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- elementary GTK Theme (Version 3.1) released
elementary GTK Theme (Version 3.1) released
Submitted by DanRabbit on Tue, 05/01/2012 - 07:11Our GTK theme sees another small release, this one focused on fixing a number of small annoyances and also bringing a couple new goodies.
Mutter Support
This release sees initial support for the Mutter window manager. This mainly means Mutter users will get nice smooth anti-aliased window borders. This also lays out the ground work to start thinking about implementing a dark theme for apps.
Popover Fixes
A number of issues regarding popover styling have been addressed. They should appear sleeker than ever with smoother borders that look fantastic on light or dark backgrounds, slight transparency, and a soft gradient.
Text Header Styles
As highlighted in a previous post, this version of the theme contains text header styles that allow app developers to easily display great typography in their apps.
Content View Window
One thing we've been exploring is the use of lightly colored windows. This release provides support for the new Content View Windows found in Granite. One place where you can already see this in action is Granite's About dialog.
Other Fixes
Other fixes include fixing text color for :backdrop widgets, :backdrop styling for Noise' statusbar, a refined style for bottom toolbars, a refined style for Noise' album windows, grips on pane handles, distinguishing between selected and focused rows in treeviews, and more.
Get It Today
As per usual, you can grab the sources from launchpad here, or if you're using our ppa the update will trickle in very soon. Remember to report bugs here and enjoy :)
Hi, I've recently tried this version of the elementary theme, and I find it really nice but, unfortunatelly for me, it has a major drawback. I work a lot with spreadsheets, and, in Libreoffice, the tabs look so tiny that you can't read names on them, and you can't almost see them. It would be nice if you could fix this for the release. I want to use your system for a day to day work, but unless this could be fix it would be impossible for me to use it as my main system.
excelente.
I tried the daily built of luna for 3 months..and there are lots of important things to say..
First of all, you're doing a really good job!
BUT! but there are things that I believe are wrong!
1)..THE DESKTOP.
When a user (and even a professional) use computers, often I have to do operations on files that will use only temporarily (for example, downloading a file, unpack it, modify it and reload it online .. even the mere creation of temporary folders to reorganize files etc..).
The desktop for these things is CRITICAL
One of the most uncomfortable things I've found myself having to do when I used the elementary OS was right each time having to open the file manager.
If a person does not want to use the desktop, is free not to. BUT if a person WANT to use it, why can not have this freedom?
When a user uses a PC, it often happens that while working on a program should use another one to retrieve the data or simply browse other files. Imagine if every time I have to do different jobs I have to close the application I'm working on .. imagine saying to a professional who needs to close autocad to browse the phonebook or that to minimize the program must go every time on the dock or click with right on the title bar. When things work very well .. why remove them?
The minimize button is CRITICAL!
The desktop is not critical, there are file managers for your file browsing/storage needs. The minimize button is not critical either, because you can minimize apps by clicking on them in Plank and navigate them quicly with alt tab.
I think you have never worked with more than one window of an app then. For example, if I have 2 browser windows open and want to minimize just one of them ... I can't. Same with spreadsheets, word documents, scratch windows etc. ... Keeping it like this, it will never be a poweruser OS. Even though it _has_ much potential.
I'm confused; what is so hard about clicking on the dock icon to minimize? If anything it takes exactly the same amount of time to click a minimize button as it does to click a simple dock icon to minimize/maximize. And once you get used to it, it really is a nice change.
Also keep in mind elementary OS is for web browsing, email, etc. Not working in AutoCAD or some other professional software. If you're using the OS for that, then you should know how to modify it to your needs.
That is true. One can get used to minimize to Plank by clicking on Plank. Unfortunately, minimized items stay minimized in Plank until next app is closed. Then all of them gets restored and that is just stupid.
This is the list of apps that need some kind of minimized state:
- Skype (ok, it uses wingpanel icon and there is your consistency, the main reason to remove systray)
- Clipboard managers
- Transmission and other DL managers
- Kazaam and other screen recording apps (Kazaam uses Wingpanel, again inconsistency that was behind removing systray)
Once again, some apps don't need to be visible all the time, they need a systray or Plank to work in background. Hiding them in Plank is OK but please make them stay minimized until clicked.
All these talks about consistency is purely academic and theoretical. We're all coming from Windows (OK, I'm coming from OS/2) and there is no word for consistency there. Why do we want to be holier that the Pope? People know their tools. They know what is gonna happen when click minimize. Who are we pleasing with this theory without real life proof that systray and minimize are wrong?
Am I seeing right? Anti-aliased curved corners for windows?
Is there any plans to change the way how the application menu looks like ? it not really good, you can do much way better than that.
What exactly isn't good about it?
also there is a bug, when i search for an application the search entry only takes one letter, example: if i want to search for 'gedit':
i would write g, when i write 'e' the 'g' vanishes and applications starts 'e' appears in the search results.
the main design of it isn't as good as unity-dash or gnome 3, also it should be activated when user clicks on the superkey 'just like unity and gnome3'. also it should disappear when i click elsewhere on the desktop or in the web browser. also when i browse applications using the categories style, the very right icons don't have border.
DanRabbit hello, you can talk to me if the OS elementary luna already being done, the Ubuntu 12.4 has been released.
I think your theme very well designed and beautiful, I'm waiting for Luna, but for now I'm using Jupiter.
It's getting better and better!
Just an additional note for those interested- the patch for anti-aliased borders in compiz was recently pushed to 12.10.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/compiz-core/+bug/827537
Thanks for the link! I wonder if we can't copy these packages to our PPA...
Checked it out again and nope, it's still not fixed...
Dark Theme ? Wao ... for some apps like video player or image viewer ?
Exactly. For everything that works with colorful content.
I love the way you perfect the interface. elementary by far had the best user experience. I like the Raleway font. I dislike the thick blunt fonts Ubuntu uses all the time.
Very happy with the Mutter support. This means I can enjoy the smooth borders when Luna comes out (although I'll have to set up the session myself, but that shouldn't be too hazardous).
I very much look forward to the dark themes as well, and the about dialog is delicious. I'm thinking elementary may very well win me over. Just goes to show how effective a focus on solid design really is- a somewhat small project like this changing peoples' minds. You're doing amazing work, and I hope you guys can take it all the way in the coming years and make something truly beautiful.
Quick inquiry- is there any way to tell compiz/mutter to display different styles based on the window's contents, sort of like how Kwin doesn't render the radial gradient based on the 'window hint'? Main reason I ask is that GTK 2 (and by extension Qt 4) applications don't have a way to show the inactive widget theme, so the titlebar clashes when they stay behind (much as it did back in GNOME 3.0).
Of course, the right solution is for developers to port their applications (and after Qt5 is released the QGtkStyle developer might port the theme to GTK 3). I just wonder if there's a quick workaround until then.
Could you provide a link to a tutorial, on how to set up a correct mutter session?
(And any idea on how to activate/script expo/compiz scale like behaviour?)
So far, i got it working installing it with
apt-get --no-install-recommends install mutter
Then i had to select a theme with gnome-tweak-tool (probably there's a better way to do this)
apt-get --no-install-recommends install gnome-tweak-tool
(Go to the theme page and select "elementary" for the windows theme)
Now you can run it "mutter --replace"
I'm not sure if it still has some problem/wrong design or i'm just doing it wrong
That is correct, this works. You still have to modify the button layout for mutter so it keeps the close button on the left, maximize on the right. Also, there are some striking visual deficiences.
Namely, the tooltips on Plank and within GTK applications render poorly. Plank's are flat-edged, as though no compositing were available, and the GTK tooltips are crusty on the rounded corners. Not sure if this should be a bug report or not, as mutter is not necessarily designed to run standalone.
Awesome!
I like the new lightly colored windows. Reminiscent of (but cooler than) the old "Pin Stripe" windows in OSX Panther. Nice choice.
Can we have Content View style popup's? that would look really awesome!
We'll start rolling out this new window style gradually where it makes sense :)
Is there a tutorial to create a mutter-session? :)
The alignment of the search icon is not perfectly aligned inside the search box.
Well, 1 image is better than 1000 words:
http://i49.tinypic.com/zx5gzl.png
I hope it's fixable :)
Unfortunately this is a bug in the toolkit :/ All GTK themes are affected.
Is it reported anywhere?
Nautilus still looks so ugly in elementary theme. The sidebar is in white color is not elegant, you can polish it with color that becomes better. The toolbar also needs to polish to match with sidebar. Thx
I definitely agree. It's not just the colour of the sidebar (although I agree that's pretty bad) but also the weird divider. It is totally weird-looking. Same case in Rhythmbox.
Sorry I don't have any plans to add any special cases for GNOME apps. Marlin already looks great without any special considerations ;)
you are doing this on purpose, you know we can't wait for Luna to be released right? Great job with the theme BTW ;)
Awesome, as always! :D
I'm writing this on Windows 8. Now I understand why people complain about it :) In a few months almost all new PCs will come with Win8 preinstalled. Many people will dislike its UI, but buying additional Windows 7 license costs money. This is a chance for elementary and all other linuxes. I hope we won't waste it. Luna must be completely polished by this time. I hope pantheon-notify and all other goodies will be ready for Luna.
I know as a developer how annoying it can be to have people asking when a product will be released, but I don't think you can underestimate how excited I am about Luna! Can we have an estimate? Within the next month? two months? a year? I've wiped my computer several times recently to try different Linuxes fully, as well as virtualizing many others, and Luna has to be the most exciting in quite awhile.
We've passed feature freeze, so [hopefully] Luna will be released before Ubuntu 12.10
Thats a very good news. But I thought you guys just started working on the new mail app 'Geary' by teaming up with Yorba. Do you think it will be ready in 6 months...(approximate time remaining for 12.10 release)? Because, frankly saying Postler is nowhere near other apps developed in elementary.
Yorba started working on Geary a long time ago. I believe they had the first releaser planned for the 4th of May. I'll ask Christian what's the progress and upload the release to testing if it's ready.
So, will Mutter replace Compiz?
It's not entirely certain. At the moment, Mutter is the only window decorator that draws the dark style when requested. Supposedly Unity Window Decorator will get this functionality in the future (12.10?) and thus Compiz on Ubuntu would have it. Since Unity Window Decorator uses Metacity themes, doing this work for Mutter also means doing it for the future Unity Window Decorator.
The problem with mutter is that it's not working with ATI propietary drivers :/
after 2 days using daily build, i have to reinstall ubuntu 12. Jupiter is more better than luna. I just hope when luna is come to final, it will better
well, thats because it is a 'DAILY' build. You shouldn't ignore their wallpaper which says it all!!
This is why you can't have nice things.
If you're referring to the images named "unstable", there should not any ambiguity that they are NOT stable. Please be kind to those working hard to make Luna a great release.
I really like the new About dialog, particularly the subtle button frames and the circular '?' button.