Today we soldier on to Desktop Effects with Compiz Fusion. It can be safely said that few features are as keenly desired as Desktop Effects. Ever since Compiz was announced XXX years ago, users and developers have been playing with the bling-tastic effects and wondering when it will hit a desktop near them. Well, the wait is no longer.

So you’ve followed the latest series on KDE 4.5 and you are now using the spectacular latest release from the KDE team. You want to use Compiz, but quickly realize that it is not necessary as KDE has it’s own built-in compositing effects. In this article I am going to introduce you to the KDE Desktop Effects manager and how to use it to make your KDE desktop experience as sleek as it can be.

So, that proprietary 3D graphics driver you installed is now causing you some problems, so you got rid of it. But there's a problem. Your KDE 4 installation had those fancy desktop effects enabled, which now aren't working. Instead of a KDE desktop, you have a nice white screen.

I installed KDE4 on my desktop today so I could finally try out KWin in all its glory. If you haven't tried it yet I highly recommend it. KDE4 with desktop effects enabled is simply gorgeous. It's fast, responsive, and comes with a nice array of effects options.

One of the coolest things about Novell’s SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop (SLED) are its new “Desktop Effects”. Desktop Effects are really a combination of two opensource components written by Novell’s David Reveman, Compiz and Xgl.

KDE’s visual effects for windows and menus technically dates back to KDE 3. With the coming of KDE 4, the number of effects has multiplied, and KWin (KDE’s window manager) is now on par with Compiz.

Desktop use of GNU/Linux is on the rise, and one of the factors leading people towards its use is videos such as these, showing off the newest effects. However, to get these effects on a KDE or Gnome desktop, you must* use a 3D-accelerating hardware driver for your video card.

Compiz Fusion is the best thing that happened to Linux desktop user experience yet. In the world of Linux bashers who argue that Linux is not quite ready for home users; compiz is one of the few things that really set Linux apart from other OS with major market share.

In the new Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty Jackalope, Intel graphic (video) drivers 965 (x3000 or x3100) are blacklisted so you cannot run Compiz thus your desktop effects cannot be enabled. There is a way to enable desktop effects, though this is not recommended because