=== KDE on FreeBSD

Links: +
link:https://freebsd.kde.org/[KDE/FreeBSD initiative] URL: link:https://freebsd.kde.org/[] +
link:https://community.kde.org/FreeBSD[FreeBSD -- KDE Community Wiki] URL: link:https://community.kde.org/FreeBSD[]

Contact: Adriaan de Groot <kde@FreeBSD.org>

The KDE on FreeBSD project packages CMake, Qt, and software from the KDE Community, for the FreeBSD ports tree.
The software includes a full desktop environment called KDE Plasma (for both X11 and Wayland) and hundreds of applications that can be used on any FreeBSD machine.

The mailto:kde@FreeBSD.org[KDE team] is part of mailto:desktop@FreeBSD.org[desktop@] and mailto:x11@FreeBSD.org[x11@], building the software stack to make FreeBSD beautiful and usable as a daily-driver graphical desktop workstation.
The notes below describe *mostly* ports for KDE, but also include items that are important for the entire desktop stack.

==== Infrastructure

CMake was updated several times and is now version 3.28.1, the latest upstream release.
FreeBSD ports are once again fully up-to-date.

Qt5 is now on long-term support and updates only rarely.
The KDE patch collection is a community-supported branch of Qt which pulls in upstream patches and fixes from the KDE community, and updated to 5.15.12.
There were several deprecations (see below) in the Qt5 ports.

Qt6 and KDE's upcoming megarelease of KDE Plasma 6 (scheduled for 2024q1) are the next major milestone for the KDE team.
Qt6 was updated to version 6.6.1 along with the Python bindings for Qt, PySide.
An alpha-release of KDE Frameworks 6 was added to the ports tree.

==== KDE Stack

KDE Gear releases happen every quarter, KDE Plasma updates once a month, and KDE Frameworks have a new release every month as well.
These (large) updates land shortly after their upstream release and are not listed separately.

* KDE Frameworks reached version 5.112.
  The KDE Frameworks 5 series is winding down, although it will a few months still until it enters long-term support upstream.
* KDE Plasma Desktop was updated to version KDE Plasma 5.27.10.
* KDE Gear updated to 23.08.4.
* KDE Frameworks 6 (alpha) 5.247 was updated in the ports tree.
* KDE Plasma Desktop 6 (beta 2) 5.91.0 was updated in the ports tree.

==== Related Ports

The KDE ecosystem includes a wide range of ports -- most maintained by mailto:kde@FreeBSD.org[kde@], all building on a shared base of Qt and KDE Frameworks.
The mailto:kde@FreeBSD.org[KDE team] updates them all as needed.
This quarter the KDE team would like to thank mailto:tcberner@FreeBSD.org[Tobias C. Berner], mailto:arrowd@FreeBSD.org[Gleb Popov] and mailto:jhale@FreebSD.org[Jason E. Hale] again for keeping things up-to-date.

Many ports have been "flavorized" to support a Qt5 and a Qt6 flavor in the ports tree.

Special mention to:

* New port package:x11/xwaylandvideobridge[].
  By design, X11 applications can’t access window or screen contents for Wayland clients.
  The video bridge improves Wayland support for screen sharing tools like Discord, MS Teams, Skype, and more.
  Screen sharing is fully under the control of the Wayland user.
* Update for package:multimedia/mlt7[] which was updated to 7.20.0.
* Update for package:sysutils/bsdisks[] which was updated to 0.33.
* Bugfix for package:devel/llvm15[] to make package:devel/kdevelop[] work again.
* Security fixes for package:www/qt5-webengine[] and package:www/qt6-webengine[].

==== Deprecations

Web browsers are huge, and have a considerable security surface.
The venerable package:www/qt5-webkit[] WebKit port was removed on the last day of 2023.
