âFor whom the bell tollsâ was a nice touch 
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Snap apps are not yet properly themed, which is a shame given that 18.04 is already out. Ironically, flatpak apps support communitheme pretty well since 3 days ago, faster than ubuntuâs own snapâŚ
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I propose to use the ubuntu purple rather than blue that reminds of GNOME Vanilla for sliders and progress bars.
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Iâm afraid itâs me again!
Iâve been mulling over menu titles. I spend a lot of time looking at these because my main apps have them.
So, to sum up: I know from @c-lobrano that it isnât yet possible to fuse menu bar with window heading, because Mutter doesnât support it. And I also know that the design team werenât in favour of light menu titles.
In that case, for the menu titles, I think simply tweaking the shade of dark grey would be an improvement. Currently, I think there are two oddities:
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The shade of grey used is very close to the in-focus window heading, but not identical. To my eye, itâs in the âuncanny valleyâ. Itâs too close to make a pleasing contrast, but not close enough to make a pleasing match.
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We have three different shades of grey involved (in-focus window heading, out-of-focus window heading, menu titles). I think this could be made slightly more elegant?
So, hereâs my new suggestion: for the menu titles, use the same shade of grey as the out-of-focus window heading.
This is a very subtle change but I think itâs an improvement. It means the window heading and menu titles will either match completely (if the window is out of focus) or be a bit more different to each other, and make a more pleasing contrast (when the window is in focus). It also means we only have two shades of grey in play.
Here are mockups to show the proposal.
In focus, not maximised:
In focus, maximised:
Out of focus:
Illustration of the contrast (View, Layer and Object have the proposed background colour, whereas Path, Text and Filters have the current background colour):
Just a suggestion as always, feel free to discount. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder!
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Great work Stuart
I think itâs a subtle but very nice tweak. Would you mind opening an issue yourself? (please add the screenshots or at least refer to this post).
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Why do you think its not possible to blend the menubar with the window titlebar? Ambiance does. I guess all you need to do is remove the dark line at the bottom of the window titlebar - then there would be no separation.
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The analysis took place here and we thought that the line was a server side decoration, thatâs why mutter. However, youâre right, on Ambiance the separation does not look the same. Iâll have a further look
IMHO I think it looks better when they are seperated - especially with @jaggers color change above.
This is (1) current (2) only seperation line (3) same color without line: (click for bigger image)
Sorry to all, but @CraigD was right. Not sure why at the beginning I was unable to make it work, probably because itâs kind of server side and require reboot or refresh 
Probably to make it work best, we should add side borders to menubar too
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Here gnome-terminal
Libre office
EDIT: screenshots above show a thicker border in menubar which is not actually visible on my display
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Iâm no designer - so Iâll leave the choice as to which âlooksâ better to you 
However, seeing as you can drag the window by the menubar - I think it looks nicer when it is integrated, as it then feels âpartâ of the titlebar, and more obvious that this space is dragable.
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I just took the task 
you are making some good findings, so please do keep up contributing to the conversation. Anyway, good point.
Iâll create an issue later (if @jaggers havenât done that already) with the title âTweak the menubar colorâ and tag @luxamman there, so we can discuss what to do.
I was going to create an issue when I got home this evening
If âno separatorâ is now possible I prefer that and canât wait to try it!
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Whilst on the subject of integrating menubars into titlebars⌠What about reducing the height of titlebars? They feel very chunky, even Ambiance has smaller titlebars. Blending menubar+titlebar gives a large drag area, so reducing the height of the titlebar should be OK. For apps without a menubar, but with a âprimaryâ toolbar - perhaps this should also be dark? This would then give these non-headerbar apps a headerbar like look, no? Just a suggestionâŚ
Just noticed that easytag has a menubar and toolbar - and the window is draggable by titlebar, menubar, and toolbar. I think the draggable areas should look the same. With Ambiance easytagâs titlebar, menubar, and toolbar look unified.
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I was curious to see how the amended shade of grey would work for non-menu apps that pick up the same shade (the main ones being Chromium and Firefox - which, I think, take the same shade for the area behind the tabs). So, I made a mockup showing Chromium.
Couple of other features of this mockup:
- Iâve (again) erased the dividing line between the launcher and the Gnome header. Personally, I really like having a continuous area for these two elements.
- I restored the orange âXâ button to see how I felt about it. I do like the current look too, because itâs smart. But I wonder if the theme lost a little character when it lost the orange circle. Mixed feelings for me - Iâll be happy with whatever the design team chooses.
- I actually restored the app grid button, removing the Ubuntu logo. Again, I have mixed feelings about this, so was just trying it out. I think it was @didrocks who wanted to keep the app grid, and I see his logic. Also, if I forgot about brand loyalty, I do think a square works slightly better than a circle here, purely in terms of composition.
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There is actually a PR for bringing back the orange circle. @godlyranchdressing just needs some more time for finnishing the squircle/circle problem on hover
And there is also a PR for bringing back the app grid icon - we are not sure about the total absence of the ubuntu logo in the whole desktop though
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Perhaps there could be a small in-line logo to the left of the Activities text? Would @didrocks consider that a deviation too far from upstream? I think his idea though is that both the Activities and Applications buttons should be used and thus there shouldnât be an Ubuntu logo next to either (since that would imply that one or the other should be used)? Though having said that, with upstream there is no Dash to Dock, so you wouldnât be using the Applications button at all from the desktop, so maybe the Activities button should get an Ubuntu logo next to itâŚ
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One last post from me on this topic. If Communitheme stays with separate header/menu titles - i.e., different shades of grey + separating line - I wonder if itâs worth adding left/right borders to the menu bar anyway, to make it join more neatly with the header:
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This is something that is supported and discussed many times in the GNOME community. (some extensions even enable this). It wasnât very well received by upstream. I think weâll open a discussion at GUADEC (GNOME Dev conference) about customization/theming for distributions and see about this item (logo next to activity OR at the bottom of the Dock). I still feel as repeated many times that the logo at the bottom feels weirds to me and hide the separation activities/applications.
Edit: I really like the latest updates. Iâm having hard time personnally though with the transparency on the top bar when an application like chromium, without decoration is next to it. You have the light grey tabs next to a semi-transparent dark aubergineâŚ
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