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The KDE Project announced today the general availability for public beta testing of the upcoming KDE Plasma 5.23 desktop environment series, which is dubbed the “25th Anniversary Edition.”
Since KDE Plasma 5.23 will be released in celebration of the project’s 25th anniversary, it’s obvious that it will be a great release that introduces better support for the next-generation Wayland display server, making Plasma desktop more stable, faster, and reliable.
The Plasma Wayland improvements include the middle-click paste and drag and drop items between native Wayland and XWayland apps, the ability to adjust the Intel GPU driver’s Broadcast RGB settings, the ability to change the screen resolution when run in a virtual machine, and better touchpad gestures.
Furthermore, virtual desktops are now remembered on a per-activity basis, there’s a new screen rotation animation and a new animated cursor icon and Task Manager feedback when launching apps, and the System Tray will now notify users when something is recording the screen.
KDE Plasma 5.23 also packs numerous other new features and improvements, such as an improved Kickoff application launcher that now lets users choose between a list or a grid for the All Apps view, pin the launcher to stay on the screen as long as you want, as well as the ability to configure power and session action buttons.
The Plasma Discover package manager has been enhanced to load faster and show you the name of the source from where an app will be installed in the install button. It also brings the ability to retain multi-screen layouts across X11 and Wayland sessions.
“Plasma 25th Anniversary Edition is a leap forward in the quest for a more performant and usable desktop. We have improved the speed and stability of Plasma, while including changes that make it easier to use both on desktop and touch-enabled devices,” said the KDE Project.
The KDE Plasma 5.23 release also promises a revamped “Present Windows” effect, and a much-improved Breeze theme with redesigned buttons, checkboxes, menu items, radio buttons, scrollbar, sliders, and spinboxes, blur background for desktop widgets, and a new gear loading spinner across Plasma and KDE apps.
The System Settings app has been improved as well to let users set the status of a Bluetooth adapter on login, re-organize the screen refresh rates list, as well as to enhance the search and privacy features. Moreover, System Settings’ Colors page now lets you override the accent color of a color scheme.
Among other noteworthy changes, KDE Plasma 5.23 beta adds a simple login button on the login screen for passwordless accounts, updates the Plasma-Networks applet with support for additional authentication settings for OpenVPN connections, and removes the transparent effect on windows when moving or resizing them.
Of course, numerous crashes and hangs have been fixed, so KDE Plasma 5.23 should be more stable and reliable. If you want to give the beta version a try, I highly recommend downloading the latest KDE neon Unstable Edition. However, please keep in mind that this is pre-release software, not recommended for production use.
Image credits: KDE
Last updated 3 years ago
