[plasma-workspace-wallpapers] Improve wallpaper selection
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Authored by filipf on Jan 7 2019, 9:59 PM.

Details

Summary

This patch improves the plasma-workspace-wallpapers package by offering cleaner, more modern photographic wallpapers. It also reintroduces the legacy wallpaper Elarun.

Closes T10220

Depends on D26720

Test Plan

Before:

After:

Diff Detail

Repository
R131 Plasma Wallpapers
Branch
new-wallpapers (branched from master)
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Unit
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Build Status
Buildable 6789
Build 6807: arc lint + arc unit
filipf created this revision.Jan 7 2019, 9:59 PM
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filipf requested review of this revision.Jan 7 2019, 9:59 PM
rooty added a subscriber: rooty.Jan 7 2019, 10:17 PM

Still not sure if we should have also included the grassland

Lovely. Good call including all size and aspect ratio variants for now in case we don't opt to go with D18005: Include only the largest size for each wallpaper.

Dare I ask how big all of this on disk? You can find out with du -ch /usr/share/wallpapers/ | grep total

My only worry is that if the size is too huge, distros won't want to ship it by default and the whole exercise will have been fairly pointless. :(

filipf added a comment.Jan 8 2019, 1:47 AM

Ah we only ship the biggest size for our additions now. It's the only thing that makes sense for this package IMO, among other things distros will really think twice about shipping it if it's big, like you said.

Heck, if someone asked me if they could put 100-200 MiB of wallpapers on my disk I'd probably make a sour face!

Without D18005 size is at 138 MiB. You remove all the extra sizes for the added Plasma wallpapers and it drops to about 70 MiB.

filipf added a comment.Jan 8 2019, 2:08 AM

Here's some raw numbers listed:

  • plasma-workspace-wallpapers prior to D17780: about 42 MB
  • plasma-workspace-wallpapers after D17780: about 152 MB
  • plasma-workspace-wallpapers after this diff: about 138 MB
  • plasma-workspace-wallpapers after this diff + D18005: about 70 MB

Main competitors' package sizes:

  • Deepin: 26 MB (main) + 16 MB (community) + 8 MB (private) = 50 MB
  • GNOME: 31 MB
  • Elementary: 35 MB

All three ship only the largest wallpaper size.

mart added a subscriber: mart.Jan 8 2019, 9:34 AM

+100
(and we should push more on distros to have this installed by default, they often don't to save space on the iso :/

Thanks :)

Trying to have more distros include the package is the plan.

+ I have some good news, by scaling down the really big wallpapers added here to 5K we save 10 MiB. @rooty, that okay?

rooty added a comment.EditedJan 8 2019, 12:36 PM

wow scrolling down took a while haha
sure fine by me, crop em (except for Lake Bled? might be useful in ultra wide screen instances)

filipf updated this revision to Diff 48962.Jan 8 2019, 1:35 PM

Scale oversized wallpapers to 5K; crop the NASA wallpaper in order to remove a visual annoyance

filipf added a comment.EditedJan 8 2019, 1:45 PM

Note: scaling Almond Blossom and Two Labrador Retriever Puppies made no sense, these pics have great compression & turned out bigger when shrunk.

As a further step I suggest to remove the yellow tulips (Blooming Flowers) wallpaper because we have enough flowers. That wallpaper is also somewhat busy in the bottom part.

abetts added a subscriber: abetts.Jan 8 2019, 3:33 PM

+1

I like the selection so far. Just ping me when you need an official approval.

Thank you for your work!

+100
(and we should push more on distros to have this installed by default

Indeed! Manjaro already does. See also:

In D18078#388874, @mart wrote:

they often don't to save space on the iso :/

I agree, and this is a concern. We're trying to solve that in D18005: Include only the largest size for each wallpaper. Would you mind offering a technical perspective there to make sure we're on the right track?

As a further step I suggest to remove the yellow tulips (Blooming Flowers) wallpaper because we have enough flowers. That wallpaper is also somewhat busy in the bottom part.

Yeah that's a lot of flowers. :) Let's replace it with one of the other contenders.

ngraham edited the summary of this revision. (Show Details)Jan 23 2019, 4:29 PM

Where are we with replacing one of those flower images with another one?

Where are we with replacing one of those flower images with another one?

We could add one more cityscape instead:

https://unsplash.com/photos/n_0jH_ttsvo

Or maybe restore @rooty 's fave grassland:

https://unsplash.com/photos/qxCqkbF7tUc

Orrr use this desert photo I sort of like due to its cleanliness (not @rooty though):

https://unsplash.com/photos/d_SO6cXpYEA

As for implementation, I take it we should wait until 5.17 since there will be no save cache prior to 5.16?

My vote goes to the grassland. We already have two nice city images, and the desert one looks too much like the default wallpaper in macOS 10.14 Mojave. We might be accused of copying them.

As for implementation, I take it we should wait until 5.17 since there will be no save cache prior to 5.16?

Correct. Would still be nice to have our ducks in a row ahead of time though. Plasma release deadlines have a tendency to sneak up on you!

Can you please confirm the source of these images.
We need to be sure they all fall under: https://community.kde.org/Policies/Licensing_Policy

If not, we need to take it up with people who care about this legal stuff.

TempleFujisanAndSun/metadata.desktop
8

License=Unsplash

What's unsplash?

ngraham added inline comments.Jan 24 2019, 12:32 AM
TempleFujisanAndSun/metadata.desktop
8

https://unsplash.com/license

License

All photos published on Unsplash can be used for free. You can use them for commercial and noncommercial purposes. You do not need to ask permission from or provide credit to the photographer or Unsplash, although it is appreciated when possible.

More precisely, Unsplash grants you an irrevocable, nonexclusive, worldwide copyright license to download, copy, modify, distribute, perform, and use photos from Unsplash for free, including for commercial purposes, without permission from or attributing the photographer or Unsplash. This license does not include the right to compile photos from Unsplash to replicate a similar or competing service.

filipf added a comment.EditedJan 24 2019, 12:32 AM

Can you please confirm the source of these images.
We need to be sure they all fall under: https://community.kde.org/Policies/Licensing_Policy

If not, we need to take it up with people who care about this legal stuff.

We can. All the new wallpapers have been obtained either from Pexels or Unsplash (most of the links are in T10220#171744, but we can also provide them for the remaining ones). Both sites offer free wallpapers, with minor licensing differences.

Pexels offers either the CC0 licence or the Pexels licence. See: https://www.pexels.com/photo-license/ and https://www.pexels.com/creative-commons-images/. Note: I have to change some licence info from CC0 to Pexels.

Unsplash is similar, however it has one additional clause that renders its licence special - hence the unfamiliar Unsplash licence name. You can find out more here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unsplash#License or https://unsplash.com/license.

From what I can tell all three licences are more lax than the CC BY-SA 4.0 the KDE licencing policy prescribes for media files. The question is are they "compatible" licences. Common sense says they should be fine, but maybe it would be good for someone with knowledge on the matter to jump in.

My vote goes to the grassland. We already have two nice city images, and the desert one looks too much like the default wallpaper in macOS 10.14 Mojave. We might be accused of copying them.

+1 That makes sense, thanks for helping us out! Let's see if @rooty agrees as well.

Ok, so two important tasks.

  1. We need to get this extra license into KCoreAddons::KAboutLicense I think otherwise it won't render properly in the plasma UI.

I can take care of that. (Though I can't find it here https://spdx.org/licenses/ does it have another name?)

From what I can tell all three licences are more lax than the CC BY-SA 4.0 the KDE licencing policy proscribes for media files.
The question is are they "compatible" licences. Common sense says they should be fine, but maybe it would be good for someone with knowledge on the matter to jump in.

  1. Asking for comments here isn't enough, we need to do this proactively with the people who get excited by this sort of thing.

Please start a thread on kde-community@kde.org proposing changes to the licensing policy. Hopefully it'll be drama free.

rooty added a comment.Jan 24 2019, 8:55 AM

Grassland ftw!

I'll let the licensing people know what's up and hopefully they'll tell us what's what.

(Though I can't find it here https://spdx.org/licenses/ does it have another name?)

Probably not. I can't find any sort of formal licence text for the Pexels and Unsplash licences :/

lydia added a subscriber: lydia.Jan 27 2019, 6:20 PM

Note we cannot ship files under the Pexels License or Unsplash licence as they are non-free and have restrictions.

We can ship files in the public domain as they are unrestricted.

filipf added a comment.EditedJan 28 2019, 9:36 AM

Those licences are basically CC0 with minor additions. Photos are free to use. Where does the issue lie, that they're formally not listed somewhere as free licences?

If they're really non-free, how can they ship them in Elementary then?

https://github.com/elementary/wallpapers/blob/master/debian/copyright
(note: "Unsplash photos are public domain")

Note we cannot ship files under the Pexels License or Unsplash licence as they are non-free and have restrictions.

We can ship files in the public domain as they are unrestricted.

Actually, they have restrictions but they are free (public domain equivalent).

The Unsplash license is CC0 (public domain) with only one exception: the images are not to be used to start or advance that's a competitor of Unsplash.

The Pexels license has more restrictions:

  • Identifiable people may not not appear in a bad light or in a way that is offensive.
  • Don't sell unaltered copies of a photo, e.g. don't sell it as a stock photo, poster, print or on a physical product without adding any value.

-Don't imply endorsement of your product by people or brands on the image.
-Don't redistribute or sell the photos on other stock photo or wallpaper platforms.

If the Pexels restrictions are unacceptable then I propose we just use Unsplash only. That being said, there don't seem to be any criteria that disqualify the Unsplash license.

The Unsplash license is CC0 (public domain) with only one exception: the images are not to be used to start or advance that's a competitor of Unsplash.
The Pexels license has more restrictions.

These additional restrictions make them non-free. They do not comply with the KDE manifesto, with the Free Software Foundation definition of freedom, with the Debian Free Software Guidelines or with the Open Source Definition which KDE e.V. is just today reaffirming support of.

Can we keep this discussion of licenses on "Licensing policy change proposal" on the KDE community thread so info is not split.

filipf added a comment.Feb 6 2019, 9:46 AM

What is the final verdict reached in the mailing list discussion?

rooty added a comment.Feb 6 2019, 11:23 AM

What is the final verdict reached in the mailing list discussion?

We need to ask Unsplash and/or the photographers to release their work into the public domain or if it already is in the public domain to ask for confirmation.

The Pexels pictures don't qualify (they are in violation of Pixabay's license) so I suggest that we reduce the number of wallpapers to about five or six and email the original authors.

Can you confirm this @jriddell? Also, how strong of a document is an email confirmation to rooty or me, shouldn't it be something more formal?

We need to ask Unsplash and/or the photographers to release their work into the public domain or if it already is in the public domain to ask for confirmation.

Yes the copyright holder needs to give permission to copy it under public domain, CC0, CC-BY-SA or other suitable free licence.

Also, how strong of a document is an email confirmation to rooty or me, shouldn't it be something more formal?

e-mail is fine if it really is sent from the person or company who hold the copyright

filipf added a comment.Feb 7 2019, 6:27 PM

Excellent, thanks for the clarification. Next step is basically what @rooty said then, but I'd try to some more in (not just 5-6).

kkoma added a subscriber: kkoma.Jan 2 2020, 10:20 AM

Where are we with replacing one of those flower images with another one?

We could add one more cityscape instead:

https://unsplash.com/photos/n_0jH_ttsvo

Or maybe restore @rooty 's fave grassland:

https://unsplash.com/photos/qxCqkbF7tUc

Orrr use this desert photo I sort of like due to its cleanliness (not @rooty though):

https://unsplash.com/photos/d_SO6cXpYEA

As for implementation, I take it we should wait until 5.17 since there will be no save cache prior to 5.16?

The cityscape would look fantastic, but only with a dark (or transparent) panel. It is a great shot, please include it.
As for the grassland, you could include that too. It is also a really nice pic.
I don't know why, but the dune photo looks too pale. I don't know where the light is coming from, and the dune just seems to suddenly end in a line way too sharp. Thus there is almost no depth to the shot.
Of these 3, the first 2 seem worthy of inclusion.
This is just a suggestion, the opinion of one person, though.