OK, so everywhere I write “CBE” read “CDE”; it’s a desktop environment and not a build environment. In my defense I was rebuilding the Common Build Environment in order to compile the latest KDE4 packages on my workstation, while writing my previous entry. In any case, since then I’ve fiddled with GDM configuration and my OpenSolaris 2008.11 machine (yes, the Eee) now starts KDE4 from the login screen, fairly smoothly. So I have konsole and konqueror, at the least. One thing that just impressed me was the way the GNOME network-manager applet popped up in my KDE4 system tray to inform me that I was connected. That’s system integration coupled with shared technologies for you.

Since that machine is on again, I’ve experimented a little with KWin settings. Yes, I can enable composite and no, it’s not fast at all. I’d have to see KDE4 with composite under a Linux flavor to be able to compare the two.

Anyway: yes, KDE4 builds and runs on OpenSolaris 2008.11, you can install from source or install from packages if you know what you’re doing (I’m still testing my patches to reduce the level of knowing-what-you-are-doing required) and it runs quite nicely.