Flathub's New App Guidelines Absolutely Suck
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- čas přidán 17. 01. 2024
- Flathub has grown greatly over the past couple of years and now it's more than just an app repo now it's more akin to an application storefront and any good store front needs a set of application guidelines but the ones here aren't the best.
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It's important to note that these are guidelines, not hard rules.
FlatHub wants to represent itself as a modern Linux app store, hence the push towards that style.
But apps can decide to violate these guidelines to the degree which is sensible for the project.
For curated listing spots, they will most definitely be okay with listings that violate some guidelines but still fit the general style or feel.
Yeah, I think it's very important that those are not "the rules of Flathub" but just a vision of what it should look like.
One step after the other.
You can't go full authoritarian monetization scam right at the beginning.
But they really aren't "just guidelines", when you look at your app and it says "failing 6 checks".
@@alexanderkoskovich8993 the guidelines clearly state that they are optional - how would you word the checks failing?
We actually have to tooling strict, so we can't add something to a curated list, that doesn't pass the guideline review :)
The casing rule would be best just changed to "When doing 3rd-Party releases, stick to the official capitilization of the brand". Easy.
@@VitaMoonshadow yess haha
Yeah that's a good idea
So if I, the developer, want to protect my brand I'll have to publish it under a fake name for it to count as "3rd-party". Terrible idea
@@nezu_cc Huh? What do you mean? I am talking about when a third party, so not the developer of the app, releases it.
Finally, flatpak apps are getting some good screenshots. A lot of screenshots on flatpak are just so terrible and its nice to know thats changing
I would also like screenshots in flathub to properly zoom, because in my 1080p monitor they're fkn unintelligible
@@mat_max That's unfortunatly a limitation of the current backend - which hopefully will be changed somewhen soon
I have seen some apps where the screenshot was even done on Windows.
The changelog thing I 100% agree with. I wish Google would enforce that, but they use the "bug fixes and performance improvements" for their own apps.
That and telling the user to go into the app to find the changes. Or some marketing speak about how updating the app will make the app better for you. Or repeating the same patch notes from the last major change.
HUGE MEGA UPDATE CHANGELOG: -fixes
Changelogs are a bitch. You need someone who really understands the system technically, and can also assess how relevant or important each change is from a user perspective. And then make them do mindless work knowing that hardly anyone will do more than glance through their output.
Writing this had just made me realise how perfect a trained AI would be in this role.
@@logicalfundy Funnily enough, Google (Not sure about Apple's App Store) doesn't actually even give you a lot of room to put changelog notes that are informative, its kind of like they're tunneling you into the general "Bug fixes and improvements"...
I've had to truncate changelog notes numerous times because of that.
"Improved system stability"
> Don't add shadows to logos/icons. We add them automatically on the website.
> Add shadows to screenshots. We don't add them on the website.
...why?
Because reasons.
In half a year or so they change the design of their page and then all devs have to make new logos and screenshots to be conform again.
oh, and also change the names, because then capitalization will be the new hot sh!t and punctuation rules again or something.
Because gnome can't screenshot non maximized windows without shadows - and we want non maximized, cause otherwise you don't get rice borders/corners
@@razzeeee So essentially, "use GNOME".
So much for choice.
@@razzeeee The guidelines should recommend cropping or taking screenshots in a non-broken compositor then. Gnome's deficiencies are no excuse to make Flathub's already-undersized screenshots even harder to read.
@@Vegemeister1 you want to screenshot smaller windows, so that they are readable. Too many pixels actually make this worse.
I commented a big detailed reply but I think it got caught by spam filters because I included links to other app stores' guidelines. Oops! In summary, thanks for sharing the feedback, and I've started proposing some changes to the guidelines to clear up some things you pointed out. The title seems a bit incendiary and contradictory to your comments of them being mostly good, but I suppose you gotta get people to watch. :) In the future, I'm always happy to chat to provide the "inside story" of Flathub developments like this!
Broodie casually getting another interview for Tech Over Tea Pog
I also think most of the guidelines are reasonable or at least go in a good direction.
I would just make it super mega clear that all of these points are just preferences, things you see as good but that there are also other things that can be good that aren‘t mentioned.
Also I am looking forward to better screenshots, they are currently just awful.
@@PhilfreezeCH I actually did submit an update to make that point even more clear, but if you read the guidelines themselves, it is made pretty clear in the first section.
Man I wish toolkit used would always be listed, if there are 2 alternatives where 1 is GTK and the other is QT, I'd pick the one that matches to avoid theming problems.
I like the rule for not having drop shadows. I don't really care how they display on Flathub, but drop shadows can look really out of place on the desktop depending on how hovering over them works in your DE of choice. Shadows should only be put in by the DE, not baked into the icon. That said, I do think it'd be a losing battle asking developers not to include them.
If I got them right, this guidelines are recommended to get promoted. You can do whatever you want with your application, but they can choose what kind of apps to promote as well.
Exactly
Yes
Names of games will certainly exceed 20 character, have special versions with different info appended to the end of the name, have weird formatting for the name, have icons that are not "minimal", have summaries that are weird.
The only saving grace for games is that virtually none are freely available as flatpaks
@@Max24871 doesn't necessarily have to be free.
Funny that games are the biggest category on flathub (yeah game emulators and tools are in there too)
Yes, my "Super Methane Brothers" game has been on Linux since year 2001, and is 22 chars.
It would be nice if they had more timely guidelines for flatpaks that continue to use frameworks that have reached EOL, are no longer supported, and receive no security updates. You see these warnings with several flatpaks when running or updating from the console. I place a higher priority on security breaches than whether something looks pretty. And I like the TexWorks icon just the way it is.
You would think the devs would also get those warnings? So not sure what a guideline would help
I'm fairly sure non-EOL runtimes is a condition for showing up as a featured app-if not, it should be. But that isn’t an AppStream Metadata quality thing.
I do like they are at least trying to fix up some of the issues. There are many packages on flathub that I can't tell if they are from the original developer or someone random just made and uploaded.
You can see this when they have a verified flag, and I believe they specific list this as well.
It's funny how their own logo doesn't comply with guidelines.
It's not an app icon tho 😂 The guidelines are for apps
Brodie is also using the old logo
ssst.. don't say this. it was a secret.
@@dracostyx doesn't matter. it's called eat your own dog food.!
Guess you're trolling, otherwise you would have pointed out the actual rules
Don't you guys have historical figures saved on your contacts?
Weirdos.
i saw rosa luxembourg in the contacts🚩
Frankly, I like some older icon styles better than contemporary styles. Modern styles went way too flat and took all of the fun out of icons and make them look sterile and lacking depth.
Just like life itself!
Somewhere on CZcams, there is an entire video on the topic from a design perspective. I agree, these over-simplified logos are horrible. Take a look at how the Harley-Davidson logo developed. Gross.
@@marioschroers7318 yeah it's definitely come and gone over the years. From outlines to simple colours, to 256 and not too bad, to no take it back, and now just bleh what do these really tell us about the app?
Fads come and go. I think legibility should be key, not a style judged by a fashion police.
My fear is that this will impact findability of apps by brilliant code designers, who are no stars at making graphics.
So-called "outdated" UI design is a good shortcut for identifying apps that do their job well. It means 1) the app has existed for a long time without being abandoned by developers or users so it does something extremely useful, and it has probably been incorporating domain-specific learning into its codebase for many years, and 2) the developers haven't been wasting their time on useless "refreshes".
I think a much bigger service to users would be enforcing changelogs for apps.
That's indeed included in these guidelines!
A lot of apps don't even include changelogs, and a lot of the ones that do write them terribly. This I think is area that Flathub can request better on
It's unfortunatly not as easy, as there can be new packaging builds without the app changing. That can be confusing and causing users to think there should be a changelog.
"The code is more what you'd call guidelines than actual rules" - Barbosa
Optimize flatpaks to make them smaller: Nah
Turn the store into some goofy ass mobile app store: yeah sir !
Sure, probably the same people working on core linux, c++ code and a website...
Oh please no, I really can't see modern simple icons anymore. Bring back 3D icons I say!
anything but the modern trend
install windows 7 and never go outside again
Wasn't a fan of 3D icons but I'd rather them than the modern simple ones, they get a bit samey when you're scrolling a list through.
In the toolkit scenario what If I specifically wanted an app using the toolkit for aesthetics reasons?
This applies to both gnome and kde, where one using gnome may want to find gtk4 apps because they think they look nice, while someone on plasma may not want gtk4 as it's even harder to theme an already pretty unthemeable toolkit with flatpaks.
Gtk is a technical detail, gnome or KDE is not.
@@gusvanwes6192 while yes that is the case, it is also an aesthetic detail that applies to not just devs
Come on, it’s not like it’s impossible to find out what GTK or QT is. Newbies can just ignore it, but it’s very helpful for more advanced users especially with all the gnome libadwaita BS
@@gusvanwes6192 Yeah, they could always say "Music player for _____ desktop" instead of the toolkit. Although toolkits change so they could have the outdated one. GIMP is technically a GNOME application. Let that sink in
The Karl Marx contact had me dying 😂
and all the other figures (the poster is a cringe leftoid)
I'd highly disagree with the summary "Not Technical" thing. Frankly I'd argue a good portion of the software I currently use I only paid attention to *_because_* the summary was a technical description and something I wanted.
When I'm trying to find a good text editor, and every single app just says "This is a text editor" because you've banned people from saying "minimalist remote text editing QT client written in Rust" then all that means is every text editor looks identical to me without explicitly clicking on every single one. Using the prior example, that could only really be simplified to "minimalist text editor" when abiding by those summary rules. Does "minimalist text editor" mean the same thing as "minimalist remote text editing QT client written in Rust" to you? No, obviously not, there are countless "minimalist text editor"s, so just seeing "minimalist text editor" means practically nothing, whereas "minimalist remote text editing QT client written in Rust" tells you the exact niche it's filling, the general UX principles it will likely abide by, etc. Stopping people from including technical terms in summaries sounds fine, and even passes the smell-check when you first think about it, but it fails when someone is actually looking for an application to do something and then every application has the same meaningless description. I don't just want an application to do a job, I want a *_good_* application to do a job, and that's going to be dependent on how I define "good".
This, to me, is what people mean when they talk about "dumbing down" linux. Average users shouldn't need to be developers to use linux, but knowing "oh, I use KDE which heavily uses QT" or "oh, I use GNOME which heavily uses GTK" are fairly baseline knowledge. Not knowing those things actually affects your ability to use your computer how you want because you will be unable to find applications that follow UX principles you like. (keep in mind, that user experience is something everyone has, even if they aren't consciously thinking about it) "Oh, we don't want technical jargon in summaries because average users won't know what it means" is the average users' problem when not knowing that information *_will_* make their experience worse. Users who take the time to be informed should not suffer just so that users who don't aren't intimidated by jargon. If it's information or a behaviour that directly affects your ability to have a good experience, then it's *_your_* problem if you don't have it. If it's genuinely irrelevant that's one thing, but most of the time the jargon *_is_* relevant. As a change this would make flathub flatly worse for many users, just to avoid jargon that normies won't immediately understand.
Why are you trying to monopolize linux? Normies should be able to use the platform just fine without knowing a single thing about irrelevant implementation details. Also, whether an app is written in rust or not is completely irrelevant to it's functionality. It implies neither performance nor reliability. All of this is just stroking the egos of pseudo technical users. No other platform does this. Inconsistencies are a problem, but they are unavoidable. You can't get OBS or Bitwig to perfectly match your desktop theme, they don't even match any other platform's UI.
Maybe we can have those kinds of things just be tags we can use anyway. Rather than buzzword and jargon soup in the description. That said I personally subscribe to the GNU vision of the world where everyone is a little bit of dev and the point of opensource is that normies can modify their software.
Has to be said of you need a txt editor Neovim 😅😅😅
@@dracostyx in OBS, go to Settings > General > Theme, and select "System" to have it obey your default Qt theme
These aren't banned though and as far as I can tell these guidelines are open to change. Also, nothing wrong with making linux more accessible. I don't think this is dumbing down linux because you don't even have to use the store.
They should just make all these apps do a Twitter and do a single letter rebrand. Since X is taken, there are 25 available slots, which is fine because that's the total number of apps that will conform with these guideliens.
use other alphabets for more slots?
Regarding the title length, I think 32 characters is a reasonable maximum. More that this and it's more like a sentence than a title.
00:59 quality of icon != quality of app is very common (example: most qr code scanner apps on flathub have good icons but are bad: they silently create screenshot png in ~/Desktop and don't delete it)
"they silently create screenshot png in ~/Desktop and don't delete it"
That's more of an XDG Portals limitation...
@@Slymeballx11 clients can get screenshot to memory without xdg portal
do apps use xdg portal for screenshot because less compicated code or to work on wayland (not tested)?
@@RandomGeometryDashStuff Probably for both, most likely the first though
Flathub judging me for my horrible icon designing skills
Reach out, there is information on the blogpost on how to get a better icon
I will judge you as well
not too long? as the author of "GNU Video Non-Linear Editor and VFX for your Daily Needs with CZcams, Vimeo, Dailymotion, and Other Video Platforms 2024 (full version)" I feel deeply offended.
Why should flathub have a right to be that demanding on your icon? We are FOSS developers and often not graphic designers. The app with the medicore icon may be absolutely fantastic.
I'd never adjust the icon design just to please a store.
They are guidelines, not rules, your app will just not be a sore thumb on the front page, that's it
I admit I had to laugh at the Karl Marx one, but good to know your app should include some kind of controversial figure in your screenshots as a requirement too.
And that compositors that is too sexy needs to be 18+
Where is Karl Max a controversial figure?
No they are saying you have to include Karl Marx in your screenshots, kinda flatpak version of Waldo.
@@ruizlenato Have you been living under a rock? About half of the developed world hates him.
@@wolfwingx1 dumbs
@@wolfwingx1 him or the governments that used his books to justify creating authoritarian hellscapes? these are two pretty different things lol
modern icons often bug me as its hard to identify some apps from others lol
Not mentioning toolkits could cause major confusion with apps that come in multiple toolkit versions, eg some text editors...
Linux as we know it, and want it to be, will be dead for trying to be like MS, Apple, Android or whatever proprietary thing the "newcomers" are determined to stick to.
You mean Ubuntu. This is Ubuntu. Linux is still there if you don't try to use Ubuntu.
@@thewhitefalcon8539 I know what I mean, I know what I wrote. I ain't used that mess since 9.10, & that was for a month.
Yet another reason to prefer first party repos.
EDIT: Just to clarify, I mean the OS's native repos.
For the name thing, couldn't they add both a normal name, which displayed everywhere and an optional full name which is only displayed on the app page? (ex: Name: GIMP, Full Name: GNU Image Manipulation Program)
see the paragraph they had about icons below the example. this guideline is reasonable and accomodates projects with older icons without them needing to do a redesign
These guidelines make sense only for the verified apps.
Else, this is one more hurdle for the third party opensource developers who are maintaining the package like telegram. Also, telegram should be able to call itself telegram. Because it's not a different client even if packager is different. Clients are opensource and it doesn't become XYZ for Telegram once someone else compiles it.
Terrible burden to put on contributors who just maintain it for the love of the format.
Did you miss the part that this is completly optional? (unless you are actively violating trademarks, but that has nothing to do with the guidelines)
Aren't these just for being pushed on the front page? at 7:57, if most people see that they immediately think its some ancient software and it brings down the reputation of the entire platform. They aren't forcing any changes, they just wont push apps that make their platform look like its from windows xp era. Everything besides games should update, because otherwise it'll look outdated. Last time in my Computer class as soon people saw outdated design in ubuntu 16.04, they immediately god bad taste in their mouth of linux. Even outdated games shouldn't be pushed imo, if you're not willing to update an icon for it, then you might as well have abandoned the app.
To give an example of what FlatHub is trying to avoid, they do not want to appear like the F-Droid repository.
Which often has wildly outdated metadata for even their up-to-date apps, which are ranked the same as pieces of abandonware dating back to Android 4 days.
Techy people like me know not to care for that and only look at the software's qualities, but the general public will think "ew, this is outdated, let's avoid it".
I believe it is a matter of perceived "jankiness". Linux is historically perceived as "janky" OS, where different (often conflicting) styles collide in a patchwork of software. This is in stark contrast with MacOS which is too "sanitized". I believe Flathub's guidelines want to align the ecosystem to this "sanitized" vision in order to have greater "respectability", "trust" and so on. I mean, whether we like or not, a lot of people and potential Linux users are aesthetically aligned with this vision that Apple created. People bought this. Well, I can understand what they want, but... I'd rather say: people should embrace the jankiness.
PS: People should also embrace Karl Marx :X (...but, yeah, not the right place to put him. I get it, it's a joke, but this would turn off a lot of people who also bought the marxism is evil, red scare and so on. We should focus on getting people in Linux, not out of Linux, like a... IRON CURTAIN! Sorry, sorry, this dad's joke was stronger than me!)
I get these are only guidelines, but they’ve overcorrected from too laissez-faire to overbearing. Some of these guidelines will only stifle creativity for the devs who try to comply.
7:55 - left icon (teapot) is greatly done in Tango style! I loved Tango style back in the day and I don't care it's outdated.
To be honest, I would be happy to see Tango even on macOS! Years ago I even patches Windows .dlls so it has Tango icons instead of Microsoft ones!
They have so much charm to them, the only weird choice I can think of are those emojis lmao
13:15 I would prefer to know the technologies that my applications use, so I would hope there is a place to encode that. I will never use Flathub or Flatpak, though, since I don't need it.
Spoiler there is
@@razzeeee Nice
@@anukranan The nice thing is, you'll likely also get the benefits from this in the other package formats, as most are using appstream in the background
Naming length role seems completely unreasonable: Most short names are already taken and/or are not descriptive enough. And if I publish my personal hobby project - I'm not a f-ing marketer. It has a name - it good enough.
Except it does matter if it's Qt or GTK. I like my desktop coherent, ideally, and I would download a GTK app first, because that's my preference.
Brodie is right, i agree specially with the casing and the icons. Old icons are nice! Specially icons in skeuomorphist style, i REALY LOVE THEM!
And your missing the point, you can abolutely just ignore the guideline and keep your icon. That's pretty much the first thing the docs state.
@@razzeeeeYeah, but then your app is not going to be promoted
@@ukyoize that's unfortunate, but you also can't expect those prime promotion spaces to be free in the sense, that you might have to provide/modify some things. after all they are a limited resource.
That's a long way for Flathub to say "Avoid using Flathub".
No need to avoid using it, these are guidelines not rules
@@BrodieRobertson I get that, but the tone is very off putting, especially to a community of people who are already putting their all into making a program work in the first place. Flathub is not so popular that they can dictate, no matter how gently, that people put hours of extra, unnecessary, "polish" into a project. Better to just avoid flathub, and by extension flatpak, entirely.
Reminds me of the (sadly probably apocryphal) story of the guy who, having recently started to work at Microsoft, expressed disgust at the quality of code written by none other than...Bill Gates.
Why? Because the alleged comment was, "Who wrote this crap?!"
What if you are a developer looking for development apps? How is excluding technical detail going to help any developer?
There are other fields that you should put those. The guidelines focus on everything you see in app listing plus Screenshots. For now.
can someone please upload a 1 hour video of brodie saying "capitals"?
Developers developers turned into uppercase lowercase
16:33 are you sure rounding is done by compositor?
if I start picom, open gtk4 application with csd, kill picom, gtk4 application still has rounded corners and thicc black border instead of shadow
That's a gtk4 thing then, that's not a guaranteed toolkit feature
I forgot which video you said Linux users are "comedically challenged" but I wonder if that's what the problem with using Karl Marx as an example contact is
I've said that many times tbf, I personally think it's funny but I'm also not on Twitter every day arguing about politics
5:10 it’s not just resizing the image as icons need to have properly aligned pixels - for more complex icons different sizes need to be drawn separately.
At the size the icon is used it's not a big deal
So the only _app_ I can think of which would meed the name and icon requirement (barely) would be Cube 2: Sauerbraten. But would they be forced to call it Cube 2? Would they be forced to change the icon since it's not _entirely_ within the minimalist design language? Is this for _new_ apps or legacy apps? Because legacy KDE apps may use the KDE Crystal icons and those are *not* within the minimalist spec.
It's entirely optional. So it doesn't matter if your app is old or new.
I completely understand removing shadows from icon backgrounds.
Your desktop/apps are responsible for adding shadows on them if you want them.
They should have guidelines on how to write guidelines...
I see a lot of people shouting "They aren't RULES! People can ignore it if they want!" And they aren't wrong. Just shortsighted. "Guidelines" aren't "Rules" per se, but they do still come with an expectation that people will make an effort to follow them. Especially if they consider promotion from Flathub valuable. I don't know if they do, but it seems Flathub thinks so. This could easily just be Step 1. Follow now, or be forced later.
As for what I think of these "Guidelines" - It started off okay. I'm all for better screenshots and store presence, and avoiding trademark violations is an obvious thing to do.
Then it got to the icons, and I'm kinda like "ehhhh I'm not so sure about that. Seems a little excessive."
Then it got into the app naming requirements, summary requirements, etc. That is just dumb. App name field is too short, why is the summary the same length as the name, and why can't you even mention the *toolkit.* That's actually important to a lot of perfectly normal linux people.
Then finally at the end it brought things back to something reasonable.
Toolkit should be mentioned in the correct metadata field, that is not the summary. You can also mention it in the description.
Summary length is not the same as name length. Not sure why you would think that.
@@razzeeee
"Toolkit should be mentioned in the correct metadata field, that is not the summary. You can also mention it in the description."
The post said nothing about putting tookits in the metadata. If this is easy to do and easy to search by, sure. Sounds good. No problem with that.
Description does not show in search results, front page, etc. Putting it here is a barrier to relevant information.
And "shouldn't be in the summary" - why not? As in, what is an actual reason beyond "the people writing the guidelines don't like it"
"Summary length is not the same as name length. Not sure why you would think that."
From the docs:
"The summary should ideally be between 10 and 25 characters, and no longer than 35 characters."
"The name should ideally be no longer than 15 characters, and must be shorter than 20 characters."
What I said was an exaggeration, hyperbole. *Obviously* the requirements are not identical.
I know they are not the same, but they are very similar and even overlap.
But I'll grant that you could read that like I actually can't tell the difference.
@@obake6290 description gets searched through, but summary is one of the highest rated search field. So every unnesessary word here will make your app less findable. As for e.g. the search will also rate how soon the keyword showed up in the summary.
6:53 Are you sure? Most modern app icons I've seen don't actually have those shadows around them. It's whatever it was displayed on that adds it. Also, I don't think KDE counts because their shadows are kinda part of the design and not just added around it to make it look like it's floating.
11:20 no, camel case is meant, but I did not write an example for that. not sure we think pascal case is a problem, would have to check.
The example given of what was bad was in PascalCase so I assume it was meant to be bad, maybe the example just had a mistake then. I still don't think it's an issue but that seems like an inconsistency
Under "no weird formatting":
As a non native speaker I have never heard of "scentence case" and "title case".
You know, in Germany we just write nouns big and the rest small ;D
Sentence case is basically what you're used to, first letter and proper nouns.
Title Case is Mostly Used for as it Implies Titles.
Unless you spend your life reading style guides I'm not sure even most native English speakers know what all the variations are called.
FlatHub going nuts? Do they want to be integrated first-party in Gnome?
flathub is an app portal, rght? so the logo/icon of those apps advertized in it should instead be appealing and pretty. and should allow the app authors to get creative with it so consumers could tell the difference between similar types of apps. limiting the look of the app's "tumbnail"/icon/logo is not productive. they should be trying to attract users, not putting them off instead.
Like a green circle on a transparent background (real icon I failed due to that rule)
Much creative, would feature on the front page.
the good guidelines are good but alot of the bad guidelines are horrid.
I don't like most of these guidelines and the fact that they want to curate apps based on their opinions many of which I disagree with is kind of bull this stuff should be decided by the people doing the work
This looks like someone is trying to enforce (something close to) Gnome guidelines without actually realizing that.
Maybe instead Gnome Software should just showcase GTK and Gnome apps and KDE Discover should showcase KDE and QT apps. Other apps that don't fit the ecosystem could then still be searched for, but the user would clearly see they won't necessarily fit their system. Then you can also police icon and naming guidelines within that specific ecosystem.
(And, handling different icon themes for apps in such store would be a pretty cool idea. E.g. when you've got dark mode enabled, you see dark mode icons.)
Also, I wonder what should happen when there's both a GTK and QT version of an app. Either you put the toolkit in the name, or Flathub metadata would need to be made to specifically handle this case somehow.
The metadata for that already exists
GNOME is the biggest push to turn Linux into iOS.
@@thewhitefalcon8539 I thought iOS was copying Gnome :/
@@thewhitefalcon8539 I actually like the Adwaita look and think there are a lot of good ideas in the Gnome ecosystem.
But yeah, just let all the other projects be their own thing.
Programmers usually suck at visual design and visual designers are usually not good programmers.
I for one like applications which name kinda tells me what it does
So you agree with the guideline
@@razzeeee Like the author of the video, with some of it
i agree on having better looking icons
The guideline for no capital letter for each and every word in summary is good, in my opinion. Why copy the habit that media outlets has with having capital first letter in every word of a (not all caps) article header, when they use a large typeface anyway? It’s just annoying to read.
Using initial caps in words for the app title is another thing entirely and might also be part of the trademark.
This is very true.
I like what they want to do. Nontechnical users etc.
But changing Icons and Names? Not even on Mobile 30+ characters are a problem. And yes, if so, fix flathub and the stores.
Your missing the details especially in the icon case. Shadows are a big problem.
apps should include the native toolkit shadows and rounding...
meaning, no shadow on the toolkit, no shadow on the screenshoot.
Technically correct. But reviewing for random toolkits is hard, so you most likely will just get failed, as reviewers can't know every toolkit in existance
That's a big part of why it should probably be reworded to account for that
@@BrodieRobertson let me know if you have ideas
@@razzeeee I do think saying screenshots must include shadows and they should use the native toolkit shadows doesn't work when some don't include native shadows. The issue with suggesting to add shadows in post is they're guaranteed to be inconsistent. I think the only guaranteed solution without suggesting a specific desktop for screenshots is just accepting the inconsistency, some will have shadows and some won't or asking for all screenshots to be full screen
@@BrodieRobertson we actually have tooling for setting per app, if it has windowed screenshots or fullscreen screenshots (games, media centers etc)
but yeah, I've been looking at it for months now (there is a funny issue in ximions appstream tracker from me).
accepting the consistency would mean, we can't really have banners showing screenshots, which would be uncool or boring, I guess.
18:12 : You know who would have been a better choice than Marx for a contacts app? Alexander Graham Bell. Photos are available, the era is right, and unlike Marx he created something directly relevant to communications. It _almost_ makes me want to create a communications app just for the sake of using his image like that.
Umm, I like how icons looked in the 90s with 256 colors, dithering and black/grey outlines. I even installed a Windows 98 inspired icon theme on Android, and changed some windows icons to old ones from moricons.dll, pifmgr.dll, etc
The karl marx contact is hilarious.
Yea man. I had this debate with this kid yesterday, Imma run that by my mate Marx and see what he thinks of it.
This shit cracks me up 😂
And when will they allow for uploading bundles like all the other upstream stores? This is a must.
Likely this month
@@razzeeee Really? I've seen in some places people saying that this method would never be added because it takes control from Flathub's hands.
@@talkysassis We're already testing it. And firefox/obs has been using it for years at this point? Unless I miss what your really mean.
They are not wrong, it takes some control away, but there are also some mitigations in place for that. You can look at the code, to see what's going on if you like.
5:43 I personally would just put a white/black outline around it, depending on for what its original design theme was. very lazy, but it works, sort of. though if the icon is copyrighted with something that forbids derivatives... it could become a problem
What logo is it in the top right of the title card?
🔴 ▶️
⬛ +
I rewatched the video and didn't find it.
That's the flathub logo
7:05 For shadows they could literally just add a single boolean that tells the website/store if this icon already has a shadow.
I'm not saying someone should break every single one of these unreasonable rules, but I think it would be great if someone, let's say, submitted an app to show why this is all terrible ((wink wink))
I mean this is just to clean up the recommended sections and are frankly all pretty damn reasonable and not even all that out landish. Storefronts have much more stringent requirements.
These are also optional, Brodie just kind of missed the point by pointing out all the exceptions.
Btw, while all of these are mentioned in the guidelines, we don't check for all of these on the website/when doing a review.
18:50 The play store should also follow that rule. Most big apps don't include any changelog. Not even bugfix or performance improvements.
I point for point agree with your takes. There's definitely room for developers to improve their listings but a lot of the stylistic points and content points are a bit too controlling. The point of Linux is to have choice. If people don't like the way an app presents itself they can modify themselves or just not use it but its not flathubs place to dictate those choices.
Flathub devs are bff with Karl Marx. Knew it lmao
As a starting point, these guidelines are good. I just hope that people are able to calmly discuss them, as we all know that being loud and angry at a community makes them receive contructive criticism more easily, right?
The seem like good guidelines to me. They are guidelines, not rules, so try to follow them, if you can't follow one of them, whelp, so be it. They are not going to delete your app because you don't follow them. Your app might be more popular if you follow them. If you are making an app, and follow those guidelines, it is going to look decent on the store.
6:00 there should be a option to have both a light and a dark theme icon
I kinda think you are trolling (haven't watched yet) doing a video about guidelines, while using the wrong logo for the platform is - something :P
Oh it's the flatpak logo, my bad
I welcome it since so many Linux Software Stores and Repos are so full of dated junk that looks like a kid's high school project from the early 2000s. Have a little professionalism here. You really want people to download your software and maybe donate in the future make the stuff look like it has some value.
Apostrophe devs watching how they're getting gratuitously dissed to death:
1. When I'm looking for an app one of the things that I value is if it's visually compatible with my DE, so "technical" terms like Qt, GTK4, Gnome, etc are useful
2. How one can include a screenshot for a lib or something that does not have a GUI or a CLI?
I have longed for 8192x4320 8K full Format, with more detailed, possibly 3D icons at 128^2 to 512^2, maybe larger.
Probably easier to run your own repo than to comply with this BS. Thanks, GNOME!
What about the rest of the Marx Bro's comrades 😂
like Bakunin, whom Marx had a big beef with
100% agreed. I hope they listen to you.
I've had some people hit me up to say they agree with some of the critiques
I like that images are required and I don't mind the post 2010 logos rule but the naming rules are ridiculous.
I think it was a good idea for them to put guidelines. So I would say it is a good thing they did this, even though some of these are a bit silly. There just guidelines not rules so the ones that don't make sense can be ignored.
Unrelated to my other comment are some critiques I have for this video.
Firstly, I feel like your criticism for their guidelines for summaries should have been harsher in places, but also softer in other places. Specifically, I'd have widened the number of cases where technical things can (or even should) be mentioned in the summary, but on the other hand there are practical considerations behind the 'sentence casing, not title casing' rule.
I'm not fond of how they define 'technical'. Now, to be fair, what counts as 'technical' will be different for different people, so perhaps I'm biased because I am more technical than most people.. But including the widget toolkit, for example, can help someone select a program that fits in with the rest of their desktop environment. If I see a summary saying, "Note taking/organizing Qt app", I know that it will fit in with other applications if I use KDE, Lxqt, Maui Shell, and other Qt-based desktops. That's information that I'd want in the brief summary, so that I don't have to click and open on a bunch of different apps to see if they're Qt or GTK. I _especially_ want to be able to skip over Electron apps.
As a side note, I'm not sure how one is supposed to avoid terms like 'client'.. How else is one supposed to refer to, well, client applications? Like, what SHOULD the 'Free and open source Qt5 Matrix client' example say instead?? They have it in red as a 'bad example', but what else are you going to put? I suppose leave off the 'free and open source' bit, as almost all Matrix clients are anyway, but if the defining features of the app are, "It's a Matrix client," and, "It's written in Qt5," what else _could_ you put? How would you even reword 'Matrix client' without the word 'client'? Saying it's a 'Matrix front-end' sounds even more technical, and maybe even misleading, as if it also requires you to install something called 'matrix' yourself for you to use it. And saying things like, "Instant messenger for the Matrix network" goes over the stated character limit.
Anyway, moving on... With regards to release notes, I think 'bug fixes and performance improvements', and similar phrases, is perfectly valid for many programs. If no functionality was added and the user interface was not changed (except to fix bugs), what else are you going to put? A list of what bugs were fixed and how performance was improved would go against the idea of being 'short and informative'.
As an example, Telegram has version numbers like '4.14.9' (latest version as of when I type this), and if new features or UI changes are made they'll bump that up to something like '4.15.0'... But when '4.14.10' comes out, it will not have any new features or UI changes - instead only having performance improvements and bug fixes. They don't even mention those releases on the changelog on the Telegram website, because it'd just be a bunch of pointless clutter.
Finally, I'm not sure that the 'age rating' thing was worded well enough. It's written as if implying that if NSFW content is readily available by default, but won't show up on the main pages, it doesn't have to be rated as including such content. Furthermore, what about front-ends for services that perform age verification (even if just by asking the person to say whether they're old enough or not with a yes/no question)? If you need to log into the service to use it, and on your account you had already confirmed your age, then right from the start there might be NSFW content right there on the main screen when you first open the app; but if you _hadn't_ done that, there _won't_ be, and it won't show up even if you search for it. How should the application be rated in such a case?
It always feels bad when you ask or require something from an open source project because everyone is free to create PR if they don't like something. Perhaps that's the way to proceed if flatpak wants to get these things addressed
Lol, I have been sending issues/patches for the last six month. It doesn't scale. Not at this or future sizes.
11:15 PascalCase is a subset of CamelCase -- i.e. UpperCamelCase. In contrast to lowerCamelCase.
9:25 I did that just due to that name being longer then 20 signs - could have been more creative - wasn't really about the name. Not sure markdown should be in your main app name tho.
If it's specifically a markdown editor I don't see it being that weird of a name, you could be a lot more creative but I've seen it used a bunch
01:20 search in package description?
It seems there are people in the project involved which cannot or aren't willing to contribute something useful, therefore they have to worsen it for everyone else.
Thank you
As for window shadows - you can use an image editor to add shadows pretty easily.
You can, it's not a big deal I just don't like the way it's written
@@BrodieRobertson Fair enough
Please don't we want consitent shadows, not random shadows. It's bad enough, that KDE will give you different shadows (and thus padding) then gnome and likely other toolkits.
@@razzeeee
How the shadow looks doesn't matter. I assume Flathub requires it in order to highlight the edge of your window against whatever background it is displayed on.
As for inconsistencies - blame Gnome for their CSD obsession.
@@Kris-od3sj no, the shadow very much matters unfortunately and it doesn't matter who you think is to blame.
You can't position screenshots consistent when the transparent borders due to shadows are always in different sizes.