HOW-TO: Kicker on KDE4 0.2

HOW-TO: Kicker on KDE4 is a tutorial about how to obtain a proper and functional kicker.

(1) KDE3 kicker must be installed parallel to KDE4.

(2) Edit the plasma configuration file manually to remove the plasma panel:
nano ~/.kde4/share/config/plasma-appletsrc
In a default configuration, find all blocks which start with "[Containments][2]". But check, if "[Containments][2]" contains the line "plugin=panel" - else you should delete the respective containment and child plasmoids.

(3) Apply the configuration:

killall plasma && plasma && kicker

(4) KDE4 does not recognize kicker in terms of session management. You have to add kicker to the Autostart apps. Be careful - if you create a corrupt configuration file in Autostart, KDE4 will NOT start at all (crashes)!

Add the file ~/.kde4/Autostart/kicker.desktop with content:

[Desktop Entry]
Name=Kicker
Icon=system-run
Type=Link
URL=/opt/kde3/bin/kicker
X-SuSE-translate=false

The URL may be different. /opt/kde3 is the KDE3 path on openSuse. You may also change all application launchers on Kicker from KDE3 to their KDE4 counterparts by changing the URL from /opt/kde3/bin/appname to /usr/bin/appname (on openSuse)

I must admit that I did not expect Kicker to work so well together with KDE4 as a session, window and desktop manager. But, just try it by yourself!

Known issues:

· Transparency and 'show desktop background' in minipager do not work.
· Desktop menu should only work for KDE3 apps.
· You should also change text colors in taskbar and clock (can be found in the respective sttings dialogs)

Product's homepage

Requirements:

· KDE 4.x