Design/Collaboration

    From The Document Foundation Wiki

    Sharing Work Results

    The LibreOffice community is based on the idea of sharing information and other work results. To use and to further work on your contributions, it is required that we are allowed to do so (license) and that we can technically interpret them (file format).

    Graphics

    Some hints for sharing graphics like artwork or user interface mockups:

    • Provide the sources: Please upload the source files to the wiki and choose the right license (recommendation: "CC Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0, and LGPL 3+, and MPL 1.1"). Note: If you choose e.g. LGPL or MPL as license, you really have to provide the sources, because of the open source license.
    • Use open file formats: Use file formats like SVG or XCF for the source files you upload, so all programs can read and edit it, including free (as in freedom) ones that are available to everyone. If you, for example, created something using Adobe Illustrator, make sure you convert the source file to SVG before uploading it.
    • Consider using free software: Using free software tools will ease collaboration, since less errors will appear when sharing data. You'll find our preferred tools at Design/User Experience/Tools. Using propriatory software like Adobe Photoshop or Adobe Illustrator makes editing the source files with free software much harder and in some cases impossible. So, especially for complex designs, use free software.
    • Prefer vector formats: Vector graphics (e.g. SVG) are much more flexible than raster graphics (e.g. XCF, PNG) and it is easier to make changes or use parts of it in new designs. This is why Inkscape is our recommended design tool and SVG (web standard and Inkscape's source file format) is our standard file format. If a design mainly consists in photo manipulation or something similar, we recommend to use The Gimp and its XCF file format.

    Of course we appreciate any kind of design done with any kind of software, but before you decide to use proprietary software please note that you it might be harder to make use of your contribution. Thank you!