KDE-3.3.2: small puzzles [LONG]

[Joseph E. Sacco, Ph.D.]

I now have two versions of KDE installed on my system: The stock KDE
version supplied with YDL-4, which is rooted under /usr, and the version
I built using Konstruct, which is rooted under /opt/kde-3.3.2. 

KDE-3.3.2 is invoked through a local .xinitrc script which execs another
script that sets environment variables,

        # set up the environment
        QTDIR=/opt/kde3.3.2
        KDEDIR=/opt/kde3.3.2
        PATH=$KDEDIR/bin:$PATH
        LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$KDEDIR/lib:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH
        PYTHONPATH=$KDEDIR/lib/python2.3/site-packages
        PKG_CONFIG_PATH=$KDEDIR/lib/pkgconfig:/usr/lib/pkgconfig
        XDG_DATA_DIRS=$KDEDIR/share
        GDK_USE_XFT=1
        MANPATH=$KDEDIR/share/man:$MANPATH
        
        export QTDIR KDEDIR PATH LD_LIBRARY_PATH PYTHONPATH
        PKG_CONFIG_PATH GDK_USE_XFT XDG_DATA_DIRS MANPATH


and then execs /opt/kde-3.3.2/bin/startkde.

I have been experimenting with KDE-3.3.2, trying out the applications.
Every KDE application that I have tried out so far "works" in the sense
that the application comes up and "you can do stuff".  Not exactly
exhaustive testing, but encouraging.

What about non-KDE applications??? How would they function in this
non-standard test environment? Since I had manipulated the environment
variables there could be some surprises. 

The first "surprise" came from evolution-1.4. The spell checker no
longer worked. I figured that this was an environment issue. The output
from

	ldd /usr/bin/evolution

showed that evolution was loading six shared libraries from
/opt/kde-3.3.2/lib 

        libgthread-2.0.so.0 => /opt/kde3.3.2/lib/libgthread-2.0.so.0 
        libart_lgpl_2.so.2 => /opt/kde3.3.2/lib/libart_lgpl_2.so.2)
        libxml2.so.2 => /opt/kde3.3.2/lib/libxml2.so.2 
        libgobject-2.0.so.0 => /opt/kde3.3.2/lib/libgobject-2.0.so.0 
        libgmodule-2.0.so.0 => /opt/kde3.3.2/lib/libgmodule-2.0.so.0 
        libglib-2.0.so.0 => /opt/kde3.3.2/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0

rather than from /usr/lib.

The $PATH was set to pick up things from /opt/kde-3.3.2/bin first so 

        /opt/kde3.3.2/bin/aspell
        /opt/kde3.3.2/bin/aspell-import
        /opt/kde3.3.2/bin/pspell-config
        /opt/kde3.3.2/bin/run-with-aspell

would be chosen rather than the versions under /usr/bin.

Further experimentation using a script that reset environment variables
before launching evolution showed that the spell check failure was
attributable to the shared libraries rather than aspell.  N.B.D....

The second "surprise" also came from evolution-1.4 while an attachment
to an email.  The attachment panel appeared at the bottom of the
message, but no attachment icon was to be seen. Saving the message as a
draft and the viewing that messages showed that the attachment was
indeed there. Hmmm....

I restarted the shell script that reset the environment and launched
evolution from a console window and found that an error occurs during
attachment:

        (evolution:11584): GdkPixbuf-CRITICAL **: file gdk-pixbuf-io.c:
        line 761 ((gdk_pixbuf_new_from_file): assertion `filename !=
        NULL' failed
        
        (evolution:11584): GnomeUI-CRITICAL **: file gnome-icon-list.c:
        line 1219 (gnome_icon_list_append_pixbuf): assertion `im !=
        NULL' failed


I puzzled over this for a while, but nothing came to mind.  I knew the
attachment mechanism works properly under the GNOME environment, which I
normally use.  I wondered if it worked under the original KDE
environment.

I retreated to the original KDE environment:
* removed .xinitrc used to launch kde-3.3.2
* removed ~/.kde
* removed ~/.kderc
* rebooted
* launched startx which brought up KDE

Under the stock KDE environment that comes with YDL_4:
* spell checker works
* attachment icons are also *invisible*.

Anyone else seen this?

-Joseph


-- 
joseph_sacco[at]comcast[dot]net