Call for participation: an ubuntu default theme lead by the community?

Hi @nusi, thanks for taking time to test the new theme :wink:

Youā€™ll be happy to see that weā€™ve already decided to move to brighter button highlight, at least on dark backgrounds.

We use red color to show dangerous/destructive actions, so changing the close button to red is not that bad, but the orange close button is also very Ubuntu, this is why we kept as it is (untill now, at least)

Rounder menuā€™s corner is definitly something Iā€™d like to try

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I tried to make dash solid when windows are maximized. And i do it! :smile: The top panel with dash looks like one. It looks really good for me now. Next my step is to set the same transparency for panel and dash. What do you think about this bars theme?

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Remember that you still need to take into account the intellihide case, where the dock appears on top of windows (solid selected opacity is used in that case).

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I donā€™t think the blue for the sliders makes much sense. I know many in the community are like ā€˜brrrr, too much orange, change itā€™, butā€¦why blue? Isnā€™t ā€˜too much orangeā€™ kinda the whole point of Ubuntu theming? Where else is this blue being used? Presumably it was going to be a key part of the Unity 8 design language?

A more plausible ā€˜third colourā€™ to orange and dark gray could be the green thatā€™s being used to draw attention to important dialogue boxes and so is already being used as a ā€˜third colourā€™ for that purpose (tho maybe they would lose their effect if green was used more elsewhere)? Or perhaps purple since thatā€™s Canonicalā€™s colour (tho many in the community would hate lots of orange and purple as much as they would hate lots of orange)?

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I think that the blue is a left over from Adwaita .

Of course. But in my opinion the better is, when dock (in solid) appears on top of windows. I understand someone meaby likes more the transparency dock if appear on windows.

Moreover, it can be difficult to make two options in one: solid dock when not appears on windows, and 'transparency when appears. I canā€™t do that, I dontā€™t know howā€¦

Isnā€™t ā€˜too much orangeā€™ kinda the whole point of Ubuntu theming? Where else is this blue being used? Presumably it was going to be a key part of the Unity 8 design language?

Correct :D.
This blue does not come from Adwaita, but from Unity8. Itā€™s not sculpted into the stone of course, but some weeks ago we discussed it and then just decided to give it a try. From time to time the point is re-discussed again and the color might change in the future.
Also, the idea is not only ā€œtoo much orangeā€, but that orange looks like red that is a ā€œdestructiveā€ indicator color.

Thereā€™s also a @madsrh proposal for a different one here.
I wouldnā€™t use green, because itā€™s used with a different meaning in the theme, and aubergine (which I like a lot) to me does not fit well with very dark backgrounds.
Thatā€™s my personal taste, of course. The designers would probably answer better here :slight_smile:

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Wow only 26 days ago! A lot has been discussed since then. :grinning:I actually donā€™t miss the orange now, I really like the blue.

I agree with @c-lobrano :+1:
There are some guidelines for the use of the different colors in one of these theme threads.

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I just stumbled upon this reintroducing transparency on top panel.

It looks that, with intellihide enabled and the dock hidden, the top bar gets the ā€œ.solidā€ css class also when a window just occupies the dockā€™s space without touching any panel border.

Here with dock visible
image

Here with Dock hidden, because Nautilus went closer, but it still does not touch anything
image

@didrocks do you know any way to avoid this? Any class that let me differentiate the two use cases?

This isnā€™t the case in my installation. The transparency is kept in the upper panel even when a window occupies the dock space

Hi @c-lobrano !
Thank you for your answer.
Close-Buttons on windows
You are right. Orange gives it the ubuntu-style. It really should stay orange. But only become red when you hover over it. You are going to close this window = attention = red. Is there a reason not to do it? What are the designers thinking about this?

Blue and/or orange
Isnt there already enough orange in the theme? @merlijn-sebrechts already linked to a new blue that should have been used for focus, selection and interaction (see my previous post). Do the designers have tested it? What do they think? What would be a reason not to use it?
Some reasons to test it:

  • it is a test. We can change it back after 1-2 days. The community could give a feedback.
  • it is a new color in the ubuntu color scheme = something fresh
  • orange (as it is used at the moment) is way to aggressiv. The icons are already orange enough
  • it was considered for unity 8? There was already put thought into it.
  • the shell-theme and the gtk-theme do not really look like they have the same design-language. By using a little bit more blue in the gtk-theme it would fit more to shell-theme. At the moment blue is only used in the progressbar.

A compromise could be to really test it only on focus for icons. Once again: The Pop-theme did a great work in using different colors. It would be nice when @isantop could give some ideas.
What are the designers thinking?

Buttons
I am looking forward to the updated buttons. But it seems a bit contradictory when it stays this way: dark buttons get brighter when hovered. Bright buttons get darker when hovered. Both buttontypes should get brighter. What are the designers thinking?

@c-lobrano: this is the intended upstream design, there is some tolerance of ā€œclose enoughā€ in the upstream code for this to trigger the solid state.

Edit: this is in the non intellihide case. If you are really away from the top panel but the dock vanish, ensure you havenā€™t changed any dash to dock settings as there is a mode doing this. (reset the keys if needed)

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I am absolutely in love with the blue for sliders, spinners, and such. I very much hope it doesnā€™t go away.

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I think I hope it gets reverted (though yes, worth giving it a try!), we havenā€™t had a problem with the orange being used a lot in Ambiance, really (though maybe this is an issue weā€™re trying to fix here). But I recognize Iā€™m just one voice and not a professional designer so Iā€™ll accept whatever the pros say in the end :slight_smile: Iā€™m sure Iā€™ll get used to the seemingly-random blue eventually. Also that says in Unity 8 it was used in progress bars, not necessarily sliders? It would be very useful to know why the Unity 8 designers chose to use blue in certain situations in the first placeā€¦ But I guess it might be tricky to track down exactly who made that decision and tricky to get a respones from themā€¦ If they could give a good reason then Iā€™d be more inclined to back the switch to blue (which I know many do really like as a decision).

I donā€™t think @madsrh 's blue makes a clear difference, personally.

Agreed that aubergine probably doesnā€™t work well on dark backgrounds

Also, @didrocks, Iā€™m assuming that site will be taken down at some point (because itā€™s docs for the obsolete Ubuntu Phone), whereā€™s the source for that site? Would be nice if someone could fork a copy before it gets removed because that looks like an incredibly useful resource!

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Updated the theme just now - looking very nice :slight_smile:

The window title bars for apps without menus (e.g. files) look pretty much perfect now, both maximised and non-maximised :slight_smile: For maximised, I think the divider between Gnome top bar and the window works pretty well. Itā€™s a clear division that isnā€™t too hard on the eyes.

The divider between the window title and in-app menus is much more intrusive and, IMO, too harsh. I would prefer to see the same approach as above, as follows:

EDIT: In fact, I would challenge whether the divider between title and menus adds value or is just clutter. I think it works pretty well without:

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This seems to be on mutter side. I downloaded the source code and investigated a bit, but I still have some doubt about how to test changes on mutter :frowning:

by the way, this is the bug report

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Has anybody compared the community theme next to the 17.10 ambience theme ?
I really like what was done with Ambience . After reading a couple of comments saying that the community theme looks the same i decided to have a look .
Personally If ambience had the darker colours in the window, application bars and menus , combinded with suru and the ubuntu apps button I would also be a very happy camper. P.s. I would include the sound theme too.
Please note I am not intentionally undermining or down playing the volume of works that has already been done.

Iā€™m with you about no divider between title-bar and menus. Look cleaner and smooth.:ok_hand:

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Iā€™m absolutely against blue for sliders, spinners and such. I very much hope it GOES AWAY.
Itā€™s awful and donā€™t fit ubuntu color scheme. Go for purple/orange/green, and leave blue for fedora and adwaita.

Also, title bars and headerbars are huge, can they be reduced by 1/3?

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The use of blue for spinners and sliders seem to be a love them or hate them line of thought .
Have we considered a darker blue ?


Or there is the Ambience iteration of them for comparison.

and lastly The community theme as well.

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