Ubuntu/GNOME 3 XML wallpaper creation

I already published a script that sets a random image file as desktop wallpaper. It has only one downside: you have to run it every time you want to rotate your wallpaper.

However GNOME since 2.28 allows assigning a slide show as wallpaper by providing an image list in XML format. There you can specify the order and duration for each image. Moreover, you can even define a transition from one image to another.

So I decided to create a simple script that generates an XML file for a given set of images and, optionally, sets that as the current wallpaper. It requires GNOME 3+ or Ubuntu (11.10 or later).

Source code

You can download the latest version at the script page on my website.

Arguments

The script is quite flexible. Use it as follows:

generate-wallpaper-xml [options] pictures_dir xml_file

Where:

• options - Any combination of the following:
  • -d <number> - Override default display duration (1795 seconds, ca. half an hour)
  • -s <mode> - Sort the files according to mode, whose values are:
    • name - Sort by file path and name
    • shuffle - Randomize file order
  • -t <number> - Override default transition duration (5 seconds). If 0, no transition is used
  • -v - Verbose output
  • -w - Set the generated XML file as current wallpaper
• pictures_dir - Path to directory with pictures
• xml_file - Path to the output XML file

Usage examples

• generate-wallpaper-xml ~/Pictures ~/Pictures/wallpapers.xml

  Creates the file wallpapers.xml in the Pictures subdirectory (in the user’s home directory) from picture files from the same subdirectory.

• generate-wallpaper-xml -w ~/Pictures ~/Pictures/wallpapers.xml

  The same as above, but additionally sets the generated file as the current wallpaper.

• generate-wallpaper-xml -w -d 600 -t 0 ~/Pictures ~/Pictures/wallpapers.xml

  The same as above, plus sets display duration of each file to 10 minutes (600 seconds), and disables transitions between images.

• generate-wallpaper-xml -w -s shuffle -d 600 -t 0 ~/Pictures ~/Pictures/wallpapers.xml

  The same as above, plus shuffles the file list so that they are ordered randomly.