xinerama and plasma

so andreas pakulat notes that plasma doesn't work with xinerama very well at the moment. perhaps that's because none of the developers are using it on such a system at the moment. "humorously" i still don't have such a system to play with either. it is "cute" that andreas picked on a UI element that isn't even going to be in the final release; it is cool that he's using testing features (the form factor drop down) to find issues, though, since that's what they are there for. =)

and so, andreas concludes, that with some other apps crashing for him he's not going to "eat the dogfood" until 4.1. that's unfortunate. why? because that's precisely how we can ensure that things don't get better. so what to do? here are my thoughts:

first, use kde3 apps in your kde4 environment for the critical stuff when it crashes. if you rely on kdevelop, use the kde3 version.

second, try to have a slightly higher tolerance for work-in-progress. don't let things like missing icons in the control center freak you out. i know we're all spoiled by the years of working with kde3 which was amazingly complete, but most of us really can deal with minor inconveniences so as to get more testing in.

third, try and patch something that doesn't work every so often ... even if it isn't "your" code. taking that time out to fix a common annoyance may take time away from your own project, but it will add to the entirety of the experience and let more people use the betas with greater comfort, thereby bringing more hands on deck.

fourth, find the things that are cool and a reason to use kde4. for me, those include krunner (ok, perhaps i'm a bit attached to it for personal reasons ;), the games (i really can't stand to play the kde3 games anymore), marble (probably specific to my traveling nature) and konsole's new hotness. i put up with the other annoyances (and even try and fix some of them here and there =) because of those things.

we're on the home stretch as far as time goes right now. it's time to get the apps in shape and the features we absolutely need in working order. there's a lot left to do, and 4.1 will certainly be the desktop release that most people will start using compared to 4.0 but we owe it to ourselves (let alone our users) to plunge in an enjoy the pain a bit ;)