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From: m_elter@t-online.de (Matthias Elter)
To: lwn@lwn.net
Subject: KDE 2.1 Beta1 Released
Date: Sun, 17 Dec 2000 09:00:35 +0100

Hi

We have just released KDE 2.1 beta1, the first beta version of the second 
major release of the KDE 2 series. KDE 2.1-beta1 offers a number of 
additions, enhancements and fixes over KDE 2.0.1, the last stable KDE release 
which shipped on December 5, 2000. 

The major additions are:

A new and much-anticipated theme manager has been added, and many icons have 
been improved. In addition, semi-transparency (alpha-blending) has been 
implemented on small images and icons.

Pixie, an image viewer/editor, has been added to the Graphics package.

KDevelop, a C/C++ integrated development environment, has been added to the 
core KDE distribution. The version being shipped, 1.4beta, is the first 
version of KDevelop to make use of the KDE 2 libraries and integrate 
completely with the KDE 2 desktop.

Konqueror, the KDE 2 file manager, can now be configured to provide thumbnail 
previews for text and HTML files. In addition, the standards-compliant 
Konqueror now stores bookmarks using the standard XBEL bookmark format; a new 
bookmark editor complements the new standard. Finally, auto-proxy 
configuration has been implemented.

KHTML, the HTML widget, now has a special 'transitional mode' which greatly 
improves its handling of malformed HTML pages. In additon, KHTML now has 
greatly improved Java support and has added support for Java security (JDK 
1.2 or compatible is now required).

The panel (Kicker) has enjoyed significant improvements. An external taskbar 
has been included (familiar to KDE 1 users), support for sub-panels has been 
added (which can be separately sized and positioned), an improved external 
pager (Kasbar) has been added, and support for applets has been improved 
(including support for WindowMaker dock applets).

ARts, the KDE 2 multimedia architecture, now offers a control module to 
configure sampling rate and output devices, increased performance, improved 
user interfaces and a number of additional effects and filters.

For developers, a number of classes have been added to the core libraries, 
including a class for undo/redo support (KCommand) and a class for editing 
list boxes (KEditListBox).

The announcement is available here: 
http://www.kde.org/announcements/announce-2.1-beta1.html

A changelog can be viewed here:
http://www.kde.org/announcements/changelog2_0to2_1.html

The sources are available from:
http://ftp.kde.org/unstable/distribution/2.1beta1/tar/generic/src/

Binary packages:
http://ftp.kde.org/unstable/distribution/2.1beta1/rpm/

Mirrors are:
http://www.kde.org/mirrors.html

Installation instructions:
http://www.kde.org/install-source.html

Compilation FAQ:
http://www.kde.org/compilationfaq.html

Have fun!

-- 
Matthias Elter
elter@kde.org
me@caldera.de