Highlight proprietary license in app details page

[Lesik]

Hi! This is my first PR in this repo, sorry if I did things how you usually wouldn't.

To start with something simple, I went for the second part of #1365, "if a software is proprietary software maybe it could show "Proprietary" in red color and/or with a warning icon".

I tried eyeballing the colors to find a pleasant match that draws attention yet doesn't distract too much, I think I got it alright:

To keep contrast between background and text according to WCAG, I also had to adjust the "subtext" (link/text) color when the ListBox is highlighted.

I was thinking of adding some sort of 🛈 icon that on hover would show a popup that explains the downsides of proprietary software because new users who don't know what proprietary means might be confused. Thoughts?

[razzeee]

hey, thanks for looking into this, but I'm not sure if we want it like that. I do have some notes on how this looks etc, but I'm a bit worried about the implications of this.

@ramcq is this something we want? I know that we will always push FOSS apps to be front and center but design like this might lead to non-FOSS apps not wanting to be on flathub

[razzeee]

For context gnome software:

The Learn More then leads here https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-software/-/wikis/Software-licensing

[Danielgomesp]

Hi everyone, I have designed this idea trying to address the following concerns:

• Inform that the app is proprietary;
• Avoid a design that may lead non-FOSS apps not to want to be on Flathub;
• Follow the website's current design;
• Follow the gnome-software idea

Or, we can just add the word "Proprietary" in front of "License"?

What do you guys think?

[Lesik]

Thanks for the mockups @Danielgomesp! Out of these two, I personally prefer the one that has a bit of explainer text. However, I think we could take a bit more inspiration out of the GNOME Software design. Just "You may not be able to contribute to this app" doesn't really explain much, and most people might not even be interested in contributing to random apps they're using, so they'll think "how does this affect me?". But proprietary software has more caveats than just that, as the GNOME Software tile explains. Would it be possible to incorporate a more detailed explainer to fit with the Flathub design? Since Flathub is often used in combination with GNOME Software, a uniform approach would be of benefit here imho.

Edit: And while I do agree that the red background of my PR might be a bit off-putting for proprietary software developers, I do think some visual distinction is necessary. After all, most software in the Linux ecosystem (and in Flathub) is FLOSS. Considering that many distributions (Debian, Fedora, ...) do not incorporate proprietary apps into their repositories, it's not unreasonable for a new Flathub user to assume that all the apps they will encounter on the Flathub website is libre, too. Perhaps a lighter, less off-putting color would be a compromise? I like the very light shade of yellow used for the icons in GNOME Software (yellow standing for warning, rather than red - error).

[razzeee]

Just cause I'm looking at permission code in gnome software right now, it also shows an app as unsafe, due to proprietary licenses.

Not sure if there is anything, that overrides it in some cases.

[ramcq]

I can't really answer the design question, but I support highlighting Proprietary software and the potential downsides. I think some more textual description is needed perhaps in addition to a highlight/warning color or icon, rather than just making something red like it's broken. Flathub is after all trying to promote/support/build the free and open source Linux desktop; so we do care about favouring and promoting FOSS > Proprietary. We are just enabling developer and user choices by supporting any (distributable) software.

[razzeee]

This shouldn't be needed anymore, with the new design. Thx for looking into it.