As I mentioned a few days back in my article regarding Installing Dropbox on Kubuntu, I’ve been tinkering with KDE recently and I am enjoying my time with it. I know I’ve written in the past regarding some frustrations with KDE, but I have to admit that many of my frustrations have gone away as the KDE 4.x series has matured. Again, if you haven’t tried KDE in a while I would invite you to do so.
In this article I will outline how to activate the kubuntu-ppa (Personal Package Archive), which will allow you to install the latest KDE packages. These instructions are specific to the KDE 4.4 RC (Release Candidate) packages, which are offered for feedback and testing. If you would like to try the latest that Kubuntu has to offer (even potentially unstable), you’ll want to continue reading.
Requirements
In order to download and install the latest KDE packages you’ll need to configure and activate the Kubuntu PPA. This is a Personal Package Archive, hosted on Launchpad, which is maintained by the Kubuntu Developers, and allows for staging and testing new packages. To activate the repository, run the command:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/beta
The Kubuntu PPA, particularly the RC packages, should now be configured and activated on your machine. You’ll still need to refresh your repository and install the updates, which I will cover next.
Installing KDE RC Packages
There are two approaches we can take to installing these packages. The first is for people who are already running Kubuntu (KDE) and want to simply update their installed packages to those offered in the RC repository.
To upgrade your existing installation to KDE 4.x RC, run the following two commands:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
The second method is for people interested in trying KDE 4.x RC who do not have KDE installed currently.
To install KDE 4.x RC packages, use the following:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop
I consider the KDE 4.x series to be very mature at this point, with a plethora of features and effects. I think the KDE Team has done a great job on improving the Linux Desktop over the past few years, and I continue to enjoy my time using it. I continue to use GNOME as well, but KDE 4.x has rebuilt the bridges that previous experiences had burned.
I am interested in hearing what you think about these RC packages, and how stable you find them to be. Do you enjoy being on the bleeding edge? If you run into problems, you might try looking for support in our Forum.
Perhaps you mean RC1? RC2 is tagged today and packaged likely by end of week.
RC1 is still pretty buggy and hungry esp with processing and memory.
Also akonadi doesn’t start on boot but that’s simple to start afterward. Its certainly getting there and looks like 4.4 will be a great release! 🙂
My mistake. I have had that post in my Drafts for a while now, and in that time things must have progressed from Beta to RC. I’ve updated the post to reflect that they are in an RC state.
Please let me know if you come across any other inaccuracies.
I noticed there was a typo in the second example under the section “Installing KDE RC Packages.” I think it should say “dist-upgrade” instead of “dist-uprade”.
Great article!
@Chris – thanks for catching that. I’ve updated the post.