Warning, unfocused babbling detected ahead...
Today's adventure: KDE 2.0beta 3. Wowow. I've been using and loving 1.x since 1.0 came out, but 2.0 is really much nicer. Having the taskbar integrated into the panel a la Windows instead of as separate pieces a la KDE 1.x saves a decent amount of vertical screen space, and we all know what dimension we have less space in :)
A few gripes: - For years now in KDE and AfterStep before that I was used to having CTRL-(the 4 arrow keys) move to the next desktop in that direction. KDE2 only allows left and right movement (with wrapping to automatically go to top and bottom). This sucks.
- I don't like the new window widgets or their placement, but changing themes seems to have no effect on them, even after a restart. Considering how hyped themes are in KDE2, the inability for me to get a KDE 1-style look and feel back is somewhat disconcerting.
Other than that I suggest everyone try it out, except for you GNOME zombies who think Unix sucks ;-) Fair warning: the Redhat RPMs install in /opt/kde2, but since they have the same "root name" as the KDE 1.1.2 RPMs from Redhat 6.2 RPM will automagically delete your KDE 1.1.2 files and libraries. To work around that problem, rename all the 1.92 RPMs from kdefoo-1.92.i386.rpm to kde2foo-1.92.i386.rpm. I've successfully got KDevelop 1.2 and some homebrew KDE 1.x apps compiling and running under KDE2.0b3 after that (along with a little QTDIR and KDEDIR environment variable magic, of course).
Work's basically done for this cycle, so I'll be taking a week's vacation next week (with more vacation in October - I'm planning on going to Atlanta Linux Showcase so I can finally meet some of my heroes :)
As many of you probably know, ST2: Wrath of Khan is out on DVD, at least in Region 1. As per usual with Paramount there's almost no extras (although the original trailer in an anamorphic transfer is nice). The 16:9 enhanced transfer of the actual movie is amazing, completely blowing away the widescreen VHS edition I bought a few years ago. The new Dolby 5.1 sound mix is very nice as well - James Horner's groundbreaking score is better than ever, and you feel every explosion through the subwoofer channel :) And it's always fun to watch Ricardo "Rich Corinthian Leather"* Montalban out-scenery-chew William Shatner. Shatner almost looks subdued by comparison.
* If you get this reference, you're too old. I know I am...