Hi, haven't used KDE 4 since the early broken 4.0 release. Things are very different and on the whole much better!

I have a few questions about the process to optimize my desktop UI:

1. Is there a way to remove Dolphin completely? Even with Konqueror set as the default, some apps still use Dolphin, like for example Krunner.

2. How to minimize all the ugly chrome-tinted blank space on the drop down menus and menu bars? There seems to be so much wasted space in this faux-chrome look and it feels like a celebration of the 1950s or something. Also, what is a good theme that doesn't look like Windows Vista?

3. Is there a way to customize left, middle, and right mouse click buttons for the desktop? In this case I would like the right click to open up bookmarks.

cheers,

kilolima

So does Konqueror actually, it uses Dolphin for file browsing. It would therefore be quite counterproductive to remove Dolphin

To modify all these settings, please go to the systemsettings and check in File Associations to move Konqueror on top or remove Dolphin as the default application,.

To modify the mouse keys, it is also in systemsettings -> Input Devices.

I suggest you make yourself familiar with the systemsettings for all the other configuration questions you have

on 2 - menu bars can generally be hidden using ctrl+m (most apps use this some don't). You can also use the plasma menu widget which you can put in a panel which will then pull the menus out of the applications (for any native gtk or qt apps) and present them in the panel instead.
For an alternative theme "that doesn't look like Windows Vista" (I'd like to know what distro+theme that you are using which does look like vista - Mepis, perhaps?), there are three components: the desktop theme which affects the look-and-feel of the desktop itself, the panel(s) and any widgets on the desktop and panels; the application theme which affects open applications; and the window decorations which affects the title-bar and borders of open windows.
For the desktop themes, you can change the theme in system settings -> Workspace Appearance -> Desktop Theme. There you can select one of the installed themes or download new themes directly from kde-look.org using the Get New Themes button.
For the application themes, you can change the theme in system settings -> Application Appearance -> Style. There are a few available themes, including Oxygen (default with a few available configuration options), QtCurve (may need to install using your distro's package manager - highly configurable down to minute details, most application styles available on kde-look.org are QtCurve-based), and Bespin (may need to install using your distro's package manager, or directly from svn from http://cloudcity.sourceforge.net/, is also highly configurable with more of a Mac OSX look-and-feel)
For the window decorations, you can change the theme in system settings -> Workspace Appearance -> Window Decorations. Usually you should pick the window decoration theme which matches your application theme for the most integrated look, or you can pick one of the other themes (some of which, like dekorator, are theme engines that you can download new styles for from kde-look.org).

on 3 - you can customize the desktop mouse click actions by right-clicking on the desktop -> desktop settings -> Mouse Actions.