LXQt 1.2.0 release is recently out. Here are the top new features.
Within ~6 months of the prior LXQt 1.1.0 release, the LXQt 1.2.0 arrives with new features and performance improvements. This release sees some critical updates, such as Wayland and others.
LXQt is perhaps the most lightweight and fast desktop environment today in Linux. Hence it’s critical for many use cases where you need a low-resource footprint desktop environment.
Let’s take a look at what the new additions in this point release are.
LXQt 1.2.0: New Features
The most important item of this version is the initial work lands in LXQt Session for Wayland. It’s a critical item considering Xfce desktop is also bringing Wayland support in its 4.18 release this Christmas.
Apart from the changes in session, some Wayland-related minor display fixes for LXQt Panel and PCManFM-Qt arrive.
At the core, this version is still based on Qt 5.15, the last LTS version of Qt. Let’s talk about the individual components updates.
PCManFM-Qt file manager now allows rubberband selection in the detailed list mode in non-name columns. It’s handy for many use cases. In addition, CTRL+D now deselect items in the file dialog and the file manager.
Also added new search settings in the file manager, which allows you to configure how much search history you want to keep. The default is 0. You can access this via Edit > Preferences > Advanced in PCManFM-Qt’s file menu.
In addition, when creating a launcher, you can specify your shortcut’s categories, and additional generic bug fixes arrive for PCManFM-Qt.
The LXQt Panel quick launch items get a “Refresh” button enabling reloading them in case of theme change and other problems. The panel also sees some Wayland fixes related to the volume bar position.
QTerminal now supports bi-directional text rendering by default, bug fixes on -e command parsing and better handling of newline trimming and multiline prompts for scripts.
Elsewhere, the LXQt power manager now detects the stable state of the battery when plugged in and not discharging. Also, a new sort submenu in the image viewer improves your image browsing experience on the LXQt desktop.
The ScreenGrab utility sees a fix for multiple display situations, and additional bug fixes arrive overall in this release.
Wrapping up
Being a point release, the changes are moderate in this version. But smaller chunks of improvements, such as Wayland updates, and libQtXdg fixes, are stepping stones for the next major release in the future.
If you want to grab this version, get the source here. Ubuntu users should get this version via Lubuntu 23.04 Lunar Lobster release on April 2023, and Fedora folks should get it on Fedora 38 by Q2 2023.
Rolling release-based distributions should update their packages (pacman -Syu) to receive this update. The Arch repo is already refreshed.
That being said, a nice release from the team and all the LXQt lovers.
Cheers.
