Customizing the Welcome Center for Distros

Development
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Hi there!

I’m considering using the Welcome Center in Ubuntu Studio, but I’m wondering if there’s a way to change, for instance, the mock desktop layout in the “Simple When Needed” screen.

In Ubuntu Studio, we use a modified layout for our desktop, opting for a top panel and a different default background (see below). As such, the “Simple When Needed” screen doesn’t work, and I noticed it’s not customizable without modifying the package to carry a patch, which is something I certainly don’t want to do as that would affect Kubuntu.

Ubuntu Studio 24.10
Ubuntu Studio 24.10450×281 25.8 KB

I was considering skipping that screen altogether, but I noticed that the command line options don’t really work since it appears as though Plasma does the launching itself and not through systemd or xdg autorun.

With that in mind, I’m wondering if there is a better way to customize the default screens, or if not, if that could be implemented in the future. I understand the first page can be customized, along with additional pages, but this seems to be a bit of a blocker from using it for Ubuntu Studio.

Thanks in advance!

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There is documentation regarding this in plasma-welcome repo, how to customize it for different distro:

What you are asking is both legitimate and not accounted for.

You maybe want a different package like plasma-welcome-ubuntu-studio to be able to customize it to your need.

Otherwise open a feature request to https://bugs.kde.org/

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Yes, I’m familiar with that documentation, which is why I asked here to see if maybe there was something undocumented and what-not.

Ok, well then feature request it is, but in the meantime I’m likely going to have to do a package fork like you mentioned, which isn’t ideal.

Thanks for the advice! :slight_smile:

EDIT: For reference, bug filed here: 499555 – Feature Request: Ability to customize or remove default pages

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There is also, that should make things simpler that changing the source:

Run the app with the --pages argument to show specific pages (e.g. KDEConnect,Vaults.qml,01-NateOS)

Where you can omit or replaces pages, you will still need to package the eventual page you want to add.

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While that would be nice, the autolaunch mechanism for plasma-welcome seems to be encoded into plasmashell directly, as I could find neither a systemd user service nor an xdg/autorun .desktop file. Therefore a command-line option wouldn’t work for this use case.

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By changing the org.kde.plasma-welcome.desktop file Exec field you can change the parameters run.

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Hmm… I hadn’t considered that and will give it a shot in the meantime while the bug is being worked on. Thanks!

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And the launch is with src/kded/daemon.cpp · master · Plasma / Welcome Center · GitLab

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Thanks. After experimentation with changing the .desktop file (remember, I’m trying to keep from modifying or patching the source), it appears as though the arguments in Exec=plasma-welcome are not honored when kded launches it, using only the arguments in daemon.cpp. Modifying that would potentially hurt Kubuntu, so that is a no-go as well.

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I noticed why, daemon.cpp uses KIO::CommandLauncherJob when it should use KIO::ApplicationLauncherJob that resolves the .desktop file.
That’s a bug, easily fixable.

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