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There's something a little unnatural about the way we feel about Linux file managers. Thunar, Nautilus, and yeah, even the old Konqueror, we appreciate them for all they do. And the worst part for us here who were slightly perturbed by the unfinished feeling of the January release was that we had to put off for a bit more really getting down and dirty with Dolphin. Yes, it was available and ran with KDE 3.5.x releases. And every time we fired it up, it was a grim, searing reminder that using KDE 4.0 on a daily basis was not quite in our reach.

Dolphin has had a few features from the beginning we found hard to live without. Split-view browsing is probably the most notable, but easily changeable icon, file and folder layouts were also a big draw. There is more to love, though. Multiple files can be selected without holding down keys and clicking, folders and files can be tagged and commented on, much like you would do with photos in Digikam (or Flickr). Folders can also be given star ratings, which seems like an odd thing to want to do system-wide on a desktop (though we suppose sadistic sys-admins would have a good time rating user's /home folders based on support requests). Docked panels (such as "Places" and "Information") can be broken away or removed, as desired.

KDE 4.1 RC1 Dolphin Demo from Download Squad on Vimeo.

Dolphin behaves like you'd expect it would right out of the box, for the most part. Like the rest of KDE4 in this release, though, it has improvements and offers quite a lot in the configuration department. The default breadcrumb style location bar also has the option to be made editable. Filters and various settings for default viewing can be changed.

Though Dolphin has a few notable changes that make it more fun (yes, we said "fun" in relation to a file manager. You knew we had problems.) and arguably more useful, the changes aren't overly dramatic. Maybe it's because Dolphin has been released and in use longer than most KDE4 constructs, and so it feels more familiar and has had more opportunity for bug squashing. Either way, we're happy to be able to use it in its intended environment again.

The Menu - Shape shifting

KDE had this fairly uninspired little bit called the K Menu in older releases. GNOME uses something pretty similar with the Applications menu. And Windows has the infamous "Start" menu that seems to still be called the "Start" menu even though it doesn't say "Start" anymore.

Old habits die hard.

And maybe that's the main beef with the new KDE4 Applications menu. Between 4.0 and the present release, the KDE4 team has done some impressive work to make the Applications menu feel natural. The movement between tabs in the menu feels almost liquid. It's smooth and there is no lag between tabs. Clicking through the menus also feels more responsive (even when we find ourselves clicking backwards through the menus). We understand, as well, that in some ways it is a design plus that the menu team planned for the last spot in the menu hierarchy to be saved when flipping between tabs. It doesn't mean it's particularly easy to get used to.

That being said, we are finding it easier, now, to get used to than we had previously thought. That's not to say it isn't on occasion jarring or even a bit disorienting to find ourselves in a menu we didn't recall being in. It isn't to say we haven't lost a bit of time figuring out the menu hierarchy when we're located in the middle of a non-descript feeling menu trail. But we do see why the developers may have chosen this presentation, and it's not purely "because they could."


KDE 4.1 RC1 Applications Menu -- Speedy from Download Squad on Vimeo.

Though it does take, it seems, a bit more time to locate some of our more obscure or less used applications in this layout, it is easier on the eyes. We don't mean this in a purely aesthetic sense, either. The Applications menu is not at all long and gangly, like the K Menu or "Start" menus are. It isn't sectioned in as harsh a manner as the GNOME menus historically are. The Application menu is (almost) bite-sized sections of menu headers, subheaders and applications. It doesn't always work as planned, but the reasoning seems logical.

It's certainly not our favorite KDE4 feature, but it doesn't cause the slow downs and frustrations that it used to, especially between a tweaked Favorites tab and speed improvements in menu flow. We imagine we'll come around.

The Panel - The great pretender

Something about the new panel makes us giggle. It's a really evil giggle. First things first, though, and if Plasma is given the award for "Most Improvement" KDE 4.1's panel gets an award for being a real strong runner up.

Plasma being a bit flaky made a degree of sense, though. The panel, for many reasons, didn't make any degree of sense at all. Having seen what we now can say is at least a much-closer-to-finished product, it makes more sense. Maybe not huge heaping amounts, but at least some. Plasma is very closely linked to the panel. It's not as if the existence of one depends on the other, but it's pretty safe to say that for the panel to have just about any useful sorts of function (for most people), Plasma needs to be onboard in its new, supercharged form.

Previously, it was quite a chore to resize the panel in any significant way or (a bit more disturbing to us) move the icons that we could place there. For us, a pig pile of five icons clustered in an area we weren't accustomed to looking in was bad enough, but we were more aggravated by the idea that we had no way to move them at this point -- by design. Fair or not, it annoyed us.

Now, we can happily report (giggling all the while) that icons can be moved on the panel, and the panel can be resized and positioned with almost military precision. We can even say that it's easy for someone who has never resized or positioned a panel or repositioned an icon, as long as they've used a word processing program with line justification and rulers with tab stops. All right, we'll stop giggling now.


KDE 4.1 RC1 Panel Settings and Icons from Download Squad on Vimeo.

In a weird, sick sort of way, this is an ingenious manner to do panel adjustments. We mean that. A panel can appear exactly as the user wants, and it can be scaled and inched around and divided and redivided to fit any screen, or use, or sense of style. That, we admit, is pretty damn neat.

It also feels like it is probably in most cases either amazing overkill, or at least some hardcore wheel reinvention. Moving icons is a lot less error-prone (we always managed to pick up the wrong ones on previous KDE versions) and speedy this way. But the left/center/right justified icons and tab stop-esque features, while looking really impressive and admittedly allowing a whole lot of control we probably will never require, feels a bit too much like it falls into the "because we can" school of design.

On the upside, we're hoping it introduces a whole new generation of resume writers to tab stops.

The KDE 4.1 Final Release - Hope for a better tomorrow

No, there aren't any KDE4 developers running for public office. If there were, anyway, we couldn't safely promise there would be any less politics or departmental drama going on than in any of our current governments, though we'd probably have been spared that whole "series of tubes" statement.

With the KDE 4.1 release on July 29th, however, it seems the KDE team has taken a strong, confident step forward. The desktop is stable, fast, and extends its functions further than previous KDE versions. Even with the occasional quirkiness of rotating widgets and exact coordinate panel placement, it looks as though KDE4 has hit its stride and is ready for a good long run.