kdesudo “adept_manager –dist-upgrade”

After a successful install on the machine that has the most packages, I chose to repeat on the other machines. Yay, I’m able to use Konqueror again.

I’ve also been very happy with some of the other improvements. While I was disappointed to see that KDE3 is missing, KDE4 now supports saving sessions and locking the terminal. Both were my biggest complaints aside from crashes.


fish://user@remotesystem


This really cuts down on the time of using the command line to work with large groups of files. You can also use the same format within Qt applications’ dialog boxes, making it easy to work with files directly from inside of applications.

Konqueror, in my opinion, is the best file manager on any platform. If you’re new to my blog, I’ve written about Konqueror before. While it lacks Breadcrumb Navigation, it’s more capable in regards to other features. It’s a tabbed environment, with the ability to split panes vertically and horizontally, multiple times. We’re able to integrate shell scripts, so the possibilities are virtually endless. You’re able to configure a background image. It includes an excellent web browser.

Katapult is an awesome shortcut launcher. This is an example of where the open-source community is ahead. Katapult provides quick access to shortcuts, applications on the KMenu, and others through “plugins”. To activate, you press a key combination (default is Alt+Space) and you’ll see the slingshot logo. Start typing a couple of characters and Katapult finds the closest relevant application, bookmark, etc. Complete the launch by pressing Enter. This is much quicker than using Alt+F1 and the arrow keys to navigate. It’s also more flexible and quicker than using the run dialog.

Konversation is another leap of technology past mainstream commercial personal operating systems. While Instant Messaging clients have come a long way over the past decade, IRC is still the king of chat, and few software packages surpass Konversation in the way of capabilities. It’s also important to newcomers of Kubuntu, because it provides immediate, direct access to the official chat, where the community is able to really provide instant support. I’ve used it many times and I’ve always been able to find someone willing to help me get going in the right direction when trying to solve my problem. It doesn’t have all of the instant messaging capabilities, but it’s direct link to instant help and free technical support earns it’s high ranking here.

kTorrent also holds no equal in Windows XP (or Vista I believe). Instead, you’re stuck to the demise of the single threaded transfer of Internet Exploder. If you’re not familiar yet with torrents, you should take the time to consider some of the free and open source torrents available at Jamendo while you’re testing out kTorrent.

SpeedCrunch also fills the gap where CALC.EXE fails to put processing power to work. SpeedCrunch’s view is more informative and input options are more diverse. It provides a running history of the calculations and provides user defined variables.

Kontact is THE free PIM and Mail client I choose to stick with. Many other applications integrate to Kontact which make it truly exceptional. It expertly handles my mail (IMAP mostly), my calendars, groupware connections, to do, notes, RSS feeds, etc. To achieve similar capabilities, you can spend several hundreds of dollars. It does everything.

Kaffeine is a stand up media player. This awesome KDE media player supports visualizations, plugins, it’s got it all. It plays mp3, wma, ogg, avi, etc. The program allows us to create media playlists. The integrated screen shot capture system is just a toolbar away.

Kopete is an awesome instant messaging client. It supports Jabber, AIM, Yahoo, MSN, GMail/XMPP, IRC, Gadu-Gadu, and many others. There are many messenger clients, but Kopete is so complete I’m not compelled to use anything else. While you can use Kopete for IRC, it’s just not flexible enough for an experienced IRC user to consider it higher in the ranking.

Kate is another Text Editor… but not just any. She’s very configurable and is powerful enough for use by developers. She’s particularly adept at helping change all of your configuration files. She’s not as fast or light as some of the alternatives, but the system has no competitive alternative when it comes to robustness.

k3b is by far superior to GnomeBaker. It allows the user to create DVD’s, audio CD’s, data DVD and CD’s, as well as VCD’s. It can create audio CD’s directly from MP3 with the addition of a plug in. It also directly burns and creates ISO image files of all formats.

Akregator will be my 11th and bonus application for this list. It integrates nicely with Kontact so you can easily access your feeds from your favorite PIM. Can’t beat that really.

Keep is one you can’t live without, so it’s the P.S. Bonus. It’s a backup manager allowing the user to specify the source and destinations of the backups, and scheduling the automated intervals. Another feature I enjoy is the ability to compress the backup. This works especially well for backing up /etc/ which contains many text files.

Installing KSquirrel

From the above link, click on Downloads and you’ll be taken to a page with multiple selections. You’ll need both files for the Debian binaries. In Konqueror, right click on the *-libs.deb file and use the Kubuntu package manager to install it. Mine failed, and that’s ok. Do the other file now using the same way, and it may fail again, like mine did. I fixed the install of both by using


sudo apt-get -f install


from Konsole. I was then able to launch by using alt+f2 and typing ksquirrel

Installation was a snap. I downloaded a pre-packed .DEB file from GetDeb although the installation instructions appeared simple enough, I chose to use my regular method of installing a .deb in KDE  (because I use Kubuntu) via right clicking in Konqueror and selecting Package -> Install Package.

The program permits a broad range of options and formats for the user, and directly requests the desired output format. It expertly handles 16:9 and 4:3 aspect ratios.

Where it needs help is in localization. Even after selecting the English language for the program, throughout the rest of the user’s experience, the application still presents the user with many prompts, labels, titles, etc, in something other than English.

It’s also in need of volunteers for documentation as evidenced by the gaping void of a help file of any form.

Because the program’s does perform so well, I’d like to see some more community support for this application to improve on the areas that it does need more development.

 KDE, Kubuntu, and Konqueror make this process easy. Simply right click on the downloaded file and then select Package Manager -> Install Package.

sudo apt-get install konqueror

If you find a need for a tabbed file manager, Konqueror steps up to the plate.

It also scores a double with the integrated web browser. While the browser’s not always perfect, it’s there as a convenience to me and usually renders quite nicely. Web pages appear on their own tabs.

Another score for Konqueror is the bookmark toolbar.

Konqueror can take it into overtime with the “View Most Visited” feature, found under the View menu.

Additionally, a feature I enjoy is the customized wallpaper for the browser windows. We are able to select any image file.

It also allows us to execute a shell command in the current folder, by using the Control-E key.

It also allows us to miraculously split the view, both vertically and horizontally. TRY IT!

I suggest installing Konqueror if Nautilus leaves you feeling disappointed.