# KDE tips & tricks

## huru

I couldn't find existing similar thread so I thought to make one myself. 

There's lots and lots of hidden or not-so-obvious features in KDE that most users probably do not know, like various KIO-slaves, web shortcuts etc. Maybe there's documentation somewhere but every now and then I've run into something new and I get the feeling "whoa, if I only knew earlier that was possible!". So, post your favourite KDE tricks here, whether it's handy less known KIO-slave, DCOP trick, ..whatever.

I'll start: Alt-F2 starts the "run command" dialog. What is probably less known is that the dialog can be used as simple calculator, just enter formula and hit enter. No need to start terminals or run kcalc for simple calculations  :Smile: 

Another I discovered by accident: When running konqueror in filemanager mode and moving files around (dragging), stop mouse cursor on top of folder (don't release button) for a moment. Konqueror opens the folder for you. This way you can drag and drop file deeper into hierarcy without opening new windows. Seems to be implemented in KDE 3.3.

----------

## firephoto

If your mouse decides to quit working from some application crashing or the batteries go dead or whatever you can press 'shift+numlock' and it lets you move the mouse cursor around with the number pad.

If you have the IRC client Konversation insalled it comes with some scripts you can use. If you're listening to a song with juk and type in '/juk', it will report what song you are listening to. Here's a list of the default scripts that get installed with Konversation-0.15.

amarok - Now playing script

cmd - Outputs the results of a command, '/cmd cat ~/my.file'

fortune - displays a fortune

gauge - Beer load

kaffeine - Now playing script

noatun - Now playing script

uptime - Sends your uptime info.

bug - '/bug 93482' would open kde bug 93482 in Konqueror.

colorizer - Colorizes your words.

juk - Now playing script

kdeversion - Sends the version info for Qt, KDE, and kde-config.

sayclip - Prints the contents of the clipbaord into Konversation with flood protection.

weather - Sends the weather info from KWeather

They are located in /usr/share/apps/konversation/scripts/ so you can take a look at them to see how they work and maybe make your own.

----------

## Hauser

I like to the assign my own keyboard shortcuts, for example I've changed 'Switch to desktop n' to 'Alt+n' so I can switch to one of the 4 desktops I use with my left hand very easily.   The command shortcuts are also very interesting, for instance to bind 'Ksnapshot' with the 'Print Screen' key is a very natural thing to do. 

I also like to make the panel hide automatically 1 sec after the cursor leaves the panel, it kind of makes your desktop look slightly larger. :Smile: 

If a user can mount a device (for instance by putting the 'users' option in the fstab), you can mount a device in Konqueror by clicking 'Services' (on the side bar), 'Devices' and then any one of the devices listed there, you'll immediately find yourself in the mount point (directory) associated with that device.  To umount, leave the directory first, right-click the device, and choose 'unmount'.

----------

## huru

 *Hauser wrote:*   

> I like to the assign my own keyboard shortcuts, for example I've changed 'Switch to desktop n' to 'Alt+n' so I can switch to one of the 4 desktops I use with my left hand very easily.   The command shortcuts are also very interesting, for instance to bind 'Ksnapshot' with the 'Print Screen' key is a very natural thing to do. 
> 
> 

 

Hmm, why didn't I never think of binding ksnapshot to printscreen  :Smile: 

Khotkeys is quite handy for making shortcuts. (Under regional & accessibility in control-center), for example you can program your extra multimedia keys to control amarok via dcop.

----------

## Yanaar

When I wrote my script to record tv I decided it would be better to stop setiathome/ksetiwatch during recording, but I wanted to start it after the record is finished. But ksetiwatch did not want to start, claiming about it could not connect to X. Took me some days to find out how to do it:

ksetiwatch  -display :0

So when someone needs to start an application out of a script or another Server, this might help    :Smile: 

----------

## Illissius

KHotKeys is awesome, I configured global Opera-esque mouse gestures for everything. Left -> Alt+Left (previous), Right -> Alt+Right (next), Up -> Esc (stop), Up+Down -> F5 (reload), Down -> Ctrl+N (new), Down+Right -> Ctrl+W (close).

----------

## deprave

heres one some people might not possibly be aware of.....in Konquerer you can browse thru ssh protocal via fish://

----------

## venkat

 *Hauser wrote:*   

> 
> 
> I also like to make the panel hide automatically 1 sec after the cursor leaves the panel, it kind of makes your desktop look slightly larger.
> 
> 

 

actually choosing "allow other windows to cover the panel" and checking "raise when ..." and choosing "bottom edge" does a neat job. just that i hate when the panel disappears while i'm at the root window ...

----------

## Herring42

 *deprave wrote:*   

> heres one some people might not possibly be aware of.....in Konquerer you can browse thru ssh protocal via fish://

 

Oh my!

That's one of the most useful features I've seen in a long time! Wow!

----------

## gkmac

 *Herring42 wrote:*   

>  *deprave wrote:*   heres one some people might not possibly be aware of.....in Konquerer you can browse thru ssh protocol via fish:// Oh my!
> 
> That's one of the most useful features I've seen in a long time! Wow!

 

And you can copy a file in that browser, then paste it in a hard drive view to download the file. Or you can view your hard drive, copy a file on your hard drive and then paste it in the fish:// view to upload it.

It gets better! If you see a text file in fish:// you want to edit, there's no need to download it, edit and re-upload. You can open KWrite (or Kate, or Kedit), type fish://whatever in the Location and the file selector dialog will browse the files on that server. You can then open, make edits and then save directly back to the ssh-connected server. (Just be prepared to re-enter your ssh password when you edit for a long-ish time).

It also works with plain FTP, you can type ftp://whatever and edit those HTML files on your ISPs webspace without having to download/upload back and forth all the time.

----------

## vdboor

sftp:// is also really nice.

About about dragging a picture from a website to your desktop? The file will be copied from the http:// location to your desktop (or used as background)!

Update:

Did you know you could replace the "lpr" command with "kprinter --nodialog" in your non-KDE applications?  :Smile:   :Smile: 

Did you try entering man:/ in KWrite?

Did you try opening a file on an FTP share with KWrite? The KIO-slave automatically uploads the file again if you save it.

Most window managers (inclusing KWin): Hold Alt down to move windows across the screen.

I happened to find some interesting tips in KTip:

 *Quote:*   

> Want to print by using "DragNDrop"? 
> 
> Drag a file and drop it on the "Files" tab of an opened kprinter dialog. 

 

 *Quote:*   

> If you drag a file from Konqueror or from the desktop to Konsole, you will have the choice between pasting the URL or entering that folder.

 

 *Quote:*   

> You can access a man page by entering a hash mark (#) and the name of the man page wherever you can enter a URL, like in the location field of the web browser or the Alt+F2 command-line.
> 
> You can access an info page by entering a double hash mark (##) and the name of the info page wherever you can enter a URL, like in the URL line of the web browser or the Alt+F2 command-line. 

 

 *Quote:*   

> You can change the background color of the desktop by dragging a color from a color selector in any application to the desktop background. 

 

 *Quote:*   

> You can use Konqueror to browse through tar archives, even compressed ones. You can extract files simply by dragging them to another place, e.g. another Konqueror window or the desktop.

 

 *Quote:*   

> The program Klipper, which is started by default and resides in the system tray at the right end of the panel, keeps a number of text selections around. These can be retrieved or even (in the case of URLs, for example) be executed.

 

And finally: press the maximize button with your middle or right mouse..!

----------

## LinuxRocks

 *Herring42 wrote:*   

>  *deprave wrote:*   heres one some people might not possibly be aware of.....in Konquerer you can browse thru ssh protocal via fish:// 
> 
> Oh my!
> 
> That's one of the most useful features I've seen in a long time! Wow!

 

Oh My is right. That flat out ROCKS!!! 

This will save me TONS of time scp'ing and what not...

Great Tip!!!!

Joe

----------

## FormerSlacker

CTRL + ESC brings up a nice little process manager.

----------

## Gherald

 *LinuxRocks wrote:*   

>  *Herring42 wrote:*    *deprave wrote:*   heres one some people might not possibly be aware of.....in Konquerer you can browse thru ssh protocal via fish:// 
> 
> Oh my!
> 
> That's one of the most useful features I've seen in a long time! Wow! 
> ...

 

Erm well, I'd rather have a real mount so I can use good 'ol cp, edit files directly, and such:

```
emerge shfs

modprobe shfs

mkdir /mnt/point #or whatever

echo "user@server:/                           /mnt/point/     shfs    noauto,user,stable      0 0" >> /etc/fstab

mount /mnt/point
```

Now just add shfs into your kernel's autoload so it gets loaded at boot.

Combined with keychain and a general-purpose multimount script like mmt, shfs is really badass for managing multiple machines.

----------

## acdispatcher

In Konqueror you can also browse some man pages quick and easy just type:  

man:///

Then you can bookmark it for later use.

----------

## vdboor

 *freeix wrote:*   

> 
> 
> Erm well, I'd rather have a real mount so I can use good 'ol cp, edit files directly, and such:

 

I can see your point (and the keygen example), but did you know you can open FTP/SFTP files with KWrite, and the KIO-slave uploads the file automatically if you have it?  :Smile: 

----------

## Illissius

Go to Control Centre -> System Administration -> Paths, and change the desktop path to system:/. Also try media:/, applications:/, and settings:/. (The first one may or may not require 3.4, the other three certainly do.)

----------

## akvalentine

 *Quote:*   

> Go to Control Centre -> System Administration -> Paths, and change the desktop path to system:/. Also try media:/, applications:/, and settings:/

 

What does this do?  I tried it, but didn't notice any change.

----------

## Mark Clegg

In konqueror, displaying a long web page, shift up/down arrow starts the page auto-slow-scrolling.

Successive shift up-down's let you control the speed. esc stops it.

----------

## vdboor

In KMail, select a fragment of an e-mail message and press "r". Your reply only quotes the selected text.

----------

## wget

 *FormerSlacker wrote:*   

> CTRL + ESC brings up a nice little process manager.

 In addtion, Ctrl+Alt+Esc loads Xkill.

----------

## hvengel

 *vdboor wrote:*   

> In KMail, select a fragment of an e-mail message and press "r". Your reply only quotes the selected text.

 

You can also select reply to or foward from the menu and only the selected text will be included.

----------

## Bob P

 *firephoto wrote:*   

> If your mouse decides to quit working from some application crashing or the batteries go dead or whatever you can press 'shift+numlock' and it lets you move the mouse cursor around with the number pad.
> 
> 

 

very handy.  its interesting that it works with the numeric pad but not with the cursor keypad.  :Confused: 

----------

## Gherald

 *Bob P wrote:*   

>  *firephoto wrote:*   If your mouse decides to quit working from some application crashing or the batteries go dead or whatever you can press 'shift+numlock' and it lets you move the mouse cursor around with the number pad.
> 
>  
> 
> very handy.  its interesting that it works with the numeric pad but not with the cursor keypad. 

 

No, its not interesting.  It is identical to the functionality of windows.

The cursor keypad has other, more important uses.  The numpad is sort of "auxilary" to the main parts of the keyboard and is much more suited to acting as a makeshift mouse.

Also, it's not KDE-specific.  I know it works in Fluxbox, so it is likely an X thing.

----------

## sakus

 *deprave wrote:*   

> heres one some people might not possibly be aware of.....in Konquerer you can browse thru ssh protocal via fish://

 

Which one of the split KDE builds do I need to emerge to get this? Currently I get "protocol not supported" error when I try that.

----------

## tpr

 *sakus wrote:*   

> 
> 
> Which one of the split KDE builds do I need to emerge to get this? Currently I get "protocol not supported" error when I try that.

 

Don't know about Gentoo packages at all, but kio_man is inside of kdebase. (kdebase/kioslave/man/)

----------

## sakus

 *tpr wrote:*   

>  *sakus wrote:*   
> 
> Which one of the split KDE builds do I need to emerge to get this? Currently I get "protocol not supported" error when I try that. 
> 
> Don't know about Gentoo packages at all, but kio_man is inside of kdebase. (kdebase/kioslave/man/)

 

Okay thanks, emerging kde-base/kdebase-kioslaves did it.

----------

## superstoned

 *vdboor wrote:*   

>  *freeix wrote:*   
> 
> Erm well, I'd rather have a real mount so I can use good 'ol cp, edit files directly, and such: 
> 
> I can see your point (and the keygen example), but did you know you can open FTP/SFTP files with KWrite, and the KIO-slave uploads the file automatically if you have it? 

 

this is nothing... I am waiting until I can open two ftp folders, go into a tar.gz in one of them, cd into a tar.gz in the other, and drag'n'drop files between them...  :Very Happy: 

actually I don't know if this is possible now (I can't test it now, installing gentoo...  :Very Happy: ) but I thought it isn't, and they are working on it. but you *can* copy files from one ftp folder onto another, without even noticing they are on ftp.

----------

## Illissius

Add MouseMiddleClickClosesTab=true to the [FMSettings] section in ~/.kde/share/config/konquerorrc to have it do what it says.

----------

## totencham

You can make your "Launch Pager" (desktops previewer) transparent by clicking it with right mouse button and in "Show" select transparent.

----------

## monotux

Another feature:

Install dbus / hal (make sure you have compiled in support for it...) and make it work, and enable device icons on your desktop.

Then try plug in your USB-memory...and click on the USB-disc icon on your desktop.

Another one:

Insert a audio cd, and click on the icon on the desktop - in there, you'll find a few different directories, like "Mp3", "FLAC" and "Ogg Vorbis".

Take one of these directories, and drag it to your desktop - and konqueror will start ripping and encoding it  :Very Happy: 

(you can customize it, of course! Take a look in the control panel)

----------

## jdgill0

 *acdispatcher wrote:*   

> In Konqueror you can also browse some man pages quick and easy just type:  
> 
> man:///
> 
> Then you can bookmark it for later use.

 

Ah yes this is nice ...  I have actually been using man:some_command in konq, but I never realized I could get a listing of everything that was available with man:///.

Also, these same tricks with man work with info in konq.

----------

## radfoj

also if you try for example

```
#xo
```

 you will get "list" of all available manpages starting xo  :Very Happy: 

----------

## jdgill0

 *radfoj wrote:*   

> also if you try for example
> 
> ```
> #xo
> ```
> ...

 

hmmm  ... this does the same thing as

```
man:xo
```

If you type just

```
#
```

and hit enter it does the same as man:/// ... so it appears that # is a shortcut to man, but it certainly is faster to type  :Exclamation: 

----------

## superstoned

another tip:

select some music tracks in amarok, drag'n'drop them onto the usbstick icon on your kicker, and the files are copied to the usbstick (it has to be mounted, btw). as easy as it gets.

edit: also works for the icon on the desktop!

----------

## jdgill0

This trick I got from http://wiki.kde.org

 *Quote:*   

> Create a normal textfile with the name 
> 
> e-mail.desktop
> 
>  in the directory 
> ...

 

Now the e-mail command is located under the actions when you right-click, at least in KDE 3.4.

----------

## superstoned

 *jdgill0 wrote:*   

> This trick I got from http://wiki.kde.org
> 
>  *Quote:*   Create a normal textfile with the name 
> 
> e-mail.desktop
> ...

 

thanx, great tip!

----------

## totencham

You can regulate volume of amaroK (so PCM too) by moving mouse wheel over amaroK's tray icon.

----------

## NamShub

Make sure to use Qt-Gtk engine to have a consistant looking desktop. After installing, look for the new entry in KControl (Look & Feel)

The more details you put in your X.org configuration file, the more the display section of KControl becomes useful

Editing your /usr/kde/3.x/share/config/kdm/Xservers file will let you have the "Switch User" option in your K Menu. Just hit Ctrl+Alt+F? to switch desktops.

----------

## Hoek

Maybe everyone knows that already, i'll mention it though:

In Konqueror, there's something called "web shortcuts", a very handy feature that lets you save a lot of time.

For example, type "gg:keyword" into Konqueror's address bar to browse to google searching for "keyword".

The same thing with e.g. "wp:keyword": There's no way  finding a keyword on Wikipedia faster =)

You can list all possible shortcut conbinations in Konqueror's preferences - and even create your own.

Want to find something on eBay really fast?

Go to web shortcut preferences, call the new shortcut something like "eBay search", with the shortcut "eb" or something, and type the following as search query URL:

```
http://search.ebay.com/\{@}
```

Replace ".com" with any other eBay domain (.de, .fr, .jp or something)

If you want to find out how to send more extended search queries, use the "quickhelp" feature: click on the question mark button in the dialog box and then on the URL input field and you get an explanation of the special characters you can use to express your search.

Now typing "eb:stuff" into Konqueror's address bar finds stuff on eBay..  :Cool: 

----------

## superstoned

even handier, you can set each of these searches as default. so you just type some words in the locationbar, and it can search whatever you want by default - google, google image search, ask jeeves, etcetera.

----------

## firephoto

And the url to that you can use to create a Gentoo forums search is:

https://forums.gentoo.org/search.php?sourceid=Konqueror-search&search_keywords=\{@}

Then just add whatever shortcut you want to it and you have quick forum searching handy.

----------

## superstoned

 *firephoto wrote:*   

> And the url to that you can use to create a Gentoo forums search is:
> 
> https://forums.gentoo.org/search.php?sourceid=Konqueror-search&search_keywords=\{@}
> 
> Then just add whatever shortcut you want to it and you have quick forum searching handy.

 

cool  :Cool: 

----------

## i92guboj

Finally figured out how to take rid of two things that annoyed me for some time.

First was the kmenu titles, that are pretty useless. Now the menu looks much more simpler and beautifull, second was the kmenu icons, that i dont need, now the menu displays much faster that before. For both things you have to edit the ~/.kde/share/config/kickerrc file and add tow lines like these under the [menus] section:

```

ShowMenuTitles=false   ## This is for annoying grey titles

MenuEntryHeight=-1   ## This one is for the icons

```

Note that what the line for the icons do is to set the height of that column to -1, so it won't display. You can also use a value like 32 to get one kmenu a la winxp, with bigger icons. The default is 16, that are the small icons that you see by default when you install kde.

These little tips came from here:

https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-337050-start-0-postdays-0-postorder-asc-highlight-.html

Thanks to fuji for that.  :Very Happy: 

----------

## jdgill0

Konqueror stores its favicons in /var/tmp/.../kdecache-username/favicon/ or something like that.  This normally isn't a problem, but if you happen to be one of those people who regularly cleans out /var/tmp you will delete your favicons too.

You can avoid this problem by backing up the KDE specific tmp directories, but an easier method of dealing with this is to set KDEVARTMP and KDETMP environment variables ... I export them myself to /home/usrname/.KDEVARTMP and /home/usrname/.KDETMP, respectively.

[EDIT]

In fact, see this webpage for a list of KDE's environment variables.

----------

## Sir-Gentoo

Wow, damn, that are some really nice tips, thx goes to the one who told about the usbstick thingy on the desktop, its right that what i wanted, and thx to the one with the amarok volume switch per mouse wheel, pretty nice...

----------

## merced

 *furiorc wrote:*   

> Another feature:
> 
> Install dbus / hal (make sure you have compiled in support for it...) and make it work, and enable device icons on your desktop.
> 
> Then try plug in your USB-memory...and click on the USB-disc icon on your desktop.
> ...

 

Thanks for the tip, furiorc!  However, I'm having some problems with it.

How do I get my users to be able to "Safely Remove" the device?  I can only do this as root.

I know it has something to do with kdeeject and the device permissions, but I don't want to give my users access as a part of the disk group.

----------

## jmercer

When you paste an address into kmail, it will translate "myname at foo dot bar" into "myname@foo.bar"

----------

## monotux

 *merced wrote:*   

> Thanks for the tip, furiorc!  However, I'm having some problems with it.
> 
> How do I get my users to be able to "Safely Remove" the device?  I can only do this as root.
> 
> I know it has something to do with kdeeject and the device permissions, but I don't want to give my users access as a part of the disk group.

 Ever considered using sudo?  :Smile: 

----------

## merced

 *furiorc wrote:*   

> Ever considered using sudo? 

 

Well, I actually found (can't remember where...) that I have to copy /usr/share/hal/fdi/90defaultpolicy/storage-policy.fdi to /usr/share/hal/fdi/95userpolicy/storage-policy.fdi and make one change.

```
<merge key="storage.policy.default.mount_option.user" type="bool">true</merge>
```

should be changed to

```
<merge key="storage.policy.default.mount_option.users" type="bool">true</merge>
```

Now users can unmount the device with "Safely Remove", but the icon doesn't disappear like it does for root.  Any ideas on how to get the icon to disappear?

----------

## monotux

 *merced wrote:*   

>  *furiorc wrote:*   Ever considered using sudo?  
> 
> Well, I actually found (can't remember where...) that I have to copy /usr/share/hal/fdi/90defaultpolicy/storage-policy.fdi to /usr/share/hal/fdi/95userpolicy/storage-policy.fdi and make one change.
> 
> ```
> ...

 

I usually tell KDE that unmounted devices's shouldn't be displayed on my desktop if I don't want to see them...  :Smile: 

----------

## Jeremy_Z

One i think is quite useful too on a laptop. You close your laptop while watching the TV but forgot to put your Kopete status to "away" ? Use DCOP and ACPI event to do that for you !

In /etc/acpi/default.sh

```

# Default acpi script that takes an entry for all actions

set $*

group=${1/\/*/}

action=${1/*\//}

case "$group" in

        button)

                case "$action" in

                        power)  /sbin/init 0

                                ;;

                        lid)    /etc/acpi/actions/lid.sh

                                ;;

                        *)      logger "ACPI action $action is not defined"

                                ;;

                esac

                ;;

        *)

                logger "ACPI group $group / action $action is not defined"

                ;;

esac

```

And lid.sh :

```

#!/bin/bash

state=`cat /proc/acpi/button/lid/LID/state`

if [[ $state =~ 'open' ]]

then

        logger "ACPI: Lid is open."

        /usr/kde/3.4/bin/dcop --all-user kopete KopeteIface setAvailable

else

        logger "ACPI: Lid is closed."

        /usr/kde/3.4/bin/dcop --all-user kopete KopeteIface setAway "Away, the computer is closed, no need to insist."

fi

```

 :Smile: 

PS: a better way is to just use setAutoAway on lid close, and do nothing and lid open, this way keep your status if you were already away before.

----------

## jaso

I don't like the way kmail shows its status in the panel. I would like to be informed when a new mail is arrived and not how many are unread. So I've tried kbiff today. It now stays in the panel, waits for new mails, plays a sound and changes its icon if a new mail is arrived. A click at the icon brings me  to kontact and forces kmail to check for new mails.

At first you have to install kbiff

```
emerge -a kbiff
```

After you've started kbiff it shows its configuration box. You have to configure the mailboxes which have to be monitored in the "Mailbox" tab - e.g. my incoming mails are delivered into a maildir ~/.maildir.

kbiff has to play a sound when a new mail is arrived, that can be configured in the tab "New Mail".

I use several virtual desktops and desktop no. 4 is the one where kontact is running. When I click at the kbiff icon in the panel, kbiff has to open (or use the already running) kontact on desktop 4 and force kmail to check for new mails.

This can be done through dcop calls in the "General" tab. Enter 

```
kstart --desktop 4 kontact && dcop kwin KWinInterface setCurrentDesktop 4 && dcop kmail KMailIface checkMail 
```

into the "Mail client" box.

----------

## azlan

The kio-locate slave is one of my favorites..

You have to emerge it.. emerge kio-locate

What is cool about it is that unlike the built in Konqueror search tool, it will let you browse through the  located paths as if you had created a seperate filesystem.  

Also like Firefox you can use the find_as_you_type feature, just the hit / character and type in the word you are looking for.  The only downside, is that you have a time limit as to how long it stays on.

The same with find as you type links, just hit the ' character and start typing.

----------

## lynxnyl

btw, / works in man too. Invaluable.

```
kdialog --title "Top process" --passivepopup "`ps ax -o pcpu,pid,comm k -pcpu | sed -e '/Fah/d' -e 's/\../&%/' -e '1d' -e '4,$d'`" 3
```

I added that to sysmon - cron jobs can scare me.  :Wink:  Shows which process is taking the most proc power.

```
kdict %s
```

You've got to love this! I've assigned it to one of my multimedia keys - it launches kdict and searches for the content of the clipboard.

saveBackup.desktop

Kde context menu item that duplicates the curent item (file or dir) to "$name".dupl. Save it in $KDEDIR/share/apps/konqueror/servicemenus/

openAsRoot.desktop

Kde context menu item that gives you root access to the text file. I always want to edit something of root, but running su kde is redundant. Save it in $KDEDIR/share/apps/konqueror/servicemenus/

Then I also modified the "convert to" service menus, since they don't use any compression by default.Last edited by lynxnyl on Sun Sep 11, 2005 7:53 am; edited 1 time in total

----------

## azlan

Your links are dead.... I tried them... and ..... dead

----------

## lynxnyl

ups, put in the wrong host. FIXED

----------

## madmango

Ok. I've set my volume keys on my lappy to adjust volume using aumix (i don't like how kde steps the volume too much), but whenever i push it, aumix appears for a microsecond in the taskbar. Anyway to get rid of this?

----------

## thomasvk

Perhaps good if it's listed here: how to bind the Windows logo key, found on many modern keyboard, to show the KMenu?  :Rolling Eyes: 

----------

## Headrush

You can't go a day without hearing someone whining about how bloated they think KDE is. 

It seems the argument is more based in semantics about numbers than how effective and useful this environment is.

 * wrote:*   

> (OK your DE uses 15MB less of RAM, but who cares if most people have 256MB or more and it runs fine?)
> 
> (Or my favorite, OMG, KDE uses 300MB of HD space, my 80GB HD will be filled too fast.)

 

Although there are areas of improvement in interface defaults, the more I use KDE the more little features I find that are indispensible.

Kio-slaves like fish:/ are obvious but what are some of the less known nuggets?

Preface: I'm using the latest 3.5_alpha1 KDE packages, so I don't know if this is new or not.

The lastest I found was the clear button in konqueror.

If you had a URL address in the clipboard that you were ready to paste in the location bar, you hit the clear button and then middle click in the location bar to post the URL. You needed the clear button since selecting the text in the location bar to paste over would cause its contents to be added to the clipboard, erasing your original URL.

If you middle click the clear button, it clears the location bar and pastes the text in one operation, saving you a mouse click.

Just curious how many other goodies like this are in KDE?

----------

## TNorthover

Just middle clicking anywhere neutral in the window works as well (basically, anywhere but a hyperlink). Very nice feature.

----------

## Headrush

 *TNorthover wrote:*   

> Just middle clicking anywhere neutral in the window works as well (basically, anywhere but a hyperlink). Very nice feature.

 

Cool.

And if the selected text isn't a URL, it asks if you want to search the internet using the selection.   :Cool: 

----------

## TNorthover

Damn, that seems to be a 3.5 feature. I really am looking forward to that.

----------

## KhanReaper

 *Headrush wrote:*   

> 
> 
> Just curious how many other goodies like this are in KDE?

 

Since it appears that you are using KDE 3.5, I have a new feature to suggest to you. If you like Windows XP's ability to lock the contents and alignment of the taskbar, you might be surprised to find out that 3.5's Kicker supports something relatively similar to this.

I have a few screenshots of this available on my KDE 3.5 preview page.

As well, while I know that this feature has been in KDE for years now, not too many people know about it: You can use the audiocd:/ KIOSlave to rip and encode CDs into your favorite audio format, including tagging. Depending upon your use flags, you can encode the contents in Ogg/Vorbis, WAV, RAW, FLAC, and MP3. I know that not everyone knows about this feature. Oh, I should mention that it uses libcdparanoia, so that should help ensure a high quality rip. The options for this KIOSlave are housed in kcontrol under the audio administration dialog.

----------

## Headrush

 *KhanReaper wrote:*   

> Since it appears that you are using KDE 3.5, I have a new feature to suggest to you. If you like Windows XP's ability to lock the contents and alignment of the taskbar, you might be surprised to find out that 3.5's Kicker supports something relatively similar to this.

 

I don't really care about the locking feature itself, but I do like how it removes the "move" handles for the different sections in the panel.

----------

## Earthwings

Merged https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-p-2742885.html#2742885 ff.

konqueror's ability to be controlled by dcop is great btw. I use it to extract [topic] links from all tabs so I don't have to collect them manually when moving threads to Duplicates   :Twisted Evil: 

----------

## i92guboj

 *Headrush wrote:*   

>  *KhanReaper wrote:*   Since it appears that you are using KDE 3.5, I have a new feature to suggest to you. If you like Windows XP's ability to lock the contents and alignment of the taskbar, you might be surprised to find out that 3.5's Kicker supports something relatively similar to this. 
> 
> I don't really care about the locking feature itself, but I do like how it removes the "move" handles for the different sections in the panel.

 

Same here. Still, there is a thing that I hardly dislike about the lock feature: I use to drag&drop icons from the menu to some folders (for example~/kde/Autostart), that feature is also disable when the bar is locked, which is annoying for me. I would like better a fast acces to the hide/unhide handlers. It is a pain to open kcontrol just for that each time that you need to move and applet.

----------

## thomasvk

You can go to the panel options and select to hide the grip handles until you hover over them, on the same tab where you can set the panel background. Under an extra button. Is that the option you're looking for, or do I understand you lot wrong?

----------

## i92guboj

No, what I want isnt in kde yet. What I want is to completely remove these handles (which I already have), but I would like a nearest option to show them if I need to in a concrete moment. For example an option like "Show/Hide handles" in the right click menu of kicker. So, I can have them hide, but if I need the handles to show to move one control right now, I can activate them w/o having to enter the control center or kicker configuration panel.

I could have them as you say, to only show when hovering them, but that waste the precious space in kicker, that I need to open tasks. So, that is not an option.

Still, thanks so much for taking your time  :Wink: 

----------

## chetan13

 *t0maz wrote:*   

> Perhaps good if it's listed here: how to bind the Windows logo key, found on many modern keyboard, to show the KMenu? 

 

i have asked this question in #kde multiple times but no one there seems to know the answer  :Sad: 

maybe it isn't possible

----------

## count_zero

 *chetan13 wrote:*   

>  *t0maz wrote:*   Perhaps good if it's listed here: how to bind the Windows logo key, found on many modern keyboard, to show the KMenu?  
> 
> i have asked this question in #kde multiple times but no one there seems to know the answer 
> 
> maybe it isn't possible

 

Here you go:

The newer kde's apply the windows key as a modifier key, much like shift or control.  Thus, you'll have to remap the key to get it to behave like you want it to.  Add this to your ~/.Xmodmap file:

```
keycode 115 = F13
```

Restart X.

Go into the control center --> Regional & Accessibility --> Keyboard Shortcuts.

Look under the Global Shortcuts tab for "Popup Launch Menu"

Choose to define an alternate shortcut for it, and hit your windows key.  That's it.  

(though personally, I have mine linked to win-c and win-v so I can cut and paste in the console, but to each his own  :Very Happy: )

----------

## thomasvk

I don't want to be annoying,   :Embarassed:  but I guess there isn't a way to have it both pop the KDE menu and have it be a modifier key?   :Rolling Eyes: 

----------

## count_zero

 *t0maz wrote:*   

> I don't want to be annoying,   but I guess there isn't a way to have it both pop the KDE menu and have it be a modifier key?  

 

None that I know of...

but do you really want the K-menu popping up every time you use the windows key in another key combination?  :Shocked: 

(after all, there are around 300 different two-key combinations using only shift, alt, and ctrl as modifiers on a standard 104 key keyboard--you can surely find another to suit you  :Wink: )

----------

## iplayfast

First emerge festival 

Then in kmail set up a filter based on subject or person or whatever the trigger should be. 

When kmail gets the mail with the trigger, have the filter execute command

echo "Message from ebay regarding your stupid purchase" | saytext

There's probably a way to have it state the message subject as well, but it's not obvious

----------

## Bobbie

konqueror:

- using mouse wheel on tabs will cycle tabs. 

amarok:

- mouse wheel over the play buttons will change volume (like over notification are icon)

- left clik on play buttons brin context menu

- notification area icon change colors accoding to the song position when playing

----------

## Earthwings

Split off yakuake.

----------

## andromexus

This is on of the most useful threads I have ever seen!

Maybe it's already been stated before, but I'll post it anyway:

If you drag and drop a file from ftp (or http or whatever) directory in konqueror into an open konsole window it gets saved in the actual working directory of that konsole using kfmclient. I also works with images etc.

A very nice feature, showing how well integrated KDE is already.

----------

## Zee

If you use KDM as your login manager, you can disable the background and thus speed up the boot process of your KDE environment.

----------

## torio

 *Bobbie wrote:*   

> konqueror:
> 
> - using mouse wheel on tabs will cycle tabs. 
> 
> amarok:
> ...

 

Also 

- "control + moving the mouse wheel on the notification area icon" plays next/previous track in playlist

- "shift + moving the mouse wheel on the notification area icon" skips 5 sec forward/back the current song

----------

## torio

 *jdgill0 wrote:*   

> This trick I got from http://wiki.kde.org
> 
>  *Quote:*   Create a normal textfile with the name 
> 
> e-mail.desktop
> ...

 

Here is the link to a mini tutorial on service menus 

 *Quote:*   

>  http://developer.kde.org/documentation/tutorials/dot/servicemenus.html 

 

Here are some exsamples

enqueue/play files in beep media player

 *Quote:*   

> 
> 
> [Desktop Entry]
> 
> ServiceTypes=audio/*,inode/directory
> ...

 

send files to kate

 *Quote:*   

> 
> 
> [Desktop Entry] 
> 
> ServiceTypes=all/allfiles 
> ...

 

salu2

----------

## choenig

Anybody ever used the minitools in konqueror? No?

Anybody ever tried to use javascript(...) style links as a bookmark? Yes, with no luck? Oh, "Javascript is not supported"? Heh ...

The minitools (if you don't find them in 'Tools', activate them in 'Configure Extentisions'!) allow you to use javascript(...) style links as bookmarks. This is very useful if you like to use something like Sitebar or Bookmark4u and especially their 'Add new bookmark' links.

Hope this helps somebody as it helped me when I found it out  :Smile: 

take care, have fun

/christian

----------

## RobNyc

The trick I want to find out how to install these damn themes/window decorations/styles , its so easy in gnome

----------

## tSp

 *deprave wrote:*   

> heres one some people might not possibly be aware of.....in Konquerer you can browse thru ssh protocal via fish://

 

also, if you click on the konqueror icon on your desktop, it will have a screen that has a bunch of links, one of them is Network Folders (if you havent changed your default homepage).  Clicking that will then display any network folders you have previously set up using samba or ssh.  There is also a icon that lets you easily create network folders.....

these also work on konqueror:

smb:/         (sort of like network neighborhood in winblows)

remote:/

Here are a few screenshots....

konqueror default - http://www.maysville-linux-users-group.org/konq.jpg

if you dont get the screen above, run this command - kfmclient openProfile webbrowsing

konqueror showing network connections - http://www.maysville-linux-users-group.org/konq1.jpg

network connection setup - http://www.maysville-linux-users-group.org/konq2.jpg

----------

## thomasvk

Like you can scroll over amaroKs tray icon to change it's volume you can scroll over the KMix icon to change the master volume. Perhaps other applications have cool undiscovered tray icon features?

* starts all KDE applications and tries all 8 mousebuttons on each.   :Rolling Eyes: 

Edit: Ah, middleclick on amaroK tray icon is pause.   :Cool: Last edited by thomasvk on Mon Apr 07, 2014 9:57 pm; edited 1 time in total

----------

## andromexus

 *t0maz wrote:*   

> Like you can scroll over amaroKs tray icon to change it's volume you can scroll over the KMix icon to change the master volume. Perhaps other applications have cool undiscovered tray icon features?
> 
> * t0maz starts all KDE applications and tries all 8 mousebuttons on each.  
> 
> Edit: Ah, middleclick on amaroK tray icon is pause.  

 

tadaaa: try mousewheeling over the clock   :Razz: 

----------

## thomasvk

 *andromexus wrote:*   

>  * wrote:*   Like you can scroll over amaroKs tray icon to change it's volume you can scroll over the KMix icon to change the master volume. Perhaps other applications have cool undiscovered tray icon features?
> 
> * tarts all KDE applications and tries all 8 mousebuttons on each.  
> 
> Edit: Ah, middleclick on amaroK tray icon is pause.   
> ...

 

 :Neutral: 

Cool!Last edited by thomasvk on Mon Apr 07, 2014 9:57 pm; edited 1 time in total

----------

## Section_8

This is similar to jdgillO's kmail attachment tip, but for thunderbird - it lets you select one or more files in konqueror and do - right click->Actions->Attach to Email  to attach them all to an email in thunderbird.

First save this as ~/.kde/share/apps/konqueror/servicemenus/attachToEmail.desktop:

 *Quote:*   

> [Desktop Action attachall]
> 
> Exec=/usr/local/bin/attach_all %U
> 
> Icon=thunderbird
> ...

 

Save this as /usr/local/bin/attach_all:

 *Quote:*   

> #!/bin/bash
> 
> #  Attach all input files to a thunderbird email
> 
> # /usr/bin/thunderbird -compose attachment='file:///dir/file1,file:///dir/netrav.txt'
> ...

 

Of course, any users with the service menu entry must be able to execute this script.

----------

## Mr. Garr

hi 

is it possible to make the panel smaller but without getting panel icons (kmenu and starters) so fcking small?

----------

## ezacaria

Hi, I could not find this anywhere, and finally figured it out. Maybe somebody will use it  :Smile: 

The schemas for Kate and Kwrite are stored in the

.kde/share/config/kateschemarc

file, at least for the basic settings like font type, size and colors. 

Apparently, custom modifications for the syntax highlight are reflected in the file

.kde/share/config/katesyntaxhighlightingrc

Well, at least now I can use take the same background, font size, etc to the machine at home more easily.

It would be nice if there would be an import schema feature, similar to the highlight download feature, so that people with more knowledge about color combinations could make good schemas and dumb people like me would have an easier time when working at the computer  :Wink: 

Eduardo

----------

## gravedigga_23

Hey,

i havent find a option to disable auto backuping from kate in the gui.

so u must edit this config file:

```
~/.kde3.4/share/config/katerc
```

u have to set Backup Config Flags to 0 in [Kate Document Defaults] Section

```
Backup Config Flags=0
```

----------

## dobysirius

 *gravedigga_23 wrote:*   

> Hey,
> 
> i havent find a option to disable auto backuping from kate in the gui.
> 
> so u must edit this config file:
> ...

 

In Kate 2.5.0 on KDE 3.5.0 it's possible from the GUI:

Settings > Configure Kate > Editor > Open/Save > Backup on Save - uncheck Local and Remote files

----------

## VinzC

Hi.

I'd like to know how I can customize KDE 5 "Create new..." context menu. I'd like to add my own documents: PHP, Perl, desktop...

Thanks.

----------

## incabolocabus

 *Quote:*   

> I'd like to know how I can customize KDE 5 "Create new..." context menu.

 

This is not a help forum.

But its a nice tip and/or trick.

For each template:

  create desktop file in .kde3.5/share/templates

  add template file somewhere

  make desktop file refer to template file

Look in the /usr/share/templates directory for examples.

You might have to restart konqueror.

----------

## beatryder

 *monotux wrote:*   

>  *merced wrote:*    *furiorc wrote:*   Ever considered using sudo?  
> 
> Well, I actually found (can't remember where...) that I have to copy /usr/share/hal/fdi/90defaultpolicy/storage-policy.fdi to /usr/share/hal/fdi/95userpolicy/storage-policy.fdi and make one change.
> 
> ```
> ...

 

The proper way do that is to make the users part of the plugdev group

----------

## kulture

 *RobNyc wrote:*   

> The trick I want to find out how to install these damn themes/window decorations/styles , its so easy in gnome

 kcontrol and Desktop > WIndow decorations and "Appereance" > Style / Theme manager.

----------

## EliasP

Wheelclick on a file in Konqueror opens the file in its external application instead of the embedded Konqueror viewer.

----------

## LXj

 *firephoto wrote:*   

> If your mouse decides to quit working from some application crashing or the batteries go dead or whatever you can press 'shift+numlock' and it lets you move the mouse cursor around with the number pad.

 I tried to play with this feature and now it's on every time I start KDE. So the first thing I need to do is to press shift-numlock to be able to use my number pad in usual way. How can I revert this effect?

----------

## manouchk

I yet didn't found inside kde a integrated way to open url in a new tab in konqueror. For that I wrote a tiny script in python. Here is the code :

```

#!/usr/bin/env python

# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-

from sys import argv

from os import popen,system

#set url value

if argv.__len__()>1:

   if argv[1].count("http://") or argv[1].count("ftp://") or argv[1].count("https://") :

      url=argv[1]

   else:url="http://"+argv[1]

else: url=''

#try to get konqueror instance

profile="webbrowsing"

#get all konqueror instances in windows list

f=popen("dcop|grep konqueror")

windows=[]

for l in f:

   windows.append(l.split()[0])

f.close()

#do this if dcop is started and there is more than one konqueror instance...

if windows.__len__()>0:

   #get the right konqueror instance in good_konqueror variable

   good_konqueror=""

   for k in windows:

      f=popen("dcop %s konqueror-mainwindow\#1 currentProfile\(\)"%k)

      if f.readline().count(profile):good_konqueror=k

      f.close()

   #if the right konqueror exist :

   #     - then open url in a tab

   #if not open a new instance of konqueror

   if good_konqueror:

      # then open url in a tab

      system("dcop %s konqueror-mainwindow\#1 newTab %s"%(good_konqueror,url))

      # if hidden restore it

      f=popen("dcop %s konqueror-mainwindow\#1 hidden\(\)"%good_konqueror)

      if f.readline().split()[0].count('true'):

         system("dcop %s konqueror-mainwindow\#1 restore\(\)"%good_konqueror)

   else:

      system("konqueror --profile webbrowsing %s&"%(url))

#if no dcop or konqueror instance

else:system("konqueror --profile webbrowsing %s&"%(url))

```

I putted the commande konqueror-tab.py %u in KDE control center file association 

With that you can open html link in kmail in a new konqueror tab!!

----------

