KDE Plasma 6 for the Linux desktop is on the horizon, with Plasma Mobile developers diligently updating the mobile version of Plasma to align with the latest KDE Frameworks 6 and Qt 6 frameworks, ensuring parity with the Plasma 6 desktop environment.
In a detailed blog post, Plasma Mobile developer Devin Lin shared insights into the efforts made over recent months to adapt Plasma 6 for mobile devices, timed with the KDE “Mega Release”. The release includes KDE Plasma 6, KDE Frameworks 6, and KDE Gear 24.04, and is slated for late February 2024.
Devin Lin reports that the reimagined default homescreen for Plasma Mobile 6 will feature a range of functions, such as an app drawer, KRunner search, folders, pages, convenient drag-and-drop functionality between various elements, and customisable page transitions. Other innovations include the option to flip rows and columns for screen rotations, the ability to determine row and column counts, and the feature of importing and exporting homescreen layouts as files.
“Applets are particularly promising, despite requiring further refinement. They employ the same framework as the Desktop, allowing us to utilise existing applets,” commented Devin Lin. “Future development of new applets for mobile apps is also a possibility, depending on interest.”
Plasma Mobile 6 also promises a new “Docked Mode” quick setting that brings back window decorations and prevents the opening of application windows in full-screen mode when your mobile device is docked.
There will also be a new Plasma Mobile Welcome app to make configuring the mobile desktop environment easier for newcomers. The new Welcome screen for Plasma Mobile 6 will let you set up Wi-Fi, cellular settings, etc.
Plasma Mobile 6 will also come with a new plasma-mobile-envmanager service for automatic configuration of what’s needed for Plasma Mobile and Plasma Desktop, removing the need for hardcoded configurations and allowing the installation of a separate desktop environment on existing systems.
Among other noteworthy changes, Plasma Mobile’s task switcher was moved to the KWin window and composite manager as an effect, which will improve the performance, there are some style improvements for better performance, various mobile-specific settings modules have been unified, the lockscreen was improved, as well as the quality of the cellular settings and the ModemManager shell integration.
Plasma Mobile 6 should be released to the public shortly after the release of the KDE Plasma 6 desktop environment series on February 28th, 2024. However, to use it on your mobile device, you will need to wait for one of the mobile-focused GNU/Linux distributions to adopt it, such as postmarketOS.
Those of you who are eager to try the current version of Plasma Mobile 6 can follow the installation instructions provided by the Alpine Linux-based postmarketOS project here. Of course, a future postmarketOS release will offer ready-to-use images that can be easily installed on your mobile device, if it’s supported by postmarketOS.
Image credits: Devin Lin (collage created by Marius Nestor)
Last updated 7 hours ago