The best way to test latest Plasma version 5.18 is by using KDE Neon operating system which is indeed designed to convey latest KDE Software to humanity. However, there are other distros out there to bring same thing if you would love an alternative. I mentioned below where and what to download, how to make bootable and run it, and finally several links to read. As a longtime KDE user I really welcome this latest release. Enjoy Plasma Desktop!
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# Distro Choices
Up to today 16 March 2020 I figured out there are at least four distros which already included KDE Plasma 5.18 in their ISO images:
- KDE Neon: the official one from KDE Project itself. This is the most obvious choice.
- openSUSE Tumbleweed KDE: rolling release openSUSE with latest KDE.
- Fedora Rawhide Spin KDE: rolling Fedora with latest KDE.
- KaOS: rolling release, Arch-like KDE-exclusive distro. Announced 5.18 in latest ISO.
# Download
- Neon: [link]
- Tumbleweed: [link]
- Rawhide: [link]
- KaOS: [link]
# Make Bootable Media
Use GNOME Disk Utility on Ubuntu to write ISO image into usb flash drive.
# Run
Boot up your usb flash drive on computer (this is called Live Session) and you will see Plasma 5.18 operating system running.
# How To Do Search
In the future, you will eventually find more distros managed to publish new ISOs with Plasma 5.18. But how to find out 5.18 right now among hundreds of distro? There are 2 steps to do, first is to find which distro has package named plasma-desktop versioned >= 5.18, and second to make sure that package is included inside its ISO image. To do so, these are things I use to find out distros at previous sections:
- Use distrowatch [link]
- Use repology.org [tutorial]
- See manifest file of each distro's ISO [openSUSE's example]
- Read each distro's news [see Kaos's example]
Enjoy Plasma!
# Official Links
- Release Announcement
- Release Notes
- YouTube/Peertube Video
- Wallpaper Contest Winner
- Video Contest Winner
- Mailing List Message (by Jonathan Riddell)
This article is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.