Preamble:
This has been a persistent problem for me, so much so, that I actually moved to cinnamon for a while but that is frying my T61 when I watch veetle (up to 90 degrees Centigrade!).

Problem:
I got rid of all my config files (~/.kde*) and started anew. As soon as I dragged the main taskbar to the left hand side of the monitor, this happens to the systray:

Standard behaviour was that the wider the taskbar the more columns of icons the systray displayed. Now it stays just the one column, drops off the screen and obscures anything below it.

I've tried deleting it and starting again with a new one but no joy.

Any takers? Are there more config files I can play around with?

Many thanks in advance!

no idea but it works properly for me

Is there any more useful input I can give to get this sorted?

This renders KDE basically unusable...

something to try (a possible uglyi'sh workaround):
- remove the system tray from the panel
- adjust the panel length so it does not extend to the bottom
- in the space now available below the panel add a system tray widget (unfortunately it won't fully butt up against the side like the panel)

I'm guessing since you removed ~./kde4 all users will have the issue but I'd test a new user anyhow, I'd also post on the Arch forum to see if it's Arch specific

Would it be more appropriate in the Plasma forum?

No idea if graphics related but what gpu and which drivers?

Looked in bko and didn't see anything, night want to add one.

could it be you have an invalid geometry for the panel in your plasma-desktop-appletsrc ? search for "plugin=panel" and the line "geometry=", geometry is in pixels and I have no idea how to interpret it

In terms of system tray icons, does closing any application help alleviate this?

@ google

It says geometry=10187,-1086,181,1080
I have changed the numbers around a bit but it didn't seem to have any effect - I haven't logged out and back in again, mind.

@ bcooksley

I've tried closing every single application and the restarted them, no joy. There must be some other file outside of ~ which causes this. Is that at least possible?

Could you try adjusting the height (width) of the panel once you have moved it to the side of the screen?
It seems like this could be a bug in the system tray.

Tried that and no joy. Found out something else though which might make this whole exercise useless.

I'm running LMDE and in their update pack 7 they bunched a number of 4.8 packages together with 4.10 packages. Could that be the reason for the weird behaviour?

KDE 4.8 and KDE 4.10 packages would definitely be incompatible I suspect - especially if Plasma packages were intermixed. Can you determine which parts come from 4.8 and which from 4.10?

Yep...

Code: Select all

toad ~ $ dpkg -l|grep kde
ii  kde-baseapps                                  4:4.8.4-2                         all          base applications from the official KDE release (meta-package)
ii  kde-baseapps-bin                              4:4.8.4-2                         amd64        core binaries for the KDE base applications
ii  kde-baseapps-data                             4:4.8.4-2                         all          shared data files for the KDE base applications
ii  kde-config-cddb                               4:4.8.4-2                         amd64        CDDB retrieval configuration
ii  kde-config-cron                               4:4.8.4-3                         amd64        program scheduler frontend
ii  kde-full                                      5:77+deb7u1                       all          complete KDE Software Compilation for end users
ii  kde-plasma-desktop                            5:77+deb7u1                       amd64        KDE Plasma Desktop and minimal set of applications
ii  kde-plasma-netbook                            5:77+deb7u1                       amd64        KDE Plasma Netbook and minimal set of applications
ii  kde-runtime                                   4:4.8.4-2+b1                      amd64        runtime components from the official KDE release
ii  kde-runtime-data                              4:4.8.4-2                         all          shared data files for the KDE base runtime module
ii  kde-style-oxygen                              4:4.8.4-6                         amd64        Oxygen widget style
ii  kde-wallpapers                                4:4.10.5-1                        all          set of wallpapers for the KDE Plasma Workspaces
ii  kde-wallpapers-default                        4:4.10.5-1                        all          default wallpaper for the Plasma workspace
ii  kde-window-manager                            4:4.8.4-6                         amd64        K window manager (KWin)
ii  kde-workspace                                 4:4.8.4-6                         all          KDE Plasma Workspace components
ii  kde-workspace-bin                             4:4.8.4-6                         amd64        core binaries for the KDE Plasma Workspace
ii  kde-workspace-data                            4:4.8.4-6                         all          shared data files for the KDE Plasma Workspace
ii  kde-workspace-kgreet-plugins                  4:4.8.4-6                         amd64        KDE greet libraries for authentication
ii  kdeadmin                                      4:4.8.4-3                         all          system administration tools from the official KDE release
ii  kdeartwork                                    4:4.8.4-5                         all          themes, styles and other artwork from the official KDE release
ii  kdeartwork-emoticons                          4:4.8.4-5                         all          emoticon collections for chat clients
ii  kdeartwork-style                              4:4.8.4-5                         amd64        widget styles for applications using Qt or KDE Development Platform
ii  kdeartwork-theme-window                       4:4.8.4-5                         amd64        window decoration for the K Window manager (KWin)
ii  kdebase-runtime                               4:4.8.4-2                         all          Transitional package for the KDE runtime components
ii  kdeedu                                        4:4.8.4+5.77+deb7u1               all          educational applications from the official KDE release
ii  kdeedu-kvtml-data                             4:4.10.5-1                        all          KVTML files for KDE-Edu programs
ii  kdegames                                      4:4.8.4-3                         all          games from the official KDE release
ii  kdegames-card-data                            4:4.10.5-1                        all          card decks for KDE games
ii  kdegames-mahjongg-data                        4:4.10.5-1                        all          tilesets and backgrounds for Mahjongg games
ii  kdegraphics                                   4:4.8.4+5.77+deb7u1               all          graphics applications from the official KDE release
ii  kdegraphics-mobipocket                        4:4.8.4-1                         amd64        mobipocket plugins for Strigi indexing, Okular and thumbnails
ii  kdegraphics-strigi-analyzer                   4:4.10.5-1                        amd64        graphics file format plugins for Strigi Desktop Search
ii  kdegraphics-thumbnailers                      4:4.10.5-1                        amd64        graphics file format thumbnailers for KDE SC
ii  kdelibs-bin                                   4:4.10.5-1                        amd64        core executables for KDE Applications
ii  kdelibs5-data                                 4:4.10.5-1                        all          core shared data for all KDE Applications
ii  kdelibs5-plugins                              4:4.10.5-1                        amd64        core plugins for KDE Applications
ii  kdemultimedia                                 4:4.8.4-2                         all          multimedia applications from the official KDE release
ii  kdemultimedia-kio-plugins                     4:4.8.4-2                         amd64        transparent audio CD access for applications using the KDE Platform
ii  kdenetwork                                    4:4.8.4-3                         all          networking applications from the official KDE 4 release
ii  kdenetwork-filesharing                        4:4.8.4-3                         amd64        network filesharing configuration module
ii  kdepasswd                                     4:4.8.4-2                         amd64        graphical password changing utility
ii  kdepim                                        4:4.4.11.1+l10n-3                 all          Personal Information Management apps from the official KDE release
ii  kdepim-groupware                              4:4.4.11.1+l10n-3+b1              amd64        KDE PIM Groupware plugins
ii  kdepim-kresources                             4:4.4.11.1+l10n-3+b1              amd64        KDE PIM resource plugins
ii  kdepim-runtime                                4:4.4.11.1-6                      amd64        runtime components for Akonadi KDE
ii  kdepim-strigi-plugins                         4:4.4.11.1+l10n-3+b1              amd64        PIM file format plugins for Strigi Desktop Search
ii  kdepim-wizards                                4:4.4.11.1+l10n-3+b1              amd64        KDE server configuration wizards
ii  kdepimlibs-kio-plugins                        4:4.8.4-2                         amd64        kio slaves used by KDE PIM applications
ii  kdeplasma-addons                              4:4.8.4-1                         all          addons for Plasma
ii  kdeutils                                      4:4.8.4+5.77+deb7u1               all          general-purpose utilities from the official KDE release
ii  kdewallpapers                                 4:4.8.4-5                         all          extra KDE artwork wallpapers for the KDE Plasma Workspaces
ii  libakonadi-kde4                               4:4.8.4-2                         amd64        library for using the Akonadi PIM data server
ii  libkde3support4                               4:4.10.5-1                        amd64        KDE 3 Support Library for the KDE 4 Platform
ii  libkdeclarative5                              4:4.10.5-1                        amd64        declarative library for plasma
ii  libkdecorations4                              4:4.8.4-6                         amd64        library used by decorations for the KDE window manager
ii  libkdecore5                                   4:4.10.5-1                        amd64        KDE Platform Core Library
ii  libkdeedu-data                                4:4.10.5-1                        all          data files for libkdeedu
ii  libkdegames5a                                 4:4.8.4-3                         amd64        shared library for KDE games
ii  libkdepim4                                    4:4.4.11.1+l10n-3+b1              amd64        KDE PIM library
ii  libkdesu5                                     4:4.10.5-1                        amd64        Console-mode Authentication Library for the KDE Platform
ii  libkdeui5                                     4:4.10.5-1                        amd64        KDE Platform User Interface Library
ii  libkdewebkit5                                 4:4.10.5-1                        amd64        KDE WebKit Library
ii  libkworkspace4abi1                            4:4.8.4-6                         amd64        library for the kdebase workspace
ii  oxygencursors                                 0.0.2012-06-kde4.8-2.1            all          Oxygen mouse cursor theme

Well they seem to be binary compatible at least
Still, I'd also try upgrading to 4.10 completely and see if that helps.

Greetings!

I enabled Debian testing and am upgrading to 4.11.

Fingers crossed...

EDIT:

Ta ta!

All is well. Sorry about the layer 8 problem but it never occurred to me that LMDE would ship a broken KDE...

Please report the issue concerning the broken packages to LMDE - they need to fix this to ensure a better experience for KDE users.

Unfortunately this appears to be a well documented issue in LMDE, I just never bothered looking into any of it 'cos it has been such an easy distro to work with.

But they don't give two hoots about KDE. In fact, the main dev has started his own http://solydxk.com/homeedition/solydk/