If neither "silent" nor "verbose" are specified on the "splash=xxx" boot parameter, splashutils will simply not start, as though not installed. No comment whatsoever in dmesg (not even about an incomplete parameter). I should think if I dont care if its silent or verbose, and just specify "splash=theme:emergence", it should work - but it doesnt. That just cost me 2 hours frustration because I had no idea that {silent|verbose} was MANDATORY. I suggest either defaulting to silent, if it's missing, or reporting an error in dmesg, or clearly documenting (in your 5-step-instructions) that that keyword MUST be there. I tested splashutils-1.1.9.8, which is the current gentoo-portage version as of today.
I'll think about it.. But please not that in virtually *every* gensplash document out there the 'silent' option is mentioned many times and put into almost every example (the 5 easy steps document is no different here). Moreover, the '5 easy steps document' was written as an example of how to get gensplash working quickly, not as a replacement for the real documentation. If one just takes random pieces out of it without reading the full docs and one expects everything to work just fine, then one is probably making a mistake.
Added some info about this in the '5 steps docs' and in the splashutils documentation.
Thanks for mentioning it in the quick guide, I'm sure that will help lots of people (at least the ones wired like me :-). The "silent" parameter is indeed included in practically every example that can be found, but nowhere does it say that it is actually required. I just double-checked the FAQ and troubleshooting on http://dev.gentoo.org/~spock/projects/gensplash to make sure. It's not like I didnt read most of the docs. Anyway, I consider it resolved now, too. I added it to http://gentoo-wiki.com/HOWTO_fbsplash myself (the #1 google hit on "fbsplash howto").
Thanks for updating the Gentoo wiki.
