Development/Tutorials

Tutorials are the fastest way of finding out what KDE will do for you, and how to do it. Here is a list of currently available tutorials.

Getting started

Using Subversion with KDE

A quick KDE-specific introduction how to work with KDE's version control system

Coding with Qt and KDE

Two tutorials introducing KDE and Qt brought to you by KDE-Women.

KDE 3.0 Tutorial

An excellent tutorial by KDE developer Antonio Larrosa Jiménez leading you from nothing to a fairly full featured web browser. Highly recommended for KDE 3.0 developers.

A KDE tutorial, KHello

A KDE 2 programming tutorial by Daniel Marjamäki. This tutorial introduces the KDE APIs using a graphical version of the world famous 'hello world' program. This document is also available in single download as a gzipped tar file.

Programming Tutorial for KDE 3

Programming Tutorial for KDE 4

You are interested in writing applications for KDE 4? Here you get at tutorial which leads you from the beginners stuff to the advanced techniques.

Debug your application

Components and Plugins

Creating KParts Component

Tutorial on IBM DeveloperWorks, by David Faure shows developers how to create KParts components, under KDE 2 and KDE 3.

KParts demonstration

Tutorial by at kde dot org Philippe Fremy demonstrating the use of KParts in KDE applications, including KOffice. Applies mostly to KDE 2.x.

KDE User Interface Tutorial (XML GUI)

Tutorial by KDE developer Kurt Granroth showing how to convert an existing KDE application to use the new XML based user interface builder.

GUI building with KDE

An introduction to creating a basic KDE application. This tutorial is now somewhat out of date, there are better ways of doing things than the ones described here.

(Somewhat dated, and the XML GUI Tutorial above is a better read now.)

Embedded Components Tutorial

Tutorial by KDE developer Kurt Granroth showing how to convert an existing KDE application into a component suitable for embedding in Konqueror.

Writing Plugins For KDE Applications

This tutorial aims to demonstrate how easy it is to write plugins for KDE 2 using KParts.

Developing a Plugin Structure for a KDE Applications

This tutorial will take you through all the steps needed to write a plugin structure, plus plugins for your KDE application.

Providing file meta-data support with KFile plugins

Tutorial by Brad Hards that describes how to write a meta-data plugin for your favourite file format. It is presented as an example based tutorial.

DCOP and other automation Tutorials

Creating a DCOP Interface

This tutorial shows you how to create a DCOP interface to a KDE application.

KDE Automation writeup

Document by Olaf Zanger showing an overview of the scripting capabilities in KDE 2.x. Includes usage of "dcop", "kdcop", scripting languages, xmlrpc, and a FAQ.

Connect KDE applications using DCOP

IBM DeveloperWorks tutorial, shows how to use kdcop and dcop with several examples such as instantly messaging a contact in kopete when he comes online, and also how to create a simple DCOP-aware application.

Other tutorials

KIO Tutorial (German version)

Tutorial by KDE developers Carsten Pfeiffer and Stephan Kulow for the c't Magazine, giving an introduction into the KDE IO Architecture and an example KIO Slave.

Using IOSlaves

IOSlaves are the subprocesses KDE uses to fetch remote files without blocking the user interface. This document discusses how they work and how to use them.

(Somewhat dated, but might still be useful).

Using and extending the KDE EDU Plot widget (docbook archive)

This tutorial introduces Jason Harris' KPlotWidget that is part of the KDE EDU package. Contains information about defining your own widget in QT / KDevelop designer and about subclassing widgets and overriding member functions to extend functionality.

Extending the KDE Panel

This tutorial teaches you how to implement a simple panel applet using the panel applet API. It is a suitable task for an introduction to KDE programming.

KDE-Python tutorial

A python version of Daniel's KDE tutorial by Boudewijn Rempt.

KDE Ruby Korundum tutorial

A ruby version of Antonio Larrosa Jiménez's KDE tutorial by Richard Dale. See the Ruby Developers Corner for Qt tutorials and other info.

Creating Konqueror Service Menus

This tutorial shows you how to create mimetype-specific actions in Konqueror's context menu (aka "servicemenus")

Using KConfig XT

Tutorial on how to efficiently use the KConfig XT framework (available in KDE 3.2).

Understanding KDE Kiosk mode

Tutorial on how KDE's kiosk mode is implemented and how you can get started working with it.

Shell Scripting with KDE dialogs (German Version)

Tutorial by Brad Hards that describes how to use KDE dialogs in shell scripts with kdialog. It is presented as an example based tutorial.

KWin decoration styles

Tutorial on creating decoration plugins for the KWin window manager (KDE 3.2 and later).

KNewStuffSecure: a secure way to share resources

Tutorial showing how to share resources in a secured way (KDE 3.4 and later).

Writing Unittests for Qt4 and KDE4 with QTestLib (Original link)

Tutorial by Brad Hards that describes how to write unit tests using the QTestLib framework. It is presented as an example based tutorial, and is still under development.

KDE3 Tutorials (Original link)

These tutorials cover topics related to KDE3. If you are working with KDE4 then these are probably not useful to you.