Install a full new authentic KDE Plasma Desktop?

[deleted]

OK, Solus does come in a KDE Plasma version, but it seems to me that the Solus Plasma Desktop has been trimmed down a bit. I'd like to attempt to install a full authentic version of KDE Plasma, one I'd get directly from KDE. This should be doable, though I'm quite the beginner and Linux command line syntax is new to me.

murbert

[deleted] This should be doable, though I'm quite the beginner and Linux command line syntax is new to me

This sounds like a monumental task for a beginner

Staudey

Not sure how exactly the Solus Plasma Desktop is trimmed down (haven't really used it or looked into its structure), but if you have specific issues, you can post a request to our dev tracker for those missing features. Maintaining your own set of (different) packages would be a headache for sure.

[deleted]

Staudey The KDE Plasma Desktop on Solus doesn't look quite the same as KDE Plasma on KDE Neon and Fedora Plasma on my Laptop. I wish I knew all the correct names and terminology, but the Tray edit menu choices aren't the same on Solus Plasma and on other Distros with Plasma. Anyway more than likely all I have to do is locate a clear set of instructions, or cut and paste text into the terminal, which I have already accomplished installing Brave browser into Fedora Plasma.

Brucehankins

[deleted] look and feel largely come down to themes, default choices, and settings as well. You should be able to add almost any tray item that is there in fedora, install or change the theme to your liking, or make it look and feel largely the same from the different Plasma setting. For Brave and other software, you can install this from the Software Center if you're not comfortable in the command line.

Harvey

What you are suggesting is not possible. There is no download plasma for Solus button or set of commands. It is compiled from source and patched where necessary for Solus. Simply updating the plasma stack takes many, many hours.

Even if you managed to compile it all yourself, we might update a dependency that would require you to rebuild a significant subset of packages again. It is really not feasible or simple for users to do this, especially for a beginner.

wingman-4

The only difference I notice between neon and solus is the lack of the discovery package manager. Neon is constantly updated with the very latest packages from KDE so , there may be slight variations. I have identical themes and layouts on both of my systems. The testing version of neon is cutting edge KDE.

[deleted]

wingman-4 Well, I've installed and used three different Distros that have KDE Plasma. 1. Solus/Plasma, 2. KDE Neon, 3. Feodra/Plasma. On my Laptop with KDE Neon and Fedora Plasma the Plasma Desktop functions and Menus look very much alike almost identical, whereas with Solus Plasma there are noticeable differences some things seem to be missing or are not there. Sorry if I'm not using all the correct terminology, I'm new with Linux and Plasma.

codewizard1975

@[deleted] Are you talking about the preinstalled software that normally varies between distros? Unlike Solus, other distros tend to install extra software all the time that most people either never use or end up removing.

[deleted]

codewizard1975 This thread (conversation) is about KDE Plasma Desktop. I repeat, KDE Plasma Desktop. The Solus/Plasma Desktop installed on my Laptop computer when compared to KDE Neon and Kubuntu is lacking some functions, or has broken functionality. Whereas KDE Neon and Kubuntu look very much alike and have full Plasma Desktop functionality, the installation of Solus/Plasma on my new Laptop isn't functioning as fully as the Plasma Desktop on KDE Neon or Kubuntu. I repeat, three different Distros of Linux with KDE Plasma Desktop were fully installed on my new Laptop, only two of those Distros seemed to be functioning correctly. I repeat, I've encountered problems with the Plasma Desktop on Solus, not the other Distros and I'm wondering why and I'm wondering if this can be fixed, since I'm liking Solus more than KDE Neon or Kubuntu.

tomscharbach

[deleted] This thread (conversation) is about KDE Plasma Desktop. I repeat, KDE Plasma Desktop. The Solus/Plasma Desktop installed on my Laptop computer when compared to KDE Neon and Kubuntu is lacking some functions, or has broken functionality. Whereas KDE Neon and Kubuntu look very much alike and have full Plasma Desktop functionality, the installation of Solus/Plasma on my new Laptop isn't functioning as fully as the Plasma Desktop on KDE Neon or Kubuntu. I repeat, three different Distros of Linux with KDE Plasma Desktop were fully installed on my new Laptop, only two of those Distros seemed to be functioning correctly. I repeat, I've encountered problems with the Plasma Desktop on Solus, not the other Distros.

As @Staudley suggested, it might be helpful if you would identify specific deficiencies in functionality so that the Solus team members responsible for the Solus Plasma desktop could consider the issues and take corrective action when warranted. You might consider installing the various iterations you've mentioned (KDE Neon, Kubuntu, Fedora KDE, Solus Plasma) in VMs on your computer, so that you can compare and contrast functionality/design issues without having to do hardware installations each time.

[deleted] Whereas KDE Neon and Kubuntu look very much alike

Just a note: Distros commonly implement identical DE's with design differences -- themes, menu structure, bar/panel applications, and so on -- sometimes subtle, sometimes not. For example, the Ubuntu Budgie and Solus Budgie's OOB desktops are quite dissimilar, and that is true for other Budgie implementations as well. The Ubuntu Budgie default desktop layout (of the eight available choices) is very different than Solus Budgie's default desktop, although Ubuntu Budgie's "Traditional Budgie" layout is almost identical to Solus Budgie's desktop layout. You can usually adapt the default design through menu choices.

codewizard1975

[deleted] No need to be rude. I was only asking a simple question like everyone else.

After quite a few asked you questions you finally stated what the issues were, I understand what you are talking about.

I can tell you that any distro running on Microsoft Surface Laptops and Tablets will require some tweaking and recompiling to get things 100% fully working. The Linux Surface GitHub group will be able to help you better on getting stuff running on your laptop when it comes to specific issues since they also work on the Surface Laptop support as well.

I know my Surface Pro 7 took quite a bit of tweaking to get 100% stable and working. I wasn't able to get Solus working on it fully but was able to get about 5 distros working using GNOME and KDE deskops environments.

WetGeek

tomscharbach it might be helpful if you would identify specific deficiencies in functionality

It's certainly not hard to understand why KDE's own distribution (Ubuntu-based) would have the latest and most complete versions of all their own software, including their own DE. I mentioned that in my first comment on this thread.

That said, Tom's suggestion is a great idea. Since you apparently know what's missing in the Solus version of that DE, why not let the Solus team know what you know? That would make it a lot easier for them to make you (and presumably others) happy with the distro you appear to favor and the DE you prefer to use.

For what it's worth, I'm one of those presumed others. I run Solus/Plasma on 4 of the 7 machines here.

[deleted]

tomscharbach Right now it doesn't appear that the Solus Team has the time and resources to handle my specific situation and I don't know how to make a formal complaint/request. I've already described some of the problems in my posts, basically I get no Battery Percentage Icon in my Tray and I've tried to install a few different Widgets/Applets with no success, either they don't take or they don't function correctly, but these Widgets did install in KDE Neon and Kubuntu and Fedora Plasma. Then too when I click on Enter Edit Mode, it's appearance on Solus, the number of options that pop up is less than the number of pops up on the other Distros of Linux that I've used. So, you might say that maybe I should just switch to KDE Neon or Kubuntu or Fedora, but they each have their own specific little quirks that annoy me. I like Solus because it installed quickly and easily, it boots very fast and then too shuts down very fast, Of the maybe five or six Linux Distros I've fully installed, so far Solus is the quickest, fastest.

tomscharbach

[deleted] Right now it doesn't appear that the Solus Team has the time and resources to handle my specific situation.

Your specific situation seems to be, at least in part, Surface Go hardware/driver related because others using Plasma on laptops do not seem to be experiencing the issue, as far as I can tell from the recent posts and from searching the forums. To the extent that the issue is related to Microsoft's hardware/driver implementation, the issue is probably upstream and kernel-related, so your best option might be to wait until the 5.18 kernel is implemented in Solus.

[deleted] So, you might say that maybe I should just switch to KDE Neon or Kubuntu, but they each have their own specific little quirks that annoy me.

I've been using Linux for 16 years, and I can tell you right off the bat that you will never find a distro that doesn't have specific, annoying little quirks or find a distro that perfectly fits your needs. All you can do is pick the distro (preferably from the mainstream, well-designed, well-implemented and well-maintained) that best fits your needs and use it.

murbert

[deleted] basically I get no Battery Percentage Icon in my Tray and I've tried to install a few different Widgets/Applets with no success, either they don't take or they don't function correctly, but these Widgets did install in KDE Neon and Kubuntu and Fedora Plasma.

The battery icon works on my laptop (right click for the option to show percentage), this may be a driver issue for you. The kernel upgrade may help, dunno when that's coming though. They're working on it.
There is a workaround linked in this thread for adding widgets https://discuss.getsol.us/d/8539-cant-install-from-appearences-plasma-edition/5 , it does not work for for global themes so I'm stuck with default theming for now. Apparently there's a fix coming for that too.

[deleted]

tomscharbach Well, I have yet to install and try Solus/Budgie, LOL. I don't need any Widgets to use my Laptop, but the little extras would be nice to have. Currently my main needs are Internet/Browser-email, Word Processing, Invoices, pdf, Images/Picture viewing. All the different Distros I've tried have those. At some point I'll try GIMP and adding a printer and adding a scanner. Linux is better on this little Laptop, because it's faster and less of a resource hog, less bloated than Micro$oft Windows 10/11. Installing Linux freed up a lot more usable storage space.

[deleted]

tomscharbach One other quirk I get with Solus Plasma that I don't get with other Linux Distros is that it thinks that the eMMC (Hard Drive) on this Laptop is Removable Media, which it isn't. If anything I'd like to rename it, but regardless or what Solus thinks it is, I know what it is. Basically this Micro$oft Surface Go Laptop is one step above a Chromebook, instead of a Celeron, they supplied it with an Intel i5 which is definitely faster.

tomscharbach

[deleted] Well, I have yet to install and try Solus/Budgie, LOL.

I've used the Budgie DE exclusively since 2017, when I cut over from Ubuntu.

COVID-bored, I looked at most/all of the Budgie implementations last January, and I feel confident making this statement: Of all the Budgie implementations I looked at, two stand out in terms of functionality, stability, design and usefulness: Solus Budgie and Ubuntu Budgie. I use both Solus Budgie and Ubuntu Budgie, and both are close to perfect for my use case, which sounds similar to yours. Solus Budgie is a rolling release; Ubuntu Budgie is based on Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, and uses point releases.

I don't know whether or not Solus Budgie will resolve your battery status issues (hardware/driver issues are hardware/driver issues, and that's what I think you are experiencing), so you might try looking at both Solus Budgie and Ubuntu Budgie to see if one or the other resolves the issue. If you install Ubuntu Budgie, try the "Traditional Budgie" layout, which is almost identical to the Solus Budgie layout, and that will give you a basis for close comparison.

[deleted]

tomscharbach T
The second Linux Distro I installed and tried was Ubuntu/Gnome. I remember that it had a battery status Icon, though it seemed a bit off in that it didn't refresh correctly, or show the actual full battery amount, but that may have been due to my UEFI battery settings. Anyway, I didn't much like the Gnome Desktop. Of all the different Distros I've installed and tried, Fedora gave me the most problems, probably due to a pop up notification, something about Ibus and Waverly or whatever it's called not working on my display and needing to switch over to System5, I didn't write it down and I don't know how to switch over to whatever it was. At one point my entire screen locked up, I could move the mouse pointer but could do nothing else and then there was an instance of jumpy/bouncy folder icons.

tomscharbach

[deleted] I didn't much like the Gnome Desktop.

DE preference is both personal and idiosyncratic, which makes sense because the DE layer is our interface with the OS. I used Gnome happily for close to a dozen years and would still be using it, most likely, if I hadn't run into Budgie. Budgie just resonated with me in a way that Gnome never did. You seem to like Plasma, and you aren't alone. Plasma leaves me cold, personally, but that means nothing. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder when it comes to DE preference, it would seem.

tomscharbach

[deleted] Solus Plasma ... thinks that the eMMC (Hard Drive) on this Laptop is Removable Media ...

Weird. I have no idea. I had a friend who had a Surface Go and Windows rescue media didn't recognize the eMMC drive as a target for recovery, but that was several years ago. I don't know the details (he took it to the Geek Squad and they got it recovered). Sounds like the same issue, though (you can't recover Windows to removable media).