Pushing AppStream data to KDE project's master branches

[Matthias Klumpp]

Hi!
A while ago I posted some information about how to add AppStream data
to KDE projects, in order to make the projects visible in
software-centers like Apper, Muon and GNOME-Software.
I also compiled AppStream data for most KDE projects from the existing
information we have on the web[1].
So far, AppStream metadata adoption has been good in KDE, but we can
certainly do better! Fedora is already pulling in additional metadata
from external sources (giving it an impressive 42% metadata coverage
for KDE apps now), which is less than ideal (e.g. the data can't be
translated - but it's still better than no data).
Because adding the metadata is one of these very small things one
easily forgets, and because we expect project maintainers to do
additional work by looking at the XML spec and thinking about a
description for their project, I plan to add AppStream data to the
remaining KDE projects now. This will save the project maintainers
from doing extra work to get their application visible with rich
metadata in software centers.
If you don't want me to add stuff to your repository, please drop me a
note (private email) within the next week.
We are speaking of a small bit of XML, which is placed in
CMAKE_INSTALL_METAINFODIR (/usr/share/appdata) - so this is not a
change which could break anything (in case you still don't like it,
you can always git-revert, but in that case, it might happen that
distributors make up their own metadata file).

For more information about this data in KDE, take a look at this blog post:
http://blog.tenstral.net/2014/05/translated-appstream-metadata-for-kde.html
If you want to create your own data, you are lucky: We just updated
the quickstart guide, which describes how to write the data and
provides some hints on how to create better data:
http://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/chap-Quickstart.html#sect-Quickstart-DesktopApps

If you have any further questions/suggestions etc., let me know!

Cheers,
   Matthias

P.S: There is now a libAppstreamQt[2] available as well (used by muon
so far) for very simple access to AppStream data - if your application
could benefit from the data, you might want to try it!

[1]: https://github.com/Ximion/kde-appstream-metadata-templates
[2]: https://gitorious.org/appstream/appstream/source/master:

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