August 2023

KDE Snaps Weekly report, Debian recommenced!

Posted on August 25, 2023 by sgmoore

Now that all the planets are fixed, please see what you missed here!

/https://www.scarlettgatelymoore.dev/kde-a-day-in-the-life-the-kde-snapcrafter-part-2/

EXTREMELY IMPORTANT: I am still looking for a super awesome team lead for a super amazing project involving KDE and Snaps. Time is running out and well the KDE world will be a better a better place if this project goes through! I would like to clarify, this is a paid position! A current KDE developer would be ideal as it is a small team so your time will be split managing and coding alike. If you or anyone you know might be interested please contact me ASAP!

Lots of news on the snap front 23.04.3 is now complete with new snaps! I know, just in time for 23.08.0. I have fixed some major issues in this release, 23.08 should go much quicker. Even quicker if my per repo snapcraft files gets approved!

  • kirigami-gallery
  • Itinerary

We have more PIM snaps, however I am waiting for reserved name approvals from the snap store.

I was approached to decouple qt and frameworks sdk snaps and I have agreed for the fact that security updates are near impossible when new versions are released. Conversation here:

https://forum.snapcraft.io/t/proposal-for-changes-to-kde-content-snap-and-extension

I have started qt5 here https://github.com/ScarlettGatelyMoore/qt-5-15-10-snap

And some exciting news – I have started the KF6 content pack! I am doing like above and I am using the qt6 content pack Jarred Wilson has made. This is a requirement to start the plasma snap. Progress can be tracked here: https://github.com/ScarlettGatelyMoore/kf6-snap

I am still have on on going request for snapcraft files in their respective repositories. While defending my request I have tested some options. Snapcraft files in the repository does allow for proper snap recipes in launchpad by mirroring the repo in launchpad -> create snap recipe. I created a recipe based on stable branch and it created and published the snap as expected.

After being pointed to the flatpak workflow I discovered snaps has a similiar store feature with github, however I will need to create a github repo for each snap, which is tempting. I want to avoid duplication of snapcraft files, but I guess this is what they do for flatpak? I never received an answer.

Snapcraft: Some more tidying of the qmake plugin and resolved some review conversations.

Debian!

I am back to getting things in Debian proper, starting with the golang packages I was working on for bubble-gum a cool console beautification application. As each one passes through NEW I will keep uploading. I will be checking in with the qt-kde team to see what needs doing. I am looking into seeing if openvoices is still a viable replacement for mycroft, hopefully all that work isn’t wasted time.

And finally, I do hate having to ask, but as we quickly approach September, I have not come close to enough to pay my pesky bills, required to have a place to live and eat! I am seeking employment as a backup if my amazing project falls through. I tried to enable ads, but that broke my planet feeds, I can’t have that! So without further ado… Anything helps! Also please share! Thanks for your consideration.

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KDE: A Day in the Life the KDE Snapcrafter Part 2

Posted on August 22, 2023 by sgmoore

KDE Mascot
KDE Mascot

Much to my dismay, I figured out that my blog has been disabled on the Ubuntu planet since May. If you are curious about what I have been up to, please go to the handy links -> and read up! This post is a continuation of last weeks https://www.scarlettgatelymoore.dev/kde-a-day-in-the-life-of-the-kde-snapcrafter/

IMPORTANT: I am still looking for a super awesome team lead for a super amazing project involving KDE and Snaps. Time is running out and well the KDE world will be a better a better place if this project goes through! I would like to clarify, this is a paid position! A current KDE developer would be ideal as it is a small team so your time will be split managing and coding alike. If you or anyone you know might be interested please contact me ASAP!

Snaps: I am wrapping up the 23.04.3 KDE applications release! Head on over to https://snapcraft.io/search?q=KDE and enjoy! We are now up to 180 snaps! PIM snaps will be slowly rolling in as they go through manual reviews for D-Bus.

Snapcraft: minor fix in qmake plugin found by ruff.

Launchpad: I almost have approval for per application repository snapcraft files, but I have to prove it will work to our benefit and not cause loads of polling etc. So I have been testing various methods of achieving such a task, and so far I have come up with launchpads ability to watch and download release tarballs into a project. I will then need to script getting the tarball and pushing it to a bzr branch from which I can create a proper snap recipe. Unfortunately, my proper snap recipe fails! Hopefully a very helpful cjwatson will chime in, or if anyone wants to take a gander please chime in here: https://bugs.launchpad.net/launchpad/+bug/2031307

As reality sets in that my project may not happen if I don’t find anyone, I need help surviving until I find work or funding to continue my snap work ( still much to do! ) If you or anyone else you know enjoys our snaps please consider a donation, anything helps! Please share! Thank you for your consideration!

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KDE: A day in the life of the KDE snapcrafter!

Posted on August 18, 2023 by sgmoore

KDE Mascot
KDE Mascot

As mentioned last week, I am still looking for a super awesome team lead for a super amazing project involving KDE and Snaps. Time is running out and well the KDE world will be a better a better place if this project goes through! I would like to clarify, this is a paid position! A current KDE developer would be ideal as it is a small team so your time will be split managing and coding alike. If you or anyone you know might be interested please contact me ASAP!

On to snappy things I have achieved this week:

Most 23.04.3 is done, I am just testing them now. New applications: kmymoney ( Thanks Carlos! ), kde-dev-utils, and kxstitch ( Thanks Jeremy! )

With that said, I have seen on the internets –candidate channel apps being promoted. Please use this channel with utmost care as they are being tested and could quite possibly be very broken!

Still working on some QML issues with kirigami platform not found.

I have begun the launchpad build issues journey and have been kindly pointed to using snap recipes on launchpad so we aren’t doing public uploads which creates temporary recipes to build and cannot be bumped priority wise. So I have sent the request into the kde-devel arena to revisit having per repository snapcraft files ( rejected in the past ) as they do with flatpak files. So far I am getting positive feedback and hopefully this will go through. Once it does I can move forward with fully automating application new releases. Hooray!

This week I jumped into the xdg-desktop-portals rabbithole while working on https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=473003 for neochat. After fixing it with adding plug password-manager-service I am told that auto-connect on that one is discouraged and the libsecret should work out of the box with portals. I found and joined just in time a snapcrafter google meet and we had a long conversation spitballing and testing our portal support. At least in Neon it appears to be broken. I now have some things to do and test to see that we get this functional. Most of our online apps are affected. For now though – snap connect neochat:password-manager-service :password-manager-service does work. Auto-connect was rejected as it exposes to much. Understandable.

I have started a new thread on the KDE forums for users to ask any questions, or let me know of any issues you may have related to snaps here: https://discuss.kde.org/t/all-things-snaps-questions-concerns-praise/4033 come join the conversation!

In the snapcraft arena I have fixed my PR for the much needed qmake plugin! This should be merged and rolled out in the very near future!

I would like to continue my hard work on snap things regardless of the project going through. Unfortunately, to do so, I must ask for donations as life isn’t free. I am working on self sufficiency but even that costs money to get started! KDE snaps are used by 1.7 million active devices! I do ask that if you use KDE snaps and find my work useful, or know someone that does, to please consider donating to keep my momentum going. There is still much work to be done with Qt6 rolling out. I would like to work on the KDE Plasma snap and KDE PIM suite of apps ( I have started on this ).

Even if you can’t help, please share! Thank you for your consideration! I have a new donation form for anyone that doesn’t like gofundme here:

https://www.scarlettgatelymoore.dev/donations/donation-form/

Gofund me:

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KDE: Post Akademy Snap Wrap Up and Future

Posted on August 11, 2023 by sgmoore

Skrooge snap
KDE Skrooge snap

It has been a very busy couple of weeks in the KDE snap world! Here is a rundown of what has been done:

  • Solved issues with an updated mesa in Jammy causing some apps to seg fault by rebuilding our content pack. Please do a snap refresh if this happens to you.
  • Resolved our scanner apps not finding any scanners. Skanlite and Skanpage now work as expected and find your scanners, even network scanners!
  • Fixed an issue with neochat/ruqola that relaunching the application just hangs https://forum.snapcraft.io/t/neochat-autoconnect-requests/36331 and https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=473003 by allowing access to system password manager. Still working out online accounts ( specifically ubuntu-sso )
  • Fixed issues with QML and styles not being found or set in many snaps.
  • Helped FreeCAD update their snap to core22 ( while not KDE, they do use the kde-neon ext ) https://github.com/FreeCAD/FreeCAD-snap/pull/92
  • New applications completed – Skrooge – Qrca – massif-visualizer
  • Updating applications to 23.04.3 – half way through – unfortunately our priority for launchpad builders is last so it is a bottleneck until I sort out how to get them to bump that up.
  • Updated our content pack to latest in snapcraft upstream for the kde-neon extension.
  • Various fixes to ease updating our snapcraft files with new releases ( to ease CI automated releases )

An update to the “Very exciting news coming soon”: While everything went well, it is not (yet!) happening. I do not have the management experience the stakeholders are looking for to run the project. I understand completely! I have the passion and project experience, just not management in this type of project. So with that said, are you a KDE/C++ developer with a management background and have a history of bringing projects to the finishline? Are you interested in an exciting new project with new technologies? Talk to me! I can be reached via sgmoore on the various chat channels, sgmoore at kde dot org, or connect via linkedin and message: https://www.linkedin.com/in/scarlettgatelymoore If you know anyone that might be interested, please point them here!

As this project gets further delayed, it leaves me without an income still. If you or someone you know has any short term contract work let me know. Pesky bills and life expenses don’t pay themselves 🙁 If you can spare some change ( anything helps ) please consider a donation. https://gofund.me/5d0691bc

A big thank you to the community for making my work possible thus far!

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