KDE 1 on:
[Wikipedia]
[Google]
[Amazon]
K Desktop Environment 1 was the inaugural series of releases of the K Desktop Environment. There were two major releases in this series.
New Project: Kool Desktop Environment. Programmers wanted!
' on
An update, K Desktop Environment 1.1, was faster, more stable and included many small improvements. It also included a new set of icons, backgrounds and textures. Among this overhauled artwork was a new KDE logo by Torsten Rahn consisting of the letter K in front of a
Pre-release
The development started right afterMatthias Ettrich
Matthias Ettrich (born 14 June 1972) is a German computer scientist and founder of the KDE and LyX projects.
Early life
Ettrich was born in Bietigheim-Bissingen, Baden-Württemberg, and went to school in Beilstein while living with his parents ...
's announcement on 1996-10-14 to found the ''Kool Desktop Environment''.Matthias Ettrich: New Project: Kool Desktop Environment. Programmers wanted!
' on
Usenet
Usenet () is a worldwide distributed discussion system available on computers. It was developed from the general-purpose Unix-to-Unix Copy (UUCP) dial-up network architecture. Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis conceived the idea in 1979, and it was ...
, The word ''Kool'' was dropped shortly afterward and the name became simply ''K Desktop Environment''.
In the beginning, all components were released to the developer community separately without any coordinated timeframe throughout the overall project. First communication of KDE via mailing list, that was called ''kde@fiwi02.wiwi.uni-Tubingen.de''.
The first coordinated release was ''Beta 1'' on – almost exactly one year after the original announcement. Three additional Betas followed , , and .
K Desktop Environment 1.0
On 12 July 1998 the finished version 1.0 of K Desktop Environments was released: This version received mixed reception. Many criticized the use of the Qt software framework – back then under the ''Qt Free Edition License'' which was claimed to not be compatible withfree software
Free software or libre software is computer software distributed under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, and distribute it and any adapted versions. Free software is a matter of liberty, no ...
– and advised the use of Motif or LessTif
LessTif is a defunct free software reimplementation or clone of the Motif computer programming toolkit. The project aimed for full source- and binary-code compatibility with Motif. While this was not achieved, many Motif applications could run w ...
instead. Despite that criticism, KDE was well received by many users and made its way into the first Linux distribution
A Linux distribution (often abbreviated as distro) is an operating system made from a software collection that includes the Linux kernel and, often, a package management system. Linux users usually obtain their operating system by downloading one ...
s.
K Desktop Environment 1.1
An update, K Desktop Environment 1.1, was faster, more stable and included many small improvements. It also included a new set of icons, backgrounds and textures. Among this overhauled artwork was a new KDE logo by Torsten Rahn consisting of the letter K in front of a gear
A gear is a rotating circular machine part having cut teeth or, in the case of a cogwheel or gearwheel, inserted teeth (called ''cogs''), which mesh with another (compatible) toothed part to transmit (convert) torque and speed. The basic pr ...
which is used in revised form to this day.
Some components received more far-reaching updates, such as the Konqueror
Konqueror is a free and open-source web browser and file manager that provides web access and file-viewer functionality for file systems (such as local files, files on a remote FTP server and files in a disk image). It forms a core part of ...
predecessor ''kfm'', the application launcher ''kpanel'', and the KWin
KWin is a window manager for the X Window System and a Wayland compositor. It is released as a part of KDE Plasma 5, for which it is the default window manager. KWin can also be used on its own or with other desktop environments.
KWin can be c ...
predecessor ''kwm''. Newly introduced were e. g. ''kab'', a software library for address management, and a rewrite of KMail
Kontact is a personal information manager and groupware software suite developed by KDE. It supports calendars, contacts, notes, to-do lists, news, and email. It offers a number of inter-changeable graphical UIs (KMail, KAddressBook, Akregator, ...
, called ''kmail2'', which was installed as alpha version
A software release life cycle is the sum of the stages of development and maturity for a piece of computer software ranging from its initial development to its eventual release, and including updated versions of the released version to help impro ...
in parallel to the classic KMail version. ''kmail2'', however, never left alpha state and development was ended in favor of updating classic KMail.
K Desktop Environment 1.1 was well received among critics.
At the same time Trolltech prepared version 2.0 of Qt which was released as beta
Beta (, ; uppercase , lowercase , or cursive ; grc, βῆτα, bē̂ta or ell, βήτα, víta) is the second letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of 2. In Modern Greek, it represents the voiced labiod ...
on 1999-01-28. Consequently, no bigger upgrades for KDE 1 based on Qt 1 were developed. Instead only bugfixes were released: version 1.1.1 on 1999-05-03 and version 1.1.2 on 1999-09-13.
A more profound upgrade along with a port to Qt 2 was in development as K Desktop Environment 2
K Desktop Environment 2 was the second series of releases of the K Desktop Environment. There were three major releases in this series.
Major updates
K Desktop Environment 2 introduced significant technological improvements compared to its pre ...
.
KDE Restoration Project
To celebrate KDE's 20th birthday, KDE andFedora
A fedora () is a hat with a soft brim and indented crown.Kilgour, Ruth Edwards (1958). ''A Pageant of Hats Ancient and Modern''. R. M. McBride Company. It is typically creased lengthwise down the crown and "pinched" near the front on both sides ...
contributor Helio Chissini de Castro re-released 1.1.2 on 2016-10-14.
That re-release incorporates several changes required for compatibility with modern Linux variants. Work on that project started one month earlier at QtCon, a conference for Qt developers, in Berlin. There Castro showcased Qt 1.45 compiling on a modern Linux system.
See also
*Linux on the desktop
Besides the Linux distribution, Linux distributions designed for general-purpose use on desktops and servers, distributions may be specialized for different purposes including computer architecture support, Embedded Linux, embedded systems, stabili ...
References
{{Use dmy dates, date=September 2019 1998 software Desktop environments KDE Software Compilation de:K Desktop Environment#K Desktop Environment 1.x