Almost a month after its previous 6.12 release, KDE announced the launch of Frameworks 6.13, expanding its collection of add-on libraries to Qt and enhancing functionality available to developers across various platforms.
Many parts of this release focus on ensuring smoother integration with Qt 6.9, particularly by removing dependencies on older or deprecated methods in numerous frameworks. Throughout the changelog, you’ll notice references to “It compiles fine without qt6.9 deprecated methods,” indicating that areas like Attica, Baloo, Bluez Qt, KAuth, and a host of others have been thoroughly updated.
Another noteworthy improvement is found in KArchive, where the team tackled several long-standing issues. They added refined handling for Zip64 extra fields, addressed misdetections of nested signatures, and introduced support for reading encrypted 7z archives.
Similarly, KIO and Kirigami have improved both desktop and mobile user experiences. KIO’s upgrades include better file and directory listing, refined MIME type handling, and improved touch interactions, while Kirigami’s refresh brings smoother navigation, enhanced QML-based page layouts, and fixes for previous corner cases in page header loading.
Beyond individual modules, the broader KDE Frameworks suite continues to strengthen cross-platform capabilities. For instance, KGuiAddons now offers better high-contrast mode support on Windows, and KHolidays has expanded its calendar data to cover more regions worldwide, including Puerto Rico.
For those who prefer to build from source, the entire codebase for Frameworks 6.13 is available for download from KDE’s official website. On Linux, the recommended approach is to install binary packages from your distribution’s repositories.
Visit the official release announcement for more detailed information about KDE Frameworks 6.13, including a full list of updates and bug fixes.
