Dynamic Wallpapers doesn't works with PaperWM

[iitzrohan]

Describe the bug A clear and concise description of what the bug is.

To Reproduce Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Install Any Dynamic Wallpaper.
2. Set the wallpaper in gnome-settings
3. Activate PaperWM
4. The background becomes flat color.

Expected behavior The background should be same as when the extension was disabled.

Screenshots

System information: Distribution: Fedora Linux GNOME Shell 45.0 Display server: Wayland PaperWM branch/tag: release PaperWM commit: 7919f129bb8027e86ad8f54db682c57340bf5fd0 Enabled extensions:

• AlphabeticalAppGrid@stuarthayhurst
• Battery-Health-Charging@maniacx.github.com
• burn-my-windows@schneegans.github.com
• clipman@popov895.ukr.net
• cloudflare-warp-toggle@khaled.is-a.dev
• color-picker@tuberry
• hotedge@jonathan.jdoda.ca
• supergfxctl-gex@asus-linux.org
• quake-terminal@diegodario88.github.io
• unsafe-mode-menu@linushdot.local
• grand-theft-focus@zalckos.github.com
• miniview@thesecretaryofwar.com
• background-logo@fedorahosted.org
• appindicatorsupport@rgcjonas.gmail.com
• auto-move-windows@gnome-shell-extensions.gcampax.github.com
• user-theme@gnome-shell-extensions.gcampax.github.com
• blur-my-shell@aunetx

Additional context It works as expected when using the normal backgrounds.

[jtaala]

Thanks for the report - can you let me know what you're using for dynamic wallpapers? (e.g. the program or extension) so we can try reproduce.

P.S. I may be misunderstanding what you mean by dynamic wallpapers.

[iitzrohan]

Thanks for the report - can you let me know what you're using for dynamic wallpapers? (e.g. the program or extension) so we can try reproduce.

P.S. I may be misunderstanding what you mean by dynamic wallpapers.

Yeah, Here's the repo i downloaded the wallpaper from https://github.com/manishprivet/dynamic-gnome-wallpapers

For quick installation i ran the following command. curl -s https://wallpapers.manishk.dev/install.sh | sudo bash -s Fuji --global

Also, Fedora comes with 1-2 dynamic wallpapers by default. You can try using that too.

[jtaala]

Hmm - I tried all the fedora 38 ones but couldn't reproduce (although they look like wallpaper that just changes based on the theme).

Will try those you linked.

[iitzrohan]

Hmm - I tried all the fedora 38 ones but couldn't reproduce (although they look like wallpaper that just changes based on the theme).

Will try those you linked.

It's not based on theme. It changes with time. You probably tried the light/dark theme variant. The Dynamic ones have the timer icon at their bottom left while in gnome settings.

[jtaala]

I see it. Can also reproduce!

Will have a look at this one in the next few days. Thanks for reporting.

[Thesola10]

That would be because the wallpaper shown by PaperWM is fake. I figured that out when implementing the night mode wallpaper switch, PaperWM has to draw the wallpaper itself to hide the "real" windows, so to support dynamic wallpapers, we'd need to somehow duplicate or change the position of GNOME's official wallpaper Actor.

[bbhtt]

This is https://github.com/paperwm/PaperWM/issues/365, the title on that issue makes it hard to find. "live" or timed wallpapers is the issue - ones that change based on time of the day or animated.

[iitzrohan]

One way to fix this is to make the background layer fully transparent instead of setting it's own wallpaper.

[Thesola10]

One way to fix this is to make the background layer fully transparent instead of setting it's own wallpaper.

Unfortunately out of the question, as the background layer PaperWM draws is required to hide windows that are supposed to be off-screen, as Mutter doesn't allow windows to be this far off screen.

[jtaala]

Yes, the way to implement this correctly is to add support for this based off Gnome's Background class implementation of Meta.Background - we use the base class (Meta.Background).

Sadly, Gnome hasn't exported (exposed to extensions) their class implementation so we'll need to add our own concrete implementation (which does the same thing) in PaperWM.

[jtaala]

I hopefully should get a bit of time in the next few evenings to give this a go. Otherwise will tackle this in the weekend.

[jtaala]

Got this working on a gnome-44 branch (basically because I can access Background.Background class as I don't have to duplicate code due to gnome-45 not exporting that class).

You can test it out if you want (although it's for gnome-44, I'll port changes to gnome-45 branch shortly, but will be a bit more involved given will need to duplicate code as can't access it directly).

https://github.com/paperwm/PaperWM/tree/fix-637-animated-wallpaper (gnome 44 version)

[jtaala]

Okay, here's a gnome-45 version of this implementation. You'll note that I had to copy large portions of background.js from Gnome-shell since the main Background class wasn't exported.

Call for testing! Please checkout and test this:

git clone https://github.com/paperwm/PaperWM.git
cd PaperWM
git checkout fix-637-animated-wallpaper-gnome45
./install.sh

Then logout / login and try out any dynamic/animated wallpapers.

Thanks!

[jtaala]

I'm digging some of these dynamic wallpapers. Thanks for reporting this @iitzrohan.

[iitzrohan]

It's working on "fix-637-animated-wallpaper-gnome45" Branch. Thanks @jtaala for fixing.This extension is a godsend for productivity.May i close this issue now?

[jtaala]

Leave it open - It'll get closed when I merge it into develop and release.

[jtaala]

Found some cool dynamic wallpapers here: https://github.com/saint-13/Linux_Dynamic_Wallpapers/

[iitzrohan]

Thank you for sharing. I thought there were only a few dynamic wallpapers available.