Re: [Evolution] Highlight color problem with some themes (Crux, Eazel-Blue, etc.)

[Miles Lane <miles megapathdsl net>]

On 04 May 2001 13:04:17 -0500, Larry Ewing wrote:
> On 04 May 2001 10:18:30 -0400, Ben FrantzDale wrote:
> > On 04 May 2001 05:06:06 -0400, Christopher James Lahey wrote:
> > > On 01 May 2001 23:56:10 -0700, Chris Bailey wrote:
> > > > I'm using Sawfish, Ximian Gnome 1.4, Red Hat 6.2.  I have the Crux
> > > > Sawfish theme.  When I use the Cruz or Eazel-blue GTK themes, the
> > > > highlight color is a dark blue.  In Evolution this causes a problem
> > > > where any highlighted/selected text/item can't be read very well,
> > > > because the underlying text is still black (instead of inverting to
> > > > white, like say it does in the Control Center).  This only seems to be a
> > > > problem in Evolution.
> > > >
> > > > Is this an Evo bug, or something I can change (without changing the
> > > > selection/highlight color)?
> > >
> > > It's hard for us to tell what you mean if we don't know what part of
> > > evolution you're talking about.  I use Crux and it seems fine to me.
> > >
> > > What part of evolution doesn't change color when you select text?
> >
> > I'm pretty sure he's refering to the hilight in the mail list (the pane
> > above the actual mail message) and perhaps the folder bar. Basicly if
> > you set your Crux hilight color to black (for example) it's impossible
> > to read the title of the current mail message.
>
> Certainly, those themes need to also set their text[SELECTED] colors to
> something other than black.  These themes would have the same problem
> with a GtkText widget.  Unfortunately very few theme writers ever seem
> to test this combination.  Have I mentioned I really dislike the
> GtkStyle/Theme mechanism?

Theming is certainly an area that needs a lot more work.
One thing I notice about themes for the various Unix desktops
is that they result in an annoying hodgepodge of looks between
applications and pieces of the desktop.  For example:

    Mozilla
    Nautilus
    GDM
    GTK
    Sawfish
    XMMS/FreeAmp/etc.

All these can have different themes, resulting is a bizarre array
of appearances.

My other comment about theming is that the various theming engines
on Unix usually support all sorts of sophisticated shaped and textured
surfaces, but the user is usually locked into whatever the theme
developer put into the theme -- there is no common mechanism for
adjusting hue, saturation and brightness of the various UI elements.
This is one thing that Windoze seems to do well.  Windoze UI schemes
are easily tweaked by users, in that most individual UI elements 
may have custom colors assigned to them.  None of the Unix desktop
components provide similar control.  Some Sawfish themes allow
color tweaking of the titlebar, but not much more than that.
I'd really like to see most theme engines get modified to share
some common code than enabled YUV changes for UI elements, 
preferably with a common user interface for selecting the changes.

    Miles