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<chapter id="misc">
<title>Miscellaneous questions</title>

<qandaset>
<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>Why does &kde; use &Qt;?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>&Qt; is a very sophisticated toolkit that provides everything that
is needed to build a modern user interface.  &Qt; is written in C++, thus
allowing object-oriented development which ensures efficiency and
code reuse in a project the size and scope of &kde;.  In our opinion
there is no better toolkit available for &UNIX; systems and that it
would have been a grave mistake to try to build &kde; on anything but
the best.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>Why does &kde; not use gtk, xforms, xlib, whatever?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>There are a number of toolkits available.  To provide a
consistent user interface and to keep used resources such as memory to
a minimum, &kde; can use only one of them.  &Qt; was selected for the
reasons mentioned above.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>But &Qt; isn't free, is it?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>It is!  As of September 4, 2000, version 2.2 of the &Qt;
libraries were licensed under the <acronym>GPL</acronym>, thereby
fulfiling all aspects of <quote>free software</quote>.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>Does &kde; have terminal emulators with transparent
background?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para> Yes! An exciting new feature for &kde; 3.4 is support for the new X composite extension. This allows for effects such as translucency and drop shadows for all windows, easily configurable through &kwin;'s configuration dialog. This requires you to be using X.org version 6.8.0 or newer and have:

<screen>
Section "Extensions"
Option  "Composite" "Enable"
EndSection
</screen>

In your <filename>xorg.conf</filename>.
</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>How do I create icons for non-&kde; applications that I can put
in the <guimenu>K</guimenu> menu?  Where do these icons go?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>Create them using your favorite image manipulator, for example,
<application>GIMP</application>, or the <application>&kde; Icon
Editor</application> and put them in <filename
class="directory">$<envar>KDEDIR</envar>/share/icons(/mini)</filename>
or <filename
class="directory">$<envar>HOME</envar>/.kde/share/icons(/mini)</filename>.
</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>What about &kde; programs that do not have icons? How do I get
them into the menu?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>Use &kmenuedit;. To access it use the &RMB; on the 
<guibutton>K</guibutton> button and select <guimenu>Menu Editor</guimenu>.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>Does &kde; have a graphical &FTP; client?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>Yes, and it is none other than your favorite file
manager, &konqueror;. You can drag and drop remote files into local
folders.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>How do I exit &kde;?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>Simply click on the <guibutton>K</guibutton> button and select
<guimenu>Logout</guimenu>.  In addition, if you
<mousebutton>right</mousebutton> click on an
empty area of the desktop, you will be presented with a menu
containing logout as one of the options.
<note><para>Depending on your configuration of the &X-Window;, <keycombo
action="simul">&Ctrl;&Alt;&Backspace;</keycombo>
might also do the trick by killing the X server, but its use prevents
session management and cannot be recommended.</para></note></para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>Is there a program that checks for new mails at my
<acronym>ISP</acronym> if and only if I am online?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>&korn; will do the job.  If you are not
connected, it will just sit there (idling).</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>Is it really necessary to upgrade to the latest version?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>We recommend to always use the latest stable release. If you
don't, it will probably be difficult to get answers to your
questions. If you have a problem with an old version, the answer will
probably be <quote>Please upgrade and try again</quote>.  Note that
new versions also sometimes fix security problems.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>How do I copy and paste in &kde;?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>The simplest method is to use your mouse:</para>
<procedure>
<step performance="required"><para>Highlight the text you want to copy by holding down the
&LMB; and dragging across the text.</para></step>
<step performance="required"><para>Go to the destination area; depending on your configuration,
you might need to click it using the &LMB; to give it
focus.</para></step>
<step performance="required"><para>Click the &MMB; to paste.  If you have a two
button mouse and are emulating a three button mouse, push both buttons
simultaneously.</para></step>
</procedure>

<para>For more information about cutting and pasting in &kde; please see the &klipper;
hand book, accessed by typing <userinput><command>help:/klipper</command></userinput>
into the &konqueror; address bar. </para>

</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>How do I convert the default &RedHat; menus into a menu in the
<guimenu>K</guimenu> menu?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>Click on the <guibutton>K</guibutton> button and select
<menuchoice><guimenu>System</guimenu><guimenuitem>Appfinder</guimenuitem></menuchoice>.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question id="CVS">
<para>What is <acronym>CVS</acronym>?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>It stands for Concurrent Versions System.  It is a version 
control system and is based on <acronym>RCS</acronym> (Revision
Control System), but 
offers more functionality.  It is used to maintain source code under
development.  It will keep multiple versions of things (handy if you
broke something and have to back up and get a clean old version), and
allows people remote access over the Net to pick up the latest source
code and even to check in new files if they have permission.  It is
also open source (you pay for support if you want it), and since it is
free it is the system of choice for people writing more free products,
such as &kde;.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>Does &kde; support dual screen (Xinerama)?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>Yes, you need to have a multi-headed X server
(&eg; MetroX or XFree86 4.0 and above) and a &kde; >= 2.2.1
</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>Why does Drag and Drop not work with Xinerama?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>You should upgrade to XFree86 4.2.0 for this to work properly.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>


<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>How do I check which version of &kde; I am using?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>Fire up your <application>&kde; Control
Center</application>.  It comes up with an Info Screen including the version of &kde;
The &kde; version is also included in the application's 
<guimenuitem>About</guimenuitem> dialog.
</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>Can I write commercial software for &kde;?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>You can use the &kde; libraries to write <quote>commercial and
closed source</quote> as well as <quote>commercial and open
source</quote> software.  If you write open source software you can
use the &Qt; free edition.  But if you write closed source software
you may not use the &Qt; free edition; you need to obtain the &Qt;
professional edition from Troll Tech. </para> <para>If you want more
information, please contact <ulink
url="http://www.trolltech.com">Troll Tech</ulink> directly.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>How do I go about creating themes and icons?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>Go see <ulink
url="http://artist.kde.org">http://artist.kde.org</ulink>.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>Is <application>KLyX</application> dead?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>Yes.  But future versions of <application>LyX</application>
will be &GUI; independent.  Check the progress of the various &GUI;
frontends <ulink url="http://devel.lyx.org/guii.php3">here</ulink>.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>

<qandaentry>
<question>
<para>How can I get to know about development updates?</para>
</question>
<answer>
<para>You might want to subscribe to the various &kde; mailing lists
available, especially kde-cvs, which lists all commits done to the
&kde; <acronym>CVS</acronym> repository.  Check <ulink
url="http://lists.kde.org">http://lists.kde.org</ulink> if you want to
read without subscribing.</para>
</answer>
</qandaentry>
</qandaset>
</chapter>

