KDE prepares a character selector by holding down a key and these other new features

A long time ago, I don't even remember when, a user confessed something that surprised me: on his Mac, when he wanted to put an accent, he did it like on a mobile: keeping the vowel pressed and choosing the option with the accent. It seemed like a waste of time on a computer keyboard to me, but he was used to that. That option has been in macOS since before the operating system was renamed, and will soon be coming to the KDE desktop.

Before continuing, I would like to insist on what you put at the bottom of the header capture: that keyboard is that of an iPad, and I have chosen this option simply because I took one of the videos that has facilitated us Nate Graham this week, taking a screenshot and enlarging the image to fit dimensions would make this post ugly. But you do have a smaller screenshot below these lines so you can see what the special characters function when I get to KDE.

What's new coming to the KDE desktop

• New option of special characters that will appear when you hold down the keys. For example, different currencies will appear. The function will be activated by default, but it can be deactivated to recover the current behavior and that the same letter appears until we stop pressing (Plasma 5.21).

• Gwenview now allows you to enter arbitrary zoom values ​​using an interactive spin box that replaces the static label showing the current zoom value (Gwenview 21.04).
• Window rules can now be duplicated (Plasma 5.21).
• The standard file overwrite dialog now has an option to automatically overwrite older files (Frameworks 5.77).

Bug fixes and performance improvements

• Elisa no longer causes Plasma to noticeably increase CPU usage while playing music (Elisa 20.12).
• Elisa now restores the content of the playlist successfully when any of its items were added using the Files view (Elisa 20.12).
• Clicking on a navigated song to use Elisa's Files view now adds it to the playlist instead of meaninglessly dragging you to the Now Playing page (Elisa 20.12).
• Elisa's spacebar shortcut to play and pause music now always works in the language in which you are using the application (Elisa 20.12).
• Konsole is again able to correctly display bold red text (Konsole 20.12).
• Okular's support for FictionBook documents now includes the ability to display tables correctly (Okular 21.04).
• EnvCan's Canadian weather provider now works in the weather applet (Plasma 5.18.7) again.
• The Users page of System Preferences now shows the correct content the first time you open it (Plasma 5.20.5).
• Fixed a variety of visual glitches in the header bar window decoration buttons in GTK3 header bar applications (Plasma 5.20.5).
• KRunner's function to start composing an email when given a link mailto: // now it works again (Plasma 5.21).
• In the Plasma Wayland session, the Task Manager tooltip now shows thumbnail window previews for Electron and Java applications (Plasma 5.21).
• Discover no longer displays broken text for app reviews where the version of the app being reviewed is not known for some reason (Plasma 5.21).
• Discover performance improved in the Plasma Wayland session (Plasma 5.21).
• System Preferences no longer hangs sometimes when clicking the "Get New Scripts" button on the KWin scripts page (Frameworks 5.77).
• Removing items that were installed using the Get New [Item] system is now more reliable (Frameworks 5.77).
• Navigating to other folders using the keyboard in URL browsers works once again (Frameworks 5.77).
• Plasma scroll bars are now drawn in the correct color when using a light Plasma theme with a dark color scheme for applications (Frameworks 5.77).
• Samba shares once again show the correct icon when displayed in a Dolphin tab (Plasma 5.77).

Interface improvements

• Elisa's "Show Playlist" button is no longer visible in Party mode (aka maximized view) because in that view, what it controls is not visible anyway (Elisa 20.12).
• Dolphin now displays placeholder messages for empty views and search results, similar to placeholder text displayed in Plasma applets, System Preferences pages, and various QML-based software (Dolphin 21.04).
• Dolphin's box / rubber band selection effect now fades when released, as does Plasma's Folder View (Dolphin 21.04).
• The Dolphin "Filter ..." action has been moved to the Edit menu to be next to the "Search ..." action, because they are related in functionality (Dolphin 21.04).
• Discover now suggests installing Snap support if you try to open a URL to a Snap app when support is not currently installed (Plasma 5.21).
• The album art area of ​​the Media Player applet now stretches to fill the entire horizontal area, with no side margins (Plasma 5.21).
• The rubber band / box selection effect now has rounded corners for a more Breeze-like style (Plasma 5.21).
• The Places Panel now matches Dolphin's new behavior of highlighting only a Places Panel entry when that exact location (not a subfolder) is displayed in the main view (Frameworks 5.77).
• When you try to unmount a mounted NFS share where the open files are located, what you tried to use to unmount it now indicates that this is the problem, as is the case with physical disks (Frameworks 5.77).

When will all this come to KDE?

plasma 5.20 I arrive last October 13, Plasma 5.21 will arrive on February 9 and Plasma 5.20.5 will do it next Tuesday, January 5. KDE Applications 20.12 will arrive on December 10, and 21.04 will arrive sometime in April 2021. KDE Frameworks 5.77 will land on December 12.

To enjoy all this as soon as possible we have to add the KDE Backports repository or use an operating system with special repositories like Kde neon or any distribution whose development model is Rolling Release.

Yes, the above will not be met with Plasma 5.20 or 5.21, or not for Kubuntu until the release of Hirsute Hippo, as we already discussed in this article.