Problems with Adwaita theme

Adam Batkin adam at batkin.net
Tue Aug 19 02:12:42 UTC 2014


I have linked to a few screenshots which I think cover my biggest issues 
with Adwaita as it stands:

1) focus.png[1] - 4 identical terminal windows. It's nearly impossible 
to tell which one has focus. Sure, the titlebar text is a little darker, 
and there might even be some shading around the focused window (but if 
there is, it's invisible to me).

Proposed solution: Focused window should have a significantly darker 
titlebar, maybe even a completely different color. I personally don't 
care what it looks like (i.e. a designer should find something pretty) 
as long as the visual distinction is clear.

2) eclipse.png[2] - Eclipse with the package explorer and toolbar 
visible. Look at all that white space! I'm pretty sure this is a desktop 
theme issue and not an SWT issue because if I use the linked theme 
(eclipse-gtkrc[3]) as part of the GTK2_RC_FILES variable, I get the 
results from eclipse2.png[4] which is not perfect, but a *lot* better. 
So maybe it's a GTK3/GTK2 issue, but either way, from a user's 
perspective it still doesn't work properly.

For reference, see webstorm.png[5] (ignore the broken kerning, I assume 
that's just Swing sucking). Since Swing (I assume what's what 
WebStorm/IntelliJ use) completely ignore the system theme (yay) it's a 
great comparison. Personally, this is what I'd like to see my whole 
system look like, except the native window title which is still gigantic.

Proposed solution: Tighten up white space all over the place. Toolbar 
buttons, tabs, tree items, window titlebar, and all the other widgets 
that I didn't happen to capture. I think it would still be visually 
appealing (go look at a Mac, it's pretty dense and still pretty).

What do you think?

-Adam Batkin

[1] http://i.imgur.com/hQmfjoP.png
[2] http://i.imgur.com/xYR9GxV.png
[3] http://i.imgur.com/15JqHga.png
[4] http://i.imgur.com/SOKXmI4.png
[5] 
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/abatkin/dotfiles/master/files/eclipse-gtkrc





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