The latest in the 4.x series of the KDE Software Compilation is due to be released in early August 2010. With the first beta of this release recently unleashed, I thought I’d download the openSuse packages and see what 4.5′s got in store for us.

So What’s New?

The Beta 1 release announcement lists only 4 major new features, which seems a little underwhelming. These are:

  • A reworked notifications area;
  • Window tiling;
  • Webkit in konqueror;
  • Stability improvements.

One of the big upgrades that was scheduled for KDE SC 4.5 was porting the PIM (ie. kmail, korganizer, kaddressbook) applications to the Akonadi framework. Unfortunately, that process won’t be completed in time for 4.5.0, and will be delayed until 4.5.1. This is a little disappointing given that Akonadi has been full of promise for quite some time, with no real user visible outcomes. It would have been nice to see what Akonadi will bring to the party. However, it’s better to wait until all the kinks are ironed out. But unfortunately, it leaves the KDE 4.5 feature cupboard a little bare.

That being said, there are a whole bunch of little improvements that I’ll talk about later on in this article.

Reworked Notifications

The notification area and system tray have been reworked More >