Kubuntu-kde4 application integration

Bug #197404 reported by Ryan Lester
8
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
kubuntu-kde4-meta (Ubuntu)
Won't Fix
Wishlist
Unassigned

Bug Description

Binary package hint: kubuntu-kde4-desktop

I've noticed that in the Kubuntu-kde4 alpha (which I'm using), there are several KDE3 applications preinstalled to take the place of KDE4 applications that don't yet exist or aren't yet stable. Examples: koffice, adept, jockey-kde (the new name for the Restricted Drivers Manager), network-manager-kde, etc.

The problem with this is that, not only are the additionally KDE3 libraries loaded, but there is no visual integration whatsoever. What I suggest is to instead use GTK applications (or unstable KDE4 applications). (Examples to replace the previous ones: koffice-kde4, synaptic, jockey-gtk, network-manager-gnome, etc.) This may sound counter-intuitive, but just hear me out.

First, there is no doubt that there is no visual integration with KDE4 and KDE3 applications. Second, the KDE3/QT3 libraries will still be loaded in addition to the normal KDE4/QT4 libraries. Third, if you are going to load additional libraries, why not load GTK ones (they are more lightweight than the KDE3 ones if I'm not mistaken)? Fourth, there are far more GTK applications out there than KDE3 ones that complement the existing KDE4 ones (Gimp, Firefox, OpenOffice, VLC, etc.).

Finally, my main point: near-perfect visual integration with GTK applications is not only possible, but is being achieved by me and many others right now (look at the attached screenshot). I have Firefox 3 (though I did go into /usr/lib/firefox-3.0b3 and change all the Firefox icons to Konqueror ones), xfce4-terminal (Konsole crashes dbus for some reason (I'm on amd64)), Synaptic, file-roller (Ark doesn't detect the contents of subfolders for some reason), jockey-gtk, PCManFM (for some reason Dolphin and most other KDE4 apps can't be run as root), and Gimp (Krita is nice, but I learned on Gimp and I'm used to it's UI (yes, I know that's very unusual)) running alongside my KDE4 apps perfectly with near-perfect integration. The only problem is that I couldn't find a working GTK icon theme that replicated the Oxygen icons, so I settled for the Mac4Lin icon theme, which is still very nice and still goes well with KDE4. I know it could be better, but the GTK theme I used (called 'qt4') can be found here: http://www.kde-look.org/content/show.php/gtk-kde4?content=74689 (I never got the 'gtk-kde4' app working, but the GTK theme is excellent).

Anyways, I hope you consider my idea, because it really is the only logical choice when you really think about it (unless I'm missing something..). Oh, and by the way, the fonts should by antialiased by default, because non-antialiased fonts really do look awful.

Revision history for this message
Ryan Lester (buu700) wrote :
Revision history for this message
Ryan Lester (buu700) wrote :

Typo, should be: 'not only are the additional KDE3 libraries loaded'

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Rich Johnson (nixternal) wrote :

We aren't finished fixing up the CD images yet for one thing. Otherwise we all just said on IRC you have some good ideas.

My one question is this, did you get the qt4 theme working with Gimp? I couldn't for the life of me, but it worked fine with Firefox 3b3

Changed in kubuntu-kde4-meta:
importance: Undecided → Wishlist
status: New → Triaged
Revision history for this message
Ryan Lester (buu700) wrote :

Cool, I'm glad you guys agree with me. Yeah, Gimp is working fine (it's just like any other GTK app, so I'm not sure why it wouldn't work for you). I attached a screenshot of me with an image open in Gimp for you to see (just so you know, the scrollbars and generic backgrounds for things like the Firefox Google search bar and file managers are a little messed up right now (the scrollbars look different and the backgrounds are grey instead of white) (probably because of something I did), but it's not a problem with Gimp, it's in all my GTK apps (under normal conditions Gimp looks normal)).

As a side note, I figured out a fix to my problem of not being able to run any KDE4 apps as root: 'sudo ln -s /usr/lib/kde4/bin/* /usr/bin/', but then I guess you'd have to do that every time you install a KDE4 app you plan on running as root.
I guess /usr/lib/kde4/bin/ isn't in $PATH for root or something like that. Anyways, I'll post a bug report of this if it hasn't already been reported to bring more attention to the problem (maybe either everything could be placed in /usr/bin and then that folder could be linked to /usr/lib/kde4/bin/ if necessary, the packages themselves could link from /usr/lib/kde4/bin/ to /usr/bin as part of the install script, or /usr/lib/kde4/bin/ could be added to root's $PATH (if that's even the problem)).

Revision history for this message
Ryan Lester (buu700) wrote :

By the way, I fixed that problem with the Firefox icon on the plasma panel looking awful (you can see it in the screenshots) by changing /usr/lib/firefox-3.0b3/chrome/icons/default/default16.png to a 128x128 Konqueror icon. It wasn't necessary, but I also replaced /usr/lib/firefox-3.0b3/chrome/icons/default/default32.png and /usr/lib/firefox-3.0b3/chrome/icons/default/default48.png with the bigger icon.

Revision history for this message
Ryan Lester (buu700) wrote :

I notice this still hasn't been assigned to anyone yet. With gtk-qt-engines-kde4 now available, this becomes a much simpler task: just edit the package source to remove any dependencies that will result in Qt3 being installed, put in gtk-qt-engines-kde4, and fill any voids left by the removal of Qt3-dependent dependencies with KDE4 and/or GTK applications (and of course change the default settings to use gtk-qt-engines-kde4)

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Harald Sitter (apachelogger) wrote :

That sounds like you want to do it. Just go ahead and provide the appropriate diffs, we'll be very glad to upload if it works properly.

Revision history for this message
Ryan Lester (buu700) wrote :

Yeah, sure. I'd be glad to send you guys an altered dependency list (after testing it myself first of course). I'll get back to you as soon as possible.

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Ryan Lester (buu700) wrote :

Hi. Here's the files you asked for (I only edited the i386 dependencies from the source package, as I figured that should suffice). I actually wasn't able to test this, unfortunately, but I didn't do anything major. Just used a small BASH script I wrote to grab all the dependencies of the dependencies and made the appropriate changes.

Revision history for this message
Ryan Lester (buu700) wrote :

Actually, sorry, I missed one thing in that last altered list. My script didn't check dependencies of dependencies of dependencies, so I missed that language-selector-qt depends on Adept. This version just has that changed to language-selector and synaptic added in.

Revision history for this message
Ryan Lester (buu700) wrote :

Oh and here's that script I wrote if anyone wants it.

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Jonathan Thomas (echidnaman) wrote :

Oops, wrong bug.

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Jonathan Thomas (echidnaman) wrote :

All of KDE 3 will be gone in Jaunty so this probably isn't needed anymore.

Changed in kubuntu-kde4-meta:
status: Triaged → Won't Fix
Revision history for this message
JW (arch0njw) wrote :

There still appear to be some issues that didn't magically go away in Jaunty for Kubuntu.

1. OpenOffice still does not theme nicely. There is another bug (https://bugs.launchpad.net/openoffice/+bug/271086) on this issue that was tracking this issue, but then referenced this bug. I have a dark (ish) theme going on, and the crystal theme in OO.org is practically garish in comparison.

2. Some apps (e.g., KMyMoney) are not ported yet. Having inheritance of color schemes into KDE3 apps would be very nice... actually, more than very nice. In the least, some way to control the colors (maybe even icons) of the KDE3 apps until they are ported would provide nice backwards compatibility.

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