# Help! Wanna install KDE but how?



## Hype.it (Aug 26, 2004)

When it comes to X11 and other commands i'm a complete novice, so be gentle. 

Currently Apple's X11 have already been installed, dunno know why? Do i need this? Can I remove it? and how? 

I played around with KDE in the pass on a linux box, i heard it's possible to install on a Mac but haven't any clue as to how or what i need. Outta curiosity I recently visited kde.org and under their guidelines i should install Xfree86. So i downloaded XFree86 version "Darwin-ppc-7.x" on running "sh Xinstall.sh" i get questions about making backup and stuff... 




> Welcome to the XFree86 4.4.0 installer
> 
> You are strongly advised to backup your existing XFree86 installation
> before proceeding.  This includes the /usr/X11R6, /etc/X11
> ...



So now i play safe and said No. 




> Aborting the installation.



Now, this is completely beyond me. Like i said, Unix is new to me. Anyone like to shed some light and offer a step by step help or guide?

Thanks in advance.


----------



## Viro (Aug 26, 2004)

The easiest way to get KDE running on OS X is to use fink. Head on over to http://fink.sourceforge.net and download it. Fink is basically a package manager for OS X and it allows you to easily install UNIX software like KDE, taking care of all the dependencies for you.

Once you have fink installed, the easiest and quickest way to get KDE up and running is to type in the following commands

```
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install kde
```
Sit back and let fink do the rest.


----------



## Hype.it (Aug 26, 2004)

Yeah thanks... I have fink but i like to try with Xfree86. 

Anyone else wanna help?


----------



## chevy (Aug 26, 2004)

FinkCommander can install Xfree86 for you if I remember correctly, but I am not sure this is the best way to go.

Installing KDE on mac also means that you have the latest quicktime libraries, and the developer's tool box installed.

A complete explaination was in MacWorld of June or July.


----------



## Viro (Aug 26, 2004)

Fink will install XFree86 for you if you don't have the Apple X11 SDK installed. Plus, I seriously think that Apple's implementation of X11 is much better than XFree86 since Apple has hardware acceleration in their server.

Any reason why you want to avoid fink?


----------



## Hype.it (Aug 26, 2004)

Sorry if i'm sounding a little rude about this... I really am. 

So far, I have posted this same question in various Mac & Darwin related forums and all i get is someone saying "head over to blah blad and download FINK." 

There are reasons that there are so many versions of linux and unix out there, it's because everyone wants to do things in a different way, like me. Hopefully manually without Fink. It's sometimes nice to touch a little bit of code, get your hands dirty as they say and get away from all things point and click, isn't it? Well i think it is. I have Mac OSX for all the pointy things, now i wish to dabble in other extremes...


----------



## Hype.it (Aug 26, 2004)

chevy said:
			
		

> FinkCommander can install Xfree86 for you if I remember correctly, but I am not sure this is the best way to go.
> 
> Installing KDE on mac also means that you have the latest quicktime libraries, and the developer's tool box installed.
> 
> A complete explaination was in MacWorld of June or July.



I'm in Hong Kong, i'm not spending $100 bucks on a imported magazine.


----------



## Viro (Aug 26, 2004)

Well, that's probably because its a very complex step to get KDE compiled on OS X. You need to have all the required libraries, something that OS X doesn't ship with. There is a reason Fink and Darwinports exist. They are there to simplify things for people who want to get things done, with the minimum amount of hassle.

But if you're keen on getting KDE compiled on your own, well, just download the source tarballs (tar.gz files) and have a go at compiling them. In order to get past the configure stage you'll need to download various libraries that aren't installed in OS X by default.

In order to install XFree86 (no idea why you'd want this instead of Apple's X11 server), just do what the documentation says. Say 'Y' and have it install.

Good luck in the rest.


----------



## Viro (Aug 26, 2004)

After re-reading your original post again, I think you're pretty much a newbie to UNIX and I'm guessing you probably won't find the information in my last post too helpful (source tar balls? dependencies? eh?). So I thought that I'd just help point you more in the right direction.

First thing you need to do is install XFree86. You already worked that out, just press 'y' and things should go as planned. But hey, with open source software who knows 

Next you need to download the KDE source files. Get them from http://www.kde.org/download/. Just to be safe, download all of them.

Go to this page for information on the libraries that KDE3 needs. http://developer.kde.org/build/compile_kde3_2.html When you download the Qt libraries, make sure you download the X11 version and not the Mac OS X version. Also, you can safely disregard the bit about downloading autoconf and automake. OS X comes with those, so that's two less things to worry about. Ignore the bit about bunzip2 as well. OS X comes with it.

In the installation section, you need to set those variables in the file .profile in your users directory (e.g. /Users/viro). Here's a sample of what my .profile looks like.

```
QTDIR=/Developer/qt
PATH=$QTDIR/bin:/opt/local/bin:$PATH
DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH=$QTDIR/lib:$DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH
export QTDIR PATH DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH
```
Keep in mind, you need to set QTDIR, KDEDIR and DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH (*not* LD_LIBRARY_PATH) to where you have or will install stuff to. Traditionally, this has been /usr/local. After editing your .profile, type the following command to update your paths without restarting your machine.


```
source .profile
```

Now set aside a good day to get all things compiled nicely. On my machine, KDE takes about a day and a half to compile. But since you have a G5, that should be much shorter. If all goes well and nothing untoward happens, you should have KDE up and running.

Looking at your comments about Linux and fink, you probably don't quite get why people just prefer to use fink. As someone who works on the UNIX commandline daily and writes code pretty much for a living, getting stuff like this to compile is just mind numbingly boring. But hey, you've got a fast machine and probably have way too much time, so good luck with all that. Post back if you need help.


----------



## Hype.it (Aug 27, 2004)

Thanks.... Yes, a complete noob to Unix but not to Mac. 
Now why couldn't you help me before?

i'm running 10.3.5 btw, dunno has anyone else experience problems after a OS update. I tried with Apple's X11 before, but it just died on it's ass once KDE was installed from fink's packages. I figure it's either fink or apple not sure which, but maybe you like to give info as to how i fix the apple x11 before i delete it's directories and install Xfree86 over it, well?


----------



## Viro (Aug 27, 2004)

Well, in order to install KDE via fink you need to have the Apple's X11 SDK installed. This can be found on your XCode CD and it isn't installed by default with the other development tools. You might want to give that a check to make sure it is installed. To my knowledge, fink requires it to work correctly. Even so, you can install XFree86 alongside Apple's X11 without any bad side effects. That's unless the packages for XFree86 try to do something funny and install themselves in the wrong directories.

I haven't had any of my applications break once 10.3.5 is installed. But hey, I don't use KDE on my Mac. Other UNIX apps that make use of the X11 protocol haven't died either, so it could be a problem on your end.

As to posting those instructions before, well, they are going to get fairly complex, they are time consuming and frankly it's just too much effort just to get KDE running on OS X. Its much easier and better to just run Linux along side OS X by dual booting with Yellowdog Linux or Gentoo Linux, something I used to do when I was still transitioning from Linux to OS X.


----------

