Plasma Active 3 Improves Performance, Brings New Apps
Written for KDE SC by yurikoles on 2012-10-15
KDE has released the 3rd stable version of Plasma Active, KDE's device-
independent user experience. The Plasma Active user interface is touch-
friendly and works well across a range of devices. Its Activities function
gives users a natural way to organize and access their applications, files and
information. Plasma Active Three noticeably improves the user experience with
its enhanced and expanded set of apps, improved performance and a new virtual
keyboard.
New Apps
Files is a new default application in Plasma Active. It is a file manager,
but, unlike most others, it isn't based on folders; rather users can search
for documents by file type, creation time and semantic information such as
Tags. Files does not use the file system directly; it organizes documents with
Nepomuk, Plasma Active's underlying semantic engine.
Okular Active is Plasma Active's new Ebook Reader. Okular Active is built on
the technology which also drives the desktop version of the popular Document
Viewer, and is optimized for reading documents on a touch device. Okular
Active supports a wide range of file formats, such as PDF, EPub, Open
Document, and many others.
Through Plasma Active's Add Ons, thousands of ebooks are available for free,
with paid applications and content coming soon.
Champions: Kontact and Calligra
With Calligra Active and Kontact Touch, Plasma Active delivers scalable and
proven applications for office and groupware tasks, with a focus on
interoperability. Kontact Touch supports many groupware solutions, and brings
calendaring, email, contact management among other features. Calligra Active
has excellent support for most common office file formats such as OpenDocument
and Microsoft's .doc, .docx, .xls and .xlsx.
The KDE developers have put a lot of effort into improving the performance of
the user experience, its applications and underlying libraries. These
improvements bring a noticeably snappier and more visually coherent user
interface, and make using Plasma Active a more enjoyable experience compared
to previous versions.
Plasma Active runs on Mer
Mer is the leading openly developed Linux-based OS for mobile devices. It is
based on work from the MeeGo Project. With the size of the Core OS reduced to
the bare essentials, Mer delivers performance. It is also a fully open
development project, and thus supports fundamental Plasma Active design
principles—
Improved Text Input
Thanks to a new virtual keyboard based on Maliit, the input method used on
devices such as Nokia's N9, Plasma Active Three improves ease of text input.
The new virtual keyboard is faster and more convenient to use and offers great
flexibility for system integrators.
Roadmap: More Apps, Qt5 and File Synchronization
In future releases, users can expect support for a wider range of devices,
easier synchronization of data across devices, an improved user experience
through the use of Qt5 and KDE Frameworks 5, and more applications for popular
uses.
The KDE team is currently working to bring a Plasma Active-based tablet to the
market to demonstrate its capabilities fully and offer users a fresh and more
open alternative to existing mobile operating systems.
About Plasma Active
Plasma Active is openly developed Free software. Its reference implementation
builds on the Mer operating system and runs on a number of devices, including
popular x86-based tablet computers and ARM-based hardware such as the Archos
G9 series. Plasma Active can be used as a base for creating custom user
experiences, and for a variety of purposes on existing and emerging touch-
enabled devices. Participation in Plasma Active is welcomed, either through
individual contributions or by joining the Make * Play * Live partner network
as an official support or distribution partner.
