KDE Plasma 5

2014 graphical desktop for Linux and FreeBSD

KDE Plasma 5 is the fifth generation of the KDE Plasma graphical workspaces environment, created by KDE primarily for Linux systems. KDE Plasma 5 is the successor of KDE Plasma 4 and was first released on 15 July 2014.^[1][4][5] It was succeeded by KDE Plasma 6 on 28 February 2024.^[6]

Plasma 5 includes a new default theme, "Breeze", and increased convergence across different devices. The graphical interface was fully migrated to QML, which uses OpenGL for hardware acceleration, providing better performance and reduced power consumption.^[1][4]

Plasma Mobile is a Plasma 5 variant for Linux-based smartphones.

Overview

KDE's mascot Konqi and Plasma desktop

Software architecture

KDE Plasma 5 is built using Qt 5 and KDE Frameworks 5.^[7][8] It improves support for HiDPI displays and ships a convergable graphical shell, which can adjust itself according to the device in use. 5.0 also includes a new default theme, dubbed Breeze. Qt 5's QtQuick 2 uses a hardware-accelerated OpenGL(ES) scene graph (canvas) to compose and render graphics on the screen, which allows for the offloading of computationally expensive graphics rendering tasks onto the GPU, freeing up resources on the system's main CPU.^[1]

Windowing systems

KDE Plasma 5 running under Wayland

KDE Plasma 5 uses the X Window System and Wayland. Support for Wayland was prepared in the compositor and planned for a later release.^[1] It was made initially available in the 5.4 release.^[9] Stable support for a basic Wayland session was provided in the 5.5 release (December 2015).^[10]

Support for NVIDIA proprietary driver for Plasma on Wayland was added in the 5.16 release (June 2019).^[11]

Development

Since the split of the KDE Software Compilation into KDE Plasma, KDE Frameworks and KDE Applications, each subproject can develop at its own pace.^[12] KDE Plasma 5 is on its own release schedule, with feature releases every four months, and bugfix releases in the intervening months.

Workspaces

The latest Plasma 5 features the following workspaces:

• Plasma Desktop for any mouse or keyboard driven computing devices like desktops or laptops
• Plasma Mobile for smartphones
• Plasma Bigscreen for TVs and set-top boxes incl. voice interaction^[13]
• Plasma Nano, a minimal shell for embedded and touch-enabled devices,^[14] like IoT or automotive

Desktop features

KDE Plasma with the Breeze Dark theme, with Konsole and Dolphin, core KDE applications

• KRunner, a search feature with many available plugins. In addition to launching apps, it can find files and folders, open websites, convert from one currency or unit to another, calculate simple mathematical expressions, and perform numerous other useful tasks.^[15]
• Flexible desktop and panel layouts composed of individual Widgets (also known as "Plasmoids") which can be individually configured, moved around, replaced with alternatives, or deleted. Each screen's layout can be individually configured. New widgets created by others can be downloaded within Plasma.
• Clipboard with a memory of previously-copied pieces of text that can be called up at will.
• Systemwide notification system supporting quick reply and drag-and-drop straight from notifications, history view, and a Do Not Disturb mode.
• Central location to control playback of media in open apps, the phone (with KDE Connect installed), or the web browser (with Plasma Browser Integration installed)
• Activities, which allow users to separate methods of using the system into distinct workspaces. Each activity can have its own set of favorite and recently used applications, wallpapers, "virtual desktops", panels, window styles, and layout configurations. It also couples with ksmserver (X Session Manager implementation) which keeps track of apps that can be run or shutdown along with given activity via subSessions functionality that keep track of state of applications (not all applications support this feature as they do not implement XSMP protocol).^[16]
• Encrypted vaults for storing sensitive data.
• Night Color, which can automatically warm the screen colors at night, or user-specified times, or manually.
• Styling for icons, cursors, application colors, user interface elements, splash screens and more can be changed, with new styles created by others being downloadable from within the System Settings application. Global Themes allow the entire look and feel of the system to be changed in one click.
• Session Management allows apps which were running when the system shut down to be automatically restarted in the same state they were in before.

History

The first Technology Preview of Plasma 5 (at that time called Plasma 2) was released on 13 December 2013.^[17] On 15 July 2014, the first release version – Plasma 5.0 – was released.^[1]In spring 2015, Plasma 5 replaced Plasma 4 in many popular distributions, such as Fedora 22,^[18] Kubuntu 15.04,^[19] and openSUSE Tumbleweed.^[20]

Releases

Feature releases are released every four months (up to 5.8 every three months) and bugfix releases in the intervening months.^[12] Following version 5.8 LTS KDE plans to support each new LTS version for 18 months with bug fixes, while new regular releases will see feature improvements.^[21]

See also

• GNOME
• Comparison of X Window System desktop environments

Gallery

• 
  Default lock screen of Plasma 5
• 
  Plasma 5 showing KRunner and display management
• 
  Power management and keyboard brightness OSD
• 
  Shutdown screen of Plasma 5
• 
  Login screen of Plasma 5
• 
  Plasma System Settings

References

1. "KDE Plasma 5.0 Released". KDE. 2014-07-15. Archived from the original on 2015-09-24. Retrieved 2014-08-19.
2. "KDE Plasma 5.27.11, Bugfix Release for March". 6 March 2024. Retrieved 3 May 2024.
3. "COPYING of Plasma Workspace". KDE Invent. Archived from the original on 2021-05-04. Retrieved 2021-03-14.
4. Sneddon, Joey-Elijah (July 15, 2014). "KDE Plasma 5 Arrives with Fresh New Look, True Convergence". OMG! Ubuntu!. Archived from the original on April 8, 2019. Retrieved June 14, 2019.
5. Gilbertson, Scott (August 18, 2014). "KDE Plasma 5—For those Linux users undecided on the kernel's future". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on April 12, 2019. Retrieved June 14, 2019.
6. "KDE MegaRelease 6". KDE Community. 2024-02-28. Retrieved 2024-02-28.
7. Jos Poortvliet (2013-12-17). "Qt 5.2 - Foundation for KDE Frameworks 5". Dot.kde.org. Archived from the original on 2020-11-11. Retrieved 2014-03-10.
8. "plasma-framework readme". Archived from the original on 2019-12-16. Retrieved 2016-10-08.
9. Grässlin, Martin (2015-06-29). "Four years later". blog.martin-graesslin.com. Archived from the original on 2016-04-13. Retrieved 2019-04-28.
10. Riddell, Jonathan (2015-12-08). "Plasma 5.5 With Beautiful New Artwork". KDE.news. Archived from the original on 2019-04-08. Retrieved 2019-04-28.
11. "Plasma 5.16 Release Announcement". KDE. 16 May 2019. Archived from the original on 21 May 2019. Retrieved 26 May 2019.
12. "Release schedule for Plasma 5". KDE. Archived from the original on 2019-04-02. Retrieved 2016-03-31.
13. "Plasma / Plasma Bigscreen". Archived from the original on 2020-05-06. Retrieved 2021-08-08.
14. "Plasma / Plasma Nano · GitLab". GitLab. Archived from the original on 2022-07-05. Retrieved 2022-09-12.
15. "How to Use KDE Plasma Desktop Like a Pro". Linux.com. 2015-02-22. Archived from the original on 2019-08-09. Retrieved 2017-12-22.
16. "Changes to KSMServer – David Edmundson's Web Log". 28 November 2018. Archived from the original on 2021-09-30. Retrieved 2021-09-30.
17. "Plasma 2 Technology Preview". KDE.news. 20 December 2013. Archived from the original on 12 September 2015. Retrieved 23 August 2015.
18. "Fedora 22 KDE Delivers A Great Plasma 5 Experience". Phoronix. Archived from the original on 6 September 2015. Retrieved 23 August 2015.
19. "Kubuntu 15.04 Release Announcement". 2015-04-22. Archived from the original on 2019-04-08. Retrieved 2015-07-21.
20. Nestor, Marius (2015-05-16). "openSUSE Tumbleweed Now Uses KDE Plasma 5.3 as Default Desktop". Softpedia. Archived from the original on 2019-04-08. Retrieved 2019-04-28.
21. Bhartiya, Swapnil. "KDE celebrates 20th birthday and goes LTS". CIO. Archived from the original on 9 April 2022. Retrieved 9 April 2022.
22. "KDE - Plasma 5.1 Brings Back Many Popular Features". kde.org. 15 October 2014. Archived from the original on 17 October 2014. Retrieved 23 August 2015.
23. "KDE - KDE Ships Plasma 5.2". kde.org. 27 January 2015. Archived from the original on 1 February 2015. Retrieved 23 August 2015.
24. online, heise (24 June 2013). "Kscreen 1.0 soll Monitorkonfiguration von KDE verbessern". heise online. Archived from the original on 2021-06-09. Retrieved 2022-09-12.
25. "KDE Ships Plasma 5.3, New Feature Release". KDE. 2015-04-28. Archived from the original on 2015-05-18. Retrieved 2015-05-04.
26. "KDE Ships Plasma 5.4.0, Feature Release for August". KDE. 25 August 2015. Archived from the original on 5 September 2015. Retrieved 25 August 2015.
27. "KDE Ships Plasma 5.4 Beta Release". KDE. 2015-08-11. Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2015-08-14.
28. "KDE Ships Plasma 5.5 Release". KDE. 8 December 2015. Archived from the original on 10 December 2015. Retrieved 31 March 2016.
29. "September update for Plasma's Wayland porting". Martin's Blog. 8 October 2015. Archived from the original on 28 November 2015. Retrieved 28 October 2015.
30. "KWin On Wayland Making Progress, Now Has A Virtual Backend". Phoronix. Archived from the original on 2019-04-24. Retrieved 2015-10-28.
31. "KDE Plasma 5.6 Release". KDE. 22 March 2016. Archived from the original on 4 April 2016. Retrieved 31 March 2016.
32. Nestor, Marius (24 November 2015). "KDE Developers Work on Improving the Security of KDE Plasma 5 on Wayland". Softpedia. Archived from the original on 8 April 2019. Retrieved 28 April 2019.
33. "KDE - KDE Plasma 5.7 Release". 5 July 2016. Archived from the original on 20 February 2017. Retrieved 11 July 2016.
34. "KDE at 20: Plasma 5.8 LTS. Here for the Long Term". KDE. 4 October 2016. Archived from the original on 7 October 2016. Retrieved 6 October 2016.
35. Jonathan Riddell (8 July 2016). "Plasma 5.8 LTS Kickerd Off for Stability and Performance". Archived from the original on 2019-04-08. Retrieved 2016-07-11.
36. "Plasma 5.8 will be an LTS release". 8 July 2016. Archived from the original on 9 May 2019. Retrieved 11 July 2016.
37. "Plasma 5.9 Kicks off 2017 in Style". KDE. 31 January 2017. Archived from the original on 30 July 2019. Retrieved 30 July 2019.
38. Martin Grässlin (2016-10-19). "Wayland improvements since Plasma 5.8 release". Archived from the original on 2019-05-22. Retrieved 2016-10-21.
39. "KDE Ships Plasma 5.9". 2017-01-31. Archived from the original on 2019-07-30. Retrieved 2017-01-31.
40. "Plasma 5.10". KDE. 30 May 2017. Archived from the original on 30 July 2019. Retrieved 30 July 2019.
41. "Plasma 5.10: Spring-loading in Folder View; performance work | blogs.kde.org". blogs.kde.org. 31 January 2017. Archived from the original on 2019-04-08. Retrieved 2017-02-03.
42. "Plasma 5.11". KDE. 10 October 2017. Archived from the original on 18 October 2019. Retrieved 30 July 2019.
43. "Plasma 5.11 – Keep the momentum going". OCS-Mag. 2017-10-18. Archived from the original on 2019-04-08. Retrieved 2019-04-28.
44. "KDE Plasma 5.11 Officially Released With Vault, Better Wayland & More - Phoronix". Archived from the original on 2019-04-24. Retrieved 2017-12-21.
45. "Plasma 5.12 Release Announcement". KDE. 6 February 2018. Archived from the original on 6 February 2018. Retrieved 6 February 2018.
46. "Plasma 5.13 Release Announcement". KDE. 12 June 2018. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
47. "KDE Plasma 5.13 Beta: Fast, Lightweight, and Full Featured". 2018-05-17. Archived from the original on 2019-06-07. Retrieved 2018-05-28.
48. "Plasma 5.14 Release Announcement". KDE. 9 October 2018. Archived from the original on 11 October 2018. Retrieved 11 October 2018.
49. "Plasma 5.15 Release Announcement". KDE. 12 February 2019. Archived from the original on 14 February 2019. Retrieved 14 February 2019.
50. "KDE Plasma 5.17: Thunderbolt, X11 Night Color and Redesigned Settings". KDE.org. 15 October 2019. Archived from the original on 17 October 2019. Retrieved 15 October 2019.
51. "KDE Plasma 5.18: More Convenient and with Long Term Stability". KDE. 11 February 2020. Archived from the original on 6 May 2020. Retrieved 12 February 2020.
52. "Plasma 5.19". KDE. 9 June 2020. Archived from the original on 9 June 2020. Retrieved 9 June 2020.
53. "Plasma 5.20". KDE. 13 October 2020. Archived from the original on 23 November 2020. Retrieved 20 November 2020.
54. "Plasma 5.21". KDE. 16 February 2021. Archived from the original on 8 March 2021. Retrieved 24 February 2021.
55. "Plasma 5.22". KDE. 8 June 2021. Archived from the original on 8 June 2021. Retrieved 8 June 2021.
56. "Plasma - 25th Anniversary Edition". KDE. 14 October 2021. Archived from the original on 27 October 2021. Retrieved 27 October 2021.
57. "Plasma 5.24". KDE. 8 February 2022. Archived from the original on 8 February 2022. Retrieved 8 February 2022.
58. "Plasma 5.25". KDE. 14 June 2022. Archived from the original on 14 June 2022. Retrieved 14 June 2022.
59. "Plasma 5.26". KDE. 11 October 2022. Archived from the original on 11 October 2022. Retrieved 11 October 2022.
60. "Plasma 5.27". KDE. 14 February 2023. Archived from the original on 14 February 2023. Retrieved 14 February 2023.

External links

• Official website
• Plasma Mobile website
• Plasma user wiki
• Plasma developer wiki