They were expected for the middle of August but, I don't know why, its launch I was taken by surprise: KDE had the pleasure to announce a few minutes ago KDE Applications 19.08, the first major release in this series and the second in 2019. The previous release was KDE Applications 19.04 and, like the rest, it had three maintenance releases. After about three versions in which no news is included, it is time for an important launch like the one that took place today.
Many of the new features that come with KDE Applications 19.08 we will have to discover while we use them, but KDE has published some of them in the release note. To help us understand the most outstanding news and how they have done in other releases, they have also published an explanatory video that you have below.
KDE Applications 19.08, the second major update of 2019
In the video we can see some of the most interesting news:
Dolphin
- Now we can launch the file explorer with the keyboard shortcut META + E.
- New option that reduces desktop clutter: when it is already open, if we open folders from other apps, those folders will open in a new tab. The option is enabled by default, but we can disable it.
- The information panel has been improved with functions such as that multimedia files can now be played automatically when we select them or that we can copy the text of the panel.
- Many small bugs have been fixed to improve the user experience.
Gwenview
- Thumbnail view has been improved.
- You can now use the "low resource mode" which loads low resolution thumbnails (when available).
- A new "Share" menu has been added that allows you to send images to various places.
- Now displays most EXIF metadata for RAW images.
Okular
- Line annotations have new shapes available to add to their borders, such as arrows.
- Improved support for ePub documents.
- Improved page borders.
- The presentation mode marker tool in High DPI mode has been improved.
Cover
- Brings your existing window back to the front when asked to open a new document from another application.
- The "Quick Open" function sorts items according to most recent use and preselects the top item.
- The "Recent Documents" feature now works when the current settings are set to not save individual window settings.
Console
- La "split" function arrives in this version.
- The preferences window has been improved to make it clearer and easier to use.
Show
- When taking a capture with a delay, the time remaining to take the capture will now be displayed in its title window. This information will also appear in the task manager or bottom bar.
- If we un-minimize the Spectacle window when it is waiting to take a delayed capture, a new "Cancel" button will appear to cancel the screenshot.
- When saving a capture, a message is now displayed that allows us to open said capture or the containing folder.
Kontact
- Support for Unicode color emojis has been included.
- Added support for "markup" in the mail composer.
Kdenlive
- New group of keyboard-mouse combinations that will help us be more productive. For example, we can change the speed of a clip in the timeline with Shift + Resize or activate the preview of video clip thumbnails by holding Shift and moving the mouse over the clip thumbnail.
- The 3-point editing operations are consistent with other video editors, which is especially interesting if we switch to Kdenlive from another editor.
KDE Applications 19.08 Now Available in Source Code, Soon on Discover
As usual, although sometimes not, KDE has announced the release, but at the time of writing, only its code is available. If I'm not mistaken and looking at past releases, the first application to be updated via Discover (or Flathub) will be Kdenlive and then the rest will follow, those that are installed by default on systems like Kubuntu or KDE neon. Anyone who wants to use KDE Applications 19.08 should use special repositories, such as the aforementioned KDE neon or the KDE Backports. Whatever we use, we just have to have a little more patience. KDE Applications 19.08 is here.