Vaela 1.2.0

Vaela 1.2.0 brings a logo: the stars of Vela, the Sail constellation, forming a V, with the lowest one in Vaela's coral.

What's new

• The Vaela icon. The logo is installed as the vaela icon, with simpler drawings for small sizes (16 to 32 px) so it stays crisp.
• KDE Settings → Shortcuts: Vaela's shortcut group shows the logo.
• Everywhere else Vaela appears: the login screen's session entry, the Vaela look-and-feel theme, the Vaela Workspace Backgrounds wallpaper, and Vaela's KWin plugin and Vaela monitor edges effect.
• Inside Vaela: the centre of the radial menu shows the logo while nothing is hovered, and so does the Vaela Settings header.

Requirements

• Fedora 44 or 45, x86_64, with current updates: both releases ship KWin 6.7.5, and the RPM requires exactly that version.
• Check your release with rpm -E %fedora, then pick the matching file below.

Install

Fedora Atomic (Bazzite, Kinoite, Silverblue), Fedora 45:

rpm-ostree install ./vaela-desktop-1.2.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Upgrading from an earlier Vaela RPM:

rpm-ostree install --uninstall vaela-desktop ./vaela-desktop-1.2.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Fedora Workstation:

sudo dnf install ./vaela-desktop-1.2.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

On Fedora 44, use the fc44 file instead. Log out and choose Vaela at the login screen.

SHA256SUMS lists the checksums of all four files.

Vaela 1.1.4

Vaela 1.1.4 fixes video backgrounds going black after quick workspace switches.

What's fixed

• No more black background after quick switches. If you switched workspaces again while a background was still crossfading, the video could go black, or keep showing the previous workspace's video, until you switched away and back. Now a switch during a crossfade finishes that fade before loading the next background. In testing with a video on each of three workspaces and random fast switching, 7 of 20 sequences used to end wrong; now none of 40 do.
• "Vaela" in KDE's Shortcuts settings. Vaela's global shortcuts now appear under Vaela instead of KWin. Shortcuts you've already changed are kept.

Requirements

• Fedora 44 or 45, x86_64, with current updates: both releases ship KWin 6.7.5, and the RPM requires exactly that version.
• Check your release with rpm -E %fedora, then pick the matching file below.

Install

Fedora Atomic (Bazzite, Kinoite, Silverblue), Fedora 45:

rpm-ostree install ./vaela-desktop-1.1.4-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Upgrading from an earlier Vaela RPM:

rpm-ostree install --uninstall vaela-desktop ./vaela-desktop-1.1.4-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Fedora Workstation:

sudo dnf install ./vaela-desktop-1.1.4-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

On Fedora 44, use the fc44 file instead. Log out and choose Vaela at the login screen.

SHA256SUMS lists the checksums of all four files.

Vaela 1.1.3

Vaela 1.1.3 keeps oversized windows visible on multi-monitor setups and stops windows from growing past the screen.

What's fixed

• Scrollable: wide columns no longer vanish. On a setup with several monitors, a column wider than its monitor, or one peeking past the edge, now shows up to the edge of its own monitor and is cut off there. It no longer disappears or spills onto the next monitor. A new KWin effect, Vaela monitor edges (vaelaclip), draws each tiled window only on its own monitor.
• Clicks stay on the monitor you're using. Clicks and scrolling on a monitor go to that monitor's own windows, never to the unseen part of a window reaching over from the next one.
• Widening stops at the screen. Widening or growing a window that Vaela doesn't tile (in Float mode, or on a monitor Vaela doesn't run on) stops at the monitor's size inside the gaps, and the window stays on that monitor. Tiled windows already stop at the edge of the screen.

Known limitation: a screenshot of the whole desktop at once (Spectacle's Entire Desktop) still shows Scrollable columns reaching over a neighbouring monitor. Screenshots of a single monitor show it as it looks.

Requirements

• Fedora 44 or 45, x86_64, with current updates: both releases ship KWin 6.7.5, and the RPM requires exactly that version.
• Check your release with rpm -E %fedora, then pick the matching file below.

Install

Fedora Atomic (Bazzite, Kinoite, Silverblue), Fedora 45:

rpm-ostree install ./vaela-desktop-1.1.3-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Upgrading from an earlier Vaela RPM:

rpm-ostree install --uninstall vaela-desktop ./vaela-desktop-1.1.3-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Fedora Workstation:

sudo dnf install ./vaela-desktop-1.1.3-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

On Fedora 44, use the fc44 file instead. Log out and choose Vaela at the login screen.

SHA256SUMS lists the checksums of all four files.

Vaela 1.1.2

Vaela 1.1.2 fixes tiling when Vaela runs on more than one monitor.

What's fixed

• Each monitor tiles its own windows. A window now stays on its monitor until you drag it to another or use KWin's Window to Next Screen. Before, Scrollable could slide a column across the edge, and the window would then join the other monitor's layout.
• Scrollable: each monitor centres its own focused column, so Meta+Left/Right on one monitor no longer shifts the windows on the other. Columns that would slide onto a neighbouring monitor wait off-screen until you scroll to them.
• Auto Tiling: when the last row has fewer windows than the rows above (3 or 5 windows, say), they now share the whole width instead of leaving a hole. Widening a window fills the screen, and the gap you set is the only space between windows and around the edges.
• Meta+Left/Right now focus the window to the left or right in Auto Tiling too, instead of Plasma's quick tiling pulling a window out of the grid. A window dragged to a screen edge goes back into the grid.
• Layout keys follow the focused window's monitor, wherever the mouse pointer is.

Tested on two monitors of the same size and of different sizes, with gaps of 0, 8 and 20 px, for 1 to 5 windows per monitor in both tiling modes: 1,065 layout checks.

Requirements

• Fedora 44 or 45, x86_64, with current updates: both releases ship KWin 6.7.5, and the RPM requires exactly that version.
• Check your release with rpm -E %fedora, then pick the matching file below.

Install

Fedora Atomic (Bazzite, Kinoite, Silverblue), Fedora 45:

rpm-ostree install ./vaela-desktop-1.1.2-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Upgrading from an earlier Vaela RPM:

rpm-ostree install --uninstall vaela-desktop ./vaela-desktop-1.1.2-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Fedora Workstation:

sudo dnf install ./vaela-desktop-1.1.2-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

On Fedora 44, use the fc44 file instead. Log out and choose Vaela at the login screen.

SHA256SUMS lists the checksums of all four files.

Vaela 1.1.1

Vaela 1.1.1 fixes the radial menu opening on the wrong monitor (#1).

What's fixed

• The radial menu opens where your mouse is, on whichever monitor that is, as long as Vaela runs on it. This covers holding the right button and Meta+Ctrl+M, which now also opens the menu at the pointer instead of in the middle of the screen.
• Monitors with different sizes or scales. Vaela now tells its shell which monitor to use by name, rather than leaving Qt to work out the screen from desktop coordinates. Qt can get that wrong when monitors differ in size or scale, which put the radial menu on the wrong one. Settings and Quick Commands use the same placement and open on the monitor you're working on.
• On a monitor Vaela doesn't run on, holding the right button stays a normal right-click. The shortcut opens the menu on a monitor Vaela does run on.

If the layout switch and workspace bar appear on the wrong monitor, check which monitor has priority 1 in System Settings → Display & Monitor. Vaela follows Plasma's primary monitor by default. You can also choose monitors directly in Vaela Settings → Monitors, which marks the one Vaela treats as primary.

Requirements

• Fedora 44 or 45, x86_64, with current updates: both releases ship KWin 6.7.5, and the RPM requires exactly that version.
• Check your release with rpm -E %fedora, then pick the matching file below.

Install

Fedora Atomic (Bazzite, Kinoite, Silverblue), Fedora 45:

rpm-ostree install ./vaela-desktop-1.1.1-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Upgrading from an earlier Vaela RPM:

rpm-ostree install --uninstall vaela-desktop ./vaela-desktop-1.1.1-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Fedora Workstation:

sudo dnf install ./vaela-desktop-1.1.1-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

On Fedora 44, use the fc44 file instead. Log out and choose Vaela at the login screen.

SHA256SUMS lists the checksums of all four files.

Vaela 1.1.0

Vaela 1.1 fixes where background sound plays and gives every workspace its own background options.

What's new

• Sound follows your output. Background videos now play on Plasma's default audio output, and move with it when you switch, for example to Bluetooth headphones. In 1.0 they stayed on whatever device was the default when Plasma started.
• Options per workspace. Scaling (Fill/Fit/Stretch), mute, volume, playback speed, dim and blur are now set separately for each workspace. Click a workspace in the Backgrounds list to change its options, or use Use on every workspace to copy them to the others. Crossfades keep each workspace's own look while they blend.
• Pause videos while any window is open: a new option, off by default.
• Pause videos even when their sound is on: a new option, off by default. A video you're listening to keeps playing behind windows unless you turn this on.
• Fix: a background file that failed to load is now retried once its workspace gets a new background.

Your 1.0 background settings carry over as the starting point for every workspace.

Requirements

• Fedora 44 or 45, x86_64, with current updates: both releases ship KWin 6.7.5, and the RPM requires exactly that version.
• Check your release with rpm -E %fedora, then pick the matching file below.

Install

Fedora Atomic (Bazzite, Kinoite, Silverblue), Fedora 45:

rpm-ostree install ./vaela-desktop-1.1.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Upgrading from an earlier Vaela RPM:

rpm-ostree install --uninstall vaela-desktop ./vaela-desktop-1.1.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Fedora Workstation:

sudo dnf install ./vaela-desktop-1.1.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

On Fedora 44, use the fc44 file instead. Log out and choose Vaela at the login screen.

SHA256SUMS lists the checksums of all four files.

Vaela 1.0.0

Vaela 1.0 gives every workspace its own video or picture background.

What's new

• A background per workspace. Pick a video or picture for each workspace under Backgrounds in Vaela Settings, or from a workspace's ⋯ menu in the workspace bar. Switching workspaces crossfades between backgrounds, and a video carries on where it left off when you come back. One click uses a background for every workspace.
• Your Plasma wallpaper stays. Workspaces without a background keep it. Remove the last background and Plasma's own wallpaper comes back.
• Options:
  • Fill, Fit or Stretch
  • Mute (on by default) and volume. With sound on, only one monitor plays it, so the same video on several screens doesn't echo.
  • Playback speed from 0.25× to 2×
  • Dim and blur, to keep icons readable
  • Crossfade length
  • Pause while windows cover the screen and pause on battery, both on by default. Videos with sound keep playing behind windows.
• Formats: WebM (VP9/AV1) plays everywhere. MP4 (H.264/HEVC) needs a full FFmpeg, which Bazzite has and Fedora gets from RPM Fusion. Pictures can be PNG, JPEG, WebP, AVIF, JPEG XL, SVG, BMP or an animated GIF. Hardware decoding is used where the driver supports it. A file that won't play shows your Plasma wallpaper instead.
• Scriptable: qdbus-qt6 org.vaela.Shell /Shell setBackground 2 file:///path/to/video.webm

Backgrounds appear on the monitors Vaela runs on (Settings → Monitors).

Requirements

• Fedora 44 or 45, x86_64, with current updates: both releases ship KWin 6.7.5, and the RPM requires exactly that version.
• Check your release with rpm -E %fedora, then pick the matching file below.

Install

Fedora Atomic (Bazzite, Kinoite, Silverblue), Fedora 45:

rpm-ostree install ./vaela-desktop-1.0.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Upgrading from an earlier Vaela RPM:

rpm-ostree install --uninstall vaela-desktop ./vaela-desktop-1.0.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Fedora Workstation:

sudo dnf install ./vaela-desktop-1.0.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

On Fedora 44, use the fc44 file instead. Log out and choose Vaela at the login screen.

SHA256SUMS lists the checksums of all four files.

Vaela 0.7.0

Vaela 0.7.0 brings multi-monitor support, editable shortcuts and an adjustable radial menu hold time.

What's new

• Choose your monitors. Vaela now runs on your primary monitor by default (the one with priority 1 in System Settings → Display & Monitor) and follows it when that changes. Under Monitors in Vaela Settings you can switch to All monitors or pick the ones you want. Each of those gets its own layout switch and workspace bar, plus gestures, the radial menu and tiling. On the other monitors, windows float and right-click works as in plain Plasma. (Fixes Vaela appearing on the left monitor instead of the primary one, #1.)
• Views open where you are. Quick Commands, Settings and the keyboard radial menu open on the monitor you're using.
• Edit every shortcut in Settings. Click a shortcut and press the new keys. Esc cancels and Backspace removes it. This covers the layout keys too (Meta+arrows, Meta+Plus/Minus, Ctrl+Meta+arrows). If the keys are already in use by another app or another Vaela action, Vaela names it and asks before taking them over. A reset button restores the default.
• Radial menu hold time. Set how long to hold the right button before the radial menu opens, from 0.15 to 2 seconds (default 0.5 s).
• New radial menu shortcut: Meta+Ctrl+M. Meta+Ctrl+R is Spectacle's window-recording shortcut. If you still have the old default, it moves to Meta+Ctrl+M automatically (#2).

Requirements

• Fedora 44 or 45, x86_64, with current updates: both releases ship KWin 6.7.5, and the RPM requires exactly that version.
• Check your release with rpm -E %fedora, then pick the matching file below.

Install

Fedora Atomic (Bazzite, Kinoite, Silverblue), Fedora 45:

rpm-ostree install ./vaela-desktop-0.7.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Upgrading from an earlier Vaela RPM:

rpm-ostree install --uninstall vaela-desktop ./vaela-desktop-0.7.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Fedora Workstation:

sudo dnf install ./vaela-desktop-0.7.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

On Fedora 44, use the fc44 file instead. Log out and choose Vaela at the login screen.

SHA256SUMS lists the checksums of all four files.

Vaela 0.6.0

Vaela 0.6.0 adds Fedora 44 builds alongside Fedora 45, a quicker radial menu, and moves the layout switch out of the way of window buttons.

What's new

• Fedora 44 support. There are now RPMs for both Fedora 44 and Fedora 45 (and Atomic images based on them, such as Bazzite, Kinoite and Silverblue).
• Radial menu after half a second. Hold the right button still for 0.5 s (was 1 s), move onto an item and release.
• No more context-menu flash. The application's context menu no longer pops open and closes again while you hold the button. A quick right-click opens it as usual, when you release.
• Fixed a KWin crash that could happen when that context menu was being closed during a hold.
• Layout switch moved. It is now a short coral handle on the top edge, a little left of the top-right corner, so it no longer covers a maximized window's close button. Hover it to switch between Float, Auto Tiling and Scrollable.

Requirements

• Fedora 44 or 45, x86_64, with current updates: both releases ship KWin 6.7.5, and the RPM requires exactly that version.
• Check your release with rpm -E %fedora, then pick the matching file below.

Install

Fedora Atomic (Bazzite, Kinoite, Silverblue), Fedora 45:

rpm-ostree install ./vaela-desktop-0.6.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Upgrading from an earlier local Vaela or Vela RPM:

rpm-ostree install --uninstall vaela-desktop ./vaela-desktop-0.6.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Fedora Workstation:

sudo dnf install ./vaela-desktop-0.6.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

On Fedora 44, use the fc44 file instead. Reboot or log out, then pick Vaela at the login screen. The README explains everything else.

Files

File	For
vaela-desktop-0.6.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm	Fedora 45
vaela-desktop-0.6.0-1.fc44.x86_64.rpm	Fedora 44
vaela-desktop-0.6.0-1.fc45.src.rpm, …fc44.src.rpm	Source RPMs, built from this tag
SHA256SUMS	Checksums for all four

Licensed under GPL-2.0-or-later.

Vaela 0.5.0

The first public release of Vaela, a Vivaldi-style Wayland desktop on KDE's KWin.

Requirements

• Fedora 45, or a Fedora Atomic image based on it (Bazzite, Kinoite, Silverblue), x86_64
• KWin 6.7.5 exactly. The KWin plugin is built against KWin's internal interfaces, so this RPM installs only alongside that version. After a KWin update, rebuild from source.

Install

Fedora Atomic:

rpm-ostree install ./vaela-desktop-0.5.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Fedora Workstation:

sudo dnf install ./vaela-desktop-0.5.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm

Reboot or log out, then pick Vaela at the login screen. See the README for how to use it.

What's in 0.5.0

• Renamed from Vela to Vaela. The package replaces vela-desktop, and the first login copies your velarc, radial menu images and look-and-feel choice to the new names.
• Reliable startup. The shell autostarts from /etc/xdg/autostart and detects the session through the KWin plugin, so it also loads when Plasma autostarts through systemd.
• Radial menu: hold the right button for one second, move onto an item (it grows), release to open it; left-click still works. Settings now opens from the radial menu.
• Scrollable layout: the focused column stays centred, each app's column width is remembered after it closes, and Meta+Left/Right move focus along the strip.
• Layout switch hides in the top-right corner until the pointer reaches it.
• New look: dark rounded panels with a coral accent, real icons, a card-based Settings page with direct links to Plasma's display/HDR, sound, printer, power, keyboard, mouse, shortcut and system-info pages.

Files

File
vaela-desktop-0.5.0-1.fc45.x86_64.rpm	The desktop
vaela-desktop-0.5.0-1.fc45.src.rpm	Source RPM, built from this tag
SHA256SUMS	Checksums

Licensed under GPL-2.0-or-later.