Fans of the popular KDE panel Latte Dock are in for a disappointment, with the developer announcing he will no longer be maintaining the project.

Latte Dock is a launcher for the KDE Plasma desktop that looks and functions much like the dock in macOS, albeit with more features and customization options. The launcher features prominently in many videos showcasing KDE Plasma and the degree to which it can be customized, including in Nick’s video for The Linux Experiment (below).

Unfortunately, the latest release of the Plasma desktop broke some of Latte Dock’s core functionality, including the ability to easily rearrange app icons. The developer was working on the next edition of the launcher when he posted a message saying he would no longer be able to continue working on the project.

Unfortunately I would like to inform kde community that I am stepping away from Latte development. No time,motivation or interest from my part is the main reason. I hope that this will give free space and air for new developers/maintainers to step in and move Latte forward.

I hoped that I would be able to release Latte v0.11 but unfortunately I can not. Releasing Latte v0.11 it would mean that someone would maintain it afterwards and that is no more the case.

As he mentions, it’s entirely possible another developer, or group of developers, may pick up the project and continue working on Latte. Unfortunately, as some on Reddit have pointed out, Latte is a complex project that may be challenging for many developers to tackle.

In the meantime, users looking for an up-to-date launcher that is similar to Latte, although much simpler, should take a look at Plank. The launcher is one of the oldest dock-style launchers for Linux and offers a reliable, no-frills approach.