KDE3 - KDE4 hybrid on 11.1; nothing works

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1

I performed a system wide update a little while ago. I didn’t notice anything unusual. I restarted my computer and when KDE started I had a KDE3 panel on top of a KDE4 panel. Wireless would not longer work. No KWIN, in fact, nothing but a black screen on the desktop with the two bars at the bottom. I could not add anything to the screen so I assume plasma is borked. Ctl-Alt-F1. Login, Su, rm .kde -r; rm .kde4 -r usually did the trick. Now it does nothing. Same thing when I load up KDE4.

So what I have got … or what openSUSE has forced down my throat is a hybrid KDE3 - KDE4 system where almost nothing works. In fact, it is basically unusable. Keep in mind, this was an ordinary update. No factory repos … nothing out of the ordinary. Should have gone as smooth as silk.

Now listen openSUSE and KDE4 guys. You have had plenty of time to get this working right. 11.0 came out in late 07 or early 08. We’ve since upgraded to 11.1. There is absolutely NO reason this many things should be broken after a simple update. I only use the OSS, NON-OSS and main update repos. No factory or build repos.

Gnome works fine, XFCE works fine, but KDE4 is a frigged up mess. I know how to tinker with it, but frankly, I am tired of having to tinker everytime they decide to do an incomplete or botched update.

openSUSE, get your act together or I’m outa here. There are too many other reliable distros to have to put up with this.

2

from gnome login use yast to create a new user account and try using that to do a kde4 login

report the result

(we can delete the new user later)

3

Indeed it should have.

As a quality check, and to help localize what might have gone wrong, can you please post the output of:
zypper lr

I have openSUSE-11.1 w/KDE-3.5.10 running on 4 different PCs that I maintain. I only have OSS, Non-OSS, Update and Packman repos setup on those PCs (no others). I have not seen anything like you report, hence I am suspicious wrt repos.

4

There must be something out of ordinary or else we’d be hearing about that from every user.

5

This will be the 4th time I’ve created a new user to solve a simple update that borked my entire system. I KNOW how to do it. My point is, I SHOULDN’T have to do it. Moreover, WHY should I do it? Tell me what advantage suse 11.1 has over Mint 6.0 KDE? Why should I stay with it? I can tell you the answer; NONE.

But Mint has gotten rave reviews, is based on Ubuntu and, therefore, has a more reliable stable of code writers.

6

peyre@linux-zx1n:~> zypper lr

| Alias | Name | Enabled | Refresh

—±------------------------------±--------------------------------------------±--------±-------
1 | openSUSE_11.1_KDE4_Extra-Apps | openSUSE 11.1 KDE4 Extra-Apps | Yes | Yes
2 | openSUSE_11.1_KDE4_Qt44 | openSUSE 11.1 KDE4 Qt44 | Yes | Yes
3 | openSUSE_11.1_XFCE | openSUSE 11.1 XFCE | Yes | Yes
4 | repo | Main Repository (NON-OSS) | Yes | Yes
5 | repo-debug | openSUSE-11.1-Debug | No | No
6 | repo-source | openSUSE-11.1-Source | No | No
7 | repo_1 | Main Repository (OSS) | Yes | Yes
8 | repo_10 | openSUSE BuildService - Games | No | No
9 | repo_11 | openSUSE BuildService - Database | No | No
10 | repo_12 | VideoLan Repository | No | No
11 | repo_13 | Packman Repository | No | No
12 | repo_2 | openSUSE BuildService - GNOME:Community | No | No
13 | repo_3 | openSUSE BuildService - GNOME:STABLE | No | No
14 | repo_4 | openSUSE BuildService - KDE:Backports | No | No
15 | repo_5 | openSUSE BuildService - KDE:Community | No | No
16 | repo_6 | openSUSE BuildService - OpenOffice.org | Yes | Yes
17 | repo_7 | openSUSE BuildService - Mozilla | Yes | Yes
18 | repo_8 | Main Update Repository | Yes | Yes
19 | repo_9 | openSUSE BuildService - Drivers for webcams | No | No
peyre@linux-zx1n:~>

My mistake. I do have buildservice for Mozilla and OOo enabled.

Question is, SHOULD I have some of these buildservice repos enabled?

7

It is nothing out of the ordinary and you ARE hearing it from users all over. Ordinary people who understand computers (not necessarily programmers) All you have to do is take an inventory of the number of threads reporting problems. (Which is about 90%)

8

I’m sorry to read of your frustrations, but 90% of users with threads are not having the same problem as you.

Also, users who do not have problems do not post often. … 90% of the problems on this forum are not KDE3-KDE4 hybrid problems. …

Still it would be very nice if we can figure out what happened to your PC.

I note this:

peyre@linux-zx1n:~> zypper lr

| Alias | Name | Enabled | Refresh

—±------------------------------±--------------------------------------------±--------±-------
1 | openSUSE_11.1_KDE4_Extra-Apps | openSUSE 11.1 KDE4 Extra-Apps | Yes | Yes
2 | openSUSE_11.1_KDE4_Qt44 | openSUSE 11.1 KDE4 Qt44 | Yes | Yes
16 | repo_6 | openSUSE BuildService - OpenOffice.org | Yes | Yes
17 | repo_7 | openSUSE BuildService - Mozilla | Yes | Yes
I highlighted in red KDE4_Extra-Apps and KDE4_QT44. Either of those could break your desktop with misbehaved applications inappropriately installed without one being careful. IMHO having both of those enabled was a MAJOR mistake. Having OpenOffice enabled is not IMHO a good idea (but should not be deadly). I view having Mozilla enabled is mostly harmless, although one must pay attention to updates from Mozilla.

Note - I always recommend users stick with 4 repos and ONLY 4 repos. OSS, Non-OSS, Update and Packman. Just those 4. No others. None. NONE AT ALL !! I do that for a reason. The reason is users will often break something by not understanding the risk of additional repos and not appreciate what they are doing. I fear this is what you have done.

What you could do is take a look at what you installed at the time your KDE3/4 broke. You can check the installed rpms, in chronological order by typing:
rpm -qa --last > rpmlist.txt
then open rpmlist.txt (with a text editor) and take a look at the update on the date where your KDE3/4 was broken. There is a chance you may be able to identify the application that caused the problem, and reverse the damage.

9

Of course that works. But what a pain in the a$$ to have configure everything after a simple upgrade. Now I have 4 users on my system, including my testuser.

I also have to go through the painstaking process of configuring wireless again; which by the way worked fine before this update.

So here’s the deal; In systray I have the SUSE networkmanager3 but the ball is grayed out. Of course it had no settings so I setup my wireless, found the SSID and entered the WPA-PSK key. (And yes, I did select the correct one from the drop down)

Then I right click on the globe and select the wireless I just setup. I expect the little wheel to start turning and see wireless activated. Nope, nothing happens.

So, I add the Network widget to my systray. I setup the wireless there as well. It asks me to setup KDEWallet which I do. So I should be good to go right?

Wrong. Neither Knetworkmanager3 or 4 works and they certainly don’t work together. They have, in the past, coexisted peacefully. So now I have hack on this network to get it up and running. It will probably take a day or more to read, experiment and several tries to get it going.

Oh, its great to see plasma back, but without wireless it is of no use to me. Gnome works fine, but not so much XFCE anymore. Mainly, it is the hodge-podge shoddy workmanship of either the KDE developers or those that brand it for SUSE.

At this point I don’t care. I can use Gnome, but I thought KDE4 was ready for prime time. It is NOT. Nor will it ever be if after 18 months of its original release wireless does not work out of the box and updates continually break systems.

If I were the Suse engineers I would cut KDE4 loose and take it out of the system because all it is doing is creating headaches for end users and discourages new users.

Sometimes I think Linux nerds like to keep things slightly off because that way it stays their domain. They don’t want Windows refugees. By keeping it a little bit broken they force widespread use to only long time Linux hackers like me.

Well, I’m at the point now where I DEPEND on my SUSE Linux system. I NEED it to work. If it doesn’t I’ll have to find something stable, reliable and less fussy.

Even Vista doesn’t cause these many problems and XP with SP3 is rock solid compared to this.

I’ve had my say, and tomorrow it will be a new install of Mint 6.0 KDE 4.2.2. My back up is Mint 6.0 (Gnome only) Frankly I don’t care, I just want something that works with minimal jiggling and tweaking from me.

Moreover, something that updates properly, and the updates don’t break the system.

10

I know how it feels to have some simple thing completely break the system. I had it where I was playing a game and the computer froze. I had to hard reset and then I couldn’t boot up because the filesystem was dirty. All because I played a game!

But that’s because I experiment. A LOT. And from what you said previously, having gnome, kde3, kde4, and xfce is more than what a normal new user would have. If you want something to just work without having to tweak things then don’t tweak things. Pick a DE and stick with it. No one told you you had to use more than just GNOME.

At this point I don’t care. I can use Gnome, but I thought KDE4 was ready for prime time. It is NOT. Nor will it ever be if after 18 months of its original release wireless does not work out of the box and updates continually break systems.

I use KDE4 and only KDE4 for everyday use. I have no problems with it whatsoever. I’ve installed it on three other computers for three other friends (who are FAR from tech savvy) within the past month and they have no problems with it. The only problem I’ve had so far is bluetooth. I don’t use bluetooth. If I need to transfer files from one computer to the other I use an SD card or a USB stick.

If I were the Suse engineers I would cut KDE4 loose and take it out of the system because all it is doing is creating headaches for end users and discourages new users.

Whatever headaches come, usually come from graphics card problems, wireless problems, etc. And those are system wide, not just specific to KDE4. Once again, a new user would probably start off with one desktop environment. KDE4’s wireless widget works fine with Kwallet if you have it set up correctly. If a user can’t do that they can ask on the forums where we’ll happily help them set it up.

Well, I’m at the point now where I DEPEND on my SUSE Linux system. I NEED it to work. If it doesn’t I’ll have to find something stable, reliable and less fussy.

If you need something stable then don’t fix what isn’t broken. Use GNOME if it works for you and you NEED it to work. Otherwise use a different computer for a test computer or make a persistent liveusb to test the other desktop environments out.

I’ve had my say, and tomorrow it will be a new install of Mint 6.0 KDE 4.2.2. My back up is Mint 6.0 (Gnome only) Frankly I don’t care, I just want something that works with minimal jiggling and tweaking from me.

Use whatever works for you. If it happens to be Mint with KDE 4.2.2 then that’s fine. If it happens to be Mint with Gnome that’s also fine. But I notice you said it’s Gnome only. Why not try openSUSE with just GNOME or just KDE 4.2.2? I think you’ll have a lot better experience. You can even reinstall your current system and keep your files and settings since your whole setup is so messed up. What would the difference be between doing that or installing a whole different distro?

Whichever path you take I wish you luck.

Take Care,

Ian

11

I noticed you have quite many repositories not enabled but did You do any updates from them earlier and then disabled?

I for example had problems with those KDE repos you have (not the 4.2 but the ones you get from “Community Repositories” in YaST).

12

Also, have you changed your KDE4 repositories to these?

Maine KDE 4.2 repo
Index of /repositories/KDE:/42/openSUSE_11.1

Community repo
Index of /repositories/KDE:/KDE4:/Community/openSUSE_11.1_KDE_42

(you probably won’t need this for things to “just work” but I’m providing it just in case) Playground
Index of /repositories/KDE:/KDE4:/Playground/openSUSE_11.1_KDE_42

These are the stable repositories now for KDE 4.2.2. Just an idea if you haven’t switched yet.

Good Luck,

Ian

13

Glad to read you made some progress.

I’m still a die hard KDE3 user. I am hoping for KDE4 improvement, and I do my best to positively encourage the KDE4 developers to improve KDE4, but in the end I’m not willing to test the KDE4 desktop at the expense of the functionality of my day-to-day activities ( instead I dedicate special time for “beta” / “early milestone release” testing on a separate sandbox PC ). One of my biggest concerns is the state of KDE3 for openSUSE-11.2. From what I read, Novell/SuSE-GmbH will not package it, although they will work with community members who are willing to take on the task. I fear openSUSE-11.1 may be the last openSUSE with a KDE3 with the quality and functionality we have been fortunate to expect out of KDE. Unlike Linus (and others) who left KDE for Gnome (while waiting for KDE4 stability and feature restoration), I don’t like Gnome and I will NOT use Gnome (I recently tried Gnome in Fedora 10 , which once again confirmed my views not to use Gnome). I hope KDE-4.3 is up to the task in openSUSE 11.2 (but the preceding statements of mine are all are soap box statements and they don’t belong here in this thread).

Best of luck in sorting your PC problems, and I hope you find the stable system that “works” for you, whether it be vista, xp, or some other Linux distribution. … After all is said and done, computers are just computers, there are more important things in life, and when not tinkering, we all want a system that just works for us.

Cheers!