Christoph,

Thanks for prodding again on this matter.  I've been extremely busy.

On Tue, Jul 22, 2008 at 05:05:03PM +0200, Christoph Haas wrote:
> Dear list...
> 
> the matter has been discussed at least twice already. Roberto C. Sanchez 
> brought the matter back up in January 2008. The response was very positive 
> but nobody wanted to implement that. Several Debian end users in my circle 
> would surely be happy about having screenshots available for GUI 
> applications to get a quick impression of how different GUI programs 
> look/feel like without tediously installing, trying and deinstalling them. 
> The "Description:" doesn't really give a good mental picture and different 
> maintainers choose different wordings there which makes applications hard 
> to compare by just reading the text.
> 
> So I'd like to get things moving. I assume we had to do this:
> 
> - Propose a new optional debian/control field "X-Screenshot:" pointing to
>   an URL serving an image file (PNG, JPG)
>   [debian-devel-announce as soon as we are ready?]

I agree with other comments that this is not necessary.  If the service
is centralized (like the screenshots.d.n that you suggest below) then
looking for non-existent screenshots should simply indicate that no such
screenshot exists.

> - Create a new tree on hg.debian.org to host screenshots.

I'm not sure about this.  But I personally am not a fan of hg.  I think
some sort of webservice that accepts signed uploads would be better.

> - Alternatively provide a web service that hosts screenshots so that
>   packages can point to it (e.g. http://screenshots.debian.net/PACKAGE).
>   The service should also scale down the pictures to a reasonable
>   size suitable for thumbnail display (max 150x150).
>   (I can program that if needed. The only problem is probably
>   authenticating the maintainer. Maybe a simple email interface
>   checking PGP signatures will do. Needs further brainstorming.)

Yes, I like this better.

> - Change packages.debian.org to show the thumbnail from the
>   package's control file. I will work on a patch if desired.

I don't think that this needs to reference the control file.  Simply
checking the web service should be sufficient.

> - Add this feature to package managers (synaptic, kpackage, ...).
>   I don't know enough about GUI programming yet that I could possibly
>   help here.
> 
> Actually that doesn't sound too hard. And it would be a neat little 
> service. Let me know what you think and please step forward if you are 
> already working on something like that.
> 
> This time we will really do it. :)
> 
I know I have really wanted to get started on this, but keep lacking the
time.  I feel like we can probably get something substantial started
this time.  Perhaps a meeting on IRC would be a good idea.  Maybe on a
Saturday to get maximum participation?

Regards,

-Roberto

-- 
Roberto C. Sánchez
http://people.connexer.com/~roberto
http://www.connexer.com

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