Description: I created this theme for a couple of reasons: 1. I wanted to learn more about GTK and Metacity theme creation/modification. 2. I wanted to come up with a theme that was clean and simple but not too simple. After a couple of days of work, this theme was born. I felt like the name "Unity" fit because this theme created a sense of similarity or unity between various elements without being either too boring or too outlandish. Or at least to me it does. :-)
I'm by no means an expert with GTK and Metacity themes, so I'm sure there's room for improvement. I've tried to test this theme as thoroughly as possible on my native distribution (Arch Linux) so hopefully there aren't any glaring errors. If you have any feedback you'd like to share, please feel free to e-mail me.
This them is licensed under the GPL. You're welcome to modify, release, and distribute this theme however you wish. Improve it, package it for your favorite distribution, share it...but most of all, I hope you enjoy using it!
Credits/Notes:
GTK Theme Versions of this theme prior to version 0.4 required a GIT version of the Murrine GTK engine. As of version 0.4, options that are not present in the stable version of the Murrine engine (0.98 as of the release date of version 0.6) have been removed.
20110619 (June 19, 2011) ------------------------ -General code cleanup -Made the background color slightly darker. -Changed the tooltip background color back to the yellow color used in the Clearlooks color scheme. -Made the unfocused notebook tabs darker so that the focused tab stands out more. (Thanks to ermo for suggesting this change!) -Changed the prelight color for buttons and scrollbars. (Thanks to ermo for suggesting this change!) -Added a gradient to the scrollbar trough to make the scrollbar easier to see. (Thanks again to ermo for this suggestion!)
20110222 (February 22, 2011) ---------------------------- -Changed version numbering scheme. -GTK: Cleaned up a little of the code in the gtkrc file. Didn't affect the appearance of the theme at all.
v0.7 (January 17, 2011) ----------------------- -Metacity: Changed back to style used in v0.5. -Also created and released matching themes for Openbox, XFCE and Emerald.
v0.6.1 (November 30, 2010) -------------------------- -Fixed a problem with permissions that prevented the Metacity theme from installing correctly.
v0.6 (November 29, 2010) ------------------------ -GTK: Added the "arrowstyle" option to give the theme nice filled-in arrows. This option was introduced in version 0.98 of the Murrine engine. -GTK: Changed the contrast value to 1.0 globally, to make everything stand out just a bit more. -Metacity: Complete redesign of the titlebar, especially the buttons.
v0.5 (August 25, 2010) ---------------------- -Turned this into a single theme for greater simplicity and ease of use. Feel free to change the color scheme however you wish. The default color scheme is the same one used for the Clearlooks theme. Thanks to Padster for the idea! -GTK: Fix text color on progressbars...text was black in filled area when it should have been white, making it hard to read with certain color schemes. -GTK: Change padding values for treeview headers...the padding values in version 0.4 just seemed too big to me after using it for a while.
v0.4 (July 31, 2010) -------------------- -GTK: Many changes - theme was pretty much rebuilt from the ground up. Options not available in the stable version of the Murrine engine have been removed. Other important changes were to lighten the background color a fair bit and to fix the background of the Nautilus sidebar. It's now white as it should be, instead of matching the background color.
v0.3 (July 17, 2010) -------------------- -GTK: Added a gradient to the scrollbar & progressbar trough -GTK: Minor tweaks to progressbars -GTK: Fixed issue with borders on combo boxes
v0.2 (July 10, 2010) -------------------- -GTK: Fixed issue which was causing text boxes in toolbars to not have borders. Thanks to drazzard for pointing this issue out!! -GTK: Minor tweaks to color values used for highlighted objects (buttons & scrollbars in particular) -GTK: Added handles to sliders, to match the style used for scrollbars -GTK: Added a subtle border to buttons to make them stand out just a bit more -GTK: Changed listview header style -GTK: Minor tweaks to progressbar -Metacity: Centered title text -Metacity: Removed "grill mark" from titlebar -Metacity: Changed color selections for active and inactive titlebar text, they are now based on the GTK theme colors -Metacity: Shifted titlebar text up slightly to prevent bottoms of letters from getting cut off on occasion -Metacity: Re-edited & re-colored some of the titlebar buttons
So, after having used this theme for a week or so, I have few comments:
* The scrollbars are a little hard to distinguish from the background trough.
* The highlights on mouse-over of elements (e.g. scrollbars and buttons) are a wee bit too subtle, I think.
* The selected tab could do with a bit of extra distinction from the unselected ones.
Perhaps creating an alternative style that accounts for the above three 'issues' (they're not really issues per se) by using a slight bluish tint a lá the Glossy gnome theme tabs (but subtler) might work well?
It's not hard to imagine that this tint could be tuned to match the different Gnome Colors icon set colors?
Thanks for the feedback! I'm working on tweaking some things in this theme and hope to have an update soon. I've already added a gradient to the scrollbar trough to make it look less "flat" and give it some depth. I'll take a look at the other items you mentioned (mouseover highlights and making the selected tab stand out) to see what I can come up with - I do agree those elements could use some extra work. A slight tint on the selected tab sounds like a good idea, and as you suggested, it shouldn't be hard to be able to tune that to match the colors of the Gnome Colors icon sets. If I used the "selected_bg_color" to set the tint on the selected tab, then all you'd have to do is change the color value of "selected_bg_color". For example, to match the "Wise" color set, you'd change the value of "selected_bg_color" to #97bf60 and you'd get a light green tint instead of light blue.
I've tried my hand at modifying your theme, and the following values were what I could come up with:
# brighter highlights on buttons and scrollbars
bg[PRELIGHT] = shade (1.05, @bg_color)
# style "notebook" -- darker unselected tabs
bg[ACTIVE] = shade (0.90, @bg_color)
# Give scrollbars some breathing space
GtkScrolledWindow::scrollbar-spacing = 2
# make room for a secondary backward stepper
GtkRange::stepper-size = 16
# modify troughs to show a shade
trough_shades = { 0.9, 1.1 }
Looking forward to see your tweaks as well :)
Also, I think it would be really cool to have a grey (non-dark) version of the shiki-colors WM decorations -- I think that might work out quite well with this theme, actually?
I know it might not be terribly original, but it'd probably still be different enough to "hold its own" so to speak...
I was looking to a beautifull theme ,not dark and not looks like other operating system.I'm using ubuntu and this theme is very good for it,maybe could have a chance to be one of newer theme.Personally this appear more beautifull installed than the preview.Keep going man!!!
I just finished re-uploading the theme and it should be working now. Thanks for letting me know about the problem and my apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused.
Admittedly I'm still experimenting with the Metacity theme, so I don't know if the new one will stay or not. I wasn't 100% happy with the old one but I didn't know that anyone else actually liked it. :-) I still have the previous one handy, so I can put it back in as part of the next release.
Thanks for the feedback!!
The way it was before the toolbar was clear, contrast, yet very elegant. I admit that new is elegant too, but now it is worse in contrast. That is a pity that there is no way to set a poll of some kind too see how many people liked new/old style. Anyway thanks for the work the theme is one of the best.
Thank you very much for the 0.6 update. It looks even better now.
Still the best professionnal, easy on the eyes, uncluttered and non-intrusive theme ever !
Regards,
Denez
You're right - the only difference between the different themes in this pack is the color scheme. More specifically, the "selected_bg_color" is different for each theme:
Brave = Blue
Carbonite = Dark gray
Dust = Brown
Human = Orange
Illustrious = Pink
Noble = Purple
Tribute = Tan? (I'm slightly colorblind so I can't tell if this is tan or some shade of green)
Wine = Red
Wise = Green
Glad you like these themes...thanks for the feedback!
looks grey with a bit of green.
okay, i was just wondering if i could consolidate them or something, to save room in the theme selector, if i can just change the colors myself.
Sure, you can just use one theme and change the colors in that one to suit you. I forgot to mention in my last post that the Tooltip background color is different in each theme as well. It's set to the same value as the Selected items background color.
yeah. i just made a single version out of the wise version. it has the metacity (just called murrine-unity) and gtk of the wise one, with the window colour tweaked to be a little brighter.
Ratings & Comments
27 Comments
Download link broken.
I modified MurrinaCandido (http://gnome-look.org/content/show.php?content=144639) for a similar reason - having a clean theme, but your Murrine-Unity is way better.
Hey, I registered just to let you know that this theme ROCKS! I use it with the axiom http://xfce-look.org/content/show.php/axiom?content=90145 xfwm4 theme, which complements it nicely I think.
So, after having used this theme for a week or so, I have few comments: * The scrollbars are a little hard to distinguish from the background trough. * The highlights on mouse-over of elements (e.g. scrollbars and buttons) are a wee bit too subtle, I think. * The selected tab could do with a bit of extra distinction from the unselected ones. Perhaps creating an alternative style that accounts for the above three 'issues' (they're not really issues per se) by using a slight bluish tint a lá the Glossy gnome theme tabs (but subtler) might work well? It's not hard to imagine that this tint could be tuned to match the different Gnome Colors icon set colors?
Thanks for the feedback! I'm working on tweaking some things in this theme and hope to have an update soon. I've already added a gradient to the scrollbar trough to make it look less "flat" and give it some depth. I'll take a look at the other items you mentioned (mouseover highlights and making the selected tab stand out) to see what I can come up with - I do agree those elements could use some extra work. A slight tint on the selected tab sounds like a good idea, and as you suggested, it shouldn't be hard to be able to tune that to match the colors of the Gnome Colors icon sets. If I used the "selected_bg_color" to set the tint on the selected tab, then all you'd have to do is change the color value of "selected_bg_color". For example, to match the "Wise" color set, you'd change the value of "selected_bg_color" to #97bf60 and you'd get a light green tint instead of light blue.
I've tried my hand at modifying your theme, and the following values were what I could come up with: # brighter highlights on buttons and scrollbars bg[PRELIGHT] = shade (1.05, @bg_color) # style "notebook" -- darker unselected tabs bg[ACTIVE] = shade (0.90, @bg_color) # Give scrollbars some breathing space GtkScrolledWindow::scrollbar-spacing = 2 # make room for a secondary backward stepper GtkRange::stepper-size = 16 # modify troughs to show a shade trough_shades = { 0.9, 1.1 } Looking forward to see your tweaks as well :)
Also, I think it would be really cool to have a grey (non-dark) version of the shiki-colors WM decorations -- I think that might work out quite well with this theme, actually? I know it might not be terribly original, but it'd probably still be different enough to "hold its own" so to speak...
I was looking to a beautifull theme ,not dark and not looks like other operating system.I'm using ubuntu and this theme is very good for it,maybe could have a chance to be one of newer theme.Personally this appear more beautifull installed than the preview.Keep going man!!!
I just finished re-uploading the theme and it should be working now. Thanks for letting me know about the problem and my apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused.
Got the same error and realized that the unexpected end is because the file is zero bytes. Maybe re-upload?
Have you re-uploaded it yet?
gzip: stdin: unexpected end of file tar: Child returned status 1 tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now I get that error trying to extract it.
$ file /tmp/127092-Murrine-Unity-Theme-0.6.1.tar.gz /tmp/127092-Murrine-Unity-Theme-0.6.1.tar.gz: empty
I saved it to my desktop then tried to extract it there and received the aforementioned error.
Why? The old toolbar was perfect! Now it is just like "elementary".
Admittedly I'm still experimenting with the Metacity theme, so I don't know if the new one will stay or not. I wasn't 100% happy with the old one but I didn't know that anyone else actually liked it. :-) I still have the previous one handy, so I can put it back in as part of the next release. Thanks for the feedback!!
The way it was before the toolbar was clear, contrast, yet very elegant. I admit that new is elegant too, but now it is worse in contrast. That is a pity that there is no way to set a poll of some kind too see how many people liked new/old style. Anyway thanks for the work the theme is one of the best.
Thank you very much for the 0.6 update. It looks even better now. Still the best professionnal, easy on the eyes, uncluttered and non-intrusive theme ever ! Regards, Denez
Ingeniously simple, well made, beautiful. I do what I said ;)
since i usually use dark themes, and i wanted a change, i looked for some good-looking light themes, and chose this. it really is great :-)
btw, is the only difference the colours?
You're right - the only difference between the different themes in this pack is the color scheme. More specifically, the "selected_bg_color" is different for each theme: Brave = Blue Carbonite = Dark gray Dust = Brown Human = Orange Illustrious = Pink Noble = Purple Tribute = Tan? (I'm slightly colorblind so I can't tell if this is tan or some shade of green) Wine = Red Wise = Green Glad you like these themes...thanks for the feedback!
looks grey with a bit of green. okay, i was just wondering if i could consolidate them or something, to save room in the theme selector, if i can just change the colors myself.
Sure, you can just use one theme and change the colors in that one to suit you. I forgot to mention in my last post that the Tooltip background color is different in each theme as well. It's set to the same value as the Selected items background color.
yeah. i just made a single version out of the wise version. it has the metacity (just called murrine-unity) and gtk of the wise one, with the window colour tweaked to be a little brighter.