I would like to learn how to make themes.

[bigpup]

You should turn this topic into a how to make themes.

[`f00]

Add in others like qt, fltk, and tcl/tk. Not to mention most window managers have their own way of doing theme/styles (from simple ones like jwm and blackbox on to how afterstep rearranges gtk by colorscheme and enlightenment theming).

Could be a long-ish topic of some depth

Yep, the 12-character codes confused me a bit as well ('straight' 6-character codes do indeed work just fine for simple gtk if you edit manually). Also of note is the subtle difference between fg, bg, text and base if you play about with the basics.

[puppyiso]

I have been so frustrated by the fact that I cannot download some new puppies such as Enlightened Dpup 0.1.0 Alpha 1 , ISpup, Puppy Lupen- K 2.6.38.4.....Compiz-Fusion/Emerald/Cairo-dock and so on and on..


I heard they are nice and worth trying but what good it is if I cannot get them.

I have always wanted a beautiful Puppylinux at least for myself.
Not a collection of individual pieces but a harmonious consistant theme as a whole. I am sick of getting a better wallpapers from the internet or changing icons either switching icons or manually assigning PNG files to them.

Sometimes I downloaded puppies just because they looked nice not because they are technically advanced. I guess I am more interested in beauty than function.

So I decided to learn how to make theme of my own including all the icons and expand customization into the areas of menu, and overlaying drive / directory names so instead of sda, I want drive 1 or storage A something.

There are many things I would like to do. On the "Look" not on "technical improvement" Since there are so many gurus making so many technically advanced Puppies, I leave that part to the experts.

I wish I can tackle the "Feel"section but I don't think I have that much time.
The other day, I saw a vendor selling a transparent cover that makes any monitor touch sensitive, enabling a huge TV screen size puppy.But that will be a interest to some gurus who are still young.

bigpup, I have just started my long journey to the land of theme making and more. I don't know how it is gong to be. Let's leave it as it is for a few months.

`f00, like I said, I am not a technically adaptable person. qt, fltk, and tcl/tk... it's not my cup of tea.

My knowledge on Puppylinux is so little that I am the most ignorant person in this forum.

I am so old that I shiver on my not too far away future when I will be put into a 1000 Celcius degree burning furnace and my bones will be crushed by a unknown man and the ash will be blown away.

I should try the least complex one so that I can finish in time.
Do not push this old man too hard.

Now, I am diving into reading the GTK file.

[`f00]

As BK mentioned, it can go up and up with gtk's complexity .. but you can fiddle about changing this'n'that and see what relates to what (the basic elements and states) without getting too deep (believe me I know how you feel even after a mod of Barry's 'simple' and looking at Zigbert's work). Here's a simple one I was happy with for a light example..

[puppyiso]

Hi, `f00 I am just back from reading the GTK. Headache. In a word.
Nevertheless, I wouldn't give up.

And thank you for the tip. I will try that way.

I tried changing icons. The first problem I encountered was root's hidden directories. pfind gave me a path but couldn't see it in the root directory.

So I clicked on the pfind finding and saw other path.

Found the theme folder and tried modifying one of the icon for test.

Then I encountered the second problem. I opened it in GIMP and exported after giving some change but the icon never changed even after reboot.

image 1 is the hidden directories in the root.(I had trouble with the hidden wine directory before)

image 7. 8 is the unchanging usb icon.

Uh-oh, my wife is calling. I have to go and do husband duty-doing the dishes.

I may have to make a whole new theme directory with icons which have the same 46 names but how do I register it in jwm theme chooser?

Just put the new directory into the theme directory and it would be recognized automatically?

Also, there got to be other than just changing an icon pack. What else is there? Anyone?

[puppyiso]

Now I see the beauty of visual programming. I laughed at Visual Basic.

But it has a point.

[puppyiso]

According to the reading, /usr/local/lib/X11/themes is the place where icons are. However, the name theme is misleading. It should be icons, I think.

I saw the changing icons in pixmaps and that explains why I have to wait whenever change icons. Instead of copying icons from a chosen folder, why not just write a new path to the new one. It might save some time and space.


GTK files were hiding under /usr/share/theme/

What's confusing is that there are two different GTK 2 themes. One can be selected via jwm theme chooser and the other is GTK change theme.

What is that for? (screen 4) I know menu looks can be changed but how iis it related to theme file itself?

Some GTK files were solitary, meaning just one instead of 4 like Barry said.

I feel like Alice in the wonderland. The rabbit hole is real deep.

I should have chosen the other pill.

[`f00]

2-part

______earlier
other than the 'main' /usr/local/lib/X11 stuff (icon_switcher'd in from theme to pixmap, which is the usual way for a rox d'n'd desktop and it also scales the top-level menu icons down 48->24 if needed), there's a scatload of individual icons for apps ref'd in the /usr/share/applications/*.desktop files (some in /usr/share/pixmaps, /usr/share/icons/.. and elsewhere) which you could match up in the squarish-button look if you want. And then there's the mimetype icons (for various file/nodetypes) like rox uses. And so on (like the dinky ones used in gtk ui and rox-alternatives such as xfce4 uses). It can get odd tracking all the icons down (many gtk ones are referenced within the db, I think). Some window managers don't like to have image-format extensions, others don't care, but most prefer.

Other places to futz around - /root/Choices/ and /root/.config burrow down into rox.sourceforge.net and into the globicons file(s) for 'special' rules if you like (that's where a lot of the 'set icon' r-click stuff is stored)

Dunno about getting the menus and other labels into HJK character-set (see shinobar's stuff for extended locale handling, pretty sure there's a wary just for that).

Yep, a new icon-theme dir just needs to be (helps to have it complete and names matching a standard one), the icon_switcher 'registers' it as current when you select your icon-theme (in /etc/ somewhere if I recall correctly). Mostly it scales down decently for the top-level menu but if you're picky you might want to fix a few 24s if they look 'off' (muddy transparency, usually only happens with old legacy icons).

From your caps it looks like you're moving right along themewise - I'm sure you can get the new driveicon overlays (Lobster mentioned earlier) looking even better if you go that route

______today
The 0.png screenie - in the jwmconfig window, Desktop tab .. 'GTK Theme' button merely loads gtk-chtheme. On the JWM tab there's a button to cobble/b*stardize a jwm theme from your current selected gtk (historically it sometimes messed up jwm's bottom tray or 'taskbar' but may be ok nowadays) .. jwm themes are pretty simple to make exactly as you wish, so why bother being lazy with a script?

2.png (your mention of 4th cap?) .. appears to be related to Aurora theme and lib-engine (and there you have pretty much fallen deeper into rabbithole ), it can get fairly whacky with all the stuff specialized gtk engines can do (murrine and so on). That would be a bit higher on the learning curve

Hmm, all those dotpets have summaries of what's included in them in /root/.packages/*.files files (open with a simple text-editor/viewer, read-only is nice since if you ever remove a dotpet it needs the list intact). Sometimes it's simpler to use a 'map' to find items of interest.

jwm (wm or 'external') themes are (or should be, imo) entirely separate from gtk 'interior' themes. openbox and xfce4 lump their wm themes in with 'regular' gtk interior themes in the /usr/share/themes dir (using subdirs within the theme dir, sometimes - and that may sometimes get a trifle confusing).

[puppyiso]

A load of information !!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks, `f00

[puppyiso]

I read and read the how to saw on Barry's

I tried following all the steps.


WHY Why It isn't working? Why there is no mention of png images?

Maybe I should take time to read what `f00 wrote.

The following Aurora images were converted back to indexed mode with GIMP

[puppyiso]

It wasn't the PNG, was... xpm...

the default(?) size was 28pix high. I tried 33 but didn't work.

Just a little success.

And I messed up the shutdown menu.

Changed Mi Pup to Shutdown menu

[puppyiso]

eye candy section > theme exchange is the place I have been reading but all I got so far is that the gradient menu coloring using :

I added some more gray icons(with exceptions). How do I change the size? How do I make svg images?

Any one care to answer?

[steve_s]

I played some with the svg images...the only icon set I did from scratch were the marble ones and I think I used png's, can't remember, but amidst that I did some svg stuff...as I recall I had to use Inkscape for that to manipulate those types of images as Gimp wouldn't get it...don't know if that helps any...

and I must say it was very much a trial and error using the vector images as they are more like multiple images compressed into one...

[puppyiso]

Thank you, Steve.

I guess SVG means Scalable Vector Graphic(s) something. If i have to draw on png image to make svg, it's not worth trying.

Mucho travajo, poco dinero...


Why is desktop icons limited to 48 pixels? Why not 128, 256 pixels?

Hugh, bold icons could be beautiful if you use only a few icons(like me)

I am still looking at the tray stuff. Why isn't all the configuration just in one or two places? Is this Linus' fault? or other guys with sleepy eyes?

[`f00]

jwm menu icons' size may be set in the template, /etc/xdg/templates/_root_.jwmrc (usually 24 in top level and 16 in submenus). The 'standard' sizes generally look good and don't take up too much room (indeed I sometimes go smaller on the top level for a more compact yet still legible look). To change the icons for the top level (what's referenced in the 'puppy' block), you may need to look at /usr/share/desktop-directories entries.

Desktop icons can be any size you wish (for static-state icons it's fairly easy - ones that change state like trash and driveicons are a bit different to deal with). Use the rightclick menu on each pinboard icon to 'set icon' and drag'n'drop your biggie(s) in.

jwm tray(s)

One of the nice things about jwm, you can separate the tray('taskbar') if you like into various discrete trays with different functions and parameters. If you go this route you need to edit the template to 'include' your new trays.

wbar

Another option for a launchbar - wbar has lots of 'eye-candy' appeal (animation, icons that 'jump' in size as they're hovered on, filters, pseudo-transparency and so on).

config is what it is - a bit tricky to get the hang of sometimes but jwm is fairly straightforward. Nice when it's done up just as you like but a small journey getting there

[puppyiso]

`f00, your information is very valuable. Thanks.

Frankly I am stuck. Just changing some icons into gray seems like beyond my reach.

Why are png there when all basic icons are xpm? And do I really need extra locales when I use only 3, 4 languages? I can save something like 70mb if I erase what's not needed.(That's another story)

I just changed the white background and blue letters to light gray and darkish gray letters.(not by changing GD GTK... just using theme maker)

The more I try the more I see I don't know anything. During the process, I have seen so many many weird stuff in Puppy.

Puppy need to be cleaned out throughly. Puppy can lose some 30MB.
All kinds of unnecessary icons, overlapping folders, Jesus, we need a cleaner here.

I will try what you show me. Thanks again.

[`f00]

Locales ("another story") - in general releases and dotpets, lots of 'extra' locales are a good idea (to ensure maximum compatibility with puppy's international base of users). For your personal use, for sure you can strip the ones you don't use .. usually this doen't break functionality of the app(s) that use the extra locales (check by starting the app from a terminal if things go awry). Sometimes creators of dotpets (or puppy derivatives) break them down into separate packages (a 'basic', docs, nls/locales and perhaps a dev for example) so the user can choose what they wish. It can be an art for those creators to determine just how much to include so the app is as widely compatible as practical.

icon formats - mostly you can use either .png or .xpm in any but 'vintage'/older pups (where xpm is the rule as you noted). User choice as to which you prefer to work with..

icons that change state - like trash, driveicons and such .. not so simple as a mere drag'n'drop since they reference different icons for each state (empty and full for example in the case of trash). If you wish to change these, they're best done in a personal /usr/local/lib/X11/theme/<yourtheme> where you have the various icons (for example trash_empty, trash_full and so on). Use the icon theme switcher and they should come up. Furthering the trash example, /usr/local/apps/trash is an appdir with a .DirIcon inside (a symlink that will point to the appropriate 'state' icon when it's on the pinboard via script within the appdir).

gray icons - A few ways to do .. in mtpaint, I'd probably effects->transform color and take the saturation down all the way (or gimp has other methods, I'm sure). You can also play about with palette, rgb/indexing, quantizing, reducing/simplifying and so forth.

hth .. yah, Puppy by nature is a learning process when you dig into customizing

[harii4]

very useful how-to

[harii4]

here some of the themes that were inspired by this thread!
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 231#582231

thank you,
puppyiso