How can I get this theme working properly in MX 17 (possibly the upcoming MX 18 too)

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catalinux
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How can I get this theme working properly in MX 17 (possibly the upcoming MX 18 too)

#1 Post by catalinux »

I switched to Linux on MX 16 just a month before MX 17 went available. I browsed xfce-look.org and found a theme called AfterDark that looked extraordiarly good on my aging Acer netbook. However I didn't switch to MX 17 on that thing because that same theme doesn't look quite the same on there like it did on MX 16 (here is what I am talking about). Saddly the theme appears to have been abandoned and the dev appears nowhere to be found. I'd love to support the theme in the future in my (ever shrinking) spare time because I love both the colour palette and the size of the buttons which is the same as in the default greybird theme that MX ships with (again, I found no theme with dimensions like that so far), but first I'd love to get it working properly (a.k.a. how it was designed to work) on newer versions of MX.

Does anyone know what can I do?
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asqwerth
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Re: How can I get this theme working properly in MX 17 (possibly the upcoming MX 18 too)

#2 Post by asqwerth »

catalinux wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 10:35 am I switched to Linux on MX 16 just a month before MX 17 went available. I browsed xfce-look.org and found a theme called AfterDark that looked extraordiarly good on my aging Acer netbook. However I didn't switch to MX 17 on that thing because that same theme doesn't look quite the same on there like it did on MX 16 (here is what I am talking about). Saddly the theme appears to have been abandoned and the dev appears nowhere to be found. I'd love to support the theme in the future in my (ever shrinking) spare time because I love both the colour palette and the size of the buttons which is the same as in the default greybird theme that MX ships with (again, I found no theme with dimensions like that so far), but first I'd love to get it working properly (a.k.a. how it was designed to work) on newer versions of MX.

Does anyone know what can I do?
I don't think you can. GTK themes are made to work with apps and programs made with the gtk toolkit. XFCE and in fact most desktop environments except for Plasma and LXQT use gtk for most of their programs.

I see that theme was posted in 2014. That's ancient for gtk themes. MX15/16 was gtk3.14.

Debian 9/MX17 = gtk3.22.

Old gtk themes won't be compatible with the current gtk toolkit that is why current gtk programs look weird or can't even work when applied with old gtk themes.

You will need to find a current replacement theme you can live with.
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catalinux
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Re: How can I get this theme working properly in MX 17 (possibly the upcoming MX 18 too)

#3 Post by catalinux »

there are still gtk 2 apps and even the current xfce version is at gtk 2 (even though many components have been updated to 3). I know it is ancient and I'd love to update it to get at least some support in gtk 3. But so far I'd like to get it working properly with gtk 2 stuff.
asqwerth wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 11:04 am I see that theme was posted in 2014. That's ancient for gtk themes. MX15/16 was gtk3.14.
Many apps were gtk 2. Otherwise how do you explain the fact that it looked quite the same as on the site?
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manyroads
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Re: How can I get this theme working properly in MX 17 (possibly the upcoming MX 18 too)

#4 Post by manyroads »

The theme looks pretty basic (& not really very unique)... If you want a dark background theme that works on a recent version of things (xfce), you can always search here (look at the ratings "Score" for an indication of quality).

https://www.xfce-look.org/
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catalinux
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Re: How can I get this theme working properly in MX 17 (possibly the upcoming MX 18 too)

#5 Post by catalinux »

manyroads wrote: Mon Dec 10, 2018 11:49 am The theme looks pretty basic (& not really very unique)... If you want a dark background theme that works on a recent version of things (xfce), you can always search here (look at the ratings "Score" for an indication of quality).

https://www.xfce-look.org/
I mostly like the colour pallete it uses. Most themes I came across use either some light gray / white pallete or some sort of dark gray / black pallete. The blue it has, combined with the orange shades feel really good to me with the right wallpaper and icon pack (I mostly like using Flat-Remix with that one). Apart from that, the widgets seem pretty similar in size on this one compared with the default Greybird theme that MX has (especially in the Whisker Menu).
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Stevo
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Re: How can I get this theme working properly in MX 17 (possibly the upcoming MX 18 too)

#6 Post by Stevo »

If you describe what changes you see when running it in MX 17, we won't have to try to find them ourselves comparing two similar screenshots.

catalinux
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Re: How can I get this theme working properly in MX 17 (possibly the upcoming MX 18 too)

#7 Post by catalinux »

It's been a while since I last logged in, I was caught up with my dissertation thesis and a full-time job and I almost forgot about this thread until I cleaned up my desktop :D Sorry for the very very very late response.
Stevo wrote: Sat Jan 12, 2019 3:21 pm If you describe what changes you see when running it in MX 17, we won't have to try to find them ourselves comparing two similar screenshots.
What I can see as changed is the fact that the theme (same theme, no files changed between the versions) look more flat. On MX 16 the theme had some gradients rendered especially on the mouse hover selection area which made it look like it had some depth. On the other side I saw that on MX 17 and beyond the elements look more monocolor on the selection area, thery look more like some flat blocks.

Also, the scrollbars look more different; apart from the gradient aspect, there is also the fact that their texture is different. on MX 16 they had some 3 lines on them (kinda like the ones on Windows XP with the Luna theme, I guess). On MX 17 the scrollbars look more like rectangular blocks with a single color.

I know Stevo said no more screenshots, but I had already some screens of the individual (cropped) elements so I can better explain what I was referring to in the original post. I created this post where one can see better what I was talking about, hopefully.

From what asquerth said
asqwerth wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 11:04 am Old gtk themes won't be compatible with the current gtk toolkit that is why current gtk programs look weird or can't even work when applied with old gtk themes.

You will need to find a current replacement theme you can live with.
I understand that the GTK toolkit moves quite fast and if you're creating a theme you have to keep the pace with it, right?

Well, I could still try my luck into this while being stuck at home I guess :D is there anyone that can help with any explanation on why is this happening at least?
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