Unity and KDE desktop on the same screen

Question

As you can see in the screenshot below, the user has managed to run KDE desktop in Unity (or vice versa?)

screenshot

I've already installed kubuntu-desktop package and CompizConfig Settings Manager and also able to switch to KDE desktop separately but couldn't find a way to run both on same screen.

So my question is, how to get this done?

Based on pure theory, I think this can be achieved by running nohup plasma-desktop & in a terminal from within Unity. (try that - I'm too lazy here too install 1000+MB of packages on my virtual machine, so not posting as an answer) — gertvdijk, Feb 02 '13 at 15:57
possible duplicate of KDE theme appears in Unity, Cinnamon, and XCFE — Eric Carvalho, Feb 02 '13 at 16:00
@EricCarvalho What? Read the question again! OP wants to mix two DEs in one. It's not about a mixed appearance in themes. — gertvdijk, Feb 02 '13 at 16:03
@gertvdijk Thanks that worked. Let me reboot and i'll let you know if this is persistent. — Adige72, Feb 02 '13 at 16:06
@gertvdijk How to make this code run on every reboot and also, is it possible to run it within KDE like nohup unity-desktop &? — Adige72, Feb 02 '13 at 16:13
@Adige72 I'm not sure about the other way around. I believe this is possible similarly, but using unity instead of plasma-desktop. Try it out and update my answer if that works. :) — gertvdijk, Feb 02 '13 at 17:03
@gertvdijk Sorry for late reply, i somehow couldn't boot into KDE desktop so i cant try. Anyway, thanks for the help. — Adige72, Feb 03 '13 at 17:18

score 4 · Accepted Answer · edited Mar 11 '17 at 19:03

While I totally don't know why one would want this, it's certainly possible. From a standard Ubuntu (with Unity) installation:

Install kubuntu-desktop
In a terminal within the Unity desktop, try to run the KDE desktop like this:
```
nohup plasma-desktop &
```
^{The nohup somecommand & pattern makes it run in the background and independent of the terminal you're running this in. (specifically, the process spawned isn't a child of terminal in the process tree, but given to the mother of all processes - init.)}
optional If you like this and you want to make it permanent you can create a startup script:
- Create a text file (with for example Gedit) startkde.sh, containing
```
#!/bin/bash
# sleep seems necessary - getting kdeinit I/O errors otherwise
sleep 3 && /usr/bin/nohup /usr/bin/plasma-desktop &
```
- Make the file executable, from Nautilus (file properties), or by running chmod +x startkde.sh
- Open Startup Applications from the Dash.
- Add an entry "KDE" and browse to the script.

score 0 · Answer 2 · edited Jun 09 '13 at 21:54

0

Another easy way to achieve this:

Install kubuntu-desktop
Login with KDE
Run unity in the terminal

Create an autostart entry in KDE with the command unity, if you like.

edited Jun 09 '13 at 21:54

Rodrigo Oliveira

6,182

answered Jun 09 '13 at 21:07

p.tar

1

Unity and KDE desktop on the same screen

2 Answers2