Zorin OS supports Dash to Panel development with sponsorship
- Zorin OS has pledged financial support to ensure the continuation of the Dash to Panel extension.
- Charles Gagnon, the extension's maintainer, has faced community criticism regarding donations but appreciates the sponsorship.
- This collaboration highlights the growing cooperation within the open-source community to improve user experience.
In a significant development for open-source software, the Dash to Panel extension, widely used within the GNOME desktop environment, will continue to thrive thanks to financial support from the Zorin OS team. Founded in 2016, Zorin OS is a Linux distribution based on Ubuntu that seeks to provide a more familiar user experience for people migrating from Windows by extensively modifying the GNOME desktop layout. Recently, Charles Gagnon, the current maintainer of Dash to Panel, received sponsorship from Zorin OS to sustain the extension's development, following previous controversies regarding voluntary donations. The sponsorship comes amid mixed reactions from the community when Gagnon introduced a donations button to his project. The developer expressed gratitude for the moral support from the Zorin team, dismissing concerns that he was exploiting their prior work on Dash to Panel. Zorin OS has maintained a collaborative relationship with Gagnon and the Dash to Panel project, often incorporating upstream code changes back into their Zorin Taskbar extension. This beneficial partnership highlights a growing trend among open-source projects that work together to enhance user experience across different distributions. Artyom Zorin, co-maintainer of Zorin OS, stated his original team developed the codebase behind Dash to Panel and has remained committed to contributing to the wider free and open-source software (FOSS) ecosystem. Gagnon confirmed he would continue his work on Dash to Panel to ensure compatibility with future GNOME versions, despite having no immediate plans for new feature implementations. The mutual exchange of code between Zorin OS and Dash to Panel not only benefits users of Zorin but also expands the reach of enhancements across different Linux distributions. Looking forward, the collaboration reflects the broader open-source movement towards unity among users and developers. By supporting each other, projects like Dash to Panel and Zorin OS demonstrate the strength of collaboration and shared goals in the FOSS community, paving the way for a better experience for all Linux users. With the support from Zorin, Dash to Panel's development looks promising, addressing both practical user needs and the ideological concerns of supporting free software development.