MEPIS Community Forum

When I first started using Linux back in 2004, KDE on Mandrake was my first introduction to a Linux desktop. I liked it so much that I never would consider any distro that came with a desktop other than KDE. But that all changed when KDE 4 came out. I tried it once and vowed that I would NEVER use KDE again and switched to GNOME and later Xfce.

Well, now the tables have been turned. I currently have Xubuntu installed on my computer, but I've been noticing some GTK3 programs in there. Such apps stick out like a sore thumb because they don't follow my theme settings and instead look butt ugly, looking like Windows 9x programs due to the lack of GTK3-specific instructions in my selected GTK theme. The other day, I tried some GTK3 themes, but in the panel, they all resulted in white text on a light gray background, making it unreadable.

Since the transition between GTK2 and GTK3 is only gonna get more visually annoying over the next few years plus since I've been hearing a lot of good things about KDE4 over the last year or two, I decided the other day to download the latest Mepis and check out the latest incarnation of KDE for myself (well, the latest one that's in Debian's stable repos, anyway), and I must say that KDE4 has come a LONG way from when it was first introduced back in January of 2008 -- it's actually usable and stable! I played around with the live DVD late last night after getting home from work and I'm very impressed.

However, I have a few questions about KDE:

1) Are the included titlebar styles native KDE4 decorations, deKorator decorations,...?

2) How do I switch between the two and any others? Is this handled by fusion-icon, once I install everything Compiz-related, or how does one do that?

3) On the digital clock in the panel, I prefer NOT to have the leading zeroes in the hours plus I prefer my AM/PM to be uppercase, but I couldn't find a way to change that. Xfce allowed me to display that as I wished, although of course, if what you want isn't among the preset choices, one has to know the codes to generate that (in my case, %l:%M %p, which results in, for example, "3:16 PM", but KDE only allows it to be displayed as "03:16 pm" -- yes, I'm picky. LOL).

Mind you, the clock issue isn't a deal-breaker, although I'll miss that flexibility if it's not possible to change that (or, of course, someone could take the code to that and add that flexibility).

If anyone could answer these questions, I'd really appreciate it.

Thanx in advance,
Fred in St. Louis

1. The included decorations are native KDE--the default is Crystal, which is not stock with KDE 4, but from the Debian repo. Any of those other windecs including dekorator and aroura can be used.

Switching between them is handled in systemsettings: workspace appearance. I have never been able to get Compiz working correctly with KDE 4, but the built-in effects supply some eye-candy (not as much as Compiz)

Hmmm--the clock on my taskbar is as you want it : 8:52 AM. I think you have to adjust the locale and time/date in systemsettings to a 12 hr clock.

You're right. My clock is 24 hour and has the leading zero in the morning.

Look at the options here: System Settings > Locale > Date and Time

Thanx, y'all. I tried that last night, but it never displayed EXACTLY like I wanted it. Does one have to log out and then back in before those changes take effect? I was, after all, just playing around with the live DVD...

I still can't get that clock in KDE4 to display exactly like I want it.

Oh well, no big deal. Other than that, I must say that I like what I see with KDE. :-)

The time format for a 12 Hr clock is

pH:MM:SS AMPM

24 hour clock is

PH:MM:SS AMPM

Oh no - you don't have AM/PM for a 24-hour clock. It's like having '11:30 AM in the morning' on a legacy 12-hour clock.

Phil