Thanks, that’s much more targeted and useful. A few extra thoughts (without necessarily signing up for any of these tasks):
- The “Gwenview” distracting blank pages, “Misc HMI” superfluous fade animation and “Almost every configuration window” misaligned header texts can definitely considered bugs and would really benefit from a dedicated Bugzilla page each (if other people haven’t already filed something already). Misaligned header text needs more info either way, may as well do it in Bugzilla. The other two are straightforward shortcomings but perhaps not quite trivial to fix, as you say.
- The “Dolphin” and “KNewStuff” points sound like they could be made into configuration options. Unless you want to keep recompiling KDE for future versions, in which case it does sound like easy patches, but more work overall and doesn’t benefit other community members. Consequently, I think time would be best spent to get buy-in from the respective maintainer(s) by making the case for these options, and Bugzilla is also the appropriate place for that kind of discussion. It then counts as a “feature request” kind of issue, but it’s still an issue.
- Perhaps the “Juk” bullet point also falls in this category, but I haven’t looked at the current behavior so perhaps it’s indeed just about using it correctly.
- I haven’t encountered KNewStuff download/install invitations. Not the most familiar with it, but reproduction steps would certainly help too. (I’m only aware of e.g. “Get Blender…” style items in KRunner / Desktop Search, which can be easily disabled in the configuration.)
- As for “Plasma”, swapping default keyboard shortcuts would be an issue of advocacy first and foremost. This needs less of a developer (again, unless you want to maintain patches and keep compiling Plasma going forward) and more of a nuanced discussion with Plasma maintainers. Needless to say, this would be hard to do without a Bugzilla issue because people need a chance to chime in. (Matrix chats could be a way to scope out where the developers stand, though.)
- To clarify for others, “Disconnect” is known as “Log Out” on my system. Which by default displays the dialog with also Shutdown and Reboot options, I figure that’s why it’s assigned to Ctrl+Alt+Del.
- Out of curiosity, why are custom-set shortcuts not sufficient? Even for multiple/automated deployments, it seems much easier to me to write shortcut config files as opposed to changing the hardcoded defaults.
Thanks for bearing with me trying to make the case for individual Bugzilla issues. If we want these changes upstream (and I agree that those sound mostly beneficial for a wider audience), then having Bugzilla pages to reference makes things easier for everyone.
- On one hand, you might get a motivated project maintainer (or other developer) fix your issue without even knowing about this forum post. It increases the chance of these bullet points to be worked on.
- On the other hand, it makes it possible for different people to jump in. Your bullet points cover quite a variety of components, I might find some of them very doable/inviting but others too daunting to try. Splitting up the work into digestible parts gets it done more easily.
- And also, it provides a proper thread of discussion that’s simpler to track for contributors, but also documents for the greater public why a change was deemed necessary. As a bounty hunter, it provides extra support and justification to maintainers in case they’re not (yet) convinced. Now there’s two people (one requester, one patch submitter) who think this change makes sense.
I also had another thought. How about offering to donate a part of your $500 to KDE e.V. for each issue that was fixed to your satisfaction? As an alternative to working for a personal fee. That way you don’t just attract developers with financial aspirations, but also developers who’d skip the payment hassle but just care to boost their contribution to KDE. Earning money changes the attitude towards the work, and makes it feel like work, whereas directing some extra donations towards KDE can be a different kind of motivator and maybe the morally pure one.
Again, no guarantees that any of this will work. I’m just trying to bridge the substantial gap between bounties offered (which are always hairy to pull off) and work being done. It’s great to have people noticing and reporting also the minor issues, I hope you can get something useful out of this.