tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-60724763235768997962024-02-20T10:31:23.487-08:00KDE Visual Design GroupUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger40125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-36258564355976249452014-08-28T11:10:00.001-07:002014-08-28T11:10:48.885-07:00Visual Design Stuff at Akademy 2014<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>For planet readers, this post is written by Andrew Lake.</i></span><br />
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I'm so excited to participate in my first Akademy this year! I'll finally get to meet other KDE folks I've only interacted with online from all the way in Seattle, my home. I'm especially looking forward to meeting some of our other VDGers like Thomas Pfeiffer and Jens Reuterberg.<br />
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I'll also be doing a session on <a href="https://conf.kde.org/en/Akademy2014/public/events/95">Community Design and the KDE Visual Design Group</a> where I'll share some insights on how the concept of community design works in the VDG, how we hope it will help to sustain visual design as a core competency in the KDE community, how to ensure the quality of the design output, and the lessons we are learning along the way. If you've ever interacted with the VDG, good or bad, or if you're just wondering how the VDG is working today or will in the future, you're certainly encouraged to stop by.<br />
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I'll also be hosting a workshop on <a href="https://conf.kde.org/en/Akademy2014/public/events/94">Visual Design and QML</a> where we'll cover using QML as a visual design tool by working through an example design. No previous QML experience is required - just a willingness to learn something new.<br />
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If you need any help or feedback with a design, you can find VDG folks in the <i>User Interface Design Room</i> identified on the <a href="https://community.kde.org/Akademy/2014/AllBoF">BoF schedule</a>.<br />
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I'm truly looking forward to this. My Czech is non-existent but I'm trying to learn a few phrases. My German is barely-existent but I'm trying to learn as well. So if you see this guy<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6sq6PYoOMhL9ZOxYPdOie34nlztZprNJFcN3UIDSEgWMAtMjKhu5nmQrtytCvKEuCIF6H4mJDTH3UCS8orm98x27IriU0pdtCIZDXRcJ-KbEYieSgTndfrwcsi6A8jbRDoaVlGRlu6hY/s1600/me.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6sq6PYoOMhL9ZOxYPdOie34nlztZprNJFcN3UIDSEgWMAtMjKhu5nmQrtytCvKEuCIF6H4mJDTH3UCS8orm98x27IriU0pdtCIZDXRcJ-KbEYieSgTndfrwcsi6A8jbRDoaVlGRlu6hY/s1600/me.png" /></a></div>
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or these guys</div>
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in the middle of a heated argument with Brno taxi driver, know two things:</div>
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<li>I probably insulted his dear mother without realizing it, and</li>
<li>For goodness sake, help a brother out!</li>
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Looking forward to Akademy 2014!</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-83100102842944940772014-08-12T11:40:00.000-07:002014-08-12T11:40:23.717-07:00Monday Report: Old Style In New Form<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">For the PlanetKDE readers, this posts is written by Philipp Stefan</span></div>
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Breeze C++</h2>
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Something wonderful happened, Hugo Pereira has volunteered to implemented the Breeze UI controls style in C++ and has shown off some screenshots of his work in the <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122376">forum.</a></div>
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The basis of this theme is the old oxygen style, so he was able to reuse most of the code. Below are some screenshots of his work (without the Breeze window decoration).</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/proxy/AVvXsEgluOCTLaE0KJREDYUrAVabRxQ_0Xq9LKX-M-tkd6rpsSfPmwI68-EvFk_Db131VVjw3iHNpqiSK2iu-KApsWz1oSQ183ukyEA-3SMUFG7dEpMdQ5J6HbUhyphenhyphens2q_eltI0IwPGuz-YiWipYBCOiN=" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/08/11/oxygen-demo.png" height="200" width="193" /></a><a href="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/08/11/oxygen-demo1.png" imageanchor="1" style="display: inline !important; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/08/11/oxygen-demo1.png" height="200" width="193" /></a></div>
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Plasma Addons</h2>
The plasma developers are currently porting <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122329">plasma addons</a> from the 4.X series to Plasma 5. This is of course a great opportunity for us to look at the design of these addons and, as the developers have suggested, now would be the best time to suggest bigger UI revisions, if we have something in mind.<br />
Naturally this has become our main focus this week. We plan to do it this way, open threads in the forums for each add on and wait a few days to see if someone has some ideas regarding the addon. When nothing happens we'll go forwards and finalize our design and make it accessible to the developer who ports the addon in question. <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122360">This seems to</a> <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122359">work fine for a</a> <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122358">couple of addons</a> so far.<br />
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Plasma Media Center</h2>
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After a short delay *cough* Andrew Lake has taken the task upon him to help out with the <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=121705">PMC redesign</a> :) </div>
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The usual process of discussion layout, navigation, usability and presentation of features has now begun. If you have some ideas then, as always, don't hesitate to share them. Nothing is set in stone and as of now we can expect to see changes and adjustments coming up.<br />
Have a look for yourself:<br />
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Andrew has also shown off some more mockups of his <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122273&start=15#p317201">music player idea.</a> Looking good, Andrew!<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">This blog entry is proudly presented to you after a two day long struggle with blogger. I thank my friends and family for supporting me in this difficult time.</span></div>
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<i style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">For the planet readers: This post is written by Philipp Stefan</i></h2>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Last week we saw the release of our design pattern guidelines, this week we focused on using them to prototype application designs. Some of our work has already been made public, like Andrew’s calendar <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122242&sid=d53ab8d4dcf56a865f2366fe4ba9d7c1">prototype</a> which saw some <b>amazingly</b> detailed feedback. We really love top notch input like that, keep it coming, people!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Andrew has also been working on a design for a <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122273">music player</a>. We already have a developer interested in helping us to make it a reality. As always, if you have ideas bring them on!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/08/04/Music_Mockup1a.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/08/04/Music_Mockup1a.png" height="150" width="200" /></a><a href="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/08/04/Music_Mockup1b.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/08/04/Music_Mockup1b.png" height="148" width="200" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">In another <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=121810&start=15#p316352">thread</a>, EraX has released a few more excellent mockups of how he imagines a future muon discoverer to look like. If you have some time consider to give him feedback. The more feedback he gets the better the design proposal will eventually turn out, so don’t shy away from involving yourself :).</span><br />
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<a href="https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/63396655/next/muo0_Front2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" height="224" src="https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/63396655/next/muo0_Front2.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">A few users also have kickstarted the work on a better <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122205&sid=d53ab8d4dcf56a865f2366fe4ba9d7c1">tags GUI for Dolphin</a>. Unfortunately we, besides Thomas, didn't have much time to respond to this proposal. We hope to reach out more throughout this week.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Additionally the work on redesigning the <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122233&sid=d53ab8d4dcf56a865f2366fe4ba9d7c1">desktop configuration dialogue</a> has started off. Some rough ideas have been sketched out, but nothing is final yet. We’re still arguing about what has to be included where. Currently it seems that there is no winning proposal in sight. Though, I’m sure this will change in the course of this week.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122221&sid=d53ab8d4dcf56a865f2366fe4ba9d7c1]https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122221&sid=d53ab8d4dcf56a865f2366fe4ba9d7c1]">One project</a> I’m personally very excited about is the work of designing an API that makes *PIM's mail functionality available via QML. This will enable us to be able to write e-mail clients in QML or use KMail functionality in e.g. plasmoids. The developer behind this task wants to make a prototype client to see what’s needed in the API to work best for developers. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">We come into play by designing the prototype client. However, the VDG hasn't quite finished the mockups yet, so it’s your time to shine. A few users have already responded with feedback and mockups of their own. Currently the discussion is focused on interaction patterns and the general layout of such an e-mail client, so in its very early stages.</span></div>
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<span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Besides these application the VDG is also working with developers (or without) on an image viewer and a video player. Besides that we want to make slight improvements to key areas of Plasma 5 e.g. the system tray. As you can see there’s still much to do, but we’re pleased with the progress made so far</span><span style="font-size: 15px;">.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">*I falsely wrote that the API would expose KMail functionality, when it in fact makes KDE PIM's mail functionality accessible via QML, my apologies. </span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04560474206620281575noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-71944542252385986632014-07-28T14:35:00.000-07:002014-07-28T15:32:11.851-07:00Layout Guidelines: A quick example<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>For planet readers: This post is written by Andrew Lake</i></span><br />
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We recently released new <a href="https://techbase.kde.org/Projects/Usability/HIG/Layout">layout guidelines</a> to aid with designing applications and plasmoids. So I wanted to provide a quick example of how to use the guidelines to design the layout for an imaginary calendar application.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9E5Q9cToF_zcjeYO4PkD6o-8J6mv-BD61Z7arH3T_TTRsdSvhfNUwBRbd77VbuiF_ORUg6KRDy4HM_kG32u0vxrLVPehnfjgkRBUT6kPYpU2ad2Xfz_TPKKgOrdXqib1vEaqeG-f6a9s/s1600/Calendar+Mockup.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9E5Q9cToF_zcjeYO4PkD6o-8J6mv-BD61Z7arH3T_TTRsdSvhfNUwBRbd77VbuiF_ORUg6KRDy4HM_kG32u0vxrLVPehnfjgkRBUT6kPYpU2ad2Xfz_TPKKgOrdXqib1vEaqeG-f6a9s/s1600/Calendar+Mockup.png" height="280" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A quick design for an imaginary calendar app</td></tr>
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To choose an application layout, the new guidelines encourage awareness of the functions and commands provided by your application as well as the structure of the content provided by your application.<br />
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So let's start with commands. Suppose we want the primary function of our calendar application to be providing a daily, weekly or monthly schedule of the user's upcoming work or personal events. The user, Sue, would also like to be able to add events to her schedule. There are many other functions for a calendar application that I'm sure we're all aware of. We're not designing in a vacuum - there are many calendar applications from within KDE and elsewhere from which to draw inspiration. For the sake of this example though, lets start with the described functions and commands.<br />
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The guidelines suggest layout patterns for simple, complex and very complex command structures. So where does our calendar app fit? Well, I wasn't quite sure either. And that's ok! Some things are tough to know until you start delving into the design work. The guidelines suggest starting with a pattern for a simple command structure when you're not sure. So that's what I did. As I started putting together a design and thinking about how Sue would use it for the purposes described, it became clear that not only were there several other desirable functions (like switching calendars, setting up calendar accounts, setting calendar colors, and more) but there are also certain commands Sue might use quite often (like switching between a day, week and month view of her schedule, adding an event and quickly getting back to today after browsing forward or back in time). So I settled on the suggested Toolbar + Menu Button command pattern for a complex command structure.<br />
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The mockup toolkit provides an example:</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaVm1uECe-UR-GFN1qw-z9bMlCgjlB0x3gK2bsJ7DigDSUT91qnFbogBFWDVAF4LRW8Oc3HjdTiGmzI9Y0ftQTF5rixErOmCaSzEBZO0_QhKDCISMGq9ObEBzW8FZyBWGOVvwSq6OdPQk/s1600/mockup+toolbar+menu.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaVm1uECe-UR-GFN1qw-z9bMlCgjlB0x3gK2bsJ7DigDSUT91qnFbogBFWDVAF4LRW8Oc3HjdTiGmzI9Y0ftQTF5rixErOmCaSzEBZO0_QhKDCISMGq9ObEBzW8FZyBWGOVvwSq6OdPQk/s1600/mockup+toolbar+menu.png" height="241" width="320" /></a></div>
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The content structure for a calendar is pretty much flat: Just a collection of days (with or without events). I wanted to show a single day view, a week view(7 days) or month view (28 - 31 days) as well as properties related to the current view or selection like the date, the agenda for the current day or view and the active calendars. So I settled on a Selection-Properties navigation pattern from the recommended patterns for a flat content structure</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIeMWzIckWGxCXZvG-CXHMzzSF_ZJ_C6bOdBgeFp4DRcNgXSogOkpJ8QkKd3FdB7oIyij2sTqbpyHRdzBI1kJR28lOwOKgQE1A6sP9-SoPCLzkGIHDZHMYstFEIvmLgDCODcp0frDhcYw/s1600/NP-Selection-Properties.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIeMWzIckWGxCXZvG-CXHMzzSF_ZJ_C6bOdBgeFp4DRcNgXSogOkpJ8QkKd3FdB7oIyij2sTqbpyHRdzBI1kJR28lOwOKgQE1A6sP9-SoPCLzkGIHDZHMYstFEIvmLgDCODcp0frDhcYw/s1600/NP-Selection-Properties.png" /></a></div>
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The mockup toolkit provides an example of a Selection-Properties navigation pattern combined with a Toolbar+Menu Button.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcWz3AwNbtYlxEXrS6hlTdXk5mMThbOIlLNtN8ZKdI23Z-1Gc_3tD9TmkUKb0Hi8A7AxoK0860x-2Pfn318PrMZNJpwe1HV-6q_QFrj6Idpcp-ySprFX0-VN54RQovpB-y3tGviVZTMoc/s1600/mockup+selection-properties.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcWz3AwNbtYlxEXrS6hlTdXk5mMThbOIlLNtN8ZKdI23Z-1Gc_3tD9TmkUKb0Hi8A7AxoK0860x-2Pfn318PrMZNJpwe1HV-6q_QFrj6Idpcp-ySprFX0-VN54RQovpB-y3tGviVZTMoc/s1600/mockup+selection-properties.png" height="239" width="320" /></a></div>
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Now I have a basic layout I can use for the rest of the design work. I put what I think will be the most frequently used commands on the toolbar - Today, Day, Week and Month views as well as a command to add an event. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCe6_d0o0_FrpDj9thWUn-k9aw8FRJXrd2Nyh1CeLmMCv7Fegr9Zmn-2BjmaNwo1qegcV4st3ruc03m4EogLs4yCmN1Ieyz1Ey2La7Y_vzkWGwnk5Ghx6-K_iyh9-vIizL10aQ5r_fn00/s1600/Calendar+Mockup+-+toolbar.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCe6_d0o0_FrpDj9thWUn-k9aw8FRJXrd2Nyh1CeLmMCv7Fegr9Zmn-2BjmaNwo1qegcV4st3ruc03m4EogLs4yCmN1Ieyz1Ey2La7Y_vzkWGwnk5Ghx6-K_iyh9-vIizL10aQ5r_fn00/s1600/Calendar+Mockup+-+toolbar.png" height="17" width="320" /></a></div>
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Many of the other commands like setting up calendar accounts and the like are exposed through the menu button. I design a week view using the recommended <a href="https://techbase.kde.org/Projects/Usability/HIG/Color">design color set</a> and occasionally checking the <a href="https://techbase.kde.org/Projects/Usability/HIG/Style/Typography">typography</a> guidelines. For the properties panel. I draw some inspiration of Sebastian Kügler's great design work on the new clock plasmoid panel popup for the current date to achieve some additional visual consistency with the desktop. I also decided to add a mini month view for convenience and a legend for the active calendars (possibly directly editable?).</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm9cZGMo_3YYwIe6RWlAheWPqwKvTekm0J8oQzviVpuOymG1d5JI67BrLIv1E73O5syrTpzT01QjxD5Fq2a2rHGDynaoLLnKze0KwaBMt7Fs5UXG0hLHYLaqy9N2hPC5ExsY1T7KW0Mik/s1600/plasma2tp-calendar.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm9cZGMo_3YYwIe6RWlAheWPqwKvTekm0J8oQzviVpuOymG1d5JI67BrLIv1E73O5syrTpzT01QjxD5Fq2a2rHGDynaoLLnKze0KwaBMt7Fs5UXG0hLHYLaqy9N2hPC5ExsY1T7KW0Mik/s1600/plasma2tp-calendar.png" height="109" width="200" /></a> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJUaw7qlKmQXB7Wwqv478AoyljBqdcDe8moiwHLVrLk8KiAZArXCNtsxgj4BkAFkvA8s-_2rd9705PBWPuzSnSpuUqwPo3xb3YvlkSXWNtJ92nr5rcwNyDJBncTdjRBnIHlkR8cSD4k9o/s1600/Calendar+Mockup+panel.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJUaw7qlKmQXB7Wwqv478AoyljBqdcDe8moiwHLVrLk8KiAZArXCNtsxgj4BkAFkvA8s-_2rd9705PBWPuzSnSpuUqwPo3xb3YvlkSXWNtJ92nr5rcwNyDJBncTdjRBnIHlkR8cSD4k9o/s1600/Calendar+Mockup+panel.png" height="200" width="83" /></a></div>
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Put it all together and we have a quick design for an imaginary calendar application. </div>
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It's not a complete design in any sense of the word - icons, day and month views aren't shown, nor are calendar settings and the like. But it's probably enough to, for example, start a review on the VDG forums to get feedback from our fellow intrepid designers, the usability team and/or potential developers.</div>
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Just to be clear, you still have to <i>design</i>. Design is a creative activity. While guidelines can provide a sandbox, it still requires creativity within that sandbox. Often that means that the best way is to just start and figure it out as you go. For me, that's usually a bumpy trial and error process which I simply accept rather than agonize about. And no, you're not allowed to declare that you're not creative! :-) </div>
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Always feel free to ask for help or feedback on the <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewforum.php?f=285">VDG forums</a> - it's a great place for us to learn together. This design was done using the <a href="https://techbase.kde.org/Projects/Usability/HIG/MockupToolkit">mockup toolkit</a>, but just use whatever tool you're comfortable with, including just sketching on paper and taking a picture of it. Don't wait. Don't hesitate. Just do. The long term hope is that these new layout guidelines will provide enough flexibility to create layouts suitable across the full spectrum of KDE applications while also helping to achieve layout consistency where it makes actually sense. Like all guidelines, it is a living document which we'll update collaboratively over time. We'll also do more examples like this in the future.</div>
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Hope this helps!</div>
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-8009115780305261842014-07-28T10:09:00.001-07:002014-07-28T10:09:50.516-07:00Monday Report: Creating Documentation<span style="font-family: inherit;">Yesterday we reached a small but important goal, we completed the first of our self-set tasks for this cycle, namely finishing our application layout guideline. The guideline has been presented to the community to gather <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=122173&sid=92edb24a8be1d00df8806877c65867a2">feedback</a> and was moved to the HIG <a href="https://techbase.kde.org/Projects/Usability/HIG/Layout">wiki</a> yesterday.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">If you think something blatantly obvious has been overlooked, don’t be afraid to speak up. The guidelines can always be improved. Keep in mind though that we intend to make more visual examples available in the guidelines. As of now we were mainly concerned with the textual content of the guidelines.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The guidelines are intended to standardise which layout elements KDE applications use and to help pointing out which layout is best suited for a specific type of application.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Additionally to the release of the application layout guidelines Andrew Lake has updated the <a href="https://techbase.kde.org/Projects/Usability/HIG/MockupToolkit">mockup toolkit</a> with some examples of how one can use the layout guidelines in combination with the toolkit to prototype application designs.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Another project that starts to take shape is the next <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=121776">network system settings module</a>. This module is intended to be one of the first with an updated design for the new system settings.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">This work is in its early planning phase so if you have something important to say, chime in!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">On the window decoration front Martin Gräßlin <a href="http://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2014/07/a-kdecoration2-update/">has blogged</a> about the advances he’s made. If you haven't seen the blog post yet give it a read, it provides very interesting insights in the internals of KWin’s new decoration API. Now it’s time for us to work on the details like padding, etc. We're very pleased with the amount of progress being made, which shows again how absolutely awesome the KDE developers are.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Community</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">We are very happy to see the increased community activity in the forums. Last week a whole bunch of new users arrived in the forums and started to give all kinds of useful feedback and ideas.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">It’s very impressive what a difference a few motivated individuals can make. We hope to integrate all of you into our workflow as good as possible and try not miss any of your ideas. If this should happen anyway don’t be afraid to voice your ideas again.</span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04560474206620281575noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-70016107892831439922014-07-24T12:32:00.000-07:002014-07-24T12:32:25.079-07:00A wild "monday" report appears … <div style="margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 24.149999618530273px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>Arguably our insanely-coolest member, Philipp Stefan contributed this "monday" report.</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15; white-space: pre-wrap;">Yes, it has been some time since the last entry, but with the Plasma 5 release and Jens’ busy work schedule there hasn’t been much time for him to write one, unfortunately. I hope I can keep you up to date more regularly from now on. So let’s dive right in:</span></h1>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; font-size: 21px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What’s being worked on</span></h1>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The work on revisiting and expanding the Human Interface Guideline on tooltips has begun. If there’s something that has always bothered you about how tooltips in KDE Applications and Plasma look and feel consider to join in. The work is still in its early stages, so now would be the best time to voice your concerns. [</span><a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=121892" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=121892</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">]</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Martin Gräßlin has started to work on a new window decoration API for KWin and is also working to port the Breeze window decoration to C++. This should bring the necessary performance boost to make Breeze the default window theme in future releases. We can also expect one feature many love in Oxygen to be present in the new Breeze implementation: window tabs. The awesome community member EraX has stepped up and made some mockups of how window tabs could look like in Breeze. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If you have other ideas and feedback, consider to chime in!</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Additionally Martin has created some tasks you can take up to help us out porting Breeze to C++. Take a look at Martin’s blog post for more information [http://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2014/07/kdecoration2-the-road-ahead/]</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Behind the scenes Jens Reuteberg and Heiko Tietze has started to collect information for animation guidelines. If you have an expertise in this area or are just generally interested and want to help us out try to contact them. [</span><a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=121993" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=121993</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">]</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We migrated to KDE’s new todo-board infrastructure, todo.kde.org. It’s really nice having everything consolidated in one place and accessible with one’s KDE-Identity account. In future we also hope to migrate away from Google Docs and Hangouts. We have been looking into something like an OwnCloud installation to create, share and store documents. Nothing is written in stone though and frankly we’ve got more important things to do right now. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; font-size: 21px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What has been overlooked</span></h1>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We have noticed that the participation rate in the VDG forums has plummeted and only a small core has remained, which are doing awesome work! It has to be expected that participation rates decline at the end of every release cycle, when all the work gets finalized there’s not much to be discussed after all. Nethertheless, we’d like to recreate the same experience we had with the KMyMoney, the window decoration, the widget and the cursor theme.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We identified several causes that could have contributed to the decline in participation:</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Back then the VDG forum was new – people simply got disinterested over time</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The VDG hasn’t communicated as much as in the beginning – the process became less transparent</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There has not been as much guidance in where to start helping out as in the beginning</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We try to address these issue better from now on. We have reorganized ourselves a bit, so you can expect more blog entries from more VDG members in future. We also intend to open new “challenges” (not in the sense of a contest) at the beginning of each release cycle where the community can participate in.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Please tell us if you have ideas how we can foster a more vibrant design community in KDE, critique happily appreciated. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We also have a <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=121772">thread</a> in the forums about a related issue. If you feel the same way consider to leave a comment. </span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-24026159284464695192014-07-13T22:54:00.000-07:002014-07-14T09:22:18.150-07:00The Road AheadPlasma 5.0 is wrapping up and we have all learned a LOT in the first few months of the Visual Design Group's existence. One thing is clear though. If any of us had any doubts about whether an open approach to visual design can produce great results, most of those doubts have been assuaged. I'm super-proud to be part of this community and the quality of the results we have produced. It is really exciting to see the participation and the optimism by everyone involved!<br />
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So one question some folks might be pondering is "What's next for the VDG?" Well I'm glad you asked. The core VDG group sat down and looked at the long term approach to supporting the Plasma desktop and KDE applications.</div>
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Plasma 5.0 is a beginning, not an end. Just like on the technical side where the focus was on the laying the foundations for the future, the same can be said for the VDG's activities as well. We worked together with the wider VDG community and the Usability group to come up with design guidelines that are now integrated into the <a href="https://techbase.kde.org/Projects/Usability/HIG#Presentation">Presentation</a> section of the <a href="https://techbase.kde.org/Projects/Usability/HIG">KDE HIG</a>. This is a living document and will see continuous updates. We recently updated the <a href="https://techbase.kde.org/Projects/Usability/HIG/Style/Typography">typography guidelines</a> and have just begun work on coming up with tooltip and animation guidelines. For the Plasma 5.0 release much of our focus was on trying to get the design of the building blocks in place (UI controls style, icons, colors, cursors, window decoration, etc.). These should also be considered "living" as well. We need your help to flesh out more of the fantastic Breeze icon theme effort that Uri has been leading. Design work continues on the Breeze window decoration design in the forums. The Breeze plasma theme will always need refinements and evolution as well.</div>
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Beyond the building blocks, we'll be focusing on identifying common application layout patterns, navigation patterns, as well as more localized, functional patterns to help application designers and developers build consistent, beautiful, powerful solutions. The hope is that over time we will build up a set of resources that will enable the entire KDE community to more easily create total user experiences that are both functionally and visually amazing. (About that last block in the diagram; <i>please</i> don't go about saying that KDE is creating an OS. We are not. That block is simply about designing the total user experience assuming all the underlying layers of the OS have whatever capability might be needed).</div>
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One important clarifier though; we don't need to wait until all these pieces are in place to create new designs or improve existing ones. We already have a great foundation to build on. There is much we can do<i> today</i> to improve our existing designs. More importantly, your creative ideas today will inform what we identify as desirable approaches to design both today and tomorrow. That's why we're working on the System Settings design today. That's why when a developer approaches the VDG for help we will always try to help instead of saying "hang on a bit till we get some more stuff in place". This is a continuous process of learning and improvement for everyone.<br />
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So please, don't wait around for all of this to "finish" to start sharing your ideas or helping to improve things. There is no finish line. <a href="https://forum.kde.org/viewforum.php?f=285"><b>Join</b></a> in on the fun <i>today</i> and help to update an application design, application icons, a dialog window, a panel applet, a window decoration theme, a plasma theme, fix a visual design bug, whatever. As Jens always says, you do not need to be a "designer" to participate. Just be creative! Be positive! Share your ideas! Participate! We will walk the road ahead together, in the open, where everyone can participate, learn from each other and create a new future for community design together!</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-7353070652719956422014-06-28T08:09:00.001-07:002014-06-28T08:09:15.382-07:00Wallpaper Challenge - winners<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 19px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i> In which we go through the winners of the wallpaper competition, talk about voting issues and where we go from here</i></span></span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhT9524vq-EV6VI7S8-M-LRABfwj9Q7ykhzv8PQuoBhv1PLQj7L8-32A8OCGzyWktrOVX9QvTEz0iWCTtcBdwEAUbID4X2WwAZPokB5W5cXpGOBnHHQ5vPa70UGSPi1-GlhsilzAP2liiw/s1600/rect5399.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhT9524vq-EV6VI7S8-M-LRABfwj9Q7ykhzv8PQuoBhv1PLQj7L8-32A8OCGzyWktrOVX9QvTEz0iWCTtcBdwEAUbID4X2WwAZPokB5W5cXpGOBnHHQ5vPa70UGSPi1-GlhsilzAP2liiw/s1600/rect5399.png" height="179" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nuno's wallpaper the default wallpaper for Plasma 5</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>The Heat is on!</b></span> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Right it's getting closer and closer to the D-day of Plasma and things are getting hectic. All of us are wild at work and things are getting cooler and cooler. But the wallpaper competition is at least finished and done with for this release which is nice :)</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">None of this could have happened without the help of Sogatori who has been a prince in shining armor and earned enough good Karma to last a lifetime as far as I'm concerned. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Sogatori Speaks!</b> (below is written by S)</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">After two weeks and almost 1400 casted votes we’re finally ready to announce the 3 winning wallpaper submissions:</span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Congratulations also to the 3 winning artists namely orbmiser, ivan and mck182 who is the third runner-up, all of whom can look forward to receiving a copy of the excellent book “</span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Design-Elements-Graphic-Style-Manual/dp/1592532616" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;">Design Elements: A Graphic Style Manual” by Timothy Samara</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">. We’ll contact the winners shortly so they receive their prices as quickly as possible.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Some Small Hiccups</b></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Those of you who have kept an eye on the election might have noticed that the website we were using displayed a different result than the one we’re presenting here. The problem was that Sogatori clicked the wrong checkbox when he created the election, the website was using proportional representation to determine the winners instead of a non-proportional one. It is not possible to change this option after the election process has started and at the time we noticed the mistake there had already been over 500 casted votes, so we decided against opening a new election. Instead, we were able to download the data from the website and re-run the election locally using the same software as the website. Special thanks to bshah (Bhushan Shah) who helped us despite having much to do with his GSoC project. A big thumbs up please! </span></span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-9969488541506318682014-06-11T01:32:00.002-07:002014-06-11T01:32:20.653-07:00Wallpapers! Vote for your favorite!<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i>This post was written by Sogatori who has been a rock during this process. I want, before we continue to just have a massive High Five and "You rock!" sent to Sogatori for being such a stand-up dude during this entire process. </i></span><br />
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Wallpaper Contest!</span></span></b>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">We’re glad to announce that the contest has been</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #ff9900; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">a success with over 50 submitted wallpapers. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">After the submission phase closed on June 6th</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #ff9900; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">,</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> a jury of 3 (1 VDG member, 1 forum member and 1 plasma developer) selected their favourite wallpapers.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The submissions ranged from photographs to artwork. Those who want to take a look at all the submissions that didn’t make it</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #ff9900; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">into the finale can do so <a href="http://visualdesigngroup.deviantart.com/gallery/" target="_blank">by looking at our deviantart group</a> </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">and this <a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=120497" target="_blank">forum thread</a></span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">. It was no easy task to select the wallpapers for the finale, considering how many great submissions we received. We would like to take the chance again to thank everyone who has taken part in this contest. You are the people who make the KDE community what it is. It’s a pleasure to work with you all. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Now though it is time to move on to the next phase of the plan: The greater KDE community now has the chance to vote for their 3 favourite wallpapers out of the 15 nominees. The winning wallpapers will be shipped with the first release of Plasma Next. Additionally the creators of those 3 wallpapers will receive a copy of the book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Design-Elements-Graphic-Style-Manual/dp/1592532616" target="_blank">“Design Elements: A Graphic Style Manual”</a></span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Design-Elements-Graphic-Style-Manual/dp/1592532616" target="_blank"> by Timothy Samara</a>, an excellent introduction to the basics of the world of design. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><a href="https://modernballots.com/elections/smqncwjc/vote/" target="_blank">You can vote here</a></span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">. Simply rate the individual wallpapers on a basis of 1 to 5 stars, where 1 star is the worst and 5 stars the best rating, and submit your ballot by clicking the “submit ballot” button at the bottom.</span></div>
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The vote will end 2 weeks after this blogpost has been published.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i>(Jens Addendum: ok so if you want to talk about the wallpapers and not just vote - please do so in the community thread! The more talky-talky the better! Also, IF by chance on person gets two of the three highest votes one book will go to Number Four on the list (because what are you going to do with TWO books? Better to spread the love around)</i></span><br />
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-16273296383316548162014-06-11T00:58:00.000-07:002014-06-11T00:58:09.181-07:00"Monday Report" - bi-weekly edition<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i>In which I complain about having too much to do, then start going all insane about all the cool stuff you so need to see, ask you to test the Plasma 5 beta2 and then on to the wallpaper competition and the last leg of that. </i></span><br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Right first off - I am swamped. </b></span>I know it's not good that I skip the monday reports but lets just say I had to cut down or something or skip sleep entirely... sry guys, I know reports are relevant, but not as relevant as "working on Plasma Next and Next-next" (yes there is a Next-next in the works :) ) so I hope you forgive my tardiness.<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Right on to the awesome stuff.</b></span> The screenshots are all from Sebastian "Il Capitano" Kügler who is hacking away like his life depended on it. These are all "where we are now" - and check below for "where we're heading" hints.<br />
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This is the new login screen - there are plenty of fiddly bits to deal with but it's the first step towards making a unified login experience. Yes the work is still far from over but it's getting closer every day. <br />
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So you've logged in have you? Well this is what you'll meet all the system tray icons have been reworked the new Plasma Theme "Breeze" is there and you can see the new wallpaper switcher as well as the new layout for the Application Launcher. Please note that Breeze is transparent - only that its transparent with some dark magic by Marco Martin making the background fuzzy and desaturated.</div>
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Below is the new battery and brightness tray in the systray. Notice that there are two screenshots, one with the layout as is and one with the new icons. The icon sizes will be fiddled with but when have I ever NOT shown you guys and girls some work-in-progress love? <br />
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So the switcher has gotten some revamped workings too based on the Activity Switcher by Ivan Čukić to try to make the entire feel of the switching a tad bit more unified and safe for users. </div>
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Below is a pop-up for a new message - now granted not much of a change BUT the work is being done on the layout of the thing. Essentially the Icons size in comparison with the Header and the subheader.</div>
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Here's the new Networks Systemtray dohickey - you look me in the eye and tell me that isn't the most awesome thing you've ever seen! As you can see a MASSIVE part of the work has gone into trying to make Plasma feel more unified in its design, trying to make it part of an entire whole instead of different details. The work is far from over but you gotta admit, this is nerve-tinglingly (should be a word) good!<br />
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The calendar... Now now before you go all bananas and think "Where's my daily planner bit!?!" the reason it's disabled is because we don't have support for it in PIM just yet. So better disable it by default than bring something that doesn't work amirite?<br />
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Also note the Breeze windowdeco. It's there now :)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgffaXbmbQLMKkIOkLH0hsPHTSiYMp8TQrqjjWSlpI2RTG_RNqvYoog2X7kLfO3fVu5uQI2uT012DQcFkrdenn9yOXu16na4rZUwfHn6a4j_ZZPbIsl5S3rZK-3CRBjcDXGfq_c5BIqzpU/s1600/plasma50b2-dolphin.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgffaXbmbQLMKkIOkLH0hsPHTSiYMp8TQrqjjWSlpI2RTG_RNqvYoog2X7kLfO3fVu5uQI2uT012DQcFkrdenn9yOXu16na4rZUwfHn6a4j_ZZPbIsl5S3rZK-3CRBjcDXGfq_c5BIqzpU/s1600/plasma50b2-dolphin.png" height="179" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>...</b></span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Where can I get my greasy mitts on all this magical goodness you ask?</b></span> Well young madams and sirs you can download and test the Beta 2 of it following the <a href="http://dot.kde.org/2014/06/10/plasma-5-second-beta-needs-testing" target="_blank">instructions of Jonathan Riddell on the Dot </a>remember that this is for testing only. And please please please write in bugreports and test it thoroughly the better its tested the easier the work becomes!<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>...</b></span></div>
<br /><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Wallpapers! What about the wallpapers?</b></span> Well the competition is at its final stage. But hey I'll post ANOTHER blogg post in a few seconds ok? It'll be easier for you guys.<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>...</b></span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Oh oh oh before I go any further I will whisper to you all a secret...</b></span> "The system settings are being worked on and although its to early to show anything... lets just say when I saw the current version of them I went "ooooh daaaaaaaamn!" so loud my husband asked what was up" ... I cannot explain how brilliant this will be... ooooh! :D:D:D<br />
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<i>Ok I gotta dash, have insane amounts of work to get to and I'll try to do these things properly each week but IF I don't rest assure that the only thing stopping me is because I'm working on something brilliant! </i><br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-76570598081145024432014-05-29T04:21:00.002-07:002014-05-29T04:21:59.042-07:00System Settings and new VDG members<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i>In which we introduce the work on System Settings, talk about our new members and the action group for System Settings.</i></span><br />
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Right, a while back we had some additions to the VDG team: Anditosan, Gartheco and Ken300 - I promised then that I would make little avatar images for them (which I haven't done, mea culpa etc) but that doesn't mean they've been resting or doing nothing.<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Gartheco joined Andrew Lake </b></span>in working with the new window decorations - as I've posted about before. Being a veteran Aurorae theme designer and a QML genius he and Andrew work in tandem to fiddle with bits about that.<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Anditosan and Ken300 where both doing work on System Settings</b></span> redesign and joined forces with Heiko Tietze and Thomas Pfeiffer from the HIG team to work on the question "How will system settings work in the future?". Together they make up the System Settings Action Group (it's like a superhero team, only less spandex and more thinking) and if you want to contribute with ideas I can only suggest that you go to the forum and post your mockups and help out!<br />
Now with System Settings this is a "way into the future" job - because we are working on the "bit-by-bit" production model AND lets be frank here, the devs are more or less working 24/7 getting the first version of Plasma Next out the door. <br />
But this is what system settings will work like in the future - it's what they work on that will shape the things to come.<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Also can I say something that is cool?</b></span> I am right now struggling to keep up. My intray is massive, I keep trying to read blog posts and forums posts as fast as possible. Individual members of the VDG community are doing awesome work in the forums and I can hardly keep up. I spend hours trying to answer one thing and work on it, then notice someone else have already done it.<br />
This is the coolest thing I've ever seen. Yes it's kinda harrowing but it's amazing the amount of work done.<br />
Tomorrow I'll have a "what Jens need to do" day, and start making lists and tick them off one by one. My greatest challenge for the near future is getting the right design work and designers in contact with the right devs... THATS the tricky bit right now and where I should spend my time.<br />
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Why? Because whatever work I can do, the VDG community is doing it quicker, better and cooler than I ever could alone.<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>You guys and girls ROCK! <3</b></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com18tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-18624816914235895112014-05-26T15:50:00.003-07:002014-05-26T15:50:32.962-07:00Monday Report: Wallpaper Edition<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i>The world shortest update in which we talk about the wallpaper competition, whats needed, when it ends and what we need and what you can win. </i></span><br />
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<a href="http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/pEdU70RjOkQ/0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/pEdU70RjOkQ/0.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Wallpapers are relevant,</b></span> yes they are easy to change - and yes they probably shouldn't matter since everyone changes the wallpaper but it's one of those things you see first. So a few weeks ago we started a wallpaper competition and we have gotten some great wallpapers sent in but we want more.<br />
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The wallpaper competition will therefore be extended two weeks so more can take part in it.<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>So how does it work, you ask?</b></span> Easy, our three members of the Jury, Me, one from the community (Sogatori to be precise, if you wish to want to send bribes) and one member of the Plasma dev team will pick out the favorites and with the help of the community pick out the three winners who's wallpapers will be included in Plasma Next.<br />
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The three winners will get the awesome book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Design-Elements-Graphic-Style-Manual/dp/1592532616" target="_blank">"Design Elements - a Graphic Style Manual"</a> and of course a worthy mention.<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>So what are we looking for?</b></span> Photo wallpapers, illustration wallpapers or graphical and abstract wallpapers are all accepted for submission, personally I would suggest to avoid text elements or logo's entirely - the theme we're going for is a hopeful futurism but this should be considered something to focus around, not a prerequisite.<br />
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The submissions can be <a href="http://visualdesigngroup.deviantart.com/" target="_blank">posted in the Deviant Art group</a> or in the <a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=120497" target="_blank">thread here in the forums</a>. If you have them elsewhere post a link in the forums.<br />
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How about licensing? Well this will all have to of course be yours to licence and done as Creative Commons
Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 or GPL v2 or later. <br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>THE COMPETITION ENDS AT JUNE 12th </b></span></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-28060684870655699312014-05-19T07:09:00.001-07:002014-05-19T07:09:20.910-07:00Monday Report: Deluxe Edition!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i>In which we talked about the "Conspiracy of the Missing Monday Report", a short thing about the Beta and then some screenshots of where we're heading concerning themes and icons and then talk some more about participation and how much it means.</i></span><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.toptenz.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/goldfish-animal-myths.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://www.toptenz.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/goldfish-animal-myths.jpg" height="185" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I forgot.</td></tr>
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I know, I know, no Monday Report last week - lets just keep it at "its been kinda hectic lately", "I forgot" and move on. Monday reports are continuing no matter what so don't worry about that. :)<br />
So I will post this and then ANOTHER post soon after to delve some more into the work going on with Wallpapers and the wallpaper competition.<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>To the Long and the Short of it: We have a Beta</b></span> as most of you have read. What shocked some is that the beta wasn't a major change in visual design. No, it wasn't intended to be. I've said back in January, over and over, "bit-by-bit". This will be a slow change and let me delve into the "why's".<br />
Plasma is a massive project, it has millions of users and a long history. What started as another Linux Desktop Environment has grown and grown with layers and layers of function. Now some of you might say "Well scrap all of them and build it from scratch" and for a mission with less demands that would be true. Plasma is a MASSIVE project for a reason. One of those are that the users who like the way it is NOW should not feel dismissed, another was that changes had to stick to an obvious layout path from KDE4 another that flexibility should never be compromised and a third that "Community" should always be the focus etc etc (or as a friend said when I told him about the project "What, are you stupid? Why are you doing this!?" ;) ). So bear with us, things are changing but we will do it slowly.<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Anyway I wanted to show two screen shots</b></span> of where we're heading. The first one is from Andrew Lake who together with Garthecho (a new VDG member) heads the work on QML and is tied into almost every bit of it. You can see the new window decoration (that needs to be properly ported as right now we have an Aurorae theme for it but Aurorae doesn't play nice in Plasma Next (so if you're a C++ programmer who likes to get his/her hands dirty, tell us!)) and you can see what Plasma looks like too as well as the Widget theme and a few of the Icons.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoqbHuL-OsludxEktm3Ph4ICKFu1brtU_qg16z4pPD4UKWckAz-4d4UMkTjNDFFnqz0FYFXFJBz0BfHTiShvIR-eyxtDobt9Ap5_djN24zsTYJoqfHN9Rl_j_4fLg6PjZrnnaW0fFsaMQ/s1600/loving+it.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoqbHuL-OsludxEktm3Ph4ICKFu1brtU_qg16z4pPD4UKWckAz-4d4UMkTjNDFFnqz0FYFXFJBz0BfHTiShvIR-eyxtDobt9Ap5_djN24zsTYJoqfHN9Rl_j_4fLg6PjZrnnaW0fFsaMQ/s1600/loving+it.png" height="180" width="320" /></a></div>
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Under here you can get a nice good look at Uri Herreras icon work so far. Now Uri is one of life's many overworked people who tend to take on quite a load when he gets a chance so if you want to help out with Plasma Next, try to help HIM with his Flattr Icon theme so that he gets more time to do our theme (yes it's as confusing to write as it probably is to read :) )<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEB0sZSkE2C7oloAzfcPeJ04YhRVtWUznnmGdZQU3KHLK3LZnfsFnHQSEVRXuVoch5dXzFunTrM06NPJrUpCr0BQiC8HjCd14Ja5jZ8L8vtfNfGkIOMWP27C2fqt4Hf00_6JleukUBl_o/s1600/instant%25C3%25A1nea26.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEB0sZSkE2C7oloAzfcPeJ04YhRVtWUznnmGdZQU3KHLK3LZnfsFnHQSEVRXuVoch5dXzFunTrM06NPJrUpCr0BQiC8HjCd14Ja5jZ8L8vtfNfGkIOMWP27C2fqt4Hf00_6JleukUBl_o/s1600/instant%25C3%25A1nea26.png" height="179" width="320" /></a></div>
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Please note that they window decorations, Plasma Theme and Widget Themes are for Nitrux OS and not Plasma Next!<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Ok so finally about participation</b></span> - I know since things move slowly it might be tricky and many seem to think that they are being overlooked or that no devs are checking their work. Trust me, nothing could be further from the truth. It's just that things WILL move slowly. We're working on Plasma Next. That means that when this Beta is out the door we will still be working on its refined state. Plasma as it will be in June, is not the final product. It's just the first iteration of it and my intention is that when this year ends the changes will be visible to all. Unknownnoreply@blogger.com22tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-14082860691221380892014-05-08T17:01:00.001-07:002014-05-08T17:06:20.876-07:00Moka Icon Theme Ported to Plasma!<style type="text/css">
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</style><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i>In which we talk about the porting of an immensely popular icon theme to Plasma, the relevance of Plasma and KDE people to donate a little cash, learn Sam Hewitt wasn't born in 1956 Berlin and here his opinion on design in Plasma</i></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://realhistoryww.com/world_history/ancient/Misc/Crests/Russian_icon_6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://realhistoryww.com/world_history/ancient/Misc/Crests/Russian_icon_6.jpg" height="320" width="263" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Not at all the icons we're talking about...</td></tr>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Whats all this hoo-haw about icons then?</b></span> <br />
One of the first things people think of when talking visual design is icons. Now as "design" this is a very tight definition since a large chunk of it is so much bigger. But icons is a part of it all and it is something that is the most obvious change visually. Icons are also something very very difficult to do well as there is not only several very strict rules and concepts to consider while doing them, there is also a very large amount of work involved (thousands of icons for starters). Beyond that there are issues that make it even trickier.<br />
As icons are very direct visually - they are often victim of harsh criticism (or downright harassment) but further than that the BASE theme of a distro have to follow even stricter rules if it want to be accessible to as many as possible.<br />
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Now we using Plasma do not have the huge wealth of icon themes as the boys and girls over at GTK, but we are getting there ever so slowly and today I would like to present one of the latest icon themes to get ported to KDE - Moka by Sam Hewitt.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvH-Jk2puQAo3uvBSJF4ARJckvpyxBoepxH_TssfIgDFBOvEwNyUjVYx2-jLtTt97JSWUrxpaZv7o9MfNpQfOJp2RIN-q5Wq07rsPLydMUNsnEHdeUMUQl8I6XZI7fpK1jWQYjGNY6KP4/s1600/snapshot1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvH-Jk2puQAo3uvBSJF4ARJckvpyxBoepxH_TssfIgDFBOvEwNyUjVYx2-jLtTt97JSWUrxpaZv7o9MfNpQfOJp2RIN-q5Wq07rsPLydMUNsnEHdeUMUQl8I6XZI7fpK1jWQYjGNY6KP4/s1600/snapshot1.png" height="225" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Yeah so this is one of my desktops with the Moka icon theme! </td></tr>
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I obviously talked to Sam and sent him some questions to answer which follow below but before we get there I would like to say that you can <a href="http://mokaproject.com/" target="_blank">download the icon theme from his site</a> and, as one Plasma user to another - <b>Please for our sake pay for it</b>. You can afford the 3 bucks if you got a job and what you do when you do that is to send a clear message to Sam and other predominantly GTK designers "We want design in Plasma, Qt and KDE too!"<br />
(in a perfect world I'd love for Sam to see a bump in payments OR donations (I gave 10 dollars) so remember to donate, ok?) <br />
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Anyway heres the short Interview with Sam Hewitt:<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>...</b></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Who are you?</b></span>
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<div style="-qt-block-indent: 0; -qt-user-state: 0; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;">
<i>Who am I? Well, it was 1956 and in a small town in East Berlin it was a cold December day. But Berlin is always cold in December. As for me, I'm from Canada and the '90s</i></div>
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<i>Nearly all the things I've found that I'm good at, I've taught myself, design
included; I dropped out of university a few years ago, half-way towards
an engineering degree that was killing my love of mathematics &
physics. It was after that that I kind of fell into design as a passion
and decided to pursue it –open source was simply an enable</i></div>
<i>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Whats the story with Moka?</b></span>
</i><br />
<div style="-qt-block-indent: 0; -qt-user-state: 0; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;">
<i>Moka started a little over a year ago, I can't remember exactly when. I had decided to create an icon theme, as an hobby/endeavour in teaching myself more about Inkscape –Moka then was very different from Moka now.</i></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLJtpB5CzhQnOMkz90XhEjv0e0KqYV8zS4Dvjhs5FoHAENUp-SnwlWFR_BfWV0r3JzN1_1LWKPJwVMaFvqL7kGxubSO0F12KvS90w-MzpPIgxpQsAzJAB0Te42gIpNA2IyBGPENvuSWDU/s1600/mokaupdate.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLJtpB5CzhQnOMkz90XhEjv0e0KqYV8zS4Dvjhs5FoHAENUp-SnwlWFR_BfWV0r3JzN1_1LWKPJwVMaFvqL7kGxubSO0F12KvS90w-MzpPIgxpQsAzJAB0Te42gIpNA2IyBGPENvuSWDU/s1600/mokaupdate.png" height="35" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">... heres the early versions of the Moka Icon theme ...</td></tr>
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<div style="-qt-block-indent: 0; -qt-user-state: 0; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;">
<i>I eventually abandoned the skeuomorphic aspects that I started with, as that was already done by others and it wasn't really my style. Changing gears, I decided to to fill a gap in the theming community of a well-designed, comprehensive icon set that was modern in style.
Then I decided I wanted to do a desktop (GTK) theme, which became Moka GTK. Purple as a motif was something no-one was doing; there are colours that are frequent in themes –blue is in many and is highly overused in my opinion.</i><style type="text/css">
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<i>The whole "Moka Project" is relatively recent, but with the project as a unified thing I started making other subproject and using Moka as an umbrella for it, and here we are.</i></div>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i><b>What do you expect of Moka further along the line?</b></i></span><br />
<div style="-qt-block-indent: 0; -qt-user-state: 0; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;">
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p, li { white-space: pre-wrap;</style><i>The future of Moka is uncertain, its fate is practically determined by my fate. Being the sole force behind Moka, should I decide to move on the project effectively halts. It's a reason I (made attempts to) set out to monetize it. If it made a few bucks I'd be motivated to work on it more since I would know there was an appreciative user base to work for. With all that there's a set of flaws I won't get into here.</i><br />
<i>As for future design plans, it's all up in the air. If I were to start anything majorly new (like a desktop environment), I'd do it outside the scope of Moka –have it hold it's own brand, to which the Moka brand could be applied.</i></div>
<i><br /></i>
<i><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Why did you port it to Plasma? </b></span>
</i><br />
<div style="-qt-block-indent: 0; -qt-user-state: 0; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;">
<i>I ported/expanded Moka's icon coverage to KDE because it was something I always intended to do. A goal for the set was to be as comprehensive as possible. Moka, excluding the Faba icon set, has nearly 9500 icons (I design 7 icons for every 1 application) and I still take requests (of which I still have a huge number outstanding) for additional icons. I want people to be able to use the icons on whichever environment they want and have the same experience.</i></div>
<i><br /></i>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i>What do you think are biggest design issues with Plasma? </i></span></b><br />
<i>I tend to stay away from overtly criticising the various desktop environments, but since you asked, I'll say something brief. I can sum up the flaws (as I see it) of KDE/Plasma's design practices, thusly: </i><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>"Too Much Bling"</b> </span></div>
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<i>Simply put, there's too much stuff –kill that silly bouncy ball already! ;)
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<i>The amount of user interface and user-facing options, I can see as being overwhelming to newcomers, which means it's not outwardly user friendly. Sure, the style could be modernized; the look & feel is too flashy, glow-y and realistic for a design world gone flat. But were I a benevolent dictator for the project, I'd fix the user experience first and then layer on a new style.</i></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>More to come? </b></span></div>
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So with that we will hopefully leave Sam to notice a bump in donations and payments (did I say "pay for it, for KDE and Plasma's sake"?) and perhaps we might charm him into a making a Moka Qtcurve and color theme? My plan is to next time we talk outside of the "monday" reports I'll have a collection of my favorite free wallpapers found on the web and perhaps another short interview.</div>
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<div style="-qt-block-indent: 0; -qt-user-state: 0; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;">
<i>Till next time, its now two in the morning and this design is dying to get to bed!</i> </div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-20977657768461260682014-05-06T16:22:00.003-07:002014-05-06T16:22:54.564-07:00Monday Report #14 - LazyIT edition<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i>In which we talk about Italian helper LazyIT on Google Plus, Wallpaper Competitions, Shutdown Dialogues, Schooling, Window Decorations and new members!</i></span> <br />
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First of all a great thank you to <b>LazyIT</b> who keeps reminding me that monday has passed and he has still hasn't seen my Monday Report. It's like having an italian editor constantly going on about this strange concept of "Deadlines"? :)<br />
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We have plenty of things to talk about so I will keep this short and exact:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Wallpaper Competition!</b></span><br />
So for the entire month of May we will hold a competition for wallpapers. The winners will be chosen by me, Sogatori and another member of the VDG and then the entire community.<br />
The level quality of wallpaper needed is high - so the choices will be made first by the three person team as something that is good enough for distro release and then from those passing the initial bar.<br />
We will post all things in a devianart group called aptly <a href="http://visualdesigngroup.deviantart.com/" target="_blank">"VisualDesignGroup"</a> if you have a Deviantart account - ask to join the group, if not post your suggestion in <a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=120497&start=15" target="_blank">the Forum thread</a> and I or someone else will post it for you.<br />
Please remember that your submission must be under CC-BY-SA 3.0, GPL v2 or GPL 3 licence.<br />
The theme "The Bright Future" we're going for is "The bright future" and the three chosen winners will all get as a first prize the book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Design-Elements-Graphic-Style-Manual/dp/1592532616" target="_blank">"Design Elements: a graphics style manual"</a> as well as the honor and whatever strange nicknacks is found in the back of my cupboard. <br />
<br />
This is the kicker though - if nothing passes the bar of "good enough to work as a wallpaper" - no one wins. So bring out your best work, your best smiles and lets get this done!<br />
<br />
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>Shutdown Dialogue!</b></span><br />
There is the question of the shutdown dialogue to sort through too! We're planning on revamping the ever-present "Moon" and need some new ideas. A thread will open up shortly in the forums about this so start thinking already about your suggestions. You don't have to be able to draw it, but a suggestion would be awesome.<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>QML school has opened! </b></span><br />
As I, Jens, is a massive dunce of the quality that spent his youth drawing instead of learning any real valuable skills I simply lack any form of schooling except how-to-make-certain-the-teacher-doesn't-catch-me-drawing-in-the-maths-book-again. So me and VDG member Uri will be schooled in the finer arts of QML by VDG unicorn Andrew Lake and new VDG member Garthecho and <a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=120996" target="_blank">we invite EVERYONE to join in!</a><br />
You may notice that my first post was of a boy with a dunce-hat on and Uri said "I'll draw some icons while I think" - so no matter what your skill level is you won't be the worst at it! Ask questions and talk about QML! (Then please let me copy from you during the test)<br />
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<br />
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>New Window Decorations!</b></span><br />
Ok so Andrew and new guy Gartheco has teamed up to get cracking with the new window decorations which you can see below. It has a clearer window bar as that was asked for, a blue stripe along it that disappear as the window is maximized. You can also play with the QML version if you have Project Neon up and running (In Kubuntu for example) in which case you can <a href="http://quickgit.kde.org/?p=breeze.git" target="_blank">get it here!</a><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJsRwYq8D9dzJ29KRcrrT2RufVL8-kuNxix2_1C78Df_XG9k7U6xqn4huQQWSZD2Esprz7p6L_YhQFfaWT5OowTgDizKQNRHO8ObmGV_q7ZtgKBxJdtGTgeUac3ZI-wIE5slkVgrFxMBU/s1600/QMLsnapshot.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJsRwYq8D9dzJ29KRcrrT2RufVL8-kuNxix2_1C78Df_XG9k7U6xqn4huQQWSZD2Esprz7p6L_YhQFfaWT5OowTgDizKQNRHO8ObmGV_q7ZtgKBxJdtGTgeUac3ZI-wIE5slkVgrFxMBU/s1600/QMLsnapshot.png" height="279" width="320" /></a></div>
<i><br /></i>
<i>There is an insane amount of work going on in the background too so stay tuned for next weeks "Monday" report!</i><br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-22383848176088168762014-04-29T06:53:00.000-07:002014-04-29T07:30:56.885-07:00Monday Report #13 - lucky for some<i><span style="color: #3d85c6;">In which we talk about wallpapers a competition and the magnificent prizes involved. A few things about Ask-a-dev weeks to come are touched upon. We mumble a bit about what the future will hold as it comes to releases and work on that AND we start talking about future projects and changes.</span></i><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-NgvvgKzrheI/UurYtECoeVI/AAAAAAAAAKw/zxifD_cVbuo/s1600/colanderheads.retrofuturism.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-NgvvgKzrheI/UurYtECoeVI/AAAAAAAAAKw/zxifD_cVbuo/s1600/colanderheads.retrofuturism.jpg" height="320" width="272" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Soon time to start to test things IRL</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Wallpapers - its the subject we hate to love and love to hate.</span></b> One of the things people either say "Well it's the easiest thing to change" or "It's the first things users see". I agree with both personally because I think that a good wallpaper is essentially the "hello, my name is..." of a desktop and also that I have yet to meet a user who didn't change theirs.<br />
But we need them! A while back I started a thread about it and it needs a reboot - the reception was luke warm at best and I thought "a proper competition - with fabulous prizes, like a car is whats needed!". Then I remembered that I'm not Oprah and this is Open Source and scaled it down a bit. With the help of the KDE eV we got funding so we can get the three winners the awesome book "Design Elements - a graphic style manual" (which is a brilliant and accessible book about graphic design that everyone should read) and the plan is to dig out some tshirts and stuff to to throw in the mix.<br />
<br />
So how will this work? Essentially this is the deal - a group of community organizers/VDG people will pick out the ones that work, rank them into three piles and then let the community decide through a poll. "Wait wut?" you might say, why not let the community decide from scratch? Weeeeeell this is the catch with this competition. Some distros and DE's has had a not great experience with these things and as much as I think "come one, come all" is a relevant point - we also need to have a quality check of the wallpapers. The cruel bit is: if the VDG/Community Organizers don't feel like any are up to snuff - no one will win. They will try to make certain that all entries get help to get up to snuff, but if nothing happens - no wallpaper will be chosen.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=120497" target="_blank">More on the competition in the thread HERE.</a><br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Ask-a-dev is another idea</span></b> but this is about increasing the exchange between the design community, the community-at-large and devs. Essentially every week we will pick a dev, introduce the poor man or woman - and start a thread where we can ask technical or design questions to that dev to help introduce the "behind the scenes" work. The thread will then remain BUT with the edit that "Dev has left building" meaning the dev might not answer more questions - that way the threads can be used as a FAQ section for the future and a place to talk about that specific work.<br />
Now before that kick off please bare in mind I will monitor these threads like George RR Martin writes books - the devs have agreed on the condition that we play nice. This is not an opportunity for people to scream "Why did you remove X feature!!!111" and I will go all Red Wedding on anyone who does.<br />
<br />
The <strike>first victim</strike> happy dev to be asked things this week will be David Edmundsson who can be best introduced as someone who works on Plasma and KDE Telepathy as well as a host of other things. He helped out with the work on the log-in screen and boot process and is "high protector of English cooking".<br />
<br />
<a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=120902" target="_blank">You can ask him anything HERE</a>.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">But lets get into Plasma Next again</span></b> - what does the future hold? Remember when we talked about "bit-by-bit" implementation? Somewhere like 10 Monday Reports ago? Yeah this is when we talk some more about it. For the next version of Plasma we will keep some of the most experimental things as "Opt-In" instead of "Opt-Out". Essentially the issue is as follows: Aurorae is not a viable option to ship for many good technical reasons (which may be answered in full by Martin Grässlin in the Ask-a-dev thread of the future) so we will, for the time being ship with the Oxygen windec theme (please not the difference between Widget and Windec). So essentially the first version this June will ship with mostly Oxygen and then change over time as things get finished up.<br />
<br />
So how will that work? Well hopefully we will ship with an aurorae theme and qtquick as well but let it be something you can pick during settings instead of something set by default - simply because it may be too heavy and clunky for now.<br />
Aside from all that there is work on the fonts, the Plasma theme, the porting and work on icon themes. This summer the first version shipped for testing will contain a large chunk of the work but not that which we don't feel confident shipping by default just yet.<br />
<br />
This is key: Opt-in is ALWAYS better than opt-out and I will defend this stand point to death. If we're not sure, we wont push it on you (tbh we don't push anything on you but ... yeah) :)<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Next time we will try to talk some more about real world examples, show some screen shots and essentially some more pretty pictures :)</i><br />
<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-57702435196757938122014-04-21T15:16:00.002-07:002014-04-21T15:16:50.699-07:00Monday Report #12 - Amazement!<i><span style="color: #3d85c6;">In which I can't contain the amazing efficiency of the design community in last weeks thread and blab on and on about that. Also a video AND some other details and tasty treats for you, magnificent reader. But lets start by swearing at my internet provider who've chosen this time to collapse.</span></i><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/04/21/CDProgressEnd.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/04/21/CDProgressEnd.png" height="239" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Andrew made a collage of these past seven days work.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">So "My internet is down". The "dog ate my homework" of this modern era</span></b> I suppose but it's true! My internet is down meaning this is all going through my cellphones internet connection. So I'll be brief<br />
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Lets start by saying I am double-glazed weapons-grade-amazed of the brilliant work done in the forums. Last week I posted Andrews amazing work on the widget theme and that he would open a thread on it in the forum asking for cooperation from the community. And what cooperation he got! A slew of people turned up (all that I would have named had my aforementioned internet not been down for counting) and made something stunning into something even more stellar.<br />
<br />
Heres a short video he shot (the colors is of course the phone - we're not going for a sepia theme just yet... or are we?). Just look it! Look I tell you what - you go to a design office and go "hey you know what a group of dedicated individuals working together in cooperation can do faster and better than you?" and then show them the widget theme and the activity the cooperation and just the wonder of it.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/pyvL5cy0uY4" width="480"></iframe>
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<br />
I will list you all and hope to get a few interviews in this week to come with a few of you. In the forum another thread exploded into a hive of activity when people started hacking on the Aurorae theme! Gartecho's version (one of several people who've edited, tweaked and worked on it I might add) consists of several different versions and is awesome in all possible ways <a href="http://kde-look.org/content/show.php?content=164722" target="_blank">and you can download it here!</a><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://kde-look.org/CONTENT/content-pre1/164722-1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://kde-look.org/CONTENT/content-pre1/164722-1.png" height="118" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gartecho's Auroare Theme.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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(expect this post to be greatly revised tomorrow morning when, the gods willing, the internet is back completely)<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">This leads me to three different things I want to ask for help with!</span></b> First off I want to kick off a Wallpaper Thread properly. Get as many people as possible to join in and start suggesting wallpapers. Now you don't even have to make a new one, just post things you'd LIKE in a wallpaper. You can write and simply say what it is you enjoy, what wallpaper you have and why you have it!<br />
<br />
Second I've started looking into sound effects for things.... Now I know, you don't have to say it: a majority of us turn them off directly. Now I'm not saying the current ones are bad - just that I want to simplify them, mute them a bit, make them part of the background and have a boot jingle that isn't so much a jingle. Something with less than three tone shifts in it.<br />
The second I have an internet connection I will post them here!<br />
<br />
Thirdly I think it's time to start looking again at the massive thing that is Icon themes - now Uri Herrera (Of Nitrux and Qtbox fame - you should check out his work) is working on the icon theme but to be able to devote enough time he need help on HIS icon theme and he is looking for a skilled icon designer who can follow the design guides for the Flattr theme and help him out.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">And finally before my phone bill reaches four figure sums</span></b> - I want to start planning for the second stage of the VDG. When it moves from designers working silently with a community around it into a group of Community Organizers with a passion for design, open source and cooperation who help create open, inclusive design together with everyone!<br />
This is for me the holy grail of this massive project of mine - to turn design completely into a community effort with a minimum of a hierarchies, a maximum of inclusiveness and a whole lot of cool design work for all! <br />
<br />
So these comming weeks will be strange, fun and exhausting as the hunt is on to set up community organizers who want to handle one section of design work together with the community.<br />
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Join in at the VDG forums!<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>And now I will go to bed swearing at internet providers and why I ate all that chocolate cake earlier today. </i>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-34653575011150375872014-04-14T23:13:00.001-07:002014-04-15T00:44:54.619-07:00Recap post To Dantix@reddit (+all): Wth is Community Design anyway?<i><span style="color: #3d85c6;">In which I write my first "recap" post about what's been set and what's been talked about and how things work. Just a little how-to for everyone who just joined us! This time it's about Community Design and why it matters so much.</span></i><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://parentables.howstuffworks.com/media/images/promos/2011/12/sharing-toys.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://parentables.howstuffworks.com/media/images/promos/2011/12/sharing-toys.png" height="179" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo Jencu "Sharing Toys" CC-SA</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">I've been meaning to write this post for some time</span></b> - a sort of recap for people who just joined us in what's going on.<br />
Dantix, a reddit poster was a tad miffed that the editable combobox was the wrong size for it's scroll-down arrow. I'm not trying to call the dude out, I'm sure he (or she) is a brilliant person and didn't mean anything mean, it was just a comment and an apt one so no harm no foul!<br />
<br />
But it told me that I need to talk more about this Community Design thing.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
<br />
There are three points I really want to take up:<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">1) Everything shown will be shown from scratch. Nothing hidden.</span></b><br />
Now from a marketing perspective that sucks. Lets be honest - we all like "the big reveal" where some designer in a turtleneck pulls back to curtains and go "tadaaa!". We wont do it like that. You will see it when it's just a mass of scribbles all the way to the finished product.<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Why is it like that?</span> </b>Because that way everyone can see the process. It gets demystified and something more accessible and open to all. It shows everyone the trick behind it. Design have become a catch-all for "don't bother me, you wouldn't understand" and I don't think thats a healthy attitude for Open Source to adopt. <br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">2) You are expected to join in if you want to. As long as you play nice the toys are for everyone.</span></b><br />
This is the big one. Yeah yeah you've heard it before. But its true. No matter how little of an "eye for design" you have, you have it. Comment, post mockups and try to see the cool things people do and spin off that.<br />
I can't promise that you're work will end up being the official theme for Plasma Next - but I can promise that you will influence it. We actually DO listen to comments. To cool ideas especially.<br />
And that's the bit to remember - its always better to contribute than to comment especially if you're comment is "I don't like that". We have some rules and they are essentially: If you post criticism, what it is you don't like, why you don't like, how it could be fixed and propose a fix it's a gold star comment. If you criticize, specify what it is you don't like and how it could be fixed. Thats a silver star comment. If you criticize and specify what it is you don't like ... thats bronze. As long as you do it in a nice and cooperative way it's ok to post. If you can't say exactly what it is you don't like about something AND can't be nice about it - don't post.<br />
If you have a cool idea on the other hand. Post. Thats the only rule for contributions.<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Why is it like this?</span></b> Because we want to foster a friendly attitude. Design IS communication and communication is hingent on a community. By letting everyone feel like they can contribute with mockups and cool ideas - we get more cool ideas. By playing with the art or design school rules of criticism we make certain that the other nasty and sadly common thing in design is minimized - the nonsense put-downs to make yourself seem "better" or the simple "you suck" comments that does nothing at all for design work. <br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">3) This is a massive social experiment.</span></b><br />
Yeah. It is. It's the tricky bit in what I do. On the one hand the goal is to create a stunning visual design for Plasma Next, on the other the plan is to create a community of designers and make design a "thing" within Plasma and KDE and Open Source in general.<br />
I want to change the way we look at people and stop dividing them into experts and "everyone else". I want to tear down those barriers and makes us all feel included, like we're a part (like I felt on the first sprint I was at). I want to change the way we handle design and this work is a test for that.<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Why is it like that? </span></b>Because I am old enough to know that failing is only really good when you fail miserably (that's when you learn things) and that sometimes you got to aim for the moon and skip the tree tops.<br />
When I got into this I talked to some of the other designers who had worked on KDE projects and many of them where more or less burned out. They had worked themselves to the bone and then crashed due to it. I didn't feel like being another one AND I wanted to fix the issue permanently. So I went for the higher goal of it aware that it would mean more work for me personally and a higher risk of failing.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Not only so that we all started talking about design</span></b> more constructively. Not just so everyone felt they could comment and be a part. Not only that there where hundreds of designers where yesterday there where one or two. Not only that.<br />
<br />
But so that in the future there would be a model a system in which design would be created without the need for a petty expert-dictator who's presence was ever needed for the work to go forward. Where the load was shared by all. Where the work was more play than backbraking labour.<br />
<br />
Maybe it will succeed, maybe it will fail - but if it does fail I think we can all agree that it will be a majestic catastrophe of a failure ;)<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Next time I'll talk about the Design Vision (it won't be boring promise) what it is, how we intend to stick to it and where we are now in terms of design guidelines.</i>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-88657253011283253292014-04-14T11:11:00.002-07:002014-04-14T13:08:20.453-07:00Monday Report #11 - Go time!<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><i>In which we talk about widget theme, community participation, ask for help, show off work by two handsome devs and mention some future promo work to come!</i></span><br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><br /></span></b>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://wac.3e65.edgecastcdn.net/803E65/sydney/_snacks/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/retro-futurism-computer-.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://wac.3e65.edgecastcdn.net/803E65/sydney/_snacks/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/retro-futurism-computer-.jpg" height="245" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">KDE VDG group member, hard at work!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">This time I will focus primarily on the widget theme.</span></b> Now as some of you may now there is a "quiet area" where we keep some of the work that either needs to be secret or where there are some issue or you want to test things or you need to work on it in quiet in a small group.<br />
<br />
This isn't the end plan - the idea is that in the end everything except sensitive things (where perhaps the dev has asked us not to tell others about it yet) will be done in the open. Now is the time to try that out for reals!<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Andrew has been hard at work </span></b>with the widget theme - now unlike before it doesn't demand that you know C++ just that you can handle QML. Now what does that crazy abbreviation mean? Well, QML is "Qt Meta Language" and it's the way we can among other things style Qt apps or widgets.<br />
It is comparatively simple to use and learn. I say comparatively because I'm trying to learn it as we speak and I would be lying if I said it was a dance on roses BUT it's way simpler than any other method for styling AND it offers a ton of features and possibilities.<br />
Andrew is well under way with it and the current iteration - as well as a sneak peak at the window theme - can be seen here:<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/04/14/sample1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/04/14/sample1.png" height="320" width="233" /></a></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/04/14/sample2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/04/14/sample2.png" height="205" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">With a sneak peak at window dialogues too.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br />
But he needs the communities help refining it! <a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=120628" target="_blank">In his post in the forum</a> is a short recap of the issue and some instructions as well as an invitation to EVERYONE no matter what skill level (or indeed if the suggestions are done in words or mockups or QML) to participate. I can only suggest that you do! The more we are, the better it will become!<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Aside from that some rather fascinating possibilities have opened up.</span></b> Alex Fiestas and Vishesh Handa, two of what I prefer to call "KDE's finest" <a href="https://plus.google.com/108785988818843470940/posts/W92ZDrSjFFu" target="_blank">have started working on a new Video Player.</a><br />
Now many might think that this is a waste of time as there already are video players out there - then let me let you in on a little secret. Inside this thick skull of mine is a dream of crafting applications made for desktop usage. Where we take a sincere look at whats needed, how it can best be presented, how it should work and flow - without feeling stuck in the hellish "where did my X/Y/Z feature go in X/Y/Z software?" problem. When you remodel something existing you run the risk of ruining it. It's a simple fact - it also ties you down design wise because we're nice people (trust me, designers are not only "nice" we are also "people") and to storm in and tell someone who doesn't want to change their application that you're there to do just that isn't a great experience.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Also this week hopefully a small promo video will be cut together</span></b> for one detail or two of Plasma Next. Nothing long or fancy, no wonderful great secrets revealed BUT something to set the tone.<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>So this was perhaps not the longest monday report - but it was hopefully pleasant to read and informative! Until next time! (Oh and remember my promise "A year and a day for KDE"? 20% of the time has now passed...</i><br />
<i>(EDIT: I forgot to add the second image from Andrews post, sry fixed now)</i>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-28540480421736667042014-04-07T06:45:00.002-07:002014-04-07T06:45:48.233-07:00Monday Report #10<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<i><span style="color: #3d85c6;">In which we mention the recent Alpha, gush about Community Design its problems and gains. Talk about whats coming for Plasma Next AND hand out freebee's - also we confess to have done something bad and say "sorry". </span></i></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBk7udIRSKwhMvrvonJ9K-18SP2q3469PMi7sKtHUklms3zAaN4HEMKWorew2fq4ANeYr47X6vur9ymE776MymtUCNpFK6sbD-qBB_5mQCNSv08E6EbGIJyNaotPSOwvQeSe4JLEC9Bm0/s1600/969392_10151786002121279_1485491751_n+(1).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBk7udIRSKwhMvrvonJ9K-18SP2q3469PMi7sKtHUklms3zAaN4HEMKWorew2fq4ANeYr47X6vur9ymE776MymtUCNpFK6sbD-qBB_5mQCNSv08E6EbGIJyNaotPSOwvQeSe4JLEC9Bm0/s1600/969392_10151786002121279_1485491751_n+(1).jpg" height="320" width="309" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Hello, this is the Future. I just called to say we're coming."</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Ok so first off the Alpha is out</span></b> <a href="http://dot.kde.org/2014/04/02/kde-releases-alpha-version-next-gen-plasma-workspace" target="_blank">as I'm sure most of you have seen</a>. This means that time is running up and this summer will definitely be the baptism of fire for this "Community Design" thing we got going.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">This whole process has been mostly pain-free up until now</span></b> so I would like to take a moment to get you all in on the trials to come.<br />
<br />
The first issue is marketing. Community Design, when everything happens in the open, is not as easily marketed as Closed Design. There is no "Big Reveal" with a ton of features and looks you've never seen before because you've seen the process from scratch. Sure there are some secret projects, but they are moving towards an open situation as we speak.<br />
Second is name recognition: we don't have massively famous designers that we can refer to - we have community members all as relevant as anyone else on the project.<br />
Third, when there isn't a dedicated team progress can be jumpy. It can be at a standstill at times and it can move at the speed of light at others. It all depends on how much community members wish to concentrate on any one issue.<br />
<br />
Now at one point EVERYTHING will be handled by the community with Community Organizers handling different sections and a Project Lead to pick up eventual slack. There will be a list or a roster where you sign up who's doing what without being binding (meaning if you suddenly don't have time there should never be any shame in saying "You know I can't do it now sorry") - until then this half-and-half will do.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">So why do it? Because of many good reasons.</span></b> Firstly my predecessor worked himself to the bone for the design for the last version of Plasma. Nuno Pinheiro made Plasma's (KDE 4's) design through the ample use of blood, sweat and tears and that work was almost too much for him (the fact that he did it amazes me. I would have gone around and slapped Plasma Devs at the half-way point)<br />
We need to spread the burden around.<br />
<br />
Second Open Source works magic - but design in Open Source is still closed. Why have a handful of experts when you can have hundreds of designers who can do it in cooperation and passion. Why hold yourself back?<br />
Thirdly if there is anything my art-history studies teaches me is that art, design and all has often been tied in with an elite. With that it becomes stagnant until it is broken free and opened to a larger community. Design has to be done something common - something we are all allowed to do.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">But what about Plasma Next? Well let me tell you! </span></b>We're trying to figure out how to get a new widget theme into the next version of Plasma (widget themes are a PITA) and that's puttering along. The Plasma Theme is all on and will be compliant with the color theme chosen. Icons are puttering along and will hopefully be up somewhere around summer. Hopefully widgets and window decos will come in time for the next version of Plasma.<br />
<br />
There is also two new cursor themes! It's made by the VDG Community members, Kver's Bridge (and Snowbridge) Cursor and Sir_Herrbatka's Perspective. Both are hoped to be included in Plasma Next as they follow two different goals for the design (one using Oxygen as starting point and one going for clarity).<br />
This is also another moment to talk about the awesomeness of Community Design! LegnaVI and Leroux helped out with both, Flying Sheep helped Kver with Bugfixing and the whole process was one of amazing cooperation and support. I can only be impressed as hell at everyones (there where more) work!<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://kver.ca/bridgeCursor/bridge-cursor-set.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://kver.ca/bridgeCursor/bridge-cursor-set.png" height="235" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bridge</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/04/04/kursory.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://wstaw.org/m/2014/04/04/kursory.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Perspective</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
You can <a href="http://kver.ca/bridgeCursor/bridge.tar.gz" target="_blank">download Bridge here</a> and <a href="http://kde-look.org/content/show.php/Perspective?content=164507" target="_blank">Perspective from KDE look here</a>!<br />
Also this is my moment to say sorry for screwing up the landing in the thread when I couldn't find the Perspective image AND failed to see that Andrew was supposed to do the presentation... Sorry guys and especially Sir_Herrbatka who has all right to feel a bit angry at me. Wont happen again.<a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=119857" target="_blank"> You can read their awesomeness and my bumbling mistake here!</a><br />
<br />
Oh but there is more! Andrew has started work on new logout dialogues and David (one of the Plasma Dev's) have started working on it.... iiiih! "Teh Exitez!" as the kids say these days (darn kids)!<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0ElXQK6V1fAdJnEL0jUEOB3K0L4Kg9tm7Jr7ufDW-qWFyDwrxhyphenhyphen4bKv11xmz5ZYrX44Raiv76mSh00vgQtbz-S2Re_js_NyKxMIG6N8gymcXyLA9DVYFcEv8SCR1LT-0uGYqbs_fRn6U/s1600/sett.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0ElXQK6V1fAdJnEL0jUEOB3K0L4Kg9tm7Jr7ufDW-qWFyDwrxhyphenhyphen4bKv11xmz5ZYrX44Raiv76mSh00vgQtbz-S2Re_js_NyKxMIG6N8gymcXyLA9DVYFcEv8SCR1LT-0uGYqbs_fRn6U/s1600/sett.png" height="240" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Yes it is awesome & yes it will be brilliant!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Further a new thread for wallpapers has opened up (because we need to look at more wallpapers and <a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=120497" target="_blank">I can only urge everyone to join in</a> AND we're gonna start working on a new Splash screen!<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Good gods there is more though!</span></b> I suggest checking in <a href="http://soliverez.com.ar/home/2014/04/working-on-new-artwork-for-kmymoney/" target="_blank">Kmymoney and their blogpost </a>about the recent design work gone into their application and all done on the VDG forum! There is simply too much to write up at this point! :D<br />
<div>
<i><br /></i></div>
<div>
<i>Ooooooh the future is so bright I am getting third degree burns! Talk later gotta work now!</i></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-7622320687320718622014-04-02T14:24:00.002-07:002014-04-02T14:24:43.302-07:00A Monday Report #9 of sorts... <i><span style="color: #3d85c6;">In which we dedicate this entire post to describe an idea that is moving forward... Also mention Italy AND then why "Monday" is just a mirage :)</span></i><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/US_Navy_070208-N-6936D-030_Enginemen_2nd_Class_John_Fritges_monitors_equipment_from_Damage_Control_Central_aboard_the_rescue_and_salvage_ship_USS_Safeguard_(ASR-50)_during_damage_control_training.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/US_Navy_070208-N-6936D-030_Enginemen_2nd_Class_John_Fritges_monitors_equipment_from_Damage_Control_Central_aboard_the_rescue_and_salvage_ship_USS_Safeguard_(ASR-50)_during_damage_control_training.jpg" height="214" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">"Spaceship Controls" Creative Common SA</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Yesterday Thomas Pfeiffer <a href="http://sessellift.wordpress.com/2014/04/01/freedom-maximized/" target="_blank">made an April Fools post</a></span></b><a href="http://sessellift.wordpress.com/2014/04/01/freedom-maximized/" target="_blank"> </a>based as a way to introduce a new idea for Plasma Next.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"<span style="background-color: white; color: #555555; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;">That’s why I came up with the idea of a “Choose Your Plasma Experience” dialog at the end of the installation process of distributions shipping Plasma:</span>"</blockquote>
<br />
Yes the post was a joke, we will not pretend that you can just switch into KDE 2 for funsies and I was quoted as if I talked like a Manowar lyric and no one noticed (which makes me think I should start doing that full time)... Anyway the post may have been a joke but the idea wasn't.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">See one of the majestic things with Plasma is it's flexibility</span></b> - one of the downsides is the current way to use this flexibility. I like to call it the rocketship-controls.<br />
<br />
Say that you rent a moped on a trip to Rome. You wanna swish through the streets screaming "Ciao!" at passers-by in the way of a 1950's Fellini film-revival. Once up on the moped you notice that the controls for it are in fact identical to those for the International Space Station. Passing by the Fontana-di-trevi you run down a group of Belgian tourists since to be able to turn you had to flip five switches and program the orbital angle into the mopeds steering system.<br />
This isn't empowering - this is choice made to cripple the user. While we don't have any plans on removing choices - we plan to make them accessible. The alternative: inaccessible choice is just as bad in practice as "no choice at all".<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Thomas post touched on this</span></b> and we thought we should do a work-in-progress reveal. We want to make it possible to edit your theme in one go. Not edit everything individually - but create a situation where you easily just click in a "Experience" (as these are called, encompassing not only visuals but layouts), hit apply and presto. Your desktop layout, the plasma theme, the widget theme, the icons and colors all change in one deft strike.<br />
<br />
When you first install your computer you will have a simplified version of this setting - <a href="http://sessellift.wordpress.com/2014/04/02/choose-your-own-experience-this-time-its-for-real" target="_blank">which Thomas explains on the Blog post he just posted</a>. But when up and running you will be able to change the appearance, layout, theme and concept easily. You like OSX? We can hook you up...<br />
But thats not all that we plan on doing - one of the things is a way to edit the theme. The point is as I stated not at all about REMOVING options but rather, making them accessible.<br />
So you go into the experience switcher - click an experience and then "Edit Theme". From there you can edit all the things you're used to edit individually. When you're done you save the theme to a new file and can decide on whether to export it or not.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Here are some doodles and sketches</span></b> on how we thought the System Settings "Experience" should look like and work - yes it's early and yes these are rough drafts (obviously since their on paper) but things are moving forward and soon mockups and then screenshots...<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9dHKeQHbNX1m7k4BgxWxxu_ZJy9ZQ4_5Pzf0Qpyko1qogMkYRl9dlbfvN-pKDx1LBsDKCXi6NhgI_2O-pKpyCUbXVf-N0n-Exr-LwV44839NlD1XxQ3tONzs6naRluVKMuS1jiHCbdsA/s1600/2014-04-02+12.28.17.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9dHKeQHbNX1m7k4BgxWxxu_ZJy9ZQ4_5Pzf0Qpyko1qogMkYRl9dlbfvN-pKDx1LBsDKCXi6NhgI_2O-pKpyCUbXVf-N0n-Exr-LwV44839NlD1XxQ3tONzs6naRluVKMuS1jiHCbdsA/s1600/2014-04-02+12.28.17.jpg" height="239" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Yes this is actually I how I think out application and design things.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc3GdD44zETWdLgO2V8ZviF4fCVrfhXdhfnNoGB-_QZD6xnOmqpOMpbOgsEbuD_qI6tSBGXMhOG6TzFYknku-TTa8SVt2RhHDuGvC2UwOvsTiI80TCWub9cN2xNPcW4HPvFCIoDCyDIkU/s1600/2014-04-02+12.15.45.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc3GdD44zETWdLgO2V8ZviF4fCVrfhXdhfnNoGB-_QZD6xnOmqpOMpbOgsEbuD_qI6tSBGXMhOG6TzFYknku-TTa8SVt2RhHDuGvC2UwOvsTiI80TCWub9cN2xNPcW4HPvFCIoDCyDIkU/s1600/2014-04-02+12.15.45.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">You crazy kids and your computers! I still use a pen and paper!</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
Anyway these are for the System Settings module "Experience" - <a href="http://sessellift.wordpress.com/2014/04/02/choose-your-own-experience-this-time-its-for-real" target="_blank">Thomas has more on the work on the Post-installation one on his blog as well as more detail</a>s :)<br />
<br />
Aside from all that things are moving forward - right now everyone is off doing their own thing though which is odd so it's eerily silent. Next "Monday Report" (which will actually come on a monday will have more news.<br />
<br />
<i>See you then</i><br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-61868882092688954722014-04-01T01:18:00.003-07:002014-04-01T01:18:28.471-07:00Open Source I love you!<i><span style="color: #3d85c6;">In which we apologize for "monday" being a fluent term, promise that it is coming and essentially talk about Open Source instead - because we should.</span></i><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.omlyd.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/friedrich-wanderer-above-the-sea-of-fog-1200x10242.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://www.omlyd.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/friedrich-wanderer-above-the-sea-of-fog-1200x10242.jpg" height="273" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Caspar David Friedrich, Wanderer above the sea of fog, 1818 </span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">First of all - "Monday" - I know it's been a tad fickle </span></b>when it comes to those reports. This is has all to do with the massive amount of work being done and the work posted in the Public Forums. Going through it is a solid days work suddenly which is brilliant! It's also something that suddenly springs on you - much like the sudden burst of great weather we're having here in Sweden. So tomorrow a "monday" report is coming!<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Until then I want to take this short moment</span></b> to talk about the magic of Open Source. I recently spent some time trying to fish up local funds from City officials and politicians and found out the hard way how hard it is to describe what Open Source is.<br />
Not just technically but communally - the idea behind the method that is Open Source and why I left everything proprietary behind and switched to it when the design and illustration community is so thoroughly entrenched in proprietary software.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Ok so I spent the day cold-calling</span></b> (IE calling without having a prior contact) local politicians. The discussion went sort of like this:<br />
<br />
<i><b>Politician</b>: So you guys want venture capital to invest in your idea?</i><br />
<i><b>Me</b>: No, see since this is something that everyone will use we need the common, the state, the EU etc to help fund it.</i><br />
<i><b>Politician</b>: So you're offering this to us for free?</i><br />
<i><b>Me</b>: No, we need help funding it. We can't do a years work without paying people.</i><br />
<i><b>Politician</b>: So the company you work for want to sell it to the City?</i><br />
<i><b>Me</b>: No, we want to give it away when its done so everyone can use it for free.</i><br />
<i><b>Politician</b>: So you're giving it to us for free?</i><br />
<i><b>Me</b>: No we still need funding.</i><br />
<i><b>Politician</b>: So you want venture capital?</i><br />
<br />
Here I had to explain, again, why you can't sell Open Source software in the same way you can sell Proprietary software. Then I had to explain why something that would benefit everyone isn't exactly economically viable to invest in by a company or venture capitalist.<br />
After that I had to explain WHY I did something that I couldn't make any money off. Which got me thinking... Isn't this awesome? Isn't it great that my motivation clearly isn't about making money (aside for paying my bills) but doing something that I know will benefit a rather excluded group in Europe (if not across the globe)? Something that is common - a thing for all?<br />
<br />
But how could I explain it without going on into a marxist tangent? (Now, granted I am one, but it doesn't do to use that as an explanation for your actions)<br />
<br />
The end result was: because this is the future.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
<br />
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Yes we don't have as much cash as proprietary software.</span></b> Sure, we don't have the business contacts or perhaps even the market savvy.<br />
<br />
But the difference is, they are an oared ship trying to catch the wind - while we have full sails up, flowing with it. They can hire hundreds of dedicated developers - we are already thousands. They try to figure out how to create something you can sell - We look at whats needed and do that.<br />
<br />
We're not salesmen, we're creators. We're explorers, pioneers, inventors and artists.<br />
<br />
At this point one of the politicians asked: "So do you work for Microsoft or Apple?"<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
<i>Tomorrow the "Monday" report will be done and posted! There will be a run through of all the things we're getting done and it will be awesome. Stay tuned!</i><br />
<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-60600806390128715992014-03-26T12:20:00.002-07:002014-03-26T12:20:33.748-07:00"Monday" Report #8 - Homeward Bound Edition<i><span style="color: #3d85c6;">In which I explain why I'm two days late, go through the quickest community round-up ever, talk about the Plasma Next theme and brag about the documentation work being done!</span></i><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLvqkpuD8_NafrG_ZgrTV36KMk8oL5f8Lo_1EWdKhJVU_svtGoL_WDZVtU3xtubccmSoV6MwShZZ6O5xK4HDL6xwD5FZqT9UKCHWK1mOC0-JOFA08eVsxTht-OMuey4Cx1aohZzcTMhtQ/s1600/10152016_10152337320617806_372887281_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLvqkpuD8_NafrG_ZgrTV36KMk8oL5f8Lo_1EWdKhJVU_svtGoL_WDZVtU3xtubccmSoV6MwShZZ6O5xK4HDL6xwD5FZqT9UKCHWK1mOC0-JOFA08eVsxTht-OMuey4Cx1aohZzcTMhtQ/s1600/10152016_10152337320617806_372887281_n.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Me, three days without brushing my hair, playing Minecraft on the patio. You can't see it but about 400 meters outside the image to the right, there is a massive sandy beach. But on the other hand, there was a massive vein of iron to excavate so who cares? Also since this photo I've gotten a hair cut and trimmed the 'stasche a tad. Less trolldoll meets Pancho Villa.</span></td></tr>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">So this monday report is two days late, I know.</span></b> Yesterday was when I was leaving my vacation spot, a twelve hour process of moving things (including me) around the earth trying wildly not to go insane. Then I had the happy option of being able to hang-out with my husband without a mother and a mother-in-law in tow. I am now home and going through all the backlogs for the things I have to get done and the major thing to get done is the "monday" report.<br />
I kept up for one week during my vacation but then my inate laziness set in and I stopped working to stroll in the sun, play Minecraft with my brother, his wife and my husband and walking my mums dog. Sorry.<br />
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Plenty of things have been happening in the forums</span></b> where things like help with the Media Center is asked for, the Awesome Community Icon Theme is getting closer and closer to completion (Rock on David Wright!) and in general its getting to be too many threads for me to keep track on it (I am reading through them right now!). If you are a designer and you don't at least skim through them you should be ashamed of yourself. So much work by so many people. It's like an inverted Churchill quote.<br />
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">But the Plasma Next work keeps going onwards too</span></b>: a dark theme is slowly taking shape with the work of Marco Martin! And don't it look darn pretty!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjED9nxyJ7D0LTzshYw0nTvl36gYSL72FWX-acfyq_NNo-_mWKfD43amBzF2iasDbit-7h1HKg5i3hwDKv6p_W5ska7PPnzn5DZWJMIn6tnyS3ePymJkf2Fnh75eqYQEEwJbAl4QVIGIqA/s1600/plasma-desktopkE7036.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjED9nxyJ7D0LTzshYw0nTvl36gYSL72FWX-acfyq_NNo-_mWKfD43amBzF2iasDbit-7h1HKg5i3hwDKv6p_W5ska7PPnzn5DZWJMIn6tnyS3ePymJkf2Fnh75eqYQEEwJbAl4QVIGIqA/s1600/plasma-desktopkE7036.png" height="320" width="240" /></a></div>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">There is also some awesome work being done</span></b> on the <a href="http://techbase.kde.org/Projects/Usability/HIG#Presentation" target="_blank">Design Guidelines by Andrew Lake</a> and work is going on to merge them nicely with the HIG's to create a nice one-stop place for all your guideline needs.<br />
Andrew has also provided everyone with a <a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=120225" target="_blank">GUI mockup toolkit</a> which will be fun to play with. It's SVG's so you'll have to wait for PNG versions of them but it will come in the future (as you can understand I plan on doing just that but it will have to wait until everything else gets done first :))<br />
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<i>So check those out, play with them and get things cracking!</i>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-54984794621934276802014-03-17T02:33:00.001-07:002014-03-17T02:33:51.606-07:00Monday Report #7 - beach edition<div>
<i><span style="color: #3d85c6;">In which I am bragging about being in the sun, talk about community design, post some Plasma Next design and then rush out to the beach so as to not be divorced by my husband who really wish I would sit less at the computer.</span></i><br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjz03D56iQEvhR6pj1NtBm1V4z9NvTNFlhA465tH2aZJ0_0hNslcdlpc-rugUZesKOUnaHsvoCKrKN9FzBCLelwJTK_WJaVPRXx9D0iQ1lrJvszIkxBA9OXVPfPapDPbEG-Lkb5BFnC_ZU/s1600/clock_desktop.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjz03D56iQEvhR6pj1NtBm1V4z9NvTNFlhA465tH2aZJ0_0hNslcdlpc-rugUZesKOUnaHsvoCKrKN9FzBCLelwJTK_WJaVPRXx9D0iQ1lrJvszIkxBA9OXVPfPapDPbEG-Lkb5BFnC_ZU/s1600/clock_desktop.png" height="266" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Andrew Lakes Beautiful new clock desing! Check the slogan!</span></td></tr>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>I would firstly want to say that I am on vacation in the sun</b></span> so everything written will be written while looking forlornly at the ever present sandy beach. So do not expect a massive amount of information :)<br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><b>First of all Community News:</b></span> there is simply too much going on. Me and Thomas Pfeiffer from the HIG group recently mentioned this in discussion that the success of the VDG public forum means that it's almost impossible to keep up with all the threads. Ideas are being posted, talked about and mock-up'ed at such speed that trying to keep a presence in all threads is tricky at best. </div>
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Which is as should be! The boys and girls in the forums is for me such a massive inspiration that I tend to just lurk and read and you guys will be referred to whenever someone says that Community Design is impossible!</div>
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Now the issue is getting the ideas to the right dev group in the best way possible which is something to think about, what is the preferred way of making certain the right dev see the right ideas?</div>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">In the VDG group </span></b>Uri Herrera (the Nitrux guy) is posting more and more icons for the next Icon theme and among them symbolic icons for the folder-tree - a personal dream for me (the current "same folder icon as always but tiny" has been a pet peeve of mine).<br />
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<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4eyhyphenhyphenlEjfzrfR0FqXykDhL2YbUVMhwycGxKBN4mdq6rBbSHw5spaZpo6Yk0bS-2URQZpvHhtJsFiSOEA5GUzLFvliLdFWgaEXbH_NAsogmh5TwpDrJSs1p_VOZjeq1jrLgzE0fs6VcKo/s1600/icons.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4eyhyphenhyphenlEjfzrfR0FqXykDhL2YbUVMhwycGxKBN4mdq6rBbSHw5spaZpo6Yk0bS-2URQZpvHhtJsFiSOEA5GUzLFvliLdFWgaEXbH_NAsogmh5TwpDrJSs1p_VOZjeq1jrLgzE0fs6VcKo/s1600/icons.png" height="320" width="290" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Uri's icon work</span></td></tr>
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David Brandl has started work on the logos of projects - trying to combine the logos of Plasma Next and Frameworks 5 and I can only say that the sketches and the work done there are awesome.<br />
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Andrew "The Design Machine" Lake has kept trundling onwards like the creative rocket that he is - he has also posted mockup kits and edits to the Plasma Current theme - the Next theme almost completely done! (the clock at the top is just one example).<br />
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Fabian Bornschein has almost finished the system tray icons, meaning that beyond a dark theme (which is a matter of reversing colors from the color theme) the work for Plasma Next theme is as good as done!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgT2mTPuqBu8M0hnSr4kRAWWIopJLvv5R9wJtJ75klSqCVVZGM-50VmCUwbR-TPU8fp9ymLJ4uqmQ8KVwt06YpdEiLFjwU-kFKA_tBM7IlggR441b-XLs54rtNvEyMHuC1xqlZ0xrA6424/s1600/abislHi.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgT2mTPuqBu8M0hnSr4kRAWWIopJLvv5R9wJtJ75klSqCVVZGM-50VmCUwbR-TPU8fp9ymLJ4uqmQ8KVwt06YpdEiLFjwU-kFKA_tBM7IlggR441b-XLs54rtNvEyMHuC1xqlZ0xrA6424/s1600/abislHi.png" /></a></div>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Finally it's that glorious bit </span></b>- where the borders of VDG and KDE community blur - the work being done on the new cursor theme in the forums as well as the Awesome Community Icon Theme is marching on at the speed of light. I will hopefully get an interview this week with all the people involved in those things and will give that specific subject the time it deserves then!<br />
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<i>Now I gotta go, my husband is standing looking at me with the "oh are you done soon?" look and we're heading for an early swim. </i><br />
<i>Gotta run!</i></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com43tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6072476323576899796.post-48853447639667287142014-03-10T14:41:00.002-07:002014-03-10T14:41:45.593-07:00Monday Report #6<i><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Where in we talk more about the value of community design, talk about creating resources for developers, why it's cool checking out other designers work, show some details from the coming Plasma Theme (and a sneaky special gift to our fine readers ;) ) and then end with a short comment on politics.</span></i><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://notmart.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/sneakhidpi.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://notmart.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/sneakhidpi.png" height="219" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From Marco Martins blog and Desktop. Plasma Next.</td></tr>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">What a week, what a week... </span></b>One of my favorite things is going in to the VDG forums at the KDE-forum and read and reply to posts. There are too many awesome things to talk about going on and ALL IN THE OPEN. Some would call it "design by committee" I call it "social design work"!<br />
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">First off the Awesome Community Icon's</span></b> need a mention. The idea came from a while back when a proposed set of monochrome icons to be used in applications and widgets based of the Awesome Font was talked about. It never really got further than that but <a href="http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=285&t=120026" target="_blank">now that work has started up again in earnest</a>. The idea being to make a simple, lean and above all symbolic icon language to be used in Open Source projects and KDE projects especially. By being monochrome, it can also use the coming effect of changing to the color of the chosen text color in the color theme.<br />
Right now a group of community members (me included) are sifting through the available icons and sorting them into the correct places, community member Davidwright will then work it into a git-thing and hopefully a member of the VDG will sort out a project page with all icons accessible and nice so anyone can use them. Hopefully we will also be able to describe all icon sets and what the name of the icon mean so further icon design work is made simpler.<br />
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We're also hoping to include monochrome versions of LegnaVI's Krita icons to create some kind of unification in this project, trying to make all KDE apps to use the same iconset.<br />
If you feel like helping out KDE, join in the fun and help out - the beginning of the thread has links to the Google Spreadsheet we're using for work and the Awesome Font page we're using as base for all icons. Do it!<br />
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Then Leroux also finished his network icons</span></b> that I posted about earlier and I suggest anyone who feels a passion for icons and themeing should check them out and perhaps use them in a theme (contact him so you guys can collaborate). Hopefully we will be able to use part of them in the AKI (yes "Awesome Kommunity Icons").<br />
A wild debated has started about a new form of sidebar in the forums - a plethora of mockups and design idea's are being hammered out and I for one is right now lurking in the thread reading every little idea and notion with interest.<br />
(Future Plasma Design leak: part of the design ideas are being used in the sketches for the next Plasma Kickoff Launcher... don't tell anyone, iiih exciting)<br />
The Kmymoney project is also shaping up nicely - due to the brililant work of community member lucashappy, they now have a new application icon and thoughts are being worked on working the AKI icons into a future design for them.<br />
Now there is also a large debate going on System Settings and the future of them in the forums. For now it will be a slow and bit-by-bit thing but when it takes off a large chunk of the work is done so far so if you want to get in on that, join the debate!<br />
The System Settings also had a split today in how we handle Desktop Effects. Due to technical reasons it was split into Compositing and [Desktop Effects]. One being more technical and "please don't play too much with this" and the other the same collection of effects we as KDE and Plasma users have come to love and adore. That means naming should be talked about... and it is! In the forums!<br />
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Now all this is to say: if you have a problem with something, you have an idea how to solve it - we have a massive community, together we can fix things design-wise, we can come up with new ideas and amazing concepts in an air of togetherness, kindness and cooperation. So don't just say that you don't like something somewhere on a blog, write a proper suggestion for a solution (without smacktalking anyone, respect is key) in the forums instead. Join in the fun!<br />
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">Also this week I have been installing different kinds of desktop environments</span></b> to check them out and see how they solved their issues. The plan was to post that report yesterday (along with an illustration tutorial) but things got in the way so it'll be coming next week.<br />
Safe to say, don't expect any "Unity/Gnome/Openbox/whatever sucks!" texts from me. I have nothing but admiration and respect for the work done by ALL Open Source and Linux designers. All. Even if I use Plasma by choice it doesn't mean I have to hate on them instead of seeing how they did different. So this is my shoutout to the designers of those desktop environments: "Great work boys and girls, you're an inspiration! <3"<br />
Also I will start writing a column in Full Circle Magazine about Open Source and Design which will have its basis in my experiences with the KDE Community and the design work there. I think the first short one will be in the next issue.<br />
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://notmart.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/sneak.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://notmart.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/sneak.png" height="162" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From Marco Martins blog and desktop</td></tr>
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">But what about Plasma Next? </span></b>Well the work is ticking on. The first screenshots from Plasma Next using our light theme are out on Marco Martins blog and everything is being worked on and tested right now to hopefully get into the Alpha of Plasma Next. We've soon to begin the work on a dark theme which hopefully will roll out the doors any second.<br />
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As a matter of fact... consider this a rare treat: We've bundled the preview we have that you can use in Plasma Current, it won't look exactly the same and it is massively a WORK IN PROGRESS - but we've added a color theme, an Aurorae theme for the window decoration and a Qtcurve theme for the widget - also a quick fix to make Chrome or Chromium look nice. So don't say we never did anything for you ;)<br />
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Now remember, this is massively a work in progress and hardly a final - the clock and logout and other bits need refining (and some lines etc). If you're on Plasma Next then it might be a bit more correct with the correct blurring effect on the panels - but anyway, enough talk <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B36nDbIa2M5Eek5yTHVhaW5LSEU/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">you can download a tar of it here!</a> Now it will say "no preview" but just press download and everything is ticketyboo.<br />
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All this is due to the massive work undertaken by Andrew Lake of the VDG - Andrew, what would we do without you?<br />
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<b><span style="color: #3d85c6;">...</span></b></div>
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<b style="color: #3d85c6;">Politics.</b> Concerning the recent events in Malmö I just want to add a short #kämpashowan and that during the recent surge of right wing extremist violence and politics in Europe it is important to remember Edmund Burkes words: "the only thing necessary for the triumph for evil is for good men to do nothing", that is all for now and probably the last I will talk about politics in this blog.<br />
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<i>Next week we will have some icon work to look at, some refinements to check out with the theme (maybe another sneak preview to our dedicated readers, hmm?) until then, take care!</i>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com10