Every operating system presents its users with a slightly different desktop environment from the others. In Mac OS X, the user sees a Dock at the bottom of the screen, icons that run from top to bottom, left to right, and a universal menu bar across the top of the screen. Windows has the task bar along the bottom, a start menu in the lower-left, and each window contains its own menu bar.
Ubuntu (which uses the GNOME desktop environment), has a universal menu bar across the top (although unlike Mac OS X, the menu fades out once its no longer being hovered over), but its Dock is along the left side of the screen. Kubuntu uses KDE, and in terms of basic layout, is most similar to Windows, in that it has a bottom panel, a menu in the lower left, and each window has its own menu bar. This is what Kubuntu looks like the first time the user boots into it.
There is one main difference, and that is the translucent rectangle in the upper-left portion of the screen. Instead of being able to spread icons, folders and documents all over your Desktop, the Desktop itself is sort of hidden, and its contents only appear within the borders of that rectangle. With a full Desktop, you would see something like this:
Again, notice that the documents never spill over the borders of the translucent rectangle. This is fine, but can be a little constricting. Although it isn't necessarily the best practice to have dozens of icons cluttering up your Desktop, this is the goal for today: to allow you to do just that!
First, hover over the right edge of the rectangle (actually a folder view widget), and you'll see a little control bar slide out from "beneath" it. Click the "X" to close this widget.
Now, right click anywhere on the screen. When the following menu appears, click the option for Desktop Settings at the bottom.
Now click the Layout menu at the top of the window and choose Folder View as shown below.
As odd as this might seem, since we just closed a Folder View widget, we want the entire screen to be one big Folder View. It seems counterintuitive, but hopefully it will make sense in a bit. Once you've chosen the Folder View layout, click the Apply button at the bottom of the window.
You should now see something like this.
We're getting closer. Instead of showing us the Desktop, the default Folder View layout shows us the contents of our Home folder, which includes the Desktop folder. We need to change it (if this is the desired outcome), so that the contents of the Desktop folder are shown on the Desktop (as they are in every other operating system). To do this we need to select the Location tab found in the Desktop Settings control panel, and click the Show the Desktop folder button, like we're doing below.
Once again, click the Apply button. All the folders from your Home folder that were showing on the Desktop should have disappeared, to be replaced with whatever would normally have been showing on the Desktop.
As long as you're here, however, you might want to click the Display tab and sort out how you'd like your Desktop arranged. You can have the icons and folders line up from top to bottom along the right side of the screen, as in Mac OS X, or along the left side, as in Windows. The contents can be sorted or unsorted, locked in place, aligned to a grid, or… not. It's completely up to you.
Just remember to again hit Apply when you're done, then finally the OK button to leave the Desktop Settings control panel.
At this point, your Desktop should now be just that: the contents of your Desktop folder. Remember the contents shown in the Folder View at the beginning? After we've made these changes, those same documents will appear on the Desktop, just as we'd expect them to.
Finally, you now have a few more options in your right click menu. Compare the image below to the one shown above (when we first opened the Desktop Settings control panel.
And there you have it. When KDE first made this change, it wasn't as "shocking" or "controversial" as when Ubuntu switched to the Unity desktop, but it wasn't a pleasant surprise for a lot of people. Thankfully, as you've just seen, it's an easy switch to make, and before too long you'll have the same comfortable environment you're used to.
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