With the prior KDE Plasma 5.21 is out and stable in the wild, we give you a glimpse of upcoming new features of KDE Plasma 5.22 and tentative release plans.
Update: KDE Plasma 5.22 released on June 8, 2021. Read the complete feature details, release coverage, download and upgrade instructions here.
World’s greatest and powerful Linux desktop – KDE Plasma, is gearing up for the upcoming KDE Plasma 5.22 release. The overall development is buzzing with new features, fixes. We already got the KDE Plasma 5.21 as one of the biggest releases a while back which delivered a massive list of changes across core modules, look, and feel. Being a short development iteration (~3 months) for KDE Plasma – developers are super busy with this release while working on the bug fixes for 5.21.
That said, I tried to refine the important features and updates in the KDE Plasma 5.22 from the changelog for you, here. Let’s have a look.
Table of Contents
KDE Plasma 5.22 Release Date
Here’s a planned timeline for KDE Plasma 5.22 release. The dates are incorrect in the official KDE release schedule wiki. However, I have calculated tentative dates based on the planned iterations. These may change as we move closer to the release.
- Feature Freeze: April 29, 2021
- Beta: May 13, 2021.
- Final release: June 8, 2021
KDE Plasma 5.22 New Features
Major Features
- Adaptive transparency in desktop panels is introduced. This design change is introduced to make the Panel’s transparency and any maximize window’s behaviors consistently. For example, if your panel is say 50% transparent and you have an application window maximized, then the bottom desktop panel looks odd with 50% transparency. It would have been better if the panel adapts its transparency based on panel settings to match the window. See this video from the KDE team.
- When you are copying any file or any actions on the file, the completion popup now shows which application is available to open the file. For example, “Open with Ark” for a zip file. If no file type association is found, the button changes to “Open With” and no buttons at all when the file in question is deleted or not available in the course of the operation.
Enhancements
- A warning popup is introduced to prevent accidental deletion of notes in the KNote app. Today, there is no warning and it just deletes it.
- The vault now shows an option to open in file manager action for the vault folders and files.
- The “Show KRunner” is removed from the desktop context menu (right-click). As per the developers, this is implemented mainly to de-clutter the desktop context menu. And also, the new Kickoff menu is more functional thus eliminating a separate option to lauch KRunner. And expert users already know the F2 shortcut which launches KRunner.
- The Audio applet now shows full speaker and mic names when you mouseover.
- In Discover, the applications now show the type of the package – for example, Flatpak, Snap, etc. It even includes a small icon for quick identification. This is a handy enhancement.
- It is now possible to switch between different audio profiles of your microphone, sound device from the new profiles card. For example, if your speaker supports stereo, Dolby 5.1, Dolby 7.1 – you can switch between them via the new card menu.
- KDE now can play a sound when your plugged-in devices ready to be removed safely.
Download and Test
If you want to contribute to the testing, please download the KDE Neon testing edition from the below link and test. Make sure to report bugs here.
Remember that this is a BETA copy and may contain bugs. So use with caution.
Closing Notes
So, overall these are initial changes and enhancements that are expected at the moment. KDE Plasma 5.22 would be based on Qt 5.15 and KDE Frameworks 5.82. As always, a whole lot of bug fixes that are currently being added in Plasma 5.21 would be available in the new release. And yes, many merge requests are still pending. I am not sure whether we get to see another new wallpaper or any other major design changes such as the new Kickoff menu which was introduced in 5.21. Also, a bunch of Wayland fixes and improvements is expected to land as well.
So, Stay tuned.
