Graphical Theme for the Columbia Astrophysics Lab computer network

It would be nice to see a visual theme for the Configured Workstations on the CAL network.

Anyone interested in submitting a suggestion should e-mail dkg about it.

There would be two basic elements to any proposed CAL theme: a login screen theme, and a desktop background. It would also be nice to have a customized splash screen at startup.

desktop background

Background wallpaper can be as simple as a 1024x768 or 1280x1024 or 1600x1200 jpeg or png. Even better would be something in vector graphics form (svg or eps) which we could scale cleanly to different sizes.

splash screens

a splash screen shows up as the system is booting. a simple png or jpeg sized at 420x300 should be fine, as would a vector illustration of roughly comparable aspect ratio. Be aware that there will be little icons representing services that show up overlaid along the bottom of the image after login.

login screen theme

we're using gdm for the graphical login. Creating a gdm theme isn't terribly complicated, but it's a bit more complicated than just a single background image. A reference guide to creating gdm themes can be found ​here. Examples of gdm themes can be found ​here. Feel free to submit ideas as well, if you can't create a full theme for whatever reason.