Help add screenshots to the Software Center
alsamixergui missing a screenshot
I am always looking for ways that Ubuntu users, who do not know Python, C, or some other programming language, can contribute to Ubuntu. As Ubuntu grows in popularity this is going to be a growing segment of users. I think a very important part of the Ubuntu experience is the community. The friendships, the comradery , the sense of pride and ownership that comes from helping to make Ubuntu what it is. I want everyone, regardless of technical skill to have the same opportunity to have this rewarding experience. So when I came along this opportunity I couldn’t wait to share it with you all.
Browsing through the Software Center you may have noticed there are applications that are lacking screenshots. The screenshots are a nice feature of the Software Center and a real bummer when you are on the fence about downloading an app and their is no screenshot to help you in your decision. The good news is there is a way to help get these screenshots added.
How to add screenshots to the Software Center
Browse through the Software Center or the online repository of screenshots at screenshots.ubuntu.com. When you find a missing screenshot you would like to fix, either open or install the application and proceed to take a screenshot per the guidelines below.
* Screenshots are published under the terms of the packaged software itself.
* Your screenshots must be in PNG format.
* Due to legal reasons screenshots for non-free packages aren’t accecpted.
* Images larger than 800×600 pixels will automatically be reduced to that size (retaining the aspect ratio of course). So if you like to control the exact result of what you upload then make sure your image size is no larger than that.
* Your screenshot should contain a typical scene when working with it. When snapshotting a browser load the debian.org home page. A screenshot of a graphics program should have a drawing loaded. Of a game please make a screenshot while you are playing and not of the start screen.
* You need not artificially switch off your window decorations.
* Please set your language to english so that everybody understands it. If you don’t use english by default please start your application from a shell using after setting “export LANG=C”.
* Please only take a screenshot of the respective application and not of your whole desktop (unless the screenshot is meant for a window manager).
* Please use non-interlaced PNG images.
The default application in Ubuntu for taking screenshots is found by going to Applications > Accessories > Take Screenshot. In Kubuntu you press print screen and this will bring up the ksnapshot window.
Submit Screenshots
Once taken submit your screenshots.
How about: use the default Ubuntu theme while taking the screenshot? I’ve seen horrible things that only confuse the user.
Yes absolutely. That is something we do on the Screencast Team. Always use default theme, font, icons, wallpaper, etc. A good idea is to create a new user just for the screenshots. Then you don’t have to mess around with the Appearance settings for your user.
thank you Anon that is a good tip,
duanedesign
“Please set your language to english so that everybody understands it”
wow lots of presuppositions in that sentence
You don’t even have to go as far as creating a new user. You could just use the guest account already set up to take the screen shots.
Keep in mind that this is the Debian screenshots site, so the default theme in Debian will be quite different from the default theme in Ubuntu. You will always get screenshots with different themes than the default Ubuntu one and we don’t remove screenshots just because of the theme.
@antistress – You are so right. I should of read those guidelines a little more carefully before posting them. Please accept my apology for posting such an ill-conceived statement.
I would have thought that if Ubuntu was trying to keep a unified look it would be a good idea for them to have their own screen-shot library. Or even better a unified debian library with screen shots relating to each of the distributions that use debian as a base with maybe those distributions giving debian a hand with the hosting maybe with an version tag to show which version of which dist the screen-shot relates to. Sounds logical to me but it may sound over complicated especially as its not that important in the bigger picture. I do think that the project is important and will be filling a few blanks my self it seem like something a non programmer could really get their teeth into and get a lot of satisfaction from.