KDE Connect 1.10 released | Hacker News Reader

KDE Connect 1.10 released

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218 pointscodewiz65 comments

This is an astonishingly useful tool -- I've been using it for years, and I'm always impressed that it's well maintained and getting new features.

From the way my music player (Clementine on KDE) pauses for a call, incoming or outgoing - the media controller from the phone, sms pop-ups on the computer, the file browser and two-way sharing, clipboard mirroring, and a nifty 'find my phone' feature (your computer triggers a phone ring).

There's a few features I've not used but are pretty cool to show off to 'other OS users' -- use the phone as a trackpad, triggering 'run commands', etc.

Yes, that pause on call feature is pretty cool. If you have the plasma-integration for your browser [1] installed it can even pause your Amazon Prime Video (or Youtube, ...). Assuming you are watching a video on the Amazon website and your phone rings, the video pauses automatically. As soon as the call is over, the video resumes automatically :D

Sadly Spotify does something to not let the browser detect how to control the player :-/ (it works on many websites, just not on spotify.com)

[1]: Firefox: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/plasma-integr...

[1]: Chromium: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/plasma-integration...

Regarding Spotify : I use its desktop client (an electron-like app, but using their own implementation of a browser, if I got this right), and it does properly work with Connect, as it implements the standard media player controls on desktop.

I have an android wear, this allows me to play/pause, next/previous track volume up/down spotify running on my desktop from my wrist, this is super cool (although to be fair, you can also do that with the spotify app on mobile, used to control spotify on desktop).

https://www.spotify.com/fr/download/linux/

Unfortunately you can't install tracking protection for their desktop app, so you'll have to mess with a Pi-Hole or modifying your hosts file or something...

You probably just need to hook into dbus. Do you know if it produces a media key? You can just add this script: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/spotify#D-Bus

The parent was talking about the website, spotify.com, not the desktop application.

> use the phone as a trackpad

I use the remote control feature (not the trackpad part, but the virtual keyboard) extensively when controlling mpv from the couch. Particularly in conjunction with Hacker's Keyboard for special keys like Alt+F4.

I did not hear about KDE connect (maybe because I do not use KDE), but had the exactly same need (control mpv from my couch). I have found this: https://github.com/ndunks/xdotoolweb - I only have one use case so I only run it - using a simple shell script wrapper - together with mpv.

It working fine for me, and it does not need a client on the mobile (except a browser), also it is not connected to the KDE ecosystem - if anyone else needs some lightweight solution for the same problem...

KDE Connect can be used outside of KDE to a certain extent. I used the clipboard sharing on Sway (a Wayland compositor) by starting kdeconnectd manually in a terminal.

Yes, it rocks.

kitinerary also looks promissing : https://github.com/KDE/kitinerary

> use the phone as a trackpad

Heh, I remember an app like that in the Apple world from back when the iPhone 4 was new.

Does it pause any D-Bus MPRIS compatible player? How deeply KDE-specific is it, in general?

It does pause and it's not KDE specific at all. There are Gnome parts to it and if I recall it also works in Windows.

KDE Connect is really fantastic. I recently switched to an iPhone and I miss KDE Connect so much :( Now I have to go through all kinds of ridiculous antics just to copy a file over to my phone, when it used to be so easy.

IMHO, KDE Connect is currently one of the best parts of KDE (together with Dolphin and the Nextcloud integration). I use it for a few years now and while my there are only a few use-cases I use regularly, I am always delighted to have it when something unexpected happens.

For example, my phone has its own place on my desk and there are just a few places where I put it when it isn't there. A few weeks ago it wasn't on the desk and not in the other places where I searched for it. Calling it from another phone didn't help because it was late in the night and my phone switches to silent mode for the night automatically. But KDE Connect was the hero of the day, as the 'ping' feature works even if the phone is in silent mode :-)

Looking forward to more awesome KDE Connect versions.

The best thing about kde connect is that it's an open protocol so i has been implemented in other desktops (eg: gnome made gconnect and it works with kdeconnect android)

GNOME also has native nextcloud integration, it is not limited to Doplhin.

If anybody here is using gnome instead of KDE, there is "GSConnect" that allows you to use your current desktop environment with KDEConnect on your android mobile phone.

https://github.com/andyholmes/gnome-shell-extension-gsconnec...

In a similar vein, I am not on Gnome or KDE but have been using the basic kdeconnect functionality, such as sharing clipboard and transferring files, through kdeconnect-cli quite happily. It comes with the standard kdeconnect installation I believe.

http://manpages.org/kdeconnect-cli

still, on my xubuntu system

    sudo apt install kdeconnect --no-install-recommends

wants to install 101 packages :(

That's the joy of Qt for you.

It shouldn't be so bad though, the whole set of packages is probably a couple hundred of MB, IIRC.

KDE Connect is by far the most useful tool I have discovered in the last few years. If you use Linux and Android you should give it a try!

My personal highlights:

- shared clipboard (share urls between devices, write long text on PC and then copy it into a messenger, ...)

- very easily share files (and whole folders) between devices

- music on PC stops when someone is calling

I've been using this app for several months and it's great. I can see on my desktop when I get messages and reply or see calls and I can control youtube in firefox from my phone and a lot of things in between via the Plasma integration ad-on for firefox.

It's all very seamless and it "just works"!

KDE Connect is just one of the greatest tools ever. What I really did not expect is that it worked out of the box without any shenanigans to set up. Great job!

I miss my Android phone because of KDE Connect. I wish it was available on iOS.

It seems to provide a lot of the functionality of macOS Continuity[1], and then some. It's a shame we can't hook into that stuff on iOS, since it's already capable of doing a lot of this.

1. https://www.apple.com/macos/continuity/

The Apple "experience" includes lots of little niceties that only work with Apple software running on Apple hardware (or, for those who live dangerously, a "Hackintosh").

The touchpad on my 2013 MacBook Pro doesn't click properly anymore, and I don't much care for the newer models, so I ended up buying a ThinkPad X1 Extreme (running Linux). Unfortunately, it's meant giving up lots of little things like iMessage integration, AirDrop, Continuity, synchronization with iCloud, etc.

Yes, several of these features have alternatives that do work nicely on Linux, but the experience usually isn't as seamless, especially on the iOS side. And while most of the bits above could probably be reverse engineered, I can totally understand why open source developers (many of them volunteers) might not be enthusiastic about spending their time improving compatibility with a closed platform that won't reciprocate.

You can try Feem WiFi on iOS.

Feem can share files and send texts/links between devices without passing through the internet. (Uses LAN)

Works on multiple platforms.

Thatd not what KDEConnect does at all.

Well...it's one of KDEConnect's functions. I use that, too, but it's not in my most-used KdeC functionality.

What I mean is that it does so much more. Comparing it to a software that does only file transfer does not do justice to the project, and it certainly is not an alternative.

My words exactly.

what is kde connect? https://community.kde.org/KDEConnect#What_is_KDE_Connect.3F

Excited to see Connect being actively developed. It's already incredibly useful for me, but I can see it reaching a whole other scale when librem5 phones will be out.

Something I wonder more and more often, lately, is if Connect should not be responsible to manage notifications.

I've seen that a rewrite of the notification system is on the table [1] to be on par with android's one, and indeed, I would love to have grouping and persistence in my notifications (I currently put the notification widget on my desktop ; it's good enough, but I need to click it to see notifications history and it quickly gets floody, without grouping).

The reason I would love to see it being part of Connect is to make it easy to handle shared notifications between several Plasma installs (currently, I spend a long time tweaking the send and receive notifications plugins in Connect, this works great with two devices, but starts getting ugly with three). I can see this being a killing feature, on Plasma mobile.

I guess users who don't use Connect wouldn't love that much to have a dependency on it for their notification system, though. But since the discussed rewrite seems mobile focus (IIUC), both systems could co-exist : the classic desktop style notification system currently implemented, and the mobile friendly one in Connect, with an option in system settings to select which one we want to use.

[1] https://community.kde.org/Plasma/Notifications#Crazy_Ideas

I’m tempted to get another computer just to give KDE another chance. VMs never really do it justice.

Are there any recommended hardware manufacturers that are known to work best with it? Most of the typical Linux-centric sellers seem to ship Ubuntu or some other hacked Gnome version, and I’d like to reduce my install effort to the very minimum.

I've installed Debian GNU/Linux with KDE on pretty much every computer I've had since the late 1990's, and I've never found a platform that didn't 'do it justice'.

VM's won't provide quite the same level of compositor 3D eye-candy, of course, but that's no surprise.

If you're already running Linux, then you can install KDE and log in with a different desktop environment. It might be called something like "choose session" on the login screen; it's a long time since I tried this.

https://en.opensuse.org/Portal:Hardware

OpenSUSE has always been great to me, and always been great to KDE as far as I can tell (which isn't very far, just my personal 2 cents).

System76, Purism's Librem, ZaReason, Entroware, and ThinkPenguin all make excellent Linux laptops.

Dell's XPS and Inspiron laptops typically have good support as well.

OpenSUSE, KDE Neon, Fedora, Xubuntu, and Manjaro are all solid distros for KDE-centric experience.

If you get something that's known to work well with Ubuntu, you could then install KDE Neon, which is bleeding edge KDE over Ubuntu LTS. There's also Kubuntu, but the KDE packages aren't as up to date.

I guess if you want to guarantee KDE compatibility. KDE support a laptop called the slimbook: https://kde.slimbook.es

Macbooks are always a sure thing. They don't have perfect support out of the box, there's always some annoyance, but their popularity and uniformity means that there's always a workaround available on the Arch Wiki. You could say the "community support" is top notch.

Is this still true for the newer (i.e. "touchbar") models? From what I've heard, it's very hard to get Linux working well on those, and that even things like the wifi card aren't supported yet

Meh, first time I heard about this and of course I wanted to try it. But (as I could have imagined) it says it will only discover other devices on the same local network - but my mobile is in my work's guest network, whereas my laptop is in the internal network. So yeah, this won't fly unless I can think of some VPN trickery :(

Does anyone have a quick and easy way of getting this running on OSX, or can suggest an alternative?

Currently trying to get this to work via Craft (https://community.kde.org/Craft) and hoping for the best meanwhile

Currently I'm using Soduto https://soduto.com/ and it's working ok, although only basic functionality is covered.

I forgot about this tool ages ago and recently I was wishing I did something that this does perfect.

Anyone got this working on Arch with i3?

I have gotten it to work on NixOS with it. I've read that it also works with Arch.

Make sure kdeconnectd is running, that your appindicator tray bar is working, and that your devices are on the same network

Glad to know I'm not the only one here running that combo. Unfortunately, my phone is from the dark ages so I won't be able to verify that it works.

I know this is a personal blog, but this is a good time as any to remember a few points when doing a release announcement:

- describe the project

- link to it

See: https://lwn.net/Articles/397441/ for more guidelines.

Here's a link to KDE Connect's description:

https://community.kde.org/KDEConnect#What_is_KDE_Connect.3F

And Play Store listing: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.kde.kdecon...

I know my message won't be well received here but I wish KDE had a leadership with a pair of balls that could say to developers "stop losing your time on these side projects and polish the core desktop and libraries". There are so many pet projects in KDE while the desktop rots in its instability and lack of polish...

In my opinion KDE Connect is one of the absolute core applications of the whole KDE project!

> [...] while the desktop rots in its instability and lack of polish

This is not true at all. Yes, the KDE desktop has a few rough edges but for me it is still by far the very best DE in existence.

You seem to be having some grave misconceptions about

1. How open source projects work, 2. How polished and stable KDE already is, and 3. How useful piece of software KDE Connect is.

1) Of course you can't force contributors to do anything but there are ways: tell them repeatedly there are bugs that need fixing, refuse to give them infrastructure to host their pet projects and make it clear they are not official and can't bear the KDE trademark, etc.

2) Don't make me laugh.

3) I don't even own an Android so I could never know. And that's not the point.

I know this is just some ranting and nothing will change. KDE went down a hole a long time ago when they lost their funding. But I'm sad to see the things that are happening to it. KDE does not deserve to die like this.

KDE just recently received a 300k donation [1].

You seem to remember KDE from the 4.x dark times. Give it a try, it has vastly improved in the last 2 years.

[1] https://dot.kde.org/2018/10/15/kde-ev-receives-sizeable-dona...

Refuse to give them infrastructure? You seem to know the recipe to kill an open source project.

Have you considered working in enterprise software?

2) You are the one making people laugh here :P

Speaking of balls, please don't be a dick. I totally get it if you want the absolute stable experience (although, if your install of plasma is that unstable, my bet is that it's poorly configured, either by you or by your distribution defaults), but this is only an acceptable expectation for software you pay for - or on which you fix the bugs yourself.

I'm saying such comment is not OK because there's nothing as demotivating for a freesoftware developer than being blame for what they think is their gift to the world. With such comment, you're not only being dismissive of other people hard work, you're killing it for all of us as you may very well demotivate some core developers, or contribute to do so. This is basically negative contribution.

Those guys do an amazing job. Many thanks to them.

I am not blaming the developers at all, I am blaming management/leadership. Every team needs a strong leader to call the shots, which KDE evidently doesn't have.

I am purposely putting aside the fact that (some of[0]) the developers that work on KDE don't get paid, because I believe saying "this software is bad and that is acceptable and normal because it's open source" is a shitty, defeatist attitude that doesn't bring us anywhere.

[0]I don't really know if any of the KDE developers are being paid. I know they lost most of their funding years ago, but I don't know the current situation. Given the status of the project, I assume there are no full time developers.

I contribute sometimes to fix some bugs. In your opinion I should be forced to learn graphics/OpenGL to contribute to KWin, or design to submit themes because some dude does not likes the corner radius of a button or implement features that I do not need but some entitled person wants and I should spend my free time implementing that while he is playing some video game.

Open source does not work like that, if a company wants something it will pay a full time developer to implement it, if a user wants something he needs to implement it or find someone to implement it, this may mean you may want to pay someone or convince a maintainer to implement it.

What KDE needs is a billionaire to hire a few developers to go trough the bug tracker and fix some bugs.

“pauses for a call, incoming or outgoing”

This is a pretty standard feature on most mobile operating systems. It’d be like saying “I like the how I get a notification when I receive an sms”

This pauses the video or music on your _computer_ when you receive a call on your phone.

Does it also pause youtube (or any other in browser multimedia) or other platforms?

It does as long as the application handles the standard events regarding play/pause.

It does if you have plasma-browser-integration extension on your browser.

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