Hi Didier,Considering the large number of Debian derivatives (probably more than 100, and that's without counting the ones derived from Ubuntu), it would be great to have a set of standard tools and packages for rebranding in Debian. That's why I completely agree with your idea.
There are some special purpose distributions --for example ThinStation-- that make the rebranding process extremely easy. You just have to provide a set of files (bootsplash, wallpaper, etc) and a config file, and the tools provided for building customized installation images take care of the rest. This is just an example, and I realize that in Debian this might not be so easy to implement.
IMHO, the rebranding process in Debian shouldn't be more complex than having to perform an "apt-get install debian-rebrand", and then providing the necessary files and running a single script.
I understand that this might be a bit off-topic, but nonetheless I wanted to comment on this since it could be a very nice improvement for Wheezy and future releases (and something quite welcome in the context of the expanding derivatives ecosystem).
Best regards, Marcelo On Tue, 15 Nov 2011 12:05:13 -0300, Didier Raboud <odyx@debian.org> wrote:
I would whole-heartedly welcome package-specific branding packages. I'm wondering if we could not make a sane use of Provides. e.g. : debian-theme Depends: debian-wheezy-theme Provides: distro-theme Recommends grub2-theme, gdm3-theme debian-wheezy-theme Provides: distro-theme Recommends: grub2-theme-spacefun, gdm3-theme-spacefun grub2-theme-spacefun Provides: grub2-theme gdm3-theme-spacefun Provides: gdm3-themeThen of course, the question of "conditional Recommends" comes back on thetable: we want gdm3-theme installed only if gdm3 is installed. Opinions ? Cheers, OdyXP.S. Before going ahead with more planning, ideas should be dumped to a wikipage for wider discussion, IMHO.