Default App: Onboard

[Francesco Fumanti]

Hi, 

The adaption of Onboard to GNOME Shell has been our focus since the announcement of Ubuntu switching to GNOME for 17.10. For the reasons outlined by marmuta in this thread, a full integration of the python based Onboard into GNOME Shell seems very difficult, if not impossible. 
https://bugs.launchpad.net/onboard/+bug/1672465

So he started to port Onboard to C and C++. The current state of the port is available here:
https://launchpad.net/onboardosk

The adaption to Ubuntu 17.10 has in fact two aspects: 
1) GNOME Shell 
2) Wayland 

In the meantime, OnboardOSK is quite usable on X, but not yet in Wayland, which brings me to the question, whether Ubuntu 17.10 is also going to use Wayland as default? 

We will not be able to offer a proper release before feature freeze on the 24th of august. What does this mean for Ubuntu 18.04? Will it be possible to have OnboardOSK become default again for Ubuntu 18.04, which is a LTS, if it has not already been the default on-screen keyboard in 17.10? 

Moreover, as OnboardOSK being a fork from Onboard, I wonder whether it has to go through the Universe and Main inclusion process? 

In any case, once OnboardOSK has reached a state where an installation of it becomes sensible, we will probably offer it through PPAs, as we used to do it for Onboard. 

Cheers, 

Francesco 





On 2017-08-20 00:21, Jeremy Bicha wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Since we intend to default to GNOME on Wayland for 17.10 where
> supported by hardware drivers, I nominate removing Onboard from the
> default install.
> 
> Onboard doesn't work in Wayland (LP: #1672465) and it would be
> difficult for it to work there without GNOME Shell being modified to
> allow that. See also https://bugzilla.gnome.org/785677
> 
> GNOME's built-in Caribou on screen keyboard is not as powerful or
> complete as Onboard but maybe it will get better in the next year or
> so. Caribou is very well-integrated to GNOME and is already part of
> the 17.10 default install.
> 
> Thanks,
> Jeremy Bicha
>