Bug 228805

Summary: more efficient screenshot handling
Product: [Unmaintained] ksnapshot Reporter: Ronny Standtke <Ronny.Standtke>
Component: generalAssignee: Richard Moore <rich>
Status: RESOLVED UNMAINTAINED    
Severity: wishlist CC: dev+kde
Priority: NOR    
Version First Reported In: unspecified   
Target Milestone: ---   
Platform: Ubuntu   
OS: Unspecified   
Latest Commit: Version Fixed/Implemented In:
Sentry Crash Report:
Attachments: wrapper script for ksnapshot

Description Ronny Standtke 2010-02-27 21:00:49 UTC 
Version:            (using KDE 4.4.0)
Installed from:    Ubuntu Packages

Short disclaimer: I maintain a Linux distribution for Swiss schools (lernstick) which uses KDE as the main desktop.

One user complained that making screenshots with ksnapshot is very inefficient. I interviewed her and she explained to me her usual workflow on Windows:

1) Press a hotkey that triggers starting up her screenshot program. The program hides in the systray and then automatically starts the configured grabbing function (fullscreen, window, region, ...)

2) Execute the grabbing function (e.g. select a region). The screenshot program then automatically puts the grabbed data into the clipboard.

3) Paste the screenshot in your favorite application and work with it.

4) Pressing the hotkey again (while the screenshot application still runs) just triggers the configured grabbing function again. So all in all, the workflow is just: hotkey, grab, paste.


Compare this to the workflow offered by ksnapshot:
1) Starting ksnapshot does not trigger the configured grabbing function. You have to manually start it (or use the command line to start with a selected grabbing function, but this is really out of the scope for our users).

2) Grabbed data is not automatically put into the clipboard, you have to do this manually.

3) Running ksnapshot again opens another instance of ksnapshot instead of just triggering the configured grabbing function again. Having several instances of ksnapshot open is completely confusing to users and (most probably) useless.


It would be very nice if one could work with ksnapshot as efficient as with the closed source counterparts. Fortunately, ksnapshot has a dbus interface. This way I could write a quick and dirty wrapper script that tries to make our users happy (I will attach it to this bug report). Unfortunately, our options with the wrapper script are very limited and I would really appreciate it when the ksnapshot developers would add the features mentioned above natively into the program.

Ronny
Comment 1 Ronny Standtke 2010-02-27 21:01:38 UTC 
Created attachment 41177 [details]
wrapper script for ksnapshot
Comment 2 Ronny Standtke 2010-02-27 21:05:43 UTC 
Comment on attachment 41177 [details]
wrapper script for ksnapshot

autodetection of scripts seems to be broken... changing manually to text/plain
Comment 3 Frank Steinmetzger 2012-03-28 18:41:21 UTC 
For the record: I find it handy to have several KSnapshot windows open. The KSnapshot window already has a button to get a new screenshot into the existing window.

In my use case, I edit a document and view the PDF result. I make a screenshot of the PDF, then recompile the document and afterwards make another screenshot of the PDF. Now I can quickly and easily see the differences between the two PDF version by switching back and forth between the two KSnapshot windows, without having to make a copy of the PDF and opening it in another viewer window.
Comment 4 Andrew Crouthamel 2018-09-04 04:21:59 UTC 
Hello! Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but this project has been unmaintained for many years and I will be closing this bug. Spectacle is the replacement for ksnapshot now. Please test again and file a new bug for Spectacle if you still have issues. Thank you!