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I tried asking in this GitHub thread but didn't really receive a response in terms of any beginner guides on how to contribute:
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/w ... ssues/2068
There also isn't really a clear contributor's section on the FAQ page either:
https://puppylinux.com/faq.html
Asking since I do a big of programming on the side, and do art stuff, so wanted to know where exactly I could help out with.
Thanks.
This looks like a nice, general contribution guide using GitHub:
https://docs.github.com/en/get-started/ ... o-projects
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/w ... ssues/2837 should be trivial to fix, and you can use it as an exercise.
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/w ... ssues/2802 has ideas for bugs that are easy to find and easy to fix.
If you're more into themes and artwork, you can help test GTK+ 3 applications and fix theme bugs:
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/g ... rk_blueish
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/g ... o_ambience
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/g ... ey_rounded
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/g ... ished_blue
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/g ... dient_grey
Or, improve the icon themes:
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/Pmaterial
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/puppy_icon_theme
https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/puppy_flat_theme
I have a fork of woof-CE on Github that is to date but what branch should I be in sync with?
testing, this is the only active branch.
Thanks, I double checked and am synced with the "testing" branch
I'm interested in learning how to make a theme that would look good on an e-ink device. It would be neat if I could learn how to make a light e-ink theme, a dark e-ink theme, and a "sunset", basically dark with a redshift-like color instead of white if I can figure out how to say that in the 6 digit color descriptions. That would be perfect for first boot onto an LED screen.
If you were explaining to a preschooler who wanted to learn how to do this, where would one start to get those skills and make that happen?
@hundido, just some organized thoughts.
Start by picking _what_ you want to theme, e.g. the desktop background, what's inside a window, the window frame, button/menu icons (inside a window), icons (on the desktop), the application bar a.k.a. task bar, the system menu, ... I probably left something out but this is a good start.
Pick a concrete target to theme: a specific application, if you're interested in what's inside a window, or a specific window manager, if you're interested in the window frame, etc.
Find out which graphical toolkit your target (application) uses. Broadly speaking the main tookits are GTK+ and Qt. There are others.
Find out which version of the toolkit your target uses. Read up (on wikipedia first then on the toolkit homepage) about your toolkit and how to theme your target. You can of course use tutorials but don't start with tutorials; build up some theory first -- it will pay back.
Be wary that the rules change from toolkit to toolkit and from version to version. GTK+-2 and GTK+-3 are a good example of (bad) breaking changes: a GTK+2 theme will not work with GTK+-3 and viceversa.
Your self-development path - in the first paragraph I listed many _whats_. Learn how to theme one of each (one at the time). When you're finished, put it all together into a coherent supertheme. This could be your e-ink theme, for instance. You will need to learn some technologies and tools to carry on your project. Things worth learning are: CSS, monitor color technology, a decent pixel graphics tool (gimp), of course the toolkits I already mentioned, how to effectively search for good technical information (StackOverflow is a good source).
Let me spend some words about file organization. Be organized. Decide upfront how to name folders and how to structure a tree of folders that will reflect: your learnings and topics you need to lookup frequently; content you create, such as images and other media; versions of your work; tests; documentation; screenshots; tools; todos. This list isn't exhaustive, the point is to store your project in a structured way. Oh, yes, backup your work 
Enjoy yourself while you learn and practice all these things. There's plenty of very interesting stuff to marvel about.
I'm curious: are you running Puppy Linux on an e-ink display, like an e-book reader's?
@step, thank you for your answer and organized suggestions.
Start by picking _what_ you want to theme, e.g. the desktop background,
Being able to see the desktop background clearly on boot-up would probably be the first step to good usability on e-ink. Would a list of what needs theming be:
1. desktop background
2. main menu
3. icons/dock
?
If I made a theme for Puppy Linux, would it also work on Fatdog and EasyOS?
I'm curious: are you running Puppy Linux on an e-ink display, like an e-book reader's?
I'm not, but I'd really like to. I have a Hisense A5 cell phone, and may switch to a mudita phone since my area is dropping coverage for 3G. Doing some raspberry pi projects with an e-ink display interests me. I'm hoping to someday acquire a Pine Note and, if the price ever drops, a Dasung Paperlike 25" e-ink monitor. I strongly prefer e-ink to backlit LED display, and want to do something to support it.
Wallpaper, desktop icons, jwm theme, gtk theme, designed for a pup, should also work in EasyOS.
Though, my exposure to woof-CE has mostly been 'legacy' and 'master' branches, don't know much about what structural changes have taken place in 'testing'.
I did notice something to do with wallpaper, that changed in 'testing', that I reported:
https://bkhome.org/news/202202/widescre ... creen.html
...however, that won't affect creating a wallpaper theme PET, except it might be elongated or squashed when rendered.
1-3 is a good list targeting at the desktop environment. Then you could tackle the window manager (window frame and title). Then the interior of a window (applications). You could further split icons into two distinct groups: icons on the desktop and icons inside a file manager's window. The latter are typically found under /usr/share/icons and link to the media type a.k.a. MIME-type.
If I made a theme for Puppy Linux, would it also work on Fatdog and EasyOS?
For Fatdog some of it would but not without testing. In Fatdog the main menu and panel are based on Qt, openbox is the default window manager (JWM is available as an option), ROX is the default file manager and provides the wallpaper a.k.a. backdrop.
I just created https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/w ... ibutor-101.
Is it useful? Is it clear enough?
Hey @dimkr
I read through your guide briefly, and it looks pretty good for anyone using purely GitHub.
Honestly, I'd have to really poke and prod to find holes in it. I think you explained the process well, and this is coming from someone who has to do tech support for Developer based tickets on a daily basis that is used to the terminology behind the workflows present (ex: PR's, commits, etc), so good job on this one
I'm on a weird setup where I typically use Manjaro Linux with Emacs, so I'll have to adapt a bit.
However, I do feel like I can definitely still fork the 'woof-ce' component and look to see what needs to be worked upon.
I took a look at the other suggestions you provided, and I have a few questions:
Questions:
Q1. Regarding the themes you linked in your initial post, what exactly are the bugs you are referring to?
I ask because I checked the issues page for each of these and I don't see anything. Are there known bugs with these GTK based themes?
Q2. Regarding The PMaterial Icon Themes
Do you happen to know the exact dimension and file types that required for this?
I ask because I can learn how to make some icons with some Gimp tutorials on YouTube, but wanted to know the dimension and size requirements. I'm assuming '.svg' or '.png'
Q3. I know about the issues on the main GitHub page, but are there any that are beginner friendly? I ask because I'm assuming that the codebase itself is probably C heavy, so I'm wondering how to really help out.
Anyway, hopefully this doesn't come across as too hand-holdy, but I always find myself kind of like "Ah man, where do I begin" when I look at a codebase like this, or even issues in general.
I was thinking to maybe clone your existing themes and messing around with the look to get some cool looks going that people might like as well.
Looking forward to your response.
Some applications use custom widgets, and not all GTK+ themes work equally well. Take GNOME Files as a good example - if you use any of the Puppy themes, it looks horrible.
In addition, the themes need to be ported to GTK+ 4 - https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/w ... ssues/2957.
See https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/Pmaterial
Some bugs are pretty simple, like https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/w ... ssues/2847. There is very little C involved, because most of Puppy's "secret sauce" is shell scripts.
You can find all the GTK+ 3 themes at https://github.com/puppylinux-woof-CE/? ... age=&sort=.
Bear in mind that these are straight GTK+ 3 ports of old Puppy GTK+ 2 themes, and the goal is to make these themes 1) visually consistent with GTK+ 2, 2) usable with as many applications as possible and 3) easy to maintain.
If you want to create a new theme, feel free to do that - if it's good, we can add it to woof-CE as part of a "global theme" that has matching icons and a JWM theme.
Hey @dimkr
Thanks a ton for this response!
I wrote it down in my Org notes, and will check out some of these sometime this weekend.
I'm thinking probably to start building a new icon theme that looks decent. Also, the porting process from GTK3 to GTK4 seems fine, so I'll try to understand how both of them work in that context.
This is so that I can get a better idea on how to make commits using the branches I plan on forking anyway.
Thanks a ton for this, appreciate the hand holding, since the last time I tried to help out an FOSS project was for Lubuntu, but it was daunting since it was primarily C based, primarily dealt with just QT Designer based projects to make custom apps, etc.
I think this is doable, so it should be fun, plus I really like Puppy for what it stands for.
Looking forward to it
Sorry for the long delay on this.
Had some family stuff happen for my wife's family.
However, I still have this on my radar. My plan is to check out the GTK themes first and see the related issues page accordingly.
Thanks for being transparent about it being mostly Bash related scripts that need assistance on Puppy Linux's 'woof-ce' project as my C is a bit rusty.
Hey its me again, funnily enough I had even more personal stuff get in the way of things.
I tried picking up the pace again to check my latest notes, and I'm exploring 'woof-ce' to be able to create an ISO from my forked copy first to see 'how' it works before diving into the 'Issues' page.
I have a question regarding the themes present. I noticed on a lot of the themes GitHub pages that its recommended to NOT use Inkscape or any SVG editor.
In that case, is only Grafx2 or GIMP fair game? What file formats are fair game as well?
Just wanted to confirm before I drew up some concepts for this, and went to town with some pixel art type stuff for this.
Thanks.
