Re: Themes and default fonts....

[Paul Warren <pdw ferret lmh ox ac uk>]

On Fri, 3 Dec 1999, Jim Gettys wrote:

> In order to get the applications set up with the look and fonts I want,
> I get to go play with:
> 	1) control panel from KDE
> 	2) control panel from Gnome
> 	3) whatever control panel the window manager has.
> 
> And Enlightement and Gnome, which I happen to use as my default environment 
> (maybe I should switch monthly, so no one thinks I'm taking sides here; 
> I certainly have both installed on my machines), it seems strange to have 
> to mess with both independently to change theme and/or fonts.
> 
> This "sucks big time", to use the vernacular.

Yes.  A window manager written to co-operate with Gnome (I'm thinking
Sawmill here ;-) can go so way to fixing this:  it's control panel is part
of Gnome's control centre, and the Gnome UI improvement project is
suggesting a better mechanism for doing this (so that the "Window
Manager" section of the control centre gives you control panel for your
current WM).  This is reasonably logical - I control my GTK theme with one
the desktop theme part of the control centre, and the WM theme with the WM
theme section.  Sawmill also offers a couple of themes which try to mimic
the current GTK theme, with mixed success.

> So, I strongly believe there should be:
> 	1) some way to notify apps what theme has been selected by the
> user (under whatever control panel (s)he likes.  I bet, once the mechanism
> gets built, that there will be some attempt to make at least some subset
> of the space of all possible themes roughly similar between the toolkits
> in use.  This can be done in a very simple way: you can leave it
> to the toolkits to do as best they can to match themes (and have a simple
> substitution table, saying, for example, if the user wants "gnome blue ice",
> I'll use "kde ice blue" or some such.  I think a very simple protocol
> is in order here.

I think that this is a good aim.  The visual improvement when you match WM
theme to toolkit theme is great - I'm a Gnome user, but one thing I really
like about KDE is the way that KWM matches Qt.

> 	2) similarly, some way to set the fonts to be used by the window
> manager and/or toolkits between toolkits.

[snip:...Xrm is good...]

I agree.

> I did not see anything in the window manager spec to deal with these
> issues.
>
> Am I missing something?  Should I retreat to my cave now?

Nope x 2

Whilst I agree with everything you've said, I think our main aim has to be
to get the spec finished ASAP.  I think that this is a 2nd spec issue, and
one which can be added onto the current spec without a problem.  I am now
pretty sure that we are going to need a 2nd release: Window in window MDI,
saving individual window states, themes...

I would very much like to see your comments on 1.9c.  I hope to do 1.9d
over the weekend, fixing the typos and anding the features that have come
up on the list over the last week or so.  If anybody else would prefer to
do the next revision, then please speak up - I won't be offended.  I've
just finished term and I have a week of free time and free ethernet so I'm
happy to do it.

cheers,

Paul