Kubuntu 20.04 LTS Review

The PRIME Profiles section of NVIDIA X Server Settings seems to be a contribution of the Ubuntu desktop team as it does not appear in the NVIDIA X Server Settings implementations provided by Arch, Solus, or openSUSE. It is an excellent solution to Optimus graphics switching that is officially supported by the distribution. Unfortunately, this same team that has done great work with NVIDIA PRIME, is aggressively pushing Ubuntu and Kubuntu desktop users into using the Snap package format. I don't believe Snaps or Flatpaks help desktop users in the long run, help Linux adoption on the desktop, or solve Linux fragmentation problems. Some view them as more appropriate for servers and IOT devices.

And despite what some Canonical employees espouse is a benefit of Snaps, reducing the burden for app developers in packaging and increasing adoption of their apps, this may not be true,^[1] at least for Linux users like me. As an illustration, consider my experience with the KSnip application, a screenshot utility written using the Qt framework. I installed KSnip from the Discover package manager, not paying attention to the package format. Upon opening the newly installed app I was unhappy to see that the app, despite being Qt based, like the Plasma desktop, did not visually match the desktop or any of the apps. More importantly, the button to "Browse" for the location to save captured screenshots did not open a file dialog, nor did the text input to specify the location do anything. Then I realized the reason for these problems -- it was a Snap package. I had to uninstall it because of the lack of integration into the desktop. (The xdg-desktop-portal package may resolve the integration issues, but I'm not interested in using Snaps.)^[2]

KSnip Snap Package Does Not Integrate Into the System Nor Is It Able to Save Screenshots the the Filesystem

Canonical employees could package this app as a .deb and help Ubuntu derivative distribution users with a well integrated app.

The other issues I experienced were minor:

• VirtualBox VMs running in the background will not automatically resume when the system is resumed from suspend. In some cases the VM was immediately available, but with only host-only networking available and no other networking to/from the VM. This requires saving the VM state and starting the VM again. This issue also occurs in some other distributions and not others, most notably openSUSE, where this is not an issue at all.
• I experienced an issue where TeXLive/LaTeX/LuaLaTeX compilation of a certain document using the lstinputlisting code listing command from the LaTeX Listings package results in an error. There is some indication that this is a LuaLaTeX bug, but ironically, the distributions with the cutting-edge packages, Arch and openSUSE Tumbleweed, use older versions of TeXLive that avoid this problem by using older versions of TeXLive. Apparently packagers of this software on Ubuntu (or possibly Debian) don't use this software extensively enough to be able to make packaging choices that avoid the issue. Manjaro also has this particular error, but Solus does not, and neither does Fedora, which has a less annoying error regarding fontspec.
• After switching to NVIDIA and plugging in the external monitor, tap to click stopped working for the duration of my session on at least one occasion.

The Plasma Experience

I didn't install Ubuntu and subsequently convert the installation to Kubuntu desktop by installing the appropriate package as I have on the Acer (actually, Voyager 19.10 to Kubuntu Desktop with the Kubuntu PPA). I specifically wanted KDE's Plasma desktop as I feel it is filled with capability and flexibility throughout its extent, actually making it easier to use than other desktop environments, so I should comment on the Kubuntu implementation of the Plasma desktop environment. Kubuntu provides a good implementation of Plasma with minimal modification of the stock experience. Unlike in Fedora 32, and like many distributions with a good KDE implementation, one of the features that annoys users -- the Baloo file indexer -- is not disabled in Kubuntu's implementation. This is a good choice by Kubuntu because Baloo combined with KRunner (and any application that uses the Baloo index) is one of the most impressive features of the Plasma desktop; the search results appear instantly in KRunner with search results appearing instantly even even while typing the search term.

KRunner and Instant Search Results Powered by Baloo

The speed and responsiveness of results is impressive because of Baloo indexing. Baloo also powers other Plasma components such as the Full Screen Dashboard widget and Dolphin file searches.

The other feature that I imagine annoys most users who try KDE Plasma is KWallet, the password storage utility. Although this tool is installed, I didn't see any nagging pop-ups from KWallet. In fact I actually prefer what openSUSE does, which is to require users to create a GPG key whenever a password needs to be stored, such as WiFi passwords, which, I believe is used to encrypt the wallet.

The modification that the Kubuntu team should have made is one that would have enhanced the Plasma experience, namely GTK apps and their integration with the desktop in areas such as file open/save dialogs. For example, Firefox, a GTK app, uses GTK to create a file dialog that is more appropriate on GTK based desktops. It is possible to modify the behavior of Firefox so that it, and other GTK based programs, use the native Qt/KDE Frameworks file dialog, as I describe in Enabling a Native File Dialog for Firefox on Plasma Desktop. However the distribution does not do this, a relatively simple modification that will replace native GTK behavior with native Qt/KF behavior, essential for a distribution that focuses on KDE's desktop environment and applications.

Despite this area of needed improvement, Kubuntu does make efforts to provide Qt versions of applications that do have GTK implementations. Two examples are package management related applications described in the Package Management section, below.

The only modification that I am aware of in Plasma is the inclusion of a Global Theme that slightly changes the Breeze color scheme to result in a light theme with dark grayish window title bars and a matching Plasmashell theme with the Kubuntu logo on the application launcher widget in the panel. Like many distributions, Kubuntu specifies the Breeze GTK theme for GTK applications.

Even better, in my opinion, would be to provide at least one custom theme that has a GTK equivalent so that the desktop environment has a cohesive look whether using native KDE programs or GTK based programs. Preferably such a theme would be based on YaruKdeDark in order to Unify it with other members of the Ubuntu family, and possibly going further by using Plasma's flexibility to make it look like Unity. I am one of those who liked Unity and would have preferred a replacement based on Plasma over GNOME, so I made some effort to do this myself, modifying the default Kubuntu appearance to make it look like Unity. I describe this effort in Kubuntu 20.04 LTS Review Supplement: Fixes and Enhancements.

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My Kubuntu 20.04 LTS Installation in the Early Phases of Its Customization

It is possible to make it look a lot like Unity and behave like Unity in terms of desktop effects provided by Compiz. The only thing missing is Unity's Scopes and HUD.
Click on any of the thumbnails to view a slideshow of the images.

Unlike in the subject of the other recent KDE-centric distribution review -- Fedora 32 KDE Spin -- Plasma fans who come to Kubuntu can be certain that they will always have access to the latest version of the Plasma desktop and KDE applications as they are released. Users may have to enable Kubuntu's PPA (Personal Package Archive) to get these new versions of Plasma, the underlying KDE Frameworks, and applications, but at least they will be available. I did this in my Voyager to Kubuntu conversion on the Acer without any problems. (I should note that Fedora has something similar to Ubuntu's PPAs in the form of Copr (Community Projects, previously Cool Other Package Repositories) for which at least one current alternative Plasma desktop repository exists, but this is not maintained by the distributions KDE team as is the case with the Kubuntu PPA.)

The final note in the KDE experience is the Discover package manager. This GUI package manager for the Plasma desktop is well integrated into Kubuntu's implementation of Plasma. For example, there is a panel applet that notifies of updates and launches Discover. Also, something I've never noticed in the past, KRunner searches also suggest applications if there is a match to software that is not installed, launching Discover and opening it on the application's page in Discover. But note, the results may only offer Snap packages even when a native package is available -- possibly an indication of Canonical's aggressiveness in promoting Snaps.

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Discover Integration In Plasma

Initiating a Package Installation from KRunner. Notice how on subsequent searches KRunner reorders search results intelligently.
Click on any of the thumbnails to view a slideshow of the images.

Unfortunately, the Discover experience doesn't seem to be as good as on the version of Kubuntu installed on the Acer, still at 19.10. In this 20.04 release, there seems to be either a regression in the stability of the application or some corner cases which haven't been tested. For example:

• If the user takes to long to input a password when prompted as a result of package management actions, the application becomes unresponsive after indicating 100% completion of the task.
• If there are updates pending, the application will exhibit the above behavior, becoming unresponsive after indicating 100% completion of the requested package management task. It is always a good idea to fully update the system before performing other package management, but doing so should result in a notification of an error condition, not unresponsiveness or inaccurate indication of progress.

A distribution is more than the desktop environment, so if users like the Ubuntu core, despite the issues regarding Plasma experience, I believe those who prefer KDE will like this implementation, especially considering that new updates of Plasma and KDE applications will always be available even though Kubuntu is not a rolling release, at least through a PPA.