Hi there, I have a problem after being forced to reinstall kde (due to many broken dependencies after installing one pdf-related program) on my Debian 12-derivative Kali system (KDE plasma version 5.27.11, QT 5.15.15, KDE frameworks 5.115.0) - the desktop icons are no longer selectable. They are still clickable however - I can open them or call the context menu or drag them around - but I can no longer select multiple of them by clicking on a “plus” sign that appears when you hover your cursor on a file. Clicking on them also no longer has any visual representation of a file being selected, they just open all of a sudden. Some tray icons like the battery charge also became invisible, the default web browser now looks like a blank white paper in the application list and so on . Bizarrely, the problem is on the desktop icons and those in the tray, but if I open Dolphin, then everything is fine and all functionality is like normal. I tried poking around some logs and reinstalling some parts like kinit, dolphin, plasma-desktop, plasma-workspace but to no avail. Where should I look for the source of the problem? Any ideas how to fix? Thanks.
My graphics processor is Mesa Intel UHD Graphics 620 though I don’t think it’s really important here since everything was fine just recently.
Oh, also the login screen now looks kinda different (different overall style plus I can choose X11 or Wayland, don’t think I could do it before…never really paid much attention to graphical stuff, really, just assumed it works).
Some potentially relevant logs from /var/log/syslog: https:// drop . infini . fr/r/aNMkbCGjtk#Kusf5XdmZ7Zx+47LxTDIMVOEZPJ06XigJuXDFCGUOb4=
Hi - I personally don’t have much insight into the issue you’re describing, sorry - others here might have more ideas, though.
However, in general, it may be a struggle to find folks outside of the Kali Linux community who are familiar with and able to help support using it as a permanently-installed, “daily driver” operating system.
As one example, running everything as root, as is directly enabled by Kali Linux, is explicitly unsupported and never recommended for an ongoing installation, and will result in significant issues along with many annoyances.
If you are interested in long-term usage of KDE Plasma on your device, I would encourage you to use a more appropriate general-purpose Linux distro, such as one of the ones you can see at Distributions with Plasma and KDE Applications - KDE Community.
Since using Linux I always found that the best place to seek advice about updates and packaging are the actual distribution forum:
It is also useful to learn some basic formatting tips with discourse forums, for example: Legibility Tip
When posting code, paste wrapped in three (3) backticks `, or Tildes ~ before AND after the pasted text. Like this:
pasted text
Alternatively, select all pasted text, and click the </> button on the taskbar - which will indent the whole pasted section with one TAB, causing it to render the same way as described above.
Last time I checked Kali forums were pretty dead, but apparently the had a rehaul recently. I’ll check.
Also, I know about pasting logs but since they’re pretty big I decided against putting them directly into the post.
Well, I think my issue might be fairly KDE-specific. At the very least, could you have any ideas about which part of KDE is responsible for desktop icons? Something analogous to, say, xfdesktop for XFCE?
I’m clueless - and I’m having an issue with my theme (wallpaper hint) except the desktop - the custom icon which is displayed in Dolphin also doesn’t work on Desktop.
Could be wayland, could be something else… I don’t really know.
If Kali forum is so inactive, it beggars the question - why bother? The reason I use Manjaro is because the forums are excellent.
Plasmashell handles desktop display - just FYI on that, though, how desktop icons are displayed has changed considerably in recent months, so looking at current code would be tricky since Kali, like Debian, intentionally chooses packages that are not up-to-date with upstream projects.
Legibility Tip