First thoughts and small issues after fresh install

[edroid]

Hi Maui Team,

Thank you for a very promising distro.
I was waiting for NetRunner 18, a "new" project seems interesting, I will wait for Maui 2 probably with upgrading my Netrunner 14 production environment, but the future looks bright

Some small issues I found right after install (I don't see any bugtracker on Maui website):

1. Switching to "Application Launcher" (Kickoff).
The icon is changing (it doesn't for all the other alternatives) and it's not possible to use it:



2. "IM Contacts" 
Opening it for the first time, it asks if you want to configure some accounts now, no matter of the answer, it just hides. 
Then, it's possible to open it from tray. 
Opening from tray with "Configure now" button opens the settings. In the "Online account" menu click on "Create", Google icon appears on the right side. Clicking on this Google icon:


Then, clicking OK, and Google icon again - everything works fine, google login window appears.
It looks like it happens just for the first time if there is no account configured.
If I won't configure it, logoff, logon and open the settings again - the issue also occurs for the first try only.

After logging to google account, only the "YouTube" service is displayed on the right side:


As YT is not a chatting service, Telepathy still says that there are no accounts configured.
So, in my opinion, some plugins/services should be installed by default in order to use any basic functionality of Telepathy.
Without that, I don't see to much of sense having Telepathy itself installed by default.

Also, clicking on General menu in these settings:



Some general thoughts of default software/settings:
1. I think, qBittorrent would be better than the qTransmission. It's based on QT and light on usage also, but it's much more advanced software (and available for Windows also)
2. Audacious - I really like this player, but why Winamp-classic skin as default, does anybody really like it ?
Audacious has already a stable QT port (and it will be the default version in the future). Even if you don't consider it stable, I think it's better to switch to GTK as default, because QT version will look the same, just using QT libraries. And it has much better UI that the Winamp one (it's subjective, of course).
4. gMusicbrowser - another non-QT music player as default ?
There is Clementine for example - a very alive and active development of a mature Amarok-like player, which is light on resources, based on QT and available on Windows and Android also.
5. LibreOffice - Galaxy icons... ? Why not awesome and beautiful Breeze icons, or Sifr, or Oxygen at least ? 
All of them are modern and fit KDE much better. I can't believe I'm the only one who thinks that Galaxy icons look old and ugly (correct me if I'm wrong!)


All the rest - awesome !
Based on Neon, which means having stable LTS core from Ubuntu, fresh KDE from Neno and a lot of Maui additional work - fantastic !
Default software selection (except the above) - great !
New update manager from Mint - lovely ! Works better, looks better and it's much more stable.
KDE Connect by default - nice !

After playing some time in VirtualBox, nothing has crashed, everything looks solid and works great, I can't wait when I will replace my Netrunner 14.

NetRunner was the best KDE LTS distro, I hope Maui will take over the path and become even better !
All the best wishes to the team, thank you for your great and hard work, all the tweaks, polishing and small details.
I think, Maui 2 or 3 will be the best, stable and awesome looking Linux Desktop Distro ever, I can't see it in any other way !

[starbuck]

Hi edroid, and thank you for your nice review.
We already started working on the issues and will give your suggestions some thoughts for Maui 2.

[dbyentzen]

Hi edroid, and thank you for your nice review.
We already started working on the issues and will give your suggestions some thoughts for Maui 2.

I'll echo edroid's general review. I've installed Maui 1 (Aurora) and it was worth the wait. I did initially encounter some bugs after install but nothing I wasn't able to resolve myself or with the forums help. The install went well, configuration was easy( Kmail hiccuped some but it always does), the only thing I notice now is my Chromium launcher will go invisible when I wake up from suspend and only with a KOrganizer(Calendar) reminder. The launcher reappears after I click on it. 

I personally would like a "pure" KDE desktop( no FF, T-bird, LibreOffice,etc....) choice but that is what synaptic is for. Am I correct in that I found no software center ( of course there is synaptic) ? 

I am very happy that we are using 16.04 as a base but using Neon packaging for the DE. Great up-to-date KDE with a stable, solid base...semi-rolling. LTS to LTS.

As with 14 and 17, this is great work.  Many thanks for this detailed OS and thanks to all who worked on it. The hard work shows.  I've installed Maui 1 on both home and business machines. I'm very happy and if Maui ever sets up donations I will gladly contribute!

[spacepenguin]

1. Switching to "Application Launcher" (Kickoff).
The icon is changing (it doesn't for all the other alternatives) and it's not possible to use it:


Does this really mean, I cannot use Kickoff menu with Maui??? 

[edroid]

Does this really mean, I cannot use Kickoff menu with Maui??? 

It doesn't anymore. Looks like Maui Team has fixed it already and I can confirm it's working fine now !

[spacepenguin]

Good news

[edroid]

I was a big fan of it since Kickoff appeared in KDE4.

But I advise you to try new launchers.

I started to prefer default launcher in NetRunner 14, which is called just "Application menu" here and it's very simple and useful.

Also, I didn't like the Maui default launcher "Application Dashboard" at first, because full-screen solution reminded me Windows8 too much.
But I tried it few times and I'm starting to really enjoy it.

You have everything in one place, but just the things you need there, not any useless stuff.


Try it just out of curiosity.
That's what I like in Linux - nobody's forcing you to do anything, if you don't like, you can always switch to kickoff or anything else.

[spacepenguin]

Don't assume I'm using kickoff. I don''t like it. I'm using the fullscreen menu. But a friend of mine and my father refuse to use another menu.

The fullscreen menu is too clumsy for a 1280x1024 screen (both use such a screen), the text is not very good readable, too short. And that cascading menu has too small icons.

I'm not really content withe any of the current menus but the fullscreen menu for me is the least evil . The fullscreen menu expecially is horrible for the wine menu.