On Wednesday 23 August 2017 04:21, bad sector conveyed the following to
comp.windows.x.kde...
> When a window of any width is up against the top of the screen it's
> impossible to resize; actually even maximised windows should be
> resizable without the totally unnecesary footwork of having to first
> click on unmaximizing.
I agree with that. Allowing maximized windows to be resized (and still
showing their window borders when maximized) was an option in KDE3, but
I believe it was dropped for Plasma 4.
> Not only that, but when any window covers the entire screen, maximised
> or not, then alarms/popups taking place under it should be annunciated
> to the user!
This could perhaps be adjusted by changing the "focus stealing
prevention" in the window manager options.
> Case in point, when I click on the Sylpheed "send" button the dialog
> requesting the password may well be and remain covered depending on
> circumstances.
Again, this is a matter of focus stealing prevention. Try setting it
one degree lower than what it is currently set at.
> BTW, why on earth is plasma5 not Kde5?
I'm not sure what you're asking here ─ your wording is ambiguous. If
you are referring to the name, then KDE has decided that the KDE name
should from here on be used for the organization itself and as a
branding of its products, while Plasma is now the dedicated name of the
desktop environment.
If on the other hand your comment was sarcastic, then I can relate. I'm
still using Plasma 4 here because I've tried Plasma 5 and I was
disenchanted with the bug-ridden nature of it, the lack of customization
options that still existed in Plasma 4 ─ like setting the font and font
size of the clock ─ and the fact that you have to jump through burning
hoops to get anything other than that dreadful 2D look that has become
the fashion whim of the last couple of years.
I've given Trinity Desktop Environment a spin ─ it's a fork of KDE3 ─
and it has evolved quite a lot since KDE3 proper, but it does have its
own issues as well, and it does visually feel like a throwback to the
beginning of the past decade.
Plasma 4 still has a few bugs ─ one of which I'm grateful for, see the
footnote [*] ─ and I keep on struggling with KMail2 and its awful
Akonadi/MySQL backend, but at least it's a mature and aesthetically
pleasing environment in which most things do actually work, not to
mention that it's also incredibly customizable.
I am using it with the Bespin theme (developed by Thomas Lübking), which
contains the X-Bar widget, which in turn allows for a Mac-like "global
menu" to be embedded into a separate panel at the top, which you can
then also add other widgets and icons to.
This functionality was initially missing from KDE4 and was later on
implemented in a different manner ─ by way of an auto-hiding standalone
application menu at the top of the screen that wasn't located inside a
panel and that would be invisible until you moved the mouse over it.
It was initially also missing (again) from Plasma 5 up until 5.9, but
I'm not sure how it's implemented there. It wasn't available in the
PCLinuxOS live CD/DVD that I've tried. I presume it now works like
Bespin's X-Bar, but I can't verify that as I have no diskspace available
for an actual installation of any distribution with Plasma 5, and I'm
not willing to give up on my Plasma 4 system, given that it works.
[*] The welcomed bug: I use the "Glassified" desktop theme, but I have
found that if you select and activate the "Air for Notebooks" theme
first and then select and activate the "Glassified" theme
afterwards, then you get the "Glassified" translucent panels, but
with a drop shadow underneath them, which I really like, as it
sort of lifts the panels up from the "surface" of the desktop.
It does of course only work if your video driver supports
compositing, but this machine has an on-board AMD Radeon adapter,
which works perfectly well with the GPL'd "radeon" driver. I also
have a laptop with an identical operating system installation and
an on-board Intel graphics adapter, and it works just as perfectly
there too. If you have an nVidia graphics adapter, then you still
need the proprietary driver in order to get compositing effects.
--
With respect,
= Aragorn =