Are there any applications similar to Login Screen GDM2?
It's only supported till Ubuntu Lucid, is the Splash Screen after login available for MavericK?
Yep, Ubuntu-tweak can help you with that.
sudo apt-add-repository ppa:tualatrix/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ubuntu-tweak
Once installed it will be in Applications->System Tools. You'll be able to tweak many things of your Ubuntu including GDM.
A picture is worth a thousand words :
Afaik since 9.10 only gdm group can change appearance properties. The dialog opened by user gdm allows the same changes as in the "normal" user GUI:
gksudo -u gdm dbus-launch gnome-appearance-properties
Ok how to do it in command line :
Open the GDM custom configuration file :
gksudo gedit /etc/gdm/custom.conf
Should have a lot of comment and at the end look like this :
[daemon]
[security]
[xdmcp]
[gui]
[greeter]
[chooser]
[debug]
[servers]
You'll have to add few lines under gui like this :
[daemon]
[security]
[xdmcp]
[gui]
# Path to a gtkrc containing the theme for use in gdmlogin / gdmchooser.
Gtkrc=/path/to/gtkrc
# Specifies the maximum icon width (in pixels) that the face browser will display. Icons larger than this will be scaled.
MaxIconWidth=128
# Specifies the maximum icon height (in pixels) that the face browser will display. Icons larger than this will be scaled.
MaxIconHeight=128
[greeter]
[chooser]
[debug]
[servers]
You will find gtkrc files in these folders :
/usr/share/themes/"Theme Name"/gtk-2.0/gtkrc
Just replace "Theme Name" by the name of the theme you want to use (I suggest you go to /usr/share/themes/
with Nautilus to see the real themes names).
I don't have tested this but it should work. I don't know if you'll have to restart.
In case anybody still cares about this: a way to set the theme used at login time is to configure the login environment such that it runs the Gnome "appearance properties" application when gdm starts up. To do this, you just have to copy a ".desktop" file into the "LoginWindow" autostart directory:
cd /usr/share/applications
sudo cp gnome-appearance-properties.desktop ../gdm/autostart/LoginWindow
Next time you get to the login screen, you'll get the appearance dialog first. After you've set it up the way you like it, you can get rid of the file:
sudo rm /usr/share/gdm/autostart/LoginWindow/gnome-appearance-properties.desktop
There is a project to create an utility to tweak GDM2, its called GDM2Setup. But last time I tested it, it was not stable and don't permitted anything more than what Ubuntu Tweak permit today. But maybe they have add features since then, but I can't test it because there is no PPA for Maverick.
If you have Lucid or Hardy :
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gdm2setup/gdm2setup
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install python-gdm2setup