The KDE Community has announced the availability of KDE 3.5.10, a maintenance release of KDE, the free desktop for GNU Linux and other Unix flavors.

The KDE desktop is the system of choice for a broad array of Linux users. And although the KDE community released KDE 4.1 at the end of July, KDE e.V., the nonprofit organization that represents the KDE Project, maintains the KDE 3.5 series for its user base of large organizations that do not migrate to the next major release as quickly as others.

The release of KDE 3.5.10 on Aug. 26 follows the release of KDE 3.5.9 in February. KDE 3.5.10 includes improvements in the KDE Kicker, which is the KDE application starter panel, and KPDF, the desktop's PDF viewer. The panel improvements include improved visibility on transparent backgrounds, themed arrow buttons in applets that were missing them, and layout and anti-aliasing fixes in various applets.

KDE e.V. officials said KDE 3.5.10 ships with a basic desktop and 15 other packages, including a PIM (personal information management) package and packages for administration, network, "edutainment," utilities, multimedia, games, art work and Web development. KDE's tools and applications are available in 65 languages.

KDE officials said users should expect to see the KDE 3.5.10 enhancements in the next release of their Linux products, as most of the Linux distributions and Unix operating systems do not immediately incorporate new KDE releases, but will integrate KDE 3.5.10 packages in their next releases.

KDE officials also announced that the FSFE (Free Software Foundation Europe) has welcomed the adoption of the Fiduciary License Agreement by the KDE project. The FLA is a copyright assignment that allows free software projects to assign their copyrights to a single organization or person.

Adriaan de Groot, vice president of KDE e.V., said KDE e.V. has endorsed the use of a particular FLA as the preferred way to assign copyright to the association. "We recognize that assignment is an option that individuals may wish to exercise; it is in no way pushed upon KDE contributors," de Groot said. "There are also other avenues of copyright assignment available besides the FLA, but we believe this is the easiest way to get it done, with little fuss."

Georg Greve, president of Free Software Foundation Europe, said:

" We see the adoption of the FLA by KDE as a positive and important milestone in the maturity of the free software community. The FLA was designed to help projects increase the legal maintainability of their software to ensure long-term protection and reliability. KDE is among the most important Free Software initiatives and it is playing a central role in bringing freedom to the desktop. "

KDE's adoption of the FLA is the result of cooperation between KDE e.V. and FSFE's Freedom Task Force over the last 18 months.