I’ve discovered Akonadi, a KDE service. As far as I could understand, Akonadi provides “personal information management” and is responsible for some interaction between apps within the KDE ecosystem. To me, it seems to be bloatware. Somebody may use the functions it provides, but I do not. It is just running in background all the time with no use.
- How do I completely disable it forever?
- Have you ever met something else in Linux or it’s ecosystem, that appeared to be bloatware to you (and how did you disable it)?
You can disable it thru the command
akonadictl. You can’t remove it easily tho, as a lot of KDE components depend on it. One thing tho is you can make sure it pulls SQLite instead of MySQL or PostgreSQL as its dependency.I definitely broke some apps that needed it to function when I tried removing it once
Have you literally purged it out of the system? I’ve just disabled it from starting. Though, I may have broken Kontact or something. Never opened these.
Kontact is a buggy mess.
akonadi is a dependency of some applications that are bundled in a default kde desktop, such as is installed using the kde-standard metapackage in debian.
these applications include kmail, korganizer, kaddressbook, and akregator. removing those four items from a default debian trixie kde install also removes any installed packages with ‘akonadi’ in the name.
If you want the most minimal OS possible, you can ditch Plasma and just use a Window Manager, but I wouldn’t reccomend it if you are a beginner
How exactly is it bloatware though? Not a KDE user myself, just had a look at the wiki. Seems it’s just a convenience utility to allow you to not have to enter the same things into multiple applications?
This is VERY different from pre-installed apps in your start menu that collect and sell info about you…
Yeah, thinking more about it, I don’t think the term “bloatware” (as it is commonly used) applies here at all.
How do I completely disable it forever?
To answer your question:
sudo systemctl mask <servicename>.serviceThe much more common
disablejust disables autostart; masking will point the service file at/dev/null, which makes it impossible to load or start the service, even when other services or apps (like the clock widget someone mentioned in the comments) request it.I may appear paranoic, but it’s collecting metadata from contacts and email. Even though it does not sell anything, that’s not the thing I’d like to have running on my PC. And since I don’t even use most of the apps Akonadi is designed for, it is just wasting my CPU time and RAM space. That’s why I call it bloatware. And it’s shipped preinstalled on Fedora. Another reason is that there’s no way to manage it with KDE system settings. Why on earth I can’t manage a KDE utility with the settings of KDE? Why hiding it so deep I can’t find a bare notice of it without looking into htop or config files? It isn’t that crucial for the system to be hidden so deep.
And since I don’t even use most of the apps Akonadi is designed for, it is just wasting my CPU time and RAM space. That’s why I call it bloatware.
You can’t just make up your own meanings of already established words and terms. That’s simply not how the world works.
And if you don’t use it, why did you choose to install it in the first place?
My definition matches the definition given in the Collins Dictionary. If you don’t consider this a serious source, just accept I may not be always aware of a precise meaning of a certain term.
I did not choose to install Akonadi. It was preinstalled in Fedora KDE. I chose KDE for its extensive customization. Maybe I’m too old /j, but by choosing a DE I’m choosing just a DE. I couldn’t even think about how extensive an ecosystem around a DE could be. There are useful tools, like KDE Connect, which are meaningful to me and can be configured straightforwardly, but Akonadi is neither something I missed, nor it has an accessible configuration.
My definition matches the definition given in the Collins Dictionary.
I looked it up and found this:
pre-installed computer software with an excessive number of unnecessary features and, often, unnecessarily high memory and disc space requirements
https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/bloatware
Is there another dictionary named Collins that you read?
I did not choose to install Akonadi. It was preinstalled in Fedora KDE.
It looks like you choose a Linux based operating system that seems to includes a fairly complete stack of the KDE suit.
(I don’t know much about Fedora)
I chose KDE for its extensive customization.
I bet that Fedora have a minimal version without a graphical stack, which would let you to only install the Plasma desktop environment and the parts of the KDE suit you find relevant for you.
And I’m sure that it’s possible to strip down a current setup with Fedora and the KDE suit as well.
Maybe I’m too old /j, but by choosing a DE I’m choosing just a DE.
That’s the issue here, you didn’t choose just a desktop environment (Plasma Desktop) you choose a, more or less, complete suit of software (KDE). :)
I think you mean “suite” instead of “suit.”
Thanks!
It is just something needed for synching calendar and contact information between KDE services, if you have no application that does this, akonadi is not started in the first place… The calendar events in the default panel clock is one of these and can be disabled in its settings as another commenter mentioned
It’s just a helper. It’s a way for your calendar to ask “uhhh… Should I already know of any calendars…?” and the service going “oh actually yeah, the user configured their email account, hold on, here’s the corresponding calendar”.
That’s just basic functionality. Maybe what’s tripping you up is that it’s a separate service? Because I assume you have nothing against inputting your email into a mail client and a calendar separately.
If so, then for one, it’s not really a difference if the mail app stores this into or the service does; and second, it’s a good thing to have this standardized into a single purpose built service, rather than having each app reimplement this stuff.
CPU and RAM usage is so negligible it’s laughable.
IDK.
It seems like you read something about personal data in the service description and just jumped to the conclusion that this is something nefarious.
I know what it is, that’s why I’m so sure I don’t need it for my tasks. The disturbing thing is of course not the data storage itself, but its movement accross my system. I’m okay with having social media accounts, but I’m not okay with shit like TikTok (don’t use it though, just an example) knowing each of my contacts from Signal or whatever, or the browser knowing what I’ve planned for August 16 at 04:40 PM in my calendar. I want user apps to minimally interchange any kind of data. Why would I ever use Linux if not to have control over this?
The CPU and RAM usage might be negligible, but only until there’s only one or two services like this. And I don’t think that a service, that I don’t use at all in any way, should occupy any amount of my RAM.
A user that want a minimal environment installs a modern complete and featurefull entire desktop environment and then complains that it’s too bloated, at five only on Lemmy.
What is this, reddit nowadays? /S
Anyway, you should uninstall plasma and switch to any of the many more basic Linux GUI environment that better suit you needs, that the magic of Linux after all, nobody forces you to use what you don’t like or don’t approve on your own machine
Modern DE ≠ unnecessary metadata-collecting services which you can not control within the DE interface. I do not want a “minimal” environment, I want one that looks pretty and is adjusted straightforwardly. Background metadata syncing has nothing to do with graphical environment. I understand that KDE is a whole ecosystem, but a service like this, shipping together with the DE, unreachable through normal settings interface is not what I’m expecting from a DE. Especially from such a modern and featurefull one. If I wanted to manage my DE with text configs, I would go for hyprland or something like this. It’s the issue with KDE that it doesn’t implement accessible configuration options for certain components. Hereby I’m not saying that KDE is totally bad. My main complaint isn’t the existence of Akonadi by itself, some people I’ll hardly ever meet in person would find its functionality extremely useful for a reason. But the fact it is uncontrollable with any KDE settings is dissapointing.
The actual magic of Linux here is that I can still find a text config and disable anything I don’t need there. Without ditching a whole DE because of a couple of things I don’t like.
PS. I have never been on reddit.
So, really the issue is you expect KDE to present it in UI which is not the case. You would have to use the control binary to stop it from running (
akonadictl stop). To prevent it from running in the future, you’d have to edit/create it’s configuration in$HOME/.configand add something likeStartServer=falseto[].There is no way to do this in the UI. Akonadi itself isn’t bloatware though. It’s an important component that lets “desktop” applications access PIM. It can be a resource hog, but that’s not the same. It serves a valid role. So long as you aren’t using Kalendar, Kmail, etc, just remove it.
So what’s the point? A modern and fully integrated de uses background services and those services are required for many pieces to work so much that they have made not that easy to disable the service?
If that’s the point, you are definitely being unreasonable.
On the other hand the service can still be disabled understandably by text file editing to prevent users from breaking their system. I find the lack of an UI setting to disable it a reasonable choice, and yourself are telling me that it’s still removable by user anyway. A power user indeed, but still user manageable.
Plasma user base definitely is not the customize everything people. I think it’s reasonable that akonadi needs deeper user action to be disabled
That service is local only and needed for many apps to work, including stock widgets.
What is your point against akonadi exactly?
I would complain about that search indexer daemon (kglobalaccel or something similar) in plasma that still after years sometimes gobbles up 100% on a CPU core after screen unlock instead … But whatever
Again, this syncing service has nothing to do with providing a graphical environment. Its functionality has a different purpose.
Disabling this particular service can not break the whole desktop environment. It is simply disabling some additional features, that are absolutely not crucial for the system’s operation. As far as I can tell, simply re-enabling this service brings the features back, it is an easily reversible action, so there is no reason to hide it in order to prevent breaking by an unexperienced user.
If you open any article on Linux DEs comparison, KDE Plasma will be mentioned as offering extensible customization.
My point against Akonadi is that it is hard to disable for no serious reason. Whether you use it’s features or not, you get it running in the background, and you don’t have a normal option to manage it.
Thank you for mentioning the indexer daemon, I will investigate if I need it or it is superfluous for me.
I suggest you open a ticket on akonadi or plasma settings to add that option. That would be a good addition I am always for more settings…
But no, plasma is indeed not in the ballpark of highly customizable de. Maybe more than gnome, but the bar is really low
AFAIK, anything more customizable than KDE relies heavy on text configs and scripts. Another level both in customization options and knowledge required. I will come up to that eventually, but for users, who are not ready for such way of configuring, KDE will stay the most customizeable option.
It’s using your data locally on your machine. If you don’t trust one of the biggest open source projects in the community, perhaps computers is not your thing. :D
I do not need this particular feature anyway. Neither locally, nor in a cloud. But I’m not given the opportunity to know about it and turn it down straightforwardly. It works silently, it can be only discovered via process monitor, and the only way to turn it down is digging into the terminal, as if I didn’t have a graphical environment suite from one of the biggest open source projects in Linux community installed.
That’s the downside (or upside, depending on how you look at things) of choosing a kitchen-sink distro. You get served everything and you don’t have to care or know about anything.
However. Since you seem to be more of a power-user than a casual user, perhaps you didn’t made the best choice for yourself. Perhaps building your own setup based on a bare-bones Fedora installation would have been a better fit for you? :)
You can try just tracking down Akonadi’s executable and removing its executable mark or renaming it, which may, however, break other stuff (in particular, make sure you’re not running kmail—it seems to be the most substantial program with a non-optional dependency). Or you can ditch KDE and move to a lighter DE that doesn’t have this stuff (TDE, Mate, XFCE . . .)
There are two ways to spin up a Linux machine: you can either use a desktop-ready distribution that includes everything you need to use it right away (including some stuff you don’t want), or you can start with the bare bones and build it up to usability. If you want to take the second philosophy to the extreme, Gentoo will let you turn off all optional features you don’t want before they’re even built.
If you’re using the digital clock widget, that uses Akonadi, and will launch it on startup. It’s used to (optionally) sync calendar events between compatible apps. There are also a handful of KDE PIM Applications that use it (think Kontact, KMail, KAddressBook, KOrganizer). If you want it disabled, you will need to stop using any Akonadi-enabled app. More information can be found at the KDE userbase for Akonadi. In particular, stop using any KDE PIM Application, as they cannot function without it, and disable calendar syncing from the digital clock. That will ensure the service is never started.
To fix the digital clock problem:
To ensure that Akonadi is not started, check that no applications require it at login. In particular, open the Plasma clock applet preferences, go to Calendar and uncheck Show events to prevent Plasma from requesting information from Akonadi and thus allowing it to start.
I do not use this widget. And even if I did, why do I have to have Akonadi enabled just to see a widget?
Sorry, I’ve revised my comment, so it’s more complete now. As my comment states above, it’s because by default, the digital clock widget (which is placed by default on the task bar–y’know, where it shows the time) has “Show events” enabled by default, which has a dependency on Akonadi. If you uncheck that (and keep in mind that you are using the digital clock widget unless you’ve specifically removed it), and make sure not to use any of the KDE PIM Applications stated above, then Akonadi will never start
OP, even if I personally don’t entirely agree with your sentiment. I am fully aware it is a legit one and I’m actually even sympathetic to the idea.
As others have already provided solutions to your problem, I just wanted to share https://suckless.org/philosophy/ with you. I’m pretty sure this is either were you are right now, or the logical conclusion of your trajectory.
Have you ever met something else in Linux or it’s ecosystem, that appeared to be bloatware to you (and how did you disable it)?
Perhaps through sheer luck[1] the Linux systems I’ve used have always been pretty minimal.
As bloat often comes with additional attack surface, the security-sensitive will be implored to go with minimalism anyways. As such, my current distro of choice; namely secureblue, is actively engaged with debloating the system. Recently, it has even started working on ‘debloating’ the kernel. Like, why should my system autoload parts of the kernel used to drive all sorts of old and niche hardware; like remote controls etc?
Still, there are stuff that I’m not using, but I’m too lazy to hunt them down 😅.
I started on Fedora Kinoite years ago. But due to some bug at the time, the system wasn’t fully initalized. When I eventually rebased to Silverblue, I ended up with a very minimal install. Sure, it still contained stuff we might regard bloat, but it was the last thing on my mind back then. ↩︎
Secureblue is an interesting one. As far as I could understand from their FAQ, it lacks some cons of Atomic desktops while introducing their pros. I’m more focused on resource usage reasonability, efficiency and control. But still, reducing attack surface is a good idea, it resonates with me. But I still believe we could have fancy setups without obscure undesired services that do not actually drive the things I use. And my aspiration to decide and control what happens in my PC, even if it means disabling some parts of the holy KDE, is absolutely legit. But some people in this thread are downvoting me for this. It feels like if I were hated for trying to delete Edge from Windows. One day I’ll just come up with using DIY distros like Arch and Gentoo and building custom kernels, so I’ll be responsible for any kind of bloat there. But the day hasn’t come yet, I’m still new to Linux.
it lacks some cons of Atomic desktops
What would those cons be 😜? Btw, I’m fully aware of the arguments laid down by those averse to the idea of atomic distros. I’m mostly interested in the influence they have on a newer user. So, please, just reveal what you had in mind without searching up the cons 😉.
But some people in this thread are downvoting me for this. It feels like if I were hated for trying to delete Edge from Windows.
The KDE Plasma circlejerk is real 🤣.
I’m more focused on resource usage reasonability, efficiency and control.
And my aspiration to decide and control what happens in my PC
One day I’ll just come up with using DIY distros like Arch and Gentoo and building custom kernels, so I’ll be responsible for any kind of bloat there.
Or perhaps NixOS. It allows for congruent system management rather trivially. Add to that the impermanence module, and the amount of control you’ll have on your machine is simply unmatched.
It comes at a cost, though. NixOS is the most complex distro out of the reasonably popular ones[1]. But, honestly, it isn’t that bad. If you’ve got experience with programming, you can dive right in (within a VM). And otherwise, after you’ve become comfortable with Arch or Gentoo, then NixOS becomes a logical step-up.
But the day hasn’t come yet, I’m still new to Linux.
Welcome 😊! I await to see what you’ll bring to the table 😜.
Technically, Gentoo is also on that chart. And if it wasn’t clear already, NixOS is more complex than Gentoo. ↩︎
Atomic desktops enforce immutability, the core system is literally a ROM almost like stock Android. It’s not always bad, I can easily imagine cases when it is perfect, but it’s not what I’m currently seeking from Linux. As far as I could figure out, secureblue imposes slightly less restrictions.
Yeah well I knew about Arch circlejerk, but these KDE guys are something. I would probably get same reaction asking an Arch community about how to purge pacman.
NixOS is worth testing indeed. However, AFAIK it is not lightweight enough for my setup. Pretty same as Gentoo, I guess. It is kind of ironical that the most controllable and efficiency-oriented distros aren’t actually good for mediocre setups (but well, I believe nothing stops from building a system on Gentoo with a powerful setup but with flags targeting a low-end device and then flashing the result to the latter). Unfortunately I have no experience with programming, so my learning curve will be fairly steep. But one day I’ll just have the required skill level even for managing NixOS. And probably I will even learn programming, who knows.
Atomic desktops enforce immutability, the core system is literally a ROM almost like stock Android.
Thank you for quenching my curiosity! The analogy to Android makes me worry that you might be associating stuff with atomic distros that are not (inherently) tied to them. Which, to be fair, happens a LOT, unfortunately…
secureblue imposes slightly less restrictions.
In short, as secureblue is ultimately derived from Fedora Atomic, it follows (most of) its conventions. Though, it’s most similar to uBlue in particular due to relying on their images initially. As such, all methods of installing software on say Bazzite apply to secureblue as well. Note, however, that secureblue prefers to keep it leaner for the sake of both security and simplicity. Finally, like Fedora Atomic and uBlue, it also allows you to customize the guts of your OS by creating/configuring an image.
However, AFAIK it is not lightweight enough for my setup. Pretty same as Gentoo, I guess.
If you can run KDE Plasma, then you should be able to run both NixOS and Gentoo.
my learning curve will be fairly steep
😅. Honestly, I think it’s exaggerated. But I’m only ankles deep in NixOS…
This is a purely technical association. And in case with Atomic Desktops, it is just an option at last.
Yeah I probably would be able running NixOS, but I think it will take a lot of time to compile big packages in Gentoo. And if I don’t compile the largest parts of the system by myself with appropriate flags for efficiency, Gentoo doesn’t make that much sense compared to Arch or Artix. I have 5.7GB of RAM (the rest is reserved by system and GPU), and I’ve seen a guy with 128GB RAM on youtube, who still used a lot of binaries because of long compilation and the inefficiency (hah) of portage. He has been running Gentoo for more than a year. I wish I knew C so I could rewrite portage to C.
Once, Gnome Geoclue service seemed unnecessary and suspicious to me.
Disable it by going to “system services” and disabling it
Is it in system settings? I couldn’t find it there
It’s not. look up “services” in your app launcher
Nothing relevant shows up. Had to go to config files.
really? usually KDE based distros have it preinstalled, in Kubuntu for example there’s literally an app called “system services” or “background services” where you can do this. but i’m glad you figured it out
I actually have “background services”, but again, haven’t found Akonadi mentions there. Probably it was called some other way, and probably it was not present there. Anyway, thanks, this app will be useful with other tasks later.
oh, huh. Maybe it’s a SystemD service then, which would be disableable with sudo systemctrl disable akonadi
Desktop user issues 😂
I disabled KDE once, my life has only gotten better since then.
I think I’m going to start a war against my KDE setup. I can’t even disable bluetooth automatically launching at startup. Well, actually, I could. I had to modify a very-down-to-the-bottom line in some config. But it’s definetly not okay for such a huge DE to make you edit basic settings like this in configs. I always thought simplifying tasks like this was the reason for DEs to exist.
What distro are you using? Fedora Plasma has a super simple way to disable bluetooth on startup. Open the Bluetooth settings and select the option to be disabled on startup. You may need bluetooth turned on for the options to display.
Insanely strong opinions about software YOU chose to use everyday. I’d move to something else with no “bloatware” instead.
I chose KDE, I’m choosing to struggle with it (a very good way to learn Linux deeper btw). What’s the problem?
