neddie Posted July 9, 2008 Report Share Posted July 9, 2008 (edited) I noticed something rather to my dismay the other day, in the way that the clipboard works in KDE. I was using Kate, and had typed in a lengthy bit of text, but hadn't saved it yet. Then I double-clicked on something and it opened a new instance of Kate for the new document. So now I had two Kates. I only wanted one, so selected my text, copied it to the clipboard, closed that Kate, went to the other Kate to paste it in and AARGH! It's gone! Seems like even when it's copied to the clipboard, it stays within that Kate, so when I close that Kate, it's gone from the clipboard too. How unintuitive is that? Also from Firefox, if I copy text from there, and close Firefox, then it's gone! I had the idea of the clipboard being independent of the applications (kind of "inside KDE") but that's not right, I need to remember not to close the app until after I've pasted. I don't suppose that is configurable? Or some other kind of workaround (apart from remembering not to close). Will KDE4 be any different? Edited July 9, 2008 by neddie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
liquidzoo Posted July 9, 2008 Report Share Posted July 9, 2008 Often times I find that when Ctrl-V won't work to paste, clicking on my middle mouse button (pressing the mouse wheel in) will. It could be that you had run into one of those situations, I'm not sure. Most of the time, I close clipper, and all other default startup utilities, in any distro/de/os, so I'm not sure what it's intended purpose is. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg2 Posted July 9, 2008 Report Share Posted July 9, 2008 when I close that Kate, it's gone from the clipboard too. I'm not having that problem with 2008 or 2008.1. It stays on the clipboard for me after closing the application. Right-click on the kicker icon > configure klipper > general tab > check the 'save clipboard contents on exit' box, 'prevent empty clipboard' box, 'separate clipboard and selection' button, and set the 'clipboard history size' to your desired amount of entries. Does that work? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neddie Posted July 9, 2008 Author Report Share Posted July 9, 2008 /me hangs head in shame. Thanks guys, all I needed was that magic word. Klipper wasn't running. Never seen it before, I don't think. Been using KDE for years and the clipboard just worked without klipper. But now it works much more like I expect it to when I close the applications. It even remembers previous clipboard contents. Sometimes one has to ask a question which seems really stupid in order to learn something useful! Thanks again! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neddie Posted October 17, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 17, 2008 On a related note, klipper settings can cause odd problems with eclipse - copied text isn't copied, cut text just disappears. Here's more info: http://techtavern.wordpress.com/2008/08/10...clipse-and-kde/ And the default 2008.1 settings of "don't ignore selection" really confused me - just highlighting a word, deleting it and then pasting from the clipboard operated very unintuitively... because highlighting the selection added that to the clipboard! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Batson Posted October 17, 2008 Report Share Posted October 17, 2008 The same thing happened to me often in Mandriva 2007.1 Free. I was used to Windows, where you could copy text, close the app, then paste the text in another app. I haven't noticed this much in 2008.1 Powerpack. I don't know if it's because I adapted my behavior to Mandriva Linux, or if it's because the clipboard works differently. Anyway, this thread is enlightening. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
javaguy Posted October 17, 2008 Report Share Posted October 17, 2008 The clipboard has never saved stuff for me after I close the application from which it was copied or cut. It never ocurred to me that this was a behavior I could configure; I just assumed that it was a security consideration. The clipboard in MS Windows is, in my opinion, a gaping security hole. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neddie Posted October 17, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 17, 2008 Clipboards generally offer some kind of security hole, just by their nature. In particular, if you copy/paste your credit card number from one app to another, and then with your browser go to some dodgy website, it's possible for the javascript to read your clipboard contents (and potentially send it back to the website). Obviously a malicious app could do the same. Bottom line: don't use the clipboard for passwords, credit card numbers etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
javaguy Posted October 17, 2008 Report Share Posted October 17, 2008 By default JavaScript cannot paste from the clipboard. I believe it can copy to the clipboard. But yeah, be very careful what you put on the clipboard, especially password/credit card stuff. Back when I was a Windows user, before getting up from the keyboard I had a habit of always hitting the PrintScreen button, which put a screenshot on the clipboard, overwriting whatever was previously there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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