asqwerth wrote:One thing good about it is that the kickoff menu/launcher feels much more under the user's mouse control. Don't know about other people, but I find the KDE4 launcher too "slippery". You just move the cursor a little off course, it aims at another entry, and the menu is sliding along to the next tab or level of applications. I don't experience that issue with the Plasma 5 kickoff at all..
I prefer the Lancelot menu system (available in the repos with most distros if it's not already an available "Plasma Widget).
I also used Lancelot with my Mepis 11 installs.
More about it here:
http://lancelot.fomentgroup.org/main
But, I don't know if it will be available for KDE 5.x or not.
I use OpenSUSE 13.1 most of the time with a KDE desktop, and I use the "Lancelot" menu system with it.
I also have Lancelot installed on my wife's new laptop (running Kubuntu 14.10), and I had it installed in her Mepis 11 setup on her last laptop, too.
Here's my OpenSUSE 13.1 desktop as setup right this minute as my primary Operating System, using icons for some programs, a folder view of home, and a weather widget). See the following screen captures with Lancelot (the menu system I use more often), although I also have an icon for the KDE Classic Menu available on the panel (as I don't like the Kickoff Style menu).
Click on any image to see a larger version of it:
Lancelot is not installed in OpenSUSE by default. But, I always install it myself with KDE desktops (when installing Kubuntu, OpenSUSE, Debian, etc., I like to install Lancelot with them for the menu system). It's in the repositories for many distros if you don't see it as an available Plasma Widget (I just used YAST to get it from the OpenSUSE repositories for the 13.1 install).
Next is the Lancelot Menu I see if I click on the second Icon in the panel (the left icon is for the simple KDE Classic Style Menu). It's nice in that it defaults to showing applications with Favorites you can edit (and you can also "mouse over" other choices like Computer, etc.)
So, if you keep apps you use more often as Favorites, you have very fast and easy access to them via Lancelot's default menu that you see, with no "drilling down" into categories needed. Note that it's fully resizable, too (just grab the top right corner and resize it as desired).
Again, click on one of the embedded images to see a larger version of it.
If you "drill down" into the menus, you'll see both the program name and the description whenever you "mouse over" an entry. For example, note where the description is shown under DarkTable because I have my mouse pointed at it. Again, just click on one of the embedded images to see a larger version.
Here's what I see if I "mouse over" the Computer choice on the left. I see the same "Places" I have setup in Dolphin (the file manager I use), as well as the "Devices" I have setup (basically, an icon for each partition on my internal drives). If I "mouse over" one of them, I can see the descriptions, as in the Mount Point (NTFS Shared) for the partition on the top right (and I can click on it to open it in Dolphin).
Again, click on an embedded image in this post to see a larger version of it.
Also note the other Icons on the Left for Documents, etc.
It's nice in that the Documents icon gives you recently updated programs, with recently accessed files on the right (including programs, docs, photos, etc.) that you can click on.
The Search Feature is great, too (where you can click on pages of options in the configuration for it for what it searches through including programs, descriptions, settings, files of various types, bookmarks and much more than can be returned in search results).
Then, as soon as you type the first letter in the search bar, it starts returning results.
You can even let it search through wikipedia pages, youtube videos and much more if you want to enable those options. It's really nice for finding programs, settings, bookmarks, etc.
I've become very fond of using Lancelot for my menu system. So, hopefully, it will be available for KDE Plasma 5.x, too (and I have not yet tried the newer desktop, even though most reviews of it seem to be very positive).