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List:       kde-announce
Subject:    ANNOUNCE: KDE 2.0 Beta 4
From:       Martin Konold <konold () alpha ! tat ! physik ! uni-tuebingen ! de>
Date:       2000-08-23 14:09:12
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DATELINE AUGUST 23, 2000

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

                  NEW KDE DESKTOP BETA AVAILABLE FOR LINUX®

FOURTH BETA PREVIEW OF LEADING DESKTOP FOR LINUX® AND OTHER UNIXES®

August 23, 2000 (The INTERNET). The KDE Team (http://www.kde.org/) today
announced the release of KDE 1.93, the fourth beta preview of Kopernicus,
KDE's next-generation, powerful, modular desktop. Following on the heels
of the release of KDE 1.92 on July 27, 2000, the release, code-named
"Kooldown", is based on a beta of Trolltech's(tm) (http://www.trolltech.com/)
upcoming Qt® 2.2.0 and will include the core libraries, the core desktop
environment, the KOffice suite, as well as the over 100 applications
from the other standard base KDE packages: Administration, Games, Graphics,
Multimedia, Network, Personal Information Management (PIM), Toys and
Utilities. Kooldown is targeted at users who would like to help the KDE
team make usability and feature enhancements and fix the remaining set of
bugs before the release of KDE 2.0 ("Kopernicus"), scheduled for
early-fourth quarter 2000.

The major changes since the beta 3 release ("Korner") last month include:

   * Fixed Konqueror's HTTP- and FTP-proxy support.
   * Great speed improvements in rendering by the HTML widget.
   * Integrated support for GTK themes.
   * Improvements and many fixes to the JavaScriptTM library.
   * Improvements to KWord's WinWord filter -- it now imports even MS Office
     2000(tm) documents quite well.
   * Greater stability and many bug-fixes to virtually all packages.

"It is really great to work together with all of the dedicated developers,
translators, artists, documentation writers and beta users. I'm very proud
of the results that we have achieved with this release and I hope that our
users enjoy it just as much," said core developer Waldo Bastian. "Given the
massive amount of fixes and improvements in usability as well as appearance,
this beta preview could also have been labeled a pre-release candidate for
Kopernicus," added core developer Lars Knoll.

Kooldown offers a usable desktop for a non-critical production environment.
The principal benefits lie in the cutting-edge technologies provided by
Konqueror and the KOffice suite, in KDE's enhanced customizability and in
KDE's continued improvements in ease of use.

   * Konqueror reigns as the next-generation web browser, file manager and
     document viewer for KDE 2.0. Widely acclaimed as a technological
     break-through for the Linux desktop, Konqueror has a component-based
     architecture which combines the features and functionality of Internet
     Explorer®/Netscape Communicator® and Windows Explorer®. Konqueror will
     support the full gamut of current Internet technologies, including
     JavaScript, Java®, HTML 4.0, CSS-2 (Cascading Style Sheets), SSL
     (Secure Socket Layer for secure communications) and Netscape
     Communicator® plug-ins (for playing FlashTM, RealAudioTM, RealVideoTM
     and similar technologies). In addition, Konqueror's network
     transparency offers seamless support for browsing Linux® NFS shares,
     Windows® SMB shares, HTTP pages, FTP directories as well as any other
     protocol for which a KIO plug-in is available.

   * The KOffice suite is one of the most-anticipated Open Source projects.
     The suite consists of a spreadsheet application (KSpread), a vector
     drawing application (KIllustrator), a bitmap drawing application
     (KImageShop), a frame-based word-processing application (KWord), a
     presentation program (KPresenter), and a chart and diagram application
     (KChart). Native file formats will use XML, and work on filters for
     proprietary binary file formats is progressing. Combined with a
     powerful scripting language and the ability to embed individuals
     components within each other using KDE's KParts technology, the KOffice
     suite will provide all the necessary functionality to all but the most
     demanding power users, at an unbeatable price -- free.

   * KDE's customizability touches every aspect of this next-generation
     desktop. Kooldown benefits from Qt's style engine, which permits
     developers and artists to create their own widget designs down to the
     precise appearance of a scrollbar, a button, a menu and more, combined
     with development tools which will largely automate the creation of
     these widget sets. In addition, KDE offers excellent support for GTK
     themes. Just to mention a few of the legion configuration options,
     users can choose among: numerous types of menu effects; a menu bar atop
     the display (Macintosh®-style) or atop each individual window
     (Windows-style); icon styles; system sounds; key bindings; languages;
     toolbar and menu composition; and much much more.

DOWNLOADING AND COMPILING BETA 4

The source packages for Kooldown are available for free download at
ftp://ftp.kde.org/pub/kde/unstable/distribution/2.0Beta4/tar/src/ or in the
equivalent directory at one of the many KDE ftp server mirrors. Kooldown
requires qt-2.2.0-beta2, which is available from the above locations under
the name qt-x11-2.2.0-beta2.tar.gz. Please be advised that Kooldown will not
work with any older versions of Qt. Qt is not part of KDE's beta testing.

For further instructions on compiling and installing Kooldown, please
consult the installation instructions and, if you encounter problems, the
compilation FAQ.

INSTALLING BINARY PACKAGES

The binary packages for Kooldown will be available for free download under
ftp://ftp.kde.org/pub/kde/unstable/distribution/2.0Beta4/ or under the
equivalent directory at one of the many KDE ftp server mirrors. Kooldown
requires qt2.2.0-beta2, which is available from the above locations under
the name qt-x11-2.2.0-beta2. Please be advised that Kooldown will not work
with any older versions of Qt. Qt is not part of KDE's beta testing.

At the time of this release, pre-compiled packages are available for:

   * Caldera OpenLinux 2.4 (ftp://ftp.kde.org/pub/kde/unstable/distribution/2.0Beta4/rpm/COL-2.4/)
   * SuSE Linux 6.4 (ftp://ftp.kde.org/pub/kde/unstable/distribution/2.0Beta4/rpm/SuSE/6.4-i386/)
   * Linux Technology Preview (ftp://ftp.kde.org/pub/kde/unstable/distribution/2.0Beta4/rpm/LTP/)

Check the ftp servers periodically for pre-compiled packages for other
distributions. More binary packages will become available over the coming
days.

ABOUT KDE

KDE is an independent, collaborative project by hundreds of developers
worldwide to create a sophisticated, customizable and stable desktop
environment employing a component-based, network-transparent architecture.
Currently development is focused on KDE 2, which will for the first time
offer a free, Open Source, fully-featured office suite and which promises to
make the Linux desktop as easy to use as Windows® and the Macintosh® while
remaining loyal to open standards and empowering developers and users with
Open Source software. KDE is working proof of how the Open Source software
development model can create first-rate technologies on par with and
superior to even the most complex commercial software.

For more information about KDE, please visit KDE's web site.

    ---------------------------------------------------------------------
 Press Contacts:

               United States:   Kurt Granroth
                                granroth@kde.org
                                (1) 480 732 1752

                                Andreas Pour
                                pour@kde.org
                                (1) 718-456-1165

 Europe (English and German):   Martin Konold
                                konold@kde.org
                                (49) 179 2252249

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