Initial enthusiasm at KDE faded into disappointment...

[mauricep]

Having switched from Ubuntu to Kubuntu I was initially thrilled at the KDE interface, particularly:
- I love that it is so customiseable
- Some of the KDE are awesome, such as Amarok
- I love having open folders displayed on the plasma desktop.

Since then I have a couple of gripes that are probably going to result in me switching back to Gnome despite my initial enthusiasm. I am posting them here in the hope that someone tells me that these can be resolved, and that I don't need to return to the comparatively Spartan Ubuntu or Mint. I am running Kubuntu Lucid on a 1000HE netbook:
- I get several application crashes per day. So many that I long ago stopped filing bug reports. Is this normal for KDE?
- A number of functional bugs, like the recognition of my external monitor is very flakey. In a number of situations I have ended up with 2 blank screens. Also I cannot get ubuntu one or dropbox to work, even after installing nautilus.
- My operating system slows down after a day without shutting down, forcing me to restart.

I cannot figure out whether this bugginess is simply the price I have to pay for using KDE, a problem with the Kubuntu implementation of KDE, or a problem with my installation (although I have tried a re-install already).

Any ideas anyone?

Maurice

[steelsnake]

1. App crashes
In my experience that's definitely not normal. I rarely ever get a crash, and if I do it's usually when I run prerelease for testing.

2. External monitor support
Not sure about this one. I run 6 monitors on one of my boxes but that's not a laptop.

3. Slowdown after a day
Again, not sure what would cause this. My suggestion would be to use "top" or "htop" and see what's gobbling up your ressources. Or hit CTRL+ESC and use the KDE system activity display if you'd prefer a graphical display. For slowdows there's usually a "smoking gun".

Unfortunately can't say anything about "ubuntu one" or "dropbox". Haven't used either.

[GreyGeek]

....
I am running Kubuntu Lucid on a 1000HE netbook:
- I get several application crashes per day. So many that I long ago stopped filing bug reports. Is this normal for KDE?


No. I am not running on a Eee PC but I haven't had an application crash since I can't remember when. Some don't work right, like DigiKam forgetting to include the Red Eye on their latest release, etc..., but NO crashes.



- A number of functional bugs, like the recognition of my external monitor is very flakey. In a number of situations I have ended up with 2 blank screens. Also I cannot get ubuntu one or dropbox to work, even after installing nautilus.
- My operating system slows down after a day without shutting down, forcing me to restart.


I'd make an educated guess and say that your video chip driver isn't the right one, or it isn't configured properly or it just doesn't work right on your Eee PC. Open the System Monitor and sort it by memory usage. Let it run and occasionally look to see if your video driver is gradually consuming memory instead of maintaining a rather stable memory base.



I cannot figure out whether this bugginess is simply the price I have to pay for using KDE, a problem with the Kubuntu implementation of KDE, or a problem with my installation (although I have tried a re-install already).
...


Before you installed, did you run an md5sum check on the ISO and ALSO do a check on the LiveUSB before you installed it?

[mauricep]

Thanks for getting me to take a closer look at my system resources! It seems that "virtuoso-t was using half my memory. A google search linked this to nepomuk and a LOT of questions about this. Apparently I am not the first person to face this problem. I toned down the memory usage of nepomuk (system search) and it seems to have reduce the memory footprint and CPU footprint of virtuoso-t.

Only time will tell whether this was the cause of all the problems described (and a couple more that I didn't even mention) or not.

Will let you know.

Mauricep

[miKeyBabid]

I cannot get ubuntu one or dropbox to work, even after installing nautilus.

You don't need to install nautilus. You also don't want to install dropbox via the .deb package or anything like that.

Here's a link to a thread on this forum that explains how to get dropbox up and running on Kubuntu :

http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/index.php?topic=3110544.0

[mauricep]

The instructions for installing dropbox worked great. Thanks!

And thanks to the memory tweak, my system is now extremely stable and apparently bug free.

The only thing left is testing the external monitor again. But that will have to wait until I'm home from my travels.

You guys rule!

Mauricep

[The Liquidator]

Virtuoso, which is the server for the nepomuk semantic desktop, is a work-in progress. Unless you want to do fancy searches within files etc via alt+F2 then question whether you need it.

You can do 2 things. run strigi and you can turn off the semantic desktop altogether instead of just tweaking the memory. You can also if you wish remove the package virtuoso-nepomuk.

What graphics chip do you have? Have you tried turning off desktop effects?

HTH

[GreyGeek]

Thanks for getting me to take a closer look at my system resources! It seems that "virtuoso-t was using half my memory......


I've removed virtuoso-nepomuk and don't use any of those services. They are, IMO, redundant. There is a cron script which runs regularly which executes "updatedb" as root. That database is used by the "locate" command, which is much more powerful and faster than the graphical search engine. When I want to find something I pop open a Konsole and issue a locate command, usually along the lines of

locate something | less

and page through the listing. If I am looking for an executable I can use

whereis something

or I can use

locate bin/something

and include wild card characters.

If I want to search several files I open Kate, then use its file->open command to select as many files as I want to search (I've looked through over 1,000 files at one time) and then do a find using "search all files". It will give me a listing of all findings in the lower right panel. Click on a listing and the upper write panel opens to that file and line number instantly.

[mauricep]

@ the Liquidator : I'm using a Intel GD40 graphics card. It just about handles KDE now with the extra memory.
How do I turn off the Semantic desktop without disabling Strigi?

@GreyGeek: I am a great fan of the in-file search. Especially for work. So I think I will stick with Nepomuk/Stigi.

[GreyGeek]

....
@GreyGeek: I am a great fan of the in-file search. Especially for work. So I think I will stick with Nepomuk/Stigi.


Isn't it nice that you have the choices and options to someone more than one way, and at NO extra cost! 8)

[The Liquidator]

@ the Liquidator : I'm using a Intel GD40 graphics card. It just about handles KDE now with the extra memory.
How do I turn off the Semantic desktop without disabling Strigi?

@GreyGeek: I am a great fan of the in-file search. Especially for work. So I think I will stick with Nepomuk/Stigi.


Nepomuk/strigi is the semantic desktop so you can't disable one without the other :)

[oshunluvr]

Isn't it nice that you have the choices and options to someone more than one way, and at NO extra cost! 8)
You're dangerously close to becoming a Linux "FanBoy" :D

[GreyGeek]

Wadda ya mean "Dangerously close"? ???

I try to be spot on! ;D

[mauricep]

....
@GreyGeek: I am a great fan of the in-file search. Especially for work. So I think I will stick with Nepomuk/Stigi.


Isn't it nice that you have the choices and options to someone more than one way, and at NO extra cost! 8)


Not to mention the free and friendly tech-support! :)

[Wild_Duck]

I only have two problems with Kubuntu, I cannot connect to the UbuntuOne Music Store, and if i try to move the screen with Alt+Left mouse button it minimizes.
Apart from that every things great.


Acer 5720 Laptop, Intel Core 2 Duo T7300 (2ghz)
Media Accelerator X3100, 2gb Ram.

[TomB19]

- I get several application crashes per day. So many that I long ago stopped filing bug reports. Is this normal for KDE?


Any ideas anyone?

Maurice


I have a couple of applications that crash regularly. One is Kontact. It hasn't worked reliably since they went to akonadi on the back end. It will work for a while, sometimes up to a week, but frequently it crashes several times in a day and I have to blow away the database to get it to start.

There are a few other problems too, like HandBrake that has to be killed and restarted after each run. I think this is only in the most recent version of HandBrake because it was never like that before.

Yeah, there are problems. It's generally been stable, though. I believe you're experiencing more problems than KDE is responsible for.

The move to back end software like akonadi in a general release before they are stable is a bigger problem for me. I love KDE, it's been my primary desktop since 1999, but am about to dump it for the stability issues it has had lately.

I run KDE on three systems and have enjoyed it for years. Recently, however, I picked up a laptop with Windows 7 home premium, Office 2007, and Visio 2007. It's like a breath of fresh air in how stable it is. I'm not about to switch whole scale to Windows but I'm certainly going to start spending some time with gnome.