- cross-posted to:
- linux@programming.dev
- cross-posted to:
- linux@programming.dev
What’s new?
We’ve promoted our KDE Plasma Desktop offering to “Edition” status. The Fedora KDE team has been hard at work making sure bugs get fixed and everything is polished just so. We’re confident that this can stand along our other amazing flagship offerings.
I know the naming is a bit confusing, with GNOME-powered “Workstation” using a generic label while KDE Plasma Desktop has the tech right in the name. We’ll get that figured out eventually. If you don’t know where to start, don’t panic. Pick one and see how it goes. They’re both excellent desktop environments with great upstream communities, and the same Fedora system underneath it all.
We also have a new alternative desktop choice: COSMIC. This is a modern, written-all-in-Rust desktop environment from our friends over at System 76.
Perhaps most excitingly, we have a new installation interface! The previous UI was designed to manage a lot of before-you-even-start configuration choices. Over the past decade, though, we’ve gone to “get the full system installed with no fuss, then set up what you need from a complete environment”. That made the “hub and spoke” model more confusing than helpful. The new UI is streamlined and sleek, just like the Heart of Gold.
Of course, there are other big changes, as well as the usual updates to thousands of packages. See the Fedora Linux 42 Release Notes for all of the details, and don’t miss the “What’s New?” posts here on Fedora Magazine.
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I really don’t agree with choosing to release with the UEFI bug they found. They describe it as cosmetic but those entries can last the lifetime of your computer, even if you wipe your hard drive. It’s bound to cause some confusion for years to come for Linux tinkerers.
Just upgraded. I think I must have been the only person in the world to like the old Fedora installation UI but everyone complained about it so it must be good news that it’s gone, as long as I don’t hate the new one.
Count me in! The old installer hat a great UX for people knowing what they wanted to do… There must be dozens of us, dozens! ;-)
The old one was too confusing for new users. It wasn’t clearly step by step like all the other installers on linux.
I guess I’m biased because when I first started using Linux some 20 years ago it was considered user friendly for the time. Plus I must have used it hundreds of times since I had a previous job which involved setting up a lot of CentOS servers, which could have blinded me to the problems. Still, I think it’s reassuring to do everything from a central overview page for your configuration choices, takes away a bit of self-doubt. I’m not complaining though, as long as the new one does the job.
Not as confusing as Debian though.
Xfce 4.20
On my way to attempt an upgrade from Xfce + Compiz to Xfce + Wayfire lol
Fedora need to update their homepage, KDE was removed from the spins list and the only obvious download from the landing page is workstation.
Very excited they jumped on the cosmic train though, looking forward to checking that out.
Kde has its own thing now. Lots easier to find than its own spin
Looking forward to this. I do have a question for the more seasoned people here: I installed Fedora 41 not too long after its release on a new PC, which has been my daily driver every since. Very happy with it, tweaked everything to my liking. However, by mistake I installed Workstation (with Gnome) and then switched to my preferred KDE Plasma as the DE. This has left some corners of my system with the Gnome look and feel, which is fine, but I prefer if it were more consistent.
My question:
- Can I/do you recommend that I upgrade Fedora in place? I prefer this if it means I don’t have to reinstall everything.
- Or do you recommend I do a fresh install anyway for a clean upgrade and at the same time clean up my DE? What is the least disruptive way to do this?
If you do a reinstall, I’d recommend going with a Kinoite install. It’s like regular Fedora KDE, except that it avoids this risk of traces of past experiments everywhere.
It’s like regular Fedora KDE, except that it avoids this problem of traces of past experiments everywhere.
Kinoite is much more than that: it is an atomic and immutable spin of Fedora KDE. This has big implications but the gist of it is that:
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You can roll back to any previous version if anything breaks
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The base system cannot be modified
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If you need to install RPM packages, you do that by adding “layers” on top of the base system, and these can be removed if needed to go back to a clean base system
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You can switch from one spin to another by “rebasing”, but it is recommended that you remove any additional layer first and that you stick to the same desktop environment
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My experience on other distros was that upgrading in place a system that deviated too much from “stock” would wreck the install. I would personally play it safe and backup my home folder and do a fresh install.
Just don’t forget to test your backup before formatting your drive!
Which corners are you referring to, specifically? There are some applications that use GTK components, those are styled seperately in the settings under “GNOME/GTK Application Style”. They will never look exactly like a native KDE/QT based application, but you can get them closer.
Likely you had a lot of GTK apps included with Workstation, you could also look into Qt alternatives to replace them - for example Gedit does not conform in KDE, but Kate will.
If you wipe and start fresh with the KDE install, it will prefer Qt applications. So that may be a worth while endeavor. Once you are settled, there is no reason to not upgrade in place. My install has been upgraded in place since fedora 32.
Thank you for replying, very informative. I think I have most of the actions/types I wanted associated with my preferred ones now. The most noticeable one is Firefox when I open downloads from the menu. I’m not sure if Firefox uses xdg or not? I don’t mind GTK or Gnome at all, in fact I probably have spent more time on Gnome, but I do like when things are consistent.
Ah yeah, Firefox is GTK too, and annoyingly hides xdg behind a setting. I apologize in advance as my knowledge here is bit limited, but if firefox is installed with RPM, I think you’ll need
xdg-desktop-portal-kdeinstalled, then in firefox’s about:config setwidget.use-xdg-desktop-portal= true. I’m not sure how it works with flatpak though.But hopefully that helps, best of luck!
That’s a great tip! It turns out I must have already tried some of that. I found multiple settings in about:config. Anything with a file picker works (open, save as), but the “open folder” from the Downloads dialog must just not use xdg-open, since none of the settings had an effect on that. It’s not the end of the world, but it would be nice to have my Dolphin bookmarks and places.
Upgraded my minipc to it the other day from 40. No problems. Fedora is consistently stable for me
That towel is so funny… I’ve thought about getting a shirt in the past as well but I can’t imagine wearing it outside lol
