Honestly, I have been quite excited about kde4's development. It's aboslutly fantastic. It's just what we needed. After years of compiz madness we finally get something to get excited about that isn't JUST eye-candy (though there is PLENTY of that too). I would list everything but there is just too much, so here are just a few things that come to mind.

Fonts- I don't know why, maybe it's just me but it seems that kde4 has the best font rendering of anything I've seen thus far.
Kalzium- GREAT improvments there.
Dolphin- probably the best file-manager out there
Step- lots of fun (will this be in 4.2 as well)
Kollision- best "non-video" game ever
but most of all there is just this feeling of polish and everything feels much more integrated. The things I listed above were really superficial ofcourse I don't have time to go into detail, but I really do think the developers should know just how great their work is. I am not sure of the proper channles to convey this though.

This comes from someone who has been using GNOME for years (btw they finally got the message and gnome3.0 is comming after all). I never really liked KDE3 I thought it was too cartoonish and not very professional looking, kde4 is a vast improvement. When I first saw 4.0 I was intregued by some of what I saw, it was a bit cludgy but I saw potential. Especially when I read about a lot of the backend work. It's really where all the excitement is. I don't think people will realize the fully potential of what was done in 4.0 until around kde 4.3 or 4.4. Once developers realize the full potential of these backends (soild etc.). This is what really got me excited about kde4. When kde 4.1 was released I felt my excitement was truly vindicated as it was a fantastic realease. Now I am testing 4.2svn and there are some really exciting features comming down the pipe.

Anyways I just thought it would be great for us to all list some of our favoire features that are comming in 4.2, maybe 4.1. Perhaps we can even have someone link this to a developers messaging list. Programming is much more fun when people appreciate your work (trust me on that).

Here is one thing I'm real excited about, better integration for archives in dolphin, you can now compress, uncompress archives using the actions menu in dolphin. It sounds simple but it comes in really handy if you find yourself dealing with archives a lot.

What are some of yours?


p.s. as a side note, has anyone been able to successfully use kdevelop4 in ArchLinux?

zrchrn wrote:Fonts- I don't know why, maybe it's just me but it seems that kde4 has the best font rendering of anything I've seen thus far.

Actually, I don't really like the fonts in Qt4 applications, because of a bug which forces all hinted (sub-pixel rendered) fonts to be set to full hinting. If you set them to hintslight or hintmedium, they will still be forced to hintfull. Currently I am using hintnone, because hintfull "chews" the fonts too much for my taste.

zrchrn wrote:Dolphin- probably the best file-manager out there

Nah, MC still is the best.
Although, if you are talking about KDE file managers, I would have to say that Krusader takes the cake.

zrchrn wrote:Step- lots of fun (will this be in 4.2 as well)

Yes, I think that my school may switch from Interactive Physics to Step in the near future, as they are looking into upgrading/replacing their PPC Macs, and won't be able to run it in Classic anymore.

zrchrn wrote:Anyways I just thought it would be great for us to all list some of our favoire features that are comming in 4.2, maybe 4.1. Perhaps we can even have someone link this to a developers messaging list. Programming is much more fun when people appreciate your work (trust me on that).

[...]

What are some of yours?

I'm probably most excited about the new KMail. Some awesome stuff going on in there. And it will only keep getting better, especially when it finally switches over to Akonadi and Nepomuk.

I appreciate the effort that is being put into KDE4; it's not yet got all the features I need to make it my permanent desktop but I look forward to when it has.

Yeah, KDE 4 now really rocks. Trunk is not all that stable, but it is truly amazing what huge improvements have been made - KDE 4.2 will probably make me finally switch from KDE 3.

Alone the excellent color scheming in Oxygen... wonderful, or the desktop effects or krunner... there are so much things that are really cool in KDE 4 now, the only thing it lacks currently is stability, but I think 2 months of bugfixing till the release of 4.2 will do it.

blueget wrote:Yeah, KDE 4 now really rocks. Trunk is not all that stable, but it is truly amazing what huge improvements have been made - KDE 4.2 will probably make me finally switch from KDE 3.

Alone the excellent color scheming in Oxygen... wonderful, or the desktop effects or krunner... there are so much things that are really cool in KDE 4 now, the only thing it lacks currently is stability, but I think 2 months of bugfixing till the release of 4.2 will do it.

yeah they need to take some time to stabilize everything.

blueget wrote:Yeah, KDE 4 now really rocks. Trunk is not all that stable, but it is truly amazing what huge improvements have been made - KDE 4.2 will probably make me finally switch from KDE 3.

KDE 4.2 is great. It makes me definitely switch from KDE 3.5. I am really looking forward. There are still some small bugs but it is very good usable and nice

It would be great to have usable K3b in the time when KDE 4.2 is out but for me this will be probably the only missing thing on great KDE 4.2.

I agree, K3B is currently one of the most-missing apps in KDE 4. What's also bugging me is the current state of Amarok 2, which really needs an interface overhaul (as planned after 2.0).

blueget wrote:I agree, K3B is currently one of the most-missing apps in KDE 4. What's also bugging me is the current state of Amarok 2, which really needs an interface overhaul (as planned after 2.0).

I am happy that current amarok can play music without crashes and this is everything I need to start using it
I cannot say this about k3b...