DogWalk

DogWalk is a fork of CatWalk, by Driglu4it. for KDE Plasma 6.

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Table of Contents

• About
• Purpose
• Installation
• Roadmap
• Acknowledgment
• Conclusion
• License

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About

A simple plasmoid showing the total CPU usage which is a fork of Driglu4it's CatWalk. CatWalk itsself is modeled after RunCat, a macOS taskbar app by Kyome𓃠.

Purpose

The purpose of this project is to enable additional desktop customisation that is unique and personal. More imporantly it is a fun way to learn about git, project management, linux desktop developement and documentation.

Installation

Requirements

• KDE Plasma 6.0 or higher
• Plasma System Monitor

Installation Methods

1. Manual Installation Using Terminal

1. Clone the repo.
2. Enter the Repo
3. Move folder to ".local" Directory

git clone https://github.com/BelArvardan/DogWalk.git
cd DogWalk
mv org.kde.plasma.dogwalk $HOME/.local/share/plasma/plasmoids/

2. Manual Installation from Desktop GUI

1. Right-click on the desktop or panel → Select “Add Widgets”
2. In the “Add Widgets” sidebar, click the 🛠️ settings icon (top-right corner of the widget panel) Choose “Install Widget from Local File...”
3. In the file picker dialog: Select "org.kde.plasma.dogwalk.tar.gz" file containing the widget
4. Click “Open” KDE will ask for confirmation; if valid, the widget will be installed.
5. You can now drag or double-click the new widget to add it to your desktop or panel.

3. Automatic Installation from Desktop

1. Right-click on the desktop or panel → Choose “Add Widgets”
2. In the “Add Widgets” sidebar, click the 🛠️ settings icon (top-right) → Select “Get New Widgets…”
3. In the “Get New Plasma Widgets” window: Search for "DogWalk"
4. Click “Install” on the one you want Once installed, drag the widget from the list onto your desktop or panel

4. Other Ways to Install

1. Can Be installed Directly through the web through pling.com.

2. It can also be installed Directly using KDE Plasma's Default Software Center App "Discover".

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Roadmap

• Make package available on the KDE Store to allow direct installation from the desktop.

• Fix SVGs to automatically recognize and adjust to system themes.

• Single unified tarball for installation.

• Improve the consitency and flow of the animation.

• Support Additional Localizations.

• Color Picker to allow user to select custom color.

• Aditional animals and objects similar to RunCat.

• Additional processes to follow beyond just the cpu.

Acknowledgment

Thank you to all the people, animals and large language models that gave me the resources and motivation to make this. In particular those listed below.

Vladimir

Vladimir is my adopted German Shepherd/Husky Mix who was the inspiration behind making this. He's also solely responsible for making sure that I put down my laptop and get some fresh air and excersize every day.

Yuri Saurov

Driglu4it is the creator of CatWalk and is responsible for all of the code used in this project. All I really had to do was change a few words, icons and images.

Takuto Nakamura

Kyome𓃠 created RunCat, which was sited by Driglu4it as the visual inspiration for his plasmoid CatWalk. I used and enjoyed RunChenat when I was a mac user years ago.

ChatGPT

The Image Generation Feature in GPT-4o has been greatly improved.

Prior to this update I was unable to get images that were consistant enough to use and/or the legs were too janky.

ChatGPT was also useful for the documentation part by quickly makeing templates and instructions guides.

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Conclusion

Although This was an incredibly simple project. The documentation and testing still took up a decent ammount of time. I have greater appreciation then ever toward everyone contributing to open source projects.

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License

GNU General Public License v2.0 or later

This project is licensed under the terms of the GNU GPL v2.0 or later.