18. fabio

    not only konsole in dolphin. yakuake master branch is working too. Thanks for the updates!

  19. Michelino

    @Robby,
    I’ve no problem compiling against qt5, the only package I need is qt5keychain, and it seems to be your problem.

    In order to have the qt5keychain package you can use the Eric’s qtkeychain slackbuild (with few changes, like PRGNAME variable) and it will automatically compile against qt5.

  20. Raveriux

    What do you think about the separate KDE Frameworks package? as its now needed for LxQt desktop.

  21. John Yost

    Eric in the alldeps.SlackBuild* you list a package directory as qjson. The directory is actually json-glib. Should the package be “json-glib” or is the directory incorrect?
    Thanks
    John

  22. alienbob

    Hi Raveriux

    There will not be a separate KDE Frameworks package. If LXQT uses the KDE Frameworks, that is nice. You can grab the required packages from my repository, but I will not duplicate the packages into a separate repository.
    I will hovever try to find out if I can create a sub-repository for the current/testing/*/kde/frameworks/ directory trees. My repository creation script allows for this, but I need to check if that affects the main repository.

  23. alienbob

    John, the alldeps.SlackBuild is not used by me, I use the updates.SlackBuild . The alldeps is more like a piece of info for Slackware once a new KDE release gets added to slackware-current – meant to check all these packages before attempting a compilation.
    You’ll notice that json-glib is also mentioned in alldeps.SlackBuild

  24. manciuleas

    Hi,

    First, a big thank you to alienbob for his work on the KDE5 packages.

    I have noticed that when logged in as root the Reboot, Shutdown. Suspend, Hibernate options are all present and functional in the Leave menu . So the fact that they’re missing for a normal user looks like a permission / configuration issue. Haven’t had time to dig further but I though that this observation might be a start to solve the problem.

  25. John Yost

    Thanks Eric
    Everything builds fine now that I am using the correct slackbuild.
    John

  26. alienbob

    Hi manciuleas – that is relevant info. I had actually not tried starting KDE as root, but I had my suspicions about user policies and your observation adds proof to that.
    Have to try this at home, tonight.

  27. manciuleas

    Hi alienbob,

    In found this: https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=125012 The guy wants the opposite of what we want. I couldn’t find the polkit file(s) (/etc/polkit-defaults-privs.local) mentioned in the OpenSUSE thread, though.

  28. alienbob

    I opened a KDE bug for my suspend issue: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=344456
    So far, little movement there, but I added a lot of detail to the ticket.

  29. Augusto

    Hi Alien;

    I found a bug in system settings: when i try to change the timezone logged as a common user, it is requested to authenticate as root, when I do so, the error occurred..

    I think it’s due a polkit or kauth problem in systemsettings5.

  30. alienbob

    Hi Augusto

    Yes I know, I have that bug too. But after the error, my changes are still applied.

    There is at least one other error (apart from Suspend/Hibernate missing) that is probably polkit related. If you try to change anything in the SDDM systemsettings, the the window freezes as if it is waiting for a polkit window that will never appear.

    If you find a fix, let me know and I will implement it.

  31. manciuleas

    Hi alienbob,

    Maybe you could add in your bug report that everything works for ‘root’.

  32. manciuleas

    Hi alienbob,

    I noticed that with KDE5 installed there are packages which seem to duplicate functionality:
    from KDE4 / Slackware 14.1 (current)
    polkit-kde-agent-1-9d74ae3_20120104git-x86_64-1
    polkit-kde-kcmodules-1-001bdf7_20120111git-x86_64-1
    from KDE5:
    polkit-kde-framework-5.2.0-x86_64-1alien
    polkit-kde-kcmodules-framework-c2e67c6_20150121git-x86_64-1alien
    Is that the intended setup?

    Regards

  33. alienbob

    manciuleas – yes I still need to find out what’s needed because we have both KDE 4 and Frameworks 5 based applications. The polkit-kde-agent-1 and polkit-kde-kcmodules-1 packages are from KDE 4 while polkit-kde-framework and for polkit-kde-kcmodules-framework (built from the most recent sources) I hoped they would pick up Plasma 5 functionality.
    It looks like they are basically the same thing, and not at all different. Suggestions are welcome.

  34. manciuleas

    Hi alienbob,
    I have removed the polkit-kde-* packages from KDE4 and I haven’t noticed any downside.
    Regarding the suspend/hibernate issue I have checked your bug report and Lukas asked if polkit-kde-authentication-agent-1 is running. It is running indeed but according to my .xsession-errors powerdevil is started *before* polkit-kde-authentication-agent-1. Can the start-up order of different KDE components be configured? Once the session is up the system can be suspended/hibernated using qdbusviewer-qt5 from /org/freedesktop/UPower org.freedesktop.UPower Method::Suspend / Method::Hibernate.
    * Excerpt from .xsession-errors (user):
    powerdevil: Loading UPower backend…
    powerdevil: Success!
    powerdevil: Backend loaded, loading core
    powerdevil: Core loaded, initializing backend
    powerdevil: Using XRandR
    powerdevil: Screen brightness value: 3
    powerdevil: current screen brightness value: 3
    powerdevil: Backend is ready, KDE Power Management system initialized
    powerdevil: A new battery was detected
    * Excerpt from .xsession-errors (root):
    powerdevil: Loading UPower backend…
    powerdevil: Success!
    powerdevil: Backend loaded, loading core
    powerdevil: Core loaded, initializing backend
    powerdevil: Using XRandR
    powerdevil: Screen brightness value: 3
    powerdevil: current screen brightness value: 3
    powerdevil: Can suspend
    powerdevil: Can hibernate
    powerdevil: Backend is ready, KDE Power Management system initialized
    powerdevil: A new battery was detected

    The difference is that for root powerdevil prints out “Can suspend” and “Can hibernate”

  35. alienbob

    Hi manciuleas,

    I am able to suspend the system manually using qtdbus invoking a methiod similar to yours. I wrote that in one of the comments in the bug report. The fact that I can do that means that Polkit allows me to do this. PowerDevil somehow interprets the data wrongly, is my impression.

  36. manciuleas

    Hi alienbob,

    As I said in my previous comment IMO powerdevil is started before polkit-kde-authentication-agent-1 and at that point it does not have the permission to suspend/hibernate even though it works later by invoking directly dbus methods.

  37. Willy Arana

    on mine .xsession-error look like kde is finding systemd
    ” powerdevil: Can’t contact systemd
    powerdevil: Can’t contact ck “

  38. manciuleas

    @Willy

    No. If you look closely it can’t contact either systemd or ck.

  39. alienbob

    Willy, if you are getting that error then at least you have systemd or systemd-shim or logind or any of the alternatives installed. Powerdevil checks if it finds Logind listening on the DBus and if so, will try to arrange things through Logind instead of UPower.

  40. Willy Arana

    @erick , @manciuleas you all right , i use kde like root and suspend works, maybe we a group permission or something?

  41. luis

    Hi Bob.

    For suspend/hibernate buttons, I make a file “30-org.freedesktop.upower.pkla” in “/etc/polkit-1/localauthority/50-local.d/” with:

    [upower]
    Identity=unix-group:users
    Action=org.freedesktop.upower.suspend;org.freedesktop.upower.hibernate
    ResultAny=yes
    ResultInactive=yes
    ResultActive=yes

    Rebooting and appears the suspend/hibernate buttons.

    Bye.

  42. luis

    Hi.
    For reboot/shutdown buttons. Reinstall consolekit and edit “org.freedesktop.consolekit.policy” in “/usr/share/polkit-1/actions/” , adding “yes” :

    Stop the system
    System policy prevents stopping the system

    yes
    no
    yes

    Restart the system
    System policy prevents restarting the system

    yes
    no
    yes

    Rebooting and appears the reboot/shutdown buttons.

  43. luis

    The last message is wrong.
    The complete message in http://justpaste.it/l154

    bye

  44. manciuleas

    @luis

    Thanks Luis! You made my day.
    Regarding the restart/shutdown solution it’s not recommended to change the
    files under /usr/share/….
    After some searching and experimentation I’ve added two more files in
    /etc/polkit-1/localauthority/50-local.d/:
    40-org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.stop-multiple-users.pkla with the following content:

    [Allow all users to shutdown]
    Identity=unix-group:users
    Action=org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.stop-multiple-users;org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.stop
    ResultAny=yes
    ResultInactive=no
    ResultActive=yes

    and

    50-org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.restart-multiple-users.pkla

    [Allow all users to restart]
    Identity=unix-group:users
    Action=org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.restart-multiple-users;org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.restart
    ResultAny=yes
    ResultInactive=no
    ResultActive=yes

    Note that the Action options must be on the same line.
    Now I have all four missing menu options, and functional too.
    Thanks again!

  45. manciuleas

    @alienbob

    Give the new info I think that you can close https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=344456, provided that the solutions work for everybody.

  46. alienbob

    Hi manciuleas, luis,

    I have implemented luis’ suggestion for suspend/hibernate buttons and manciuleas’s idea for restart/shutdown on my laptop.
    I could also undo my edit to “/usr/bin/startkde” where previously I had to remove the call to “kwrapper5” in order to get shutdown/reboot options available in the menu.
    All of it works properly now, I have suspend, hibernate, shutdown and reboot options in my menu. The laptop suspends successfully.

    The only modification to your proposal is that I used the Unix group “power” instead of “users”. In a multi-user system you want to be careful who you allow to shutdown your computer.

    I will add these polkit files to the next update of my ktown packages. I am still undecided whether I should add them to the powerdevil package, or to plasma-desktop.

    Since they are not needed in Slackware itself, with its KDE 4, I will not propose to Pat to get these files included into the core. When Slackware adopts Plasma 5, that will be early enough.

    Again thanks to the both of you! This has been bugging me for a long time. I will update that KDE bug report so that it can be closed.

  47. luis

    Hi Manculeas, Bob.

    Thanks for all the suggestions.

    bye.

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