If you are familiar with MS Windows, you won't get lost with PC-BSD, and if you have already used KDE, you will feel right at home! PC-BSD's workspace is an intuitive interface that follow common sense usability rules which you can find in other modern operating systems, with a task bar at the bottom of the screen, a start button, which in this case is the red icon in the lower-left corner, also known as the "Start menu", and your application shortcuts in the main screen:
As you see, clicking the "Start Menu" toggles a list of options:
PC-BSD will list here the applications that you use more frequently. You can easily launch them from here and save time rather than having to browse through the regular application menu.
In this list, you can find all applications that come with PC-BSD as well as software that you can install separately. Applications are sorted by category (Games, Graphics, etc...). In the "PBI Programs" entry, you will see a list of PBI applications that you may have installed. If no PBI application is installed, this entry will not be visible.
This neat utility will help you retrieve files or directories either searching for part of its name or part of its content in the case of text files. Click the "Contents" tab to search for files based on their content (ie: search for a file that contains "password"). You can use wild cards such as "*" for a more sophisticated search:
If you are new to KDE (PC-BSD's desktop environment), you will probably find the KDE Help Center interesting and useful. It will show you how to use all applications, menus and other utilities. The KDE Help Center offers a comprehensive manual to learn everything a KDE user needs to know:
In "Settings", you have access to the K Control Center, KDE's control panel. You can either access the K Control Center main window or a sub-item of the control panel. The K Control Center is detailed later in this chapter.
In the system menu you can access:
The "home" directory:
Your media:
Your network drives and Windows shares:
List of user folders:
You can use the "Run Command" to run a single command such as kontact to launch the "Kontact" application, but you will probably prefer using the terminal to run a series of commands. Clicking the "Run Command" pops up a window for you to type your command:
The lower menu allows you to:
Now that you know a little bit more about the PC-BSD workspace, let's see what applications come with PC-BSD by default.