projects::fbsplash

WARNING: We're in the process of renaming the gensplash project to fbsplash and the old fbsplash kernel patch to fbcondecor. Please report broken links and any other problems you might encounter. See fbcondecor::history for an explanation of the name changes.

INFO: The project website is slowly being migrated to http://fbsplash.berlios.de/. Currently, up-to-date information about fbsplash is available both here and at the new location.

fbsplash (formerly gensplash) is a userspace implementation of a splash screen for Linux systems. It provides a graphical environment during system boot using the Linux framebuffer layer.

fbsplash follows a design policy of being simple, lightweight and fast. To reduce bloat, it uses only a few most important libraries and does not require X11. The code is optimized to have minimal impact on boot-up time.

fbsplash is distro-neutral and can in principle be used on any Linux system which supports the framebuffer, but integration of fbsplash with the initscript system requires writing customized code for different Linux distributions. A reference implementation for Gentoo's baselayout-2 is provided on this site.

fbsplash::splashutils

Currently, all core programs, libraries and scripts developed as parts of the fbsplash project are available in a single package called splashutils. This package includes:

• fbsplashd -- the fbsplash daemon, responsible for displaying the splash screen during boot
• splash_util -- a simple utility for various splash-related tasks not suitable for fbsplashd
• splash_manager -- a wrapper script useful for testing themes, taking screenshots, etc
• libfbsplash -- a library to faciliatate integration of fbsplash with the initscript system
• libfbsplashrender -- a library to facilitate supporting fbsplash theme files in different applications (such as userspace parts of Linux hibernation systems)
• fbcondecor_ctl (optional) -- a control application for the fbcondecor patch
• fbcondecor_helper (optional) -- a kernel helper for the fbcondecor patch
• splash_geninitramfs -- a helper script to include fbcondecor_helper in initramfs images

fbsplash::resources

The contrib/ section contains patches for kernels that aren't officially supported (eg. -mm) and HOW-TO's for Linux distributions other than Gentoo.