Switching from Compiz to the KDE Native Composite Engine

Originally when I switched from GNOME to KDE 4, I kept using Compiz. But with the unknown state of Compiz++ / Compiz-Fusion, I opted to give the KDE 4 native compositing engine an honest shot.

I had a few criteria that had to be met:
I wanted CTRL + ALT + Arrows to determine which direction to move my “Cube”
I wanted CTRL + ALT + SHIFT + Arrows to move the current activated window from workspace to workspace
I wanted Wobbly Windows (Sadly, this is the most excitement I get out of my day. When I’m really bored, I seriously wobble the windows around for a few seconds, and it’ll always put a smile on my face).
I wanted 4 workspaces that were configured on 1 row

These were all achievable with a few configuration changes:
First I had to enable Desktop Effects, which is done in System Settings (or the icon labeled Configure Desktop)

With that I enabled Desktop Effects and verified my “Effects for Desktop Switching” was set to Desktop Cube Animation:

From there I made my way over to the “All Effects Tab” and configured Desktop Cube Animation and Desktop Cube to my likings:

Then came the configuration of the Global Shortcuts. For this I went to System Settings -> Keyboard & Mouse -> Global Keyboard Shortcuts and changed the Keyboard Shortcuts for KDE component KWin to:

and

I added Switch One Desktop to the Left, Switch One Desktop to the Right, Window One Desktop to the Left, Window One Desktop to the Right

Now my configurations were almost done, just have to configure the Desktops.

For the desktop configuration you are actually required to use the “Pager” Plasmoid (I’m going to file a feature request to add this to the Multiple Desktop portion of System Settings Desktop. Once you add the pager plasmoid, then right click it and choose Pager Settings, and here’s what I set mine to:

The change was seriously that easy. Now I’m using the native compositing engine, and it seems quite a bit snappier then Compiz, and I know that it won’t get forked 100 times within the KDE project itself.

Thanks again KDE team.. keep up the great work.

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