Application for Forking UKUI-KWin from KWin

[MouseZhang]

Dear KWin Development Team,

I am one of the maintainers of the UKUI desktop environment, and I am writing to apply for the fork of the ukui-kwin code. We hold great admiration for your KWin project and deeply value and respect your insights and suggestions. In our project, we have specific requirements that necessitate some customization to KWin, and we hope to gain your approval.

The modifications we intend to make in the fork include, but are not limited to, the following points:

1. Tablet Mode Support: We have incorporated support for the UKUI tablet mode, which differs from the existing tablet mode mechanism in KWin. Therefore, corresponding modifications are required to adapt to our desktop environment.

2. Virtual Keyboard: We have developed a virtual keyboard, but the current window layering in KWin does not fully meet our needs. Particularly, when using the virtual keyboard for text input, pop-up windows such as QCompleter often obscure the virtual keyboard. To address this issue, we need to add a new window layer to ensure that the virtual keyboard always displays above popup windows.

3. Custom Protocols: To fulfill the application requirements in the UKUI environment, we have added or modified certain protocols, such as the blur effect with gradual intensity changes.

4. Window Snapping Functionality: We have implemented a window snapping feature similar to that in Windows 11, which allows users to manage windows more efficiently.

5. Global Gestures: We have replaced the original edge gestures in KWin with global gestures, such as using a four-finger swipe to invoke search.

6. Dependency Management: We aim to release UKUI without some of the dependencies associated with the Plasma desktop environment, while still using KWin as our window manager and Wayland compositor.

7. X11 Support: We require continued support for X11 and plan to develop new features to ensure flexibility and compatibility of UKUI across various systems.

We genuinely value and respect your collaboration and feedback. If granted permission, we commit to keeping our fork in sync with the upstream KWin and regularly submitting our generic improvements and patches.

We sincerely appreciate you taking the time to review our application. We look forward to working with you to advance the development of Linux desktop environments.

Best regards,

Mouse Zhang
UKUI Desktop Environment Maintainer