Version Number in Plymouth?
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	tsimonq2
	Nov 6 2019, 5:44 PM

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I wonder if we could include a version number alongside the Lubuntu logo with the Plymouth boot screen (installed by our artwork package).

It could definitely add an extra touch for users to know the version of their system.

The questions to answer here would be:

Do we want to commit to doing this for every cycle?
Do we keep the development codename in there prior to the release or just the final version string?

Ubuntu does this for the text-only Plymouth screens, so I don't see why we could do it with the graphical ones.

Links:

Updated testing and developer hints:

Create a new virtual machine and install Lubuntu 20.10 (or use real hardware, just for testing purposes, not for daily work)
Add my PPA and install also plymouth-x11

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:apt-ghetto/ppa-test-lubuntu
sudo apt update
sudo apt full-upgrade
sudo apt install plymouth-x11

Create the script ~/bin/startplymouth to start plymouth in the desktop session (with startplymouth or bin/startplymouth). The script automatically sets up plymouth with the default theme in a window. You have to move the mouse or press any keys, because plymouth is waiting for external input. The window disappears after 10 seconds (if you have moved the mouse).

~/bin/startplymouth

#!/bin/bash

sudo plymouthd
sudo plymouth --show-splash

for ((I=0; I<10; I++))
do
  sleep 1
  sudo plymouth --update=test$I
done

sudo plymouth --quit

To make it easier for on-the-fly changes, change the owner of the system directories: sudo chown -R root:$USER /usr/share/plymouth/themes/lubuntu-{logo,text}
There are still some unused files present.
To change the background colour, change the files /usr/share/plymouth/themes/lubuntu-logo/lubuntu-logo.plymouth and /usr/share/plymouth/themes/bgrt/bgrt.plymouth. I am not sure, if both are required or not.
The images used by the plymouth theme are in /usr/share/plymouth/themes/lubuntu-log/spinner.

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rART Artwork
	D97	rART996215e24cfb Replace plymouth theme

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		Status	Assigned	Task
		Resolved	tsimonq2	T101 Lubuntu 20.10
		Open	apt-ghetto	T131 Version Number in Plymouth?

Event Timeline

tsimonq2 triaged this task as Normal priority.Nov 6 2019, 5:44 PM

tsimonq2 created this task.

tsimonq2 added a parent task: T100: Lubuntu 20.04.

tsimonq2 added a parent task: T123: 20.04 Artwork.

tsimonq2 removed a parent task: T123: 20.04 Artwork.

tsimonq2 edited parent tasks, added: T123: 20.04 Artwork; removed: T100: Lubuntu 20.04.

I think it would be really great to have an indication that a development release is a development release. I'd like us to have a stock "in construction" wallpaper (this would be a great use for Lenny). For that matter, Plymouth could use the same methodology. For the text-based, we could include the actual codename and/or version. That's my 2¢.

kc2bez edited parent tasks, added: T101: Lubuntu 20.10; removed: T123: 20.04 Artwork.Apr 16 2020, 9:53 PM

It looks like we need to do some work on Plymouth for this bug we can revisit the topic of version number then.

I have started the work to change the plymouth theme and base it on plymouth-theme-spinner, which should resolve also the problem of bug 1872669.

I hope, you can help with the graphical part (colours, images for the spinner, et cetera), @JacobSawicki.

I have created a package in my PPA, which can be used for testing.

Some testing hints:

Create a new virtual machine and install Lubuntu 20.04 (or use real hardware, just for testing purposes, not for daily work)
Add my PPA and install also plymouth-x11

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:apt-ghetto/ppa-test-lubuntu
sudo apt update
sudo apt full-upgrade
sudo apt install plymouth-x11

Create the script ~/bin/startplymouth to start plymouth in the desktop session (with startplymouth or bin/startplymouth). The script automatically sets up plymouth with the default theme in a window. You have to move the mouse or press any keys, because plymouth is waiting for external input. The window disappears after 10 seconds (if you have moved the mouse).

~/bin/startplymouth

#!/bin/bash

sudo plymouthd
sudo plymouth --show-splash

for ((I=0; I<10; I++))
do
  sleep 1
  sudo plymouth --update=test$I
done

sudo plymouth --quit

To make it easier for on-the-fly changes, change the owner of the system directories: sudo chown -R root:$USER /usr/share/plymouth/themes/lubuntu-{logo,text}
There are still some unused files present.
To change the background colour, change the files /usr/share/plymouth/themes/lubuntu-logo/lubuntu-logo.plymouth and /usr/share/plymouth/themes/bgrt/bgrt.plymouth. I am not sure, if both are required or not.
The images used by the plymouth theme are in /usr/share/plymouth/themes/lubuntu-log/spinner. I think, if you (@JacobSawicki) replace the animation* and throbber* images with the version from the forum, then it should look quite good.

Ok, thank you very much for the instructions :-) I'm already on it. I'll send the results when I'm done :-)

OK, I did it. :-)
It works and it looks great. :-)

There's one problem with the weight of these pictures, because everything weighs 600mb. (all animations + all throbbers)

I need to compress these photos. I'll probably finish it tomorrow. :-)

Hi @JacobSawicki

Welcome and thank you for your work!

You don't need to hurry, we have the next 4-5 months to finish this.

If you have any problems, please don't hesitate to ask here. Or in our development channel, which is bridged to IRC, Telegram and Matrix => links <=.

And if you have other ideas, you can also create a task and describe them.

Okay, that's how it looks https://youtu.be/XuZVdgdxkrs :-)

This is 400 images. Together they weigh 80mb after compression.

I have to work a little bit more with this, because these images do not have the lighting like in this film. https://youtu.be/479XC26xhwc :-)

I have a question because the images are too fast. Probably the images are displayed in 60 frames per second.
I prepared 30 images per second for optimization.
Is it possible to reduce the speed of the frames displayed in scripts? :-)

In T131#3320, @JacobSawicki wrote:

Okay, that's how it looks https://youtu.be/XuZVdgdxkrs :-)

The video is private. Maybe you can upload a screenshot here?

This is 400 images. Together they weigh 80mb after compression.

Are you sure, that we need 400 images? Isn't it enough to replace the ~ 70 images? And 80 MB is definitively too much. We should remain under 200 KB.

I have a question because the images are too fast. Probably the images are displayed in 60 frames per second.
I prepared 30 images per second for optimization.
Is it possible to reduce the speed of the frames displayed in scripts? :-)

I am also new to plymouth themes. And I found only old documentation from 2010 around. The most useful might be this blog.

At the moment, I can't give you good answers. I guess, the value is around 50 frames per second.

It is a lot of trial and error development. And the plymouth theme depends also a lot on the device (screen resolution, background logo of the vendor). The theme in a virtual machine behaves differently from my test and develop laptop.

OK, I'm working on the optimal loading screen.
Thank you very much for your help. :-)

In T131#3320, @JacobSawicki wrote:

Okay, that's how it looks https://youtu.be/XuZVdgdxkrs :-)

video is now public https://youtu.be/XuZVdgdxkrs :-)

I found something interesting in the script. Maybe this will help me change the frame rate.

Transition=none
TransitionDuration=0.0

https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/Plymouth/Scripts/

Plymouth Callbacks

Calling Plymouth.SetRefreshFunction with a function will set that function to be called up to 50 times every second, e.g.

fun refresh_callback ()
{
time++;
}
Plymouth.SetRefreshFunction (refresh_callback);

Hi @JacobSawicki

I saw the video and it looks really great. Unfortunately, the size of the logo is too great. Please have a look at GNOME wiki, where the idea of the plymouth theme is explained better.

The grey part with the "VENDOR LOGO" is the place, where the logo of the firmware vendor is placed (in case of UEFI, with BIOS there is no picture, as far as I know). The picture comes directly from the firmware, so we have no control over the size or colours. If there is a vendor logo, then the background colour is hardcoded to black. If the Lubuntu logo has this size, then either it is hiding the vendor logo or the vendor logo hides the Lubuntu logo.

At the very bottom of the screen, there is the grey field "OS LOGO", which is the "watermark.png". This is the logo of the operating system, in our case, from Lubuntu. If you like, you can propose also other watermark logos.

The spinning part in the middle is a graphical way to indicate, that the system is working in the background. If you can resize the picture and use a transparent background, then the size should automatically decrease.

The goal of the plymouth theme is to have a flickerfree boot screen, so that there aren't any resolution changes during the boot.

The theme was originally developed by Red Hat. It is used by Fedora and is more or less the same as in Ubuntu. So, if we are able to change the theme, this is a real nice distinction from all the other distributions.

Okay, I understand. :-)

I'll reduce the images.

I'll make a watermark.png

New version done! :-)

New video https://youtu.be/mfVh1vmGJ-s

Hi @JacobSawicki
Looks very good. Can you please upload the files here as .zip or .tar archive?

I can then create a new package in my PPA for Lubuntu 20.10 Groovy Gorilla.

Download link https://drive.google.com/file/d/1N3AyOY4lA5RmFHUTIUy3AHyefAhI4zFS/view?usp=sharing :-)

I changed one value in the script lubuntu-logo.plymouth

WatermarkVerticalAlignment=1

Hi @JacobSawicki

The link is not public. But you can simply upload here

Lubuntu Boot Animation Jacob S..zip24 MBDownload

Ohh, I'm sorry.
So much has changed to Google Drive lately.

apt-ghetto updated the task description. (Show Details)May 17 2020, 4:16 PM

Hi @JacobSawicki

I have uploaded packages for 20.04 and 20.10 to my PPA with your artwork.

Although it looks good, we really need to reduce the size of the files.

That is how it looks on my UEFI test machine

As you see, the animated logo is too big. It is hiding the watermark logo and might hide also the vendor logo.

Resizing the spinner and throbber logo, will decrease also the file size. And you have provided around 200 pictures. Maybe you can delete every second image and it will still look good?

apt show plymouth-theme-lubuntu-logo shows an installed size of 87 kB versus 26 MB. I don't say, that we need to remain under 100 kB, but less than 2 MB should be the goal.

Another thing is the entry in the changelog of the package. The artwork is a result of your hard work and of course you should get all the credits for it.

lubuntu-artwork (20.10.1ppa1) groovy; urgency=medium

  [ Jacob Sawicki ]
  * Create artwork for the Lubuntu spinner theme.

  [ apt-ghetto ]
  * Change the Lubuntu plymouth theme
    - Changed plymouth-theme-lubuntu-logo to use the Ubuntu spinner theme
    - Updated plymouth-theme-lubuntu-text to print actual release version

 -- apt-ghetto <apt-ghetto@lubuntu.me>  Sun, 17 May 2020 17:58:12 +0200

Can I use Jacob Sawicki? Or do you prefer something else?
Do you want to add something to the changelog entry? (I wrote the changelog entry without thinking much, so don't hesitate to propose changes)

In general I find your artwork very good and I hope you enjoy the work also. Thank you so far!

PS: I had to download the zip file from the google drive link, because I could not download the zip from here (it is not your fault). That is also the reason, why I did not respond earlier. If you upload another file, you can use google drive, because it works better.

PPS: I will not have much time in the next few weeks. I expect to have more time in July and August.

JacobSawicki added a comment.May 29 2020, 9:29 PM

This comment was removed by JacobSawicki.

EDIT - New link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1i4VFWzR46TBtpdunXsgTlj2Zd-6kZePw/view?usp=sharing

I'm sorry to take so long.

The images have been reduced from 300x300 to 200x200 px.

I used the most effective way to compress the images without losing their quality. Now everything together weighs ~3 MB.

In T131#3539, @JacobSawicki wrote:

EDIT - New link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1i4VFWzR46TBtpdunXsgTlj2Zd-6kZePw/view?usp=sharing

I'm sorry to take so long.

That is absolutely no problem. I will not have much time the next 5 weeks.

The images have been reduced from 300x300 to 200x200 px.

I used the most effective way to compress the images without losing their quality. Now everything together weighs ~3 MB.

Yes, that is much better. Thanks for the work.

@guiverc, @Leok: Could you please do some tests, when you have time in the next 5 weeks, with different machines (different vendors, UEFI and BIOS)? I have prepared packages in my PPA for groovy and focal. The links can be found in the task description.
Please report any findings here in the task.

apt-ghetto updated the task description. (Show Details)May 30 2020, 1:39 PM

Quoted Text " Could you please do some tests, when you have time in the next 5 weeks, with different machines (different vendors, UEFI and BIOS)? I have prepared packages in my PPA for groovy and focal."

Hope to make a test or two this weekend...

Ran a quick test on Groovy 20.10 ISO 30.05.2020

Items 1 to 4 inclusive - the test machine was Acer Aspire E3-111-P60S UEFI with secure boot. All went well and looks very good.
Comments: 1. Running the script startplymouth - window disappeared after 10 seconds (timed with stopwatch and did not move the mouse) .

Timed the boot process - after Grub 42 seconds until login greeter screen appeared - a bit slower than usual.
In desktop preferences it is possible to change background colour but the "wallpaper image file " Browse button is shaded out so the user cannot change the wallpaper - assume this is related to the plymouth theme.

Another quick test on Groovy 20.10 ISO 30.05.2020

Items 1 to 4 inclusive - the test machine was Dell [Inspiron] 3521 BIOS boot. A good - no problems.

Comments: 1. Running the script startplymouth - window disappeared after 10 seconds (timed with stopwatch and did not move the mouse) .

2.Timed the boot process - after power on 68 seconds until login greeter screen appeared.
3. In desktop preferences it is possible to change background colour and the "wallpaper image file ". The wallpaper is the default 20.04 
    wallpaper . This is not the same as the earlier test today but assume "plymouth" was updated today.

Hi @Leok
Thank you very much for testing! I think, you are testing too much. It is enough to install the PPA on different hardware and tell us, if the plymouth theme looks good.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:apt-ghetto/ppa-test-lubuntu
sudo apt update
sudo apt full-upgrade

I did not change anything with the wallpaper. And the changes in plymouth-theme-lubuntu-logo should not affect in any way the behaviour of pcmanfm-qt.

The other steps mentioned in the task description are meant to make development easier, so that you can see the plymouth theme without booting the system.

So far, everything looks correct? On UEFI machines you see the vendor logo, the spinning Lubuntu/LXQt logo and the "Powered by Lubuntu" logo? They don't overlap?
Is it flicker free?
And, of course, do you like it?

Hi @apt-ghetto

I re-tested the ACER -UEFI machine with a fresh install ISO 31.05.20 Groovy and there was no problem with the wallpaper as in my first report.

Everything looked very good indeed! I saw the vendor logo,the spinning Lubuntu/LXQt logo and the "Powered by Lubuntu" logo and they all looked good with no overlapping. Yes all flicker free. I also liked seeing the "Powered by Lubuntu" logo at shutdown.

To be thorough I also ran a new UEFI test on my Dell Inspirion 3521 with the same good results.

Do I like it? YES...it is very good !

@apt-ghetto

Added to a fresh qa-test install of [20.10/]groovy on
dell [optiplex] 755 (c2d-e8300, 8gb, amd/ati radeon rv610/radeon hd2400 pro/xt)

What it looks like can somewhat be seen via

https://photos.app.goo.gl/xd3xcDSGR57AhMYAA

(left landscape monitor is 1280x1024, right portrait is 1024x768 why it appears larger & on it's side on right display)

From this first test - it looks GREAT !!

Run using the startplymouth, it appears on single display, no circular marker was seen; the glow stays at the bottom (disappearing after ~10secs as expected), however the glow does rotate clockwise on boots & shutdown

hp dc7700 (c2d-e6320, 5gb, nvidia quadro nvs 290)
existing *focal* install
2x 1920x1080 displays; looks great here too

Note: in real life one display is above the other ; so orientation is good; refer https://photos.app.goo.gl/sTbeQ2sXa28pEmdk9

dell [optiplex] 755 (c2d-e6850, 5gb, amd/ati radeon rv516/x1300/x1550)
existing *focal* install; 1680x1050 display

https://photos.app.goo.gl/abvwPQeBBh3kBdyKA

sony vaio svp112a1cw (i5-9400u, 4gb, intel haswell-ULT)
existing *focal* install, 1920x1080 display, UEFI

https://photos.app.goo.gl/aTwJ2zSD9gwB66LN7

(on boot I

enter encryption.key,
black [screen] ,
vaoi [brand.uefi],
black,
vaoi + plymouth,
vaoi,
black (or text messages on rare occasion)
then login [sddm] (appearance is great!)

this possibly won't mean much, my mind has gone to vanvugt/1872669 or related bug report (one on main Ubuntu); I didn't expect the return to UEFI-vaoi logo alone... but I have too limited experience of Ubuntu on UEFI hardware)

(I'll may add additional details to this post in due course; hp 8200 (I don't know if it shows HP logo), but I'm now [too] tired)

I wonder if it would be better to set a black background instead of blue in the Legacy Boot...

In my opinion, it would look better because it would look more uniform with UEFI.

/usr/share/plymouth/themes/lubuntu-logo/lubuntu-logo.plymouth

BackgroundStartColor=0x000000
BackgroundEndColor=0x000000

https://photos.app.goo.gl/8gCgthXoy1AF4ij99

Hi @JacobSawicki

because it would look more uniform with UEFI.

Can agree with that - but the blue background looks nice as well. Maybe not a bad idea to be able to distinguish legacy from UEFI (with support in mind)?

At any rate I think they both look very good!

/me likes the blue :)

I don't have to be directly looking at the screen to know where it's at in booting (easily noticed if only the corner of my eye can see the screen). It's very bright yes, but personally I think the plymouth is more effective/pleasing on the BIOS machines I've used than that one single sony.cr?pbook.

installed 20.04 system; 2x1920x1080 displays (box shares displays with dc7700), but this box has uefi though i've likely disabled uefi)

https://photos.app.goo.gl/NWoNK7FxfxW5EKrC7

(I'll not likely play with more BIOS boxes as just more of the same (1920x1080 or 1280x1024)..)

Tested with QA-test install 20200607
on: Acer [Aspire] E3-111-P60S with UEFI+secure boot with encryption.
All looks good - no errors encountered.

apt-ghetto added a revision: D97: Replace plymouth theme.Jul 11 2020, 10:11 AM

The_LoudSpeaker added a commit: rART996215e24cfb: Replace plymouth theme.Jul 17 2020, 6:22 PM

The package is now in the Ubuntu archive for 20.10 Groovy Gorilla! It can be downloaded and tested.

Thank you @JacobSawicki very much for the artwork! I hope, you enjoyed it. If you are interested in continuing with artwork, please let us know. (Just as an idea, a "Under construction" theme would be very cool [with a moving excavator for example] or maybe simpler, with a red background in the animation/throbber logo.)

And also a big thank you to @guiverc and @Leok, I appreciate very much, that you spent time on testing this on different hardware!

Tested with QA-test install 20200718
On 2 machines ..both BIOS and UEFI boot modes. All looked very good.

I also like the idea of a red background for "Under construction or development" theme.

@apt-ghetto correct me if I'm wrong, but this issue seems to be completely resolved, right? Should I close this?

According to the first part of the task description, this task is not resolved:

I wonder if we could include a version number alongside the Lubuntu logo with the Plymouth boot screen (installed by our artwork package).

It could definitely add an extra touch for users to know the version of their system.

The questions to answer here would be:

Do we want to commit to doing this for every cycle?

Do we keep the development codename in there prior to the release or just the final version string?

Ubuntu does this for the text-only Plymouth screens, so I don't see why we could do it with the graphical ones.

Updating the version number in plymouth-text did not work very well in the past (it is not up to date for 21.04). And updating a version number in plymouth-logo is not that easy, because you will have to change a picture.

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