Description of problem: New "feature" in Fedora 9/KDE4 is that Kate cannot increase indentation levels using tabs. It can only use spaces. Previous versions of Kate used the indentation found on the line. If it was indented with tabs, it added another tab. If it was indented with spaces, it added more spaces. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): Kate 3.0.4/KDE 4.0.4 How reproducible: Create a file (program/script). Indent with tabs. Highlight some code and increase indentation level. It will add spaces, not tabs, to increase the indentation level. Steps to Reproduce: 1. Create code with tabs 2. Highlight part of the code 3. Increase indentation level Actual results: Spaces are added to increase indentation level. Expected results: An extra tab should be added to increase indentation level. Additional info: The expected response to this is, "Just use spaces, not tabs." However, I have many years of code that uses tabs for indentation. I do not want to go through 600 gigs of code and convert all tabs to spaces just to make a bug in Kate feel warm and fuzzy about itself.
This is (mostly likely) an upstream issue, not a fedora one. You'd be better served reporting this to bugs.kde.org. When/if you, please let us know, so we can continue to track the issue there.
On bugs.kde.org, I found that the feature has not been removed. The redesign of the configuration is a mess. If you set the tab level and indentation level to the same number of characters, it will indent with tabs. Otherwise, it will indent with spaces. There are complaints of inability to indent with spaces (because both are the same) as well as inability to indent with tabs (because they are set different). It is obvious that the configuration panel needs a redesign to make it clear what the user is setting.
FYI, there are several bugs filed upstream about this and related issues, some of them by me.