Plasma 5.16 review - A tidal wave of goodness

Discussion in 'all things UNIX' started by Mrkvonic, Jun 26, 2019.

  1. Mrkvonic

    Mrkvonic Linux Systems Expert

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    What's hotter than an 80s style haircut? The answer is Plasma. My kind of Plasma. This is a review of the Plasma 5.16 desktop environment, including upgrade process and user setup, look and feel, better themes integration and management, consistency improvements, desktop shortcuts, notifications, new features in Discover and Vault, performance and responsiveness, robust updates, various fixes, some bugs, and more. Take a look.

    https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/plasma-5-16-review.html


    Cheers,
    Mrk
     
  2. Joxx

    Joxx Registered Member

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    I'm still overwhelmed by the plethora of options with KDE, intimidated even :(
     
  3. Mrkvonic

    Mrkvonic Linux Systems Expert

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    The beauty is, you can ignore them if you don't want them. They don't interfere.
    Mrk
     
  4. Iangh

    Iangh Registered Member

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    I see I'm on 5.12.7 on Kubuntu 18.04. Not interested in a development release but any reason I should upgrade to the latest stable release? The fact Kubuntu hasn't updated it makes me think no. Advise, please.
     
  5. FastGame

    FastGame Registered Member

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    My Arch install keeps me in Plasma happy land as fast as it hits the repo's, my Debian Buster is stuck in Plasma's past, same for Manjaro. As a KDE user I would not be happy with a distro that doesn't keep up with Plasma bug fixes and improvements.
     
  6. vasa1

    vasa1 Registered Member

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    You are on the latest stable release.
     
  7. Iangh

    Iangh Registered Member

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    Mine is from September, 2018. I would have thought it would have upgraded to a later version? Is it because 18.04 is LTS?
     
  8. Mrkvonic

    Mrkvonic Linux Systems Expert

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    Yes, LTS releases only get occasional updates.
    Mrk
     
  9. vasa1

    vasa1 Registered Member

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    Kubuntu 18.04 will receive Plasma updates to only Plasma 5.12 LTS: https://community.kde.org/Schedules/Plasma_5 (You'll need to scroll down quite a bit).

    Also, the dates mentioned there don't necessarily indicate when Kubuntu users will receive the updates. For example, although 5.12.8 was released in March 2019, we still haven't got it. See acheron's post here: https://www.kubuntuforums.net/showthread.php/75575-Plasma-5-12-8?p=428295&viewfull=1#post428295

    There's a PPA Kubuntu 18.04 users can add because the update first appears there. One can monitor https://launchpad.net/~kubuntu-ppa/ archive/ubuntu/ppa?field.series_filter=bionic.

    I haven't added this ppa because I don't need it. On the other hand, my Kubuntu 19.04 (minimal install option) running in a VM already has Plasma 5.16.2 so that I can see what the nearly latest-n-greatest looks like.
     
    Last edited: Jun 27, 2019
  10. Iangh

    Iangh Registered Member

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  11. FastGame

    FastGame Registered Member

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    I installed this after Mrk posted it. No problems so far and running really well. Just might be my favorite Plasma spin, time will tell. :thumb:
     
  12. summerheat

    summerheat Registered Member

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    Hm? What you're saying about Manjaro is definitely not true. Manjaro Stable usually gets the latest packages about 2 weeks after Arch gets them - and Kde Plasma 5.16.2 is already available (and hence on par with Arch). If that's not fast enough for you, you could switch to its Testing or even Unstable branch.
     
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