Launching Applications
Table of Contents
At the bottom of the screen you will find the desktop panel, which is called
Kicker. You use the panel to launch applications. Have a look at the
button on the left with a large
icon.
This button is called the menu. It has a small arrow on the top to indicate that it will pop up a menu if you click on it. Just do it! The pop-up offers you easy access to all KDE applications installed on your computer system.
If you use one application or tool very often, then you may want to have even faster access to it, of course. In this case, you can add a single application, or an entire sub-menu of the menu, as a special quick-launch button, on to the panel. If you want to reach the KFind application directly via a launch button, simply choose ->->->-> (By this we mean that you should first click the menu, then select , where the small arrow to the right indicates that another menu will pop up. In this menu, choose , then , and in the next sub-menu, ).
You can add an entire menu this way, or one of the
icon
button sub-menus. For example, if you have KOffice installed and
want quick access to all the KOffice applications, without having to
navigate through the menu, then instead of choosing an
application, click on the menu
entry. Now you will have instant access to all the KOffice
applications, without having to put an icon for each on the panel.
You can move all items of the panel around with the command of the context menu. Just click with the mouse button (the mouse button is normally the button, but if you have configured your mouse differently, for example for left-handers, it might also be the one). A menu will pop up where you can choose . Now move the mouse and see how the icon follows while still staying on the panel. When you are done, simply hit the mouse button (by default the one). As you may have noticed, there is also a menu entry in case you are tired of a certain launch button on your desktop.
This leads us to another interesting topic: in many places, you can click the mouse button to display a context menu with choices that are applicable to the item you clicked. It is therefore always a good idea to try out the mouse button on something, if you do not know what to do with it. Even the background of the desktops has such a menu!
There are other interesting things possible with the panel. One may be important if you have a low resolution on your monitor: it is the “hide-and-show” function, activated by clicking on the small arrowed button, which is at one or both ends of the panel.
Perhaps you just don't like the panel extending the full width of the screen. That's easily changed! mouse button on an empty space in the panel, and choose . In the KControl dialog that pops up, you can choose Length on the Appearance tab, and use the slider there to set the panel to less than 100% width.
If you're following along, and have that dialog open anyway, then feel free to play with all the options, and use the to see the effect they have. You can easily reset everything to the default configuration, by simply pressing the button.
By the way, if you are not sure what a certain button does in KDE, just move the mouse pointer over it and wait for a short while: KDE has a built-in mini context help, called “tool tips”, which explains the functionality of such controls in a few words.
