♞ Coming up on 9TO5Linux ♞
KaOS 2022.02 Brings Latest KDE Plasma to Its Users
KaOS remains one of the most aesthetically pleasing Linux distros around sporting the
beautiful KDE desktop environment.
The KDE-focused desktop platform KaOS Linux has got a new update.
Just over a month after the last release, KaOS 2022.02 has emerged with the latest KDE
Plasma.
KaOS is described as being a tightly integrated rolling and transparent distribution for the
modern desktop that focuses only on KDE Plasma.
The distro was influenced by Arch Linux, uses Pacman as its package manager, but does not
rely on software repositories developed and maintained by Arch.
Instead, it labels itself as a built-from-scratch Linux distro since all packages in each of
its repositories are compiled by the project for the distro.
Yesterday, KaOS 2022.02 finally becomes available as an incremental update to the previous release,
so let’s take a look in brief at what’s new.
What’s New in KaOS 2022.02
KaOS 2022.02 introduces the latest KDE Plasma Desktop 5.24, KDE Framework 5.91, and KDE
GEar 21.12.
It’s important to note that Wayland on Plasma is now the default session for KaOS.
The Virtualbox users should be aware that some intervention is needed for the auto-resize
feature to work.
This means that you will need to set manually the desired screen resolution in System Settings.
Moreover, there is a new Configure Display Settings item.
This lets you adjust your screens’ resolution, orientation, scaling, and position relative
to other monitors.
In addition, the Desktop Panels are now easier to move around and stick to any edge you want,
as you can now drag them from anywhere on their toolbar while in Edit Mode.
We can’t fail to mention that KaOS 2022.02 ships with Kalendar 1.0 app, which has been
receiving significant updates for quite a while.
It includes some useful features like scheduling, tasks, support for recurring events, attachments,
and more.
Keep in mind that one application that is not ready for Wayland, is SMplayer, used in
KaOS for many years as the default media player.
Unfortunately, it seems SMplayer is unable to move to Wayland.
The main problem usually is the video being on a separate window, but it can also be a
black window or a crash when trying to play a video.
With that said, the KaOS devs have decided to replace SMPlayer with Haruna.
It is a Qt-based video player for Linux that acts as a front-end to mpv.
Under the hood, with the latest release, you can also find updated packages that include:
Perl 5.34 PHP 8.1.2
GStreamer 1.20 Systemd 250.3
Curl 7.81 Mesa 21.3.6
Wayland 1.20 KaOS 2022.01 is powered by Linux kernel 5.15.23
LTS.
At the moment the LTS period projects Linux 5.15 LTS to be end-of-life in October 2023.
However, as is usually the case, this can be extended by years given enough industry
support.
Download
KaOS Linux is a rolling distribution so keeping up with the updates is enough to get you the
latest packages.
The official ISO is also updated every few months to keep it up to date with all the
latest changes for new installations so you are not presented with a large first update.
:: More ::
The KaOS distribution is a rolling-release project with a strong focus on the KDE Plasma
desktop and related software.
The project has announced a new version, KaOS 2022.02, which features a significant new
milestone: "With the release of Plasma 5.24, a first for KaOS can be announced.
Wayland on Plasma is in such a good shape that it now can be the default session for
KaOS.
For VirtualBox, this means some intervention is needed for auto-resize, upstream does not
support this yet for a Wayland session, so you will need to set the desired screen resolution
in System Settings.
When you choose to use non-free NVIDIA during the boot-up of the Live session, then Wayland
won't be used, for NVIDIA, it is still better to use an X session.
The one application that is not ready for Wayland, is SMplayer, used in KaOS for many
years as the default media player.
From the many bug reports for Wayland support and SMplayer (dating back to 2017), it seems
SMplayer is unable to move to Wayland, thus can no longer be the default.
Haruna is the replacement.
It is developed for Plasma, is QML based, has yt-dlp support, subtitle feature, and
a rich set of configuration options."
:: More ::
KaOS 2022.02 released with Plasma Wayland as the default session
And KaOS 2022.02 was released with Plasma Wayland as the default session, and more.
Check out the news and find out where to download the distro.
KaOS is a desktop Linux distribution that features the latest version of the KDE desktop
environment, the Calligra office suite, and other popular software applications that use
the Qt toolkit.
Despite being inspired by Arch Linux, developers build their own packages, available in internal
repositories.
KaOS employs a rolling release development model and is developed exclusively for 64-bit
computer systems.
Now, the developers behind the KaOS distribution today released the KaOS Linux 2022.02 ISO
as the second update in 2022, bringing the latest KDE Plasma desktop environment and
more.
What's New in KaOS KaOS 2022.02
KaOS Linux 2022.02 comes a little over a month after the first release of KaOS Linux in 2022
and comes with the recently released KDE Plasma 5.24 LTS desktop environment, which is accompanied
by the latest and greatest KDE Frameworks 5.91 and KDE software packages.
Gear 21.12.2, as well as the new Kalendar 1.0 app.
With KaOS 2022.02, the system stops Plasma Wayland as the default session for new installations.
As you can imagine, this big move brings some changes to the distribution, such as the fact
that the default media player, SMPlayer, has been replaced by Haruna as it supports Wayland.
Yes.
The only application that is not Wayland ready is SMplayer, used in KaOS for many years as
the default media player.
From the many bug reports for Wayland and SMplayer support (since 2017), it seems that
SMplayer is unable to move to Wayland, so it can no longer be the default.
Haruna is the substitute.
It is developed for Plasma, is QML based, has yt-dlp support, subtitles feature and
a rich set of configuration options.
Also, in KaOS 2022.02 NVIDIA users will not be able to use the Plasma Wayland live session
with non-free NVIDIA graphics drivers, and VM users will need to set the desired screen
resolution in the KDE Plasma system settings to use the distribution in a virtual machine.
The default graphical installer for KaOS Linux, Calamares, has also been updated in this release
to show a warning message when the partition module has a conflicting configuration for
the swap partition.
As such, it will no longer set the “bigtime” option when using XFS file systems nor use
“suspend”.
Under the hood, the KaOS Linux 2022.02 release is powered by the long-term supported Linux
5.15 kernel series and comes with an updated toolchain that includes components like GNU
C Library 2.33, GCC 11.2, systemd 250.3, Mesa 21.3.6, Perl 5.34. 0, PHP 8.1.2, GStreamer
1.20, cURL 7.81.0, Vulkan 1.3.205, Wayland 1.20.0, Qt 5.15.3, sudo 1.9.9 and OpenLDAP
2.6.1.
To learn more about this version of the distribution, visit the release note .
Download and Try KaOS 2022.02
Existing users do not need to download the new ISO image, but just to ensure their installations
are up to date by running the command sudo pacman -Syu from time to time.
The KaOS 2022.02 ISO image can now be downloaded by going to the distribution's download page
.
Thanks for watching,
I hope you enjoyed this video,
If you did hit that thumbs up button, it helps me to make good content for you, other then
that, I will see you in tomorrow's video, peace out.