Fedora has released Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop Edition 44 to the public.

The Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop Edition is suitable for many needs.  It combines the reliable and trusted Fedora Linux base with the KDE Plasma Desktop environment.  It provides a selection of KDE applications that are simple by default, but powerful when needed.

KDE Plasma 6.6

The KDE community makes your life easier with the latest release of KDE Plasma. It builds upon the foundations of Plasma 6 to provide a seamless, friendly, and familiar experience.

Fedora KDE 44 ships with Plasma 6.6.4 featuring:

  • Custom global theme creation by saving the current theme setup
  • More options for using color accent in windows with tint intensity for window frames
  • Support for connecting to Wi-Fi networks by scanning QR codes
  • Per-application volume adjustment from the task manager
  • New grayscale filter for colorblindness correction
  • New screen magnifier feature that tracks the mouse pointer
  • New “Slow keys” and “reduced motion” settings
  • Spectacle can do OCR scanning of images to capture text
  • Per-window filter from screencast through the menu in the title bar

There’s so much more detail available in the Plasma 6.6 release announcement.

Fedora KDE 44 specific updates

Beyond just the updates included in KDE Plasma 6.6, there are some major new features with Fedora KDE on Fedora Linux 44.

  • Fresh installations now use the brand-new Plasma Setup and Plasma Login Manager. These provide a more cohesive and integrated experience from the moment the computer is powered on the first time. The installation process has been simplified. It now enables you to easily set up Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop for a computer for a friend or a loved one.
  • The on-screen keyboard uses the new Plasma Keyboard, providing a fresh and future-forward implementation for keyboard input.

Fedora Linux 44 general updates

Some broader changes in Fedora Linux also directly impact Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop Edition, notably:

  • PackageKit now uses version 5 of the DNF package manager as the backend.
  • Support for select Qualcomm-based laptops.
  • The /etc/pki/tls/cert.pem file no longer exists by default. This may impact some programs that expect this file to provide system CA certificates instead of leveraging behaviors built into cryptographic security libraries to offer this information.

Fedora Ready is ready for Fedora KDE

The Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop 44 edition is fully supported within the Fedora Ready program. Fedora KDE is actively engaging with hardware vendors to support Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop on their devices.

We are pleased to announce that Star Labs offers preinstalled Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop as an option for their portfolio of devices. As makers of computers with an open source ethos embedded into the core of their products with even open source firmware powered by Coreboot, they share many of the same principles the Fedora community values. This is a very exciting moment for Fedora KDE and we look forward to deepening our collaboration with Fedora Ready participants and extending to other vendors. If you are a vendor potentially interested in Fedora Ready, please reach out!

Wrap-up

The Fedora KDE SIG hopes that you’ll find the Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop 44 to be a wonderful experience. When you’re ready to try it, click here for download links and verification instructions. If you’d like to learn more, check out the Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop website.