I have a single panel vertically aligned on my widescreen monitor, as it is a much better use of space than horizontal. The 'problem' is that the application buttons on the taskbar still run horizontally, meaning they are squeezed to a more-or-less square shape, and the writing on them describing the application they represent is unreadable.

When using KDE3.5 I have this problem as well, but I get around it by having a kasbar on the opposite side of the screen, which acts as taskbar, with clearly visible icons and descriptions showing open applications to switch between.

As kasbar appears to be AWOL in KDE4, is there any way I can make the standard taskbar useable while aligned vertically? If I could align the button text vertically that might work, as reading side-on is better than not being able to read them at all.

Alternatively if I could replace the writing on the buttons with the application icons, represented at a decent size. At the moment they are so small I can't make out the difference without squinting at the screen.

I am running sidux btw.

Cheers

spoov

spoovy wrote:If I could align the button text vertically that might work, as reading side-on is better than not being able to read them at all.

You might want to try Smooth Tasks.

Alternatively if I could replace the writing on the buttons with the application icons, represented at a decent size. At the moment they are so small I can't make out the difference without squinting at the screen.

Smooth Tasks has an option to hide the text, but I can get the same effect with the standard task manager (4.4) by decreasing the width of the panel - when there's no space for any text, it'll only show icons.

You could also increase the width to show more text. (See this HowTo if you don't know how to change the height/width of a horizontal/vertical panel).

Cheers, I might give that smooth tasks a go, though it isn't in my repos.

Your other suggestion doesn't work for me though - it doesn't matter how small I make the panel, the writing and icons just get relatively smaller as well, until the icons are literally just a couple of pixels wide.

I have used fedora before and I'm sure this wasn't the case there - I had icons taking up the whole of the button space there. Curious...


EDIT - not so curious. I just installed smooth-tasks. This is what I had seen in Fedora before. Works a treat.

Cheers Hans! (and dude who made smooth tasks)

It probably depends on the KDE Plasma Desktop version, maybe the feature was introduced in 4.4 while you're running 4.3.x.

Glad that you liked Smooth Tasks - it's rocking in my panel as well . Since it sounds like you're satisfied, could you please mark the topic as solved (by clicking on under the post with the solution)?