Platform guides - splash screens

Ubuntu offers three kinds of splash screens for applications:

  1. A splash with a gradient background, the application icon and application name (default)
  2. A splash with a gradient background and an image
  3. A splash faking a MainView with header text set giving the illusion that the application has started instantly but with its contents being shown later on.

Apps by default get option 1 and the gradient background is all black by default as well. So nothing changes until you start adding the new entries to the desktop file of your application. Those entries are the following:

X-Ubuntu-Splash-Show-Header (boolean)

Whether an application header should be shown on the splash screen. It turns on splash screen mode 3 (as described above). The header will display the text in X-Ubuntu-Splash-Title, if defined, or the application name otherwise.

X-Ubuntu-Splash-Title (text, to be localizable soon)

See X-Ubuntu-Splash-Show-Header above.

X-Ubuntu-Splash-Image (file name)

File name of an image present in the directory stated in the Path entry. The splash image is centered on the splash screen and displayed in its actual size (ie, it's not stretched or shrunk and aspect ratio is kept).

X-Ubuntu-Splash-Color (color)

Background color of the splash screen. It uses QColor::setNamedColor to parse a color value out of a text string. The see its documentation for valid string formats and values. If X-Ubuntu-Splash-Show-Header is true, it defaults to the theme's background color, otherwise it defaults to black.

X-Ubuntu-Splash-Color-Header (color)

Background color used in the upper area of the splash screen (ie, its header area). It uses QColor::setNamedColor to parse a color value out of a text string. There will be a vertical gradient between X-Ubuntu-Splash-Color-Header and X-Ubuntu-Splash-Color in the upper half of the splash background. By default it uses X-Ubuntu-Splash-Color (or its default value, if not set).

Background color used in the bottom area of the splash screen (ie, its footer area). It uses QColor::setNamedColor to parse a color value out of a text string. There will be a vertical gradient between X-Ubuntu-Splash-Color and X-Ubuntu-Splash-Color-Footer in the lower half of the splash background. By default it uses X-Ubuntu-Splash-Color (or its default value, if not set).