The FACTS about GNOME’s plans for THEMES

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Get your Linux desktop or laptop here: slimbook.es/en/

[@muhammadyusoffjamaluddin]

Nick can you make another videos about developers planning on Error Handling if any, thanks Nick for addressing this.

[@TheLinuxCast]

This was a great video. I do have to say I'm worried that the whole "creating a GNOME app" vs "creating a Plasma app" could lead to a world where developers only develop for one, to the exclusion of the other. We've already kind of seen this with some elementaryOS apps, where they were only ever compiled for eOS, and were not ever distributed to the larger distros like Ubuntu, Arch and Fedora. This, if it ever became more widespread, could lead to a world where you would have to use a specific desktop environment in order to actually get the apps you need, similar to how you have to choose between Windows or Mac to get certain apps in the proprietary world. This is why GTK was such a good thing because it was desktop environment agnostic, which made it easier for developers to target it instead of a desktop environment-specific framework.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

As long as we have flatpak, this won’t happen, it will be very easy to run apps made for another DE, just as it is today :)

[@softwarelivre2389]

They will be built and have the UI of the original platform, but it will run everywhere.

[@akza0729]

Basically looks won't be mutable. GNOME & eOS apps on Plasma will look more inconsistent but it'll work without weird color issues... ( Assuming one day Plasma devs won't decide to fork libadwaita and tweak for theme support.

[@ehhwhatevericantthinkofago8903]

@@TheLinuxEXP Flatpaks are a useful tool, but I think they should never be considered a first class citizen in package distribution. If you are unable to compile all your software from source agnostic of your distribution and desktop environment I think you are inviting in a much more dangerous dragon than you know.

[@yahallo4423]

@@TheLinuxEXP Basically what you're suggesting is that you can throw a hundred dollars on a computer and it will fix itself magically. Flatpak isn't a fix to anything and you probably don't even understand the concept of bloat. "Oh it's just a few megabytes", well what if I have less than a 100 gb of storage? "Oh it doesn't take more processing power", "Oh it's just this, oh it's just that". You know, that's easy for a rich guy like you to say, but that's basically why Windows and Mac runs poorly specially in server applications, and that's why people just throw away those computers because they've became too slow to even use. I don't think you've even used old hardware or even sbcs, and so probably don't even understand what it's like to be handling another new headache like libadwaita or flatpaks, and in turn you don't understand the bad reputation it gets. KDE generally gets this, Kdenlive and Krita works very well with whatever DE or Tiling window manager I use, and if the theming is incorrect, themes can easily switched with whatever gtk theme you have in the settings. What you've only proven in this video is that gnome developers want to be the new macOS, instead of being actually linux and that's good. FOSS is all about meritocracy and if they want to be this immature, grab your popcorn and watch it fall. But don't sell me this flatpak bloat as if this solution works for everyone, frankly that's just laziness. (edited for spelling errors)

[@k4everut]

My wife, who changes the curtains in our room every time she changes our bedsheets, got marching towels for our bathroom rugs, and wanted all of the appliances in our kitchen to be the same color and brand had the nerve to ask me why I themed my desktop.

[@cultureclashmusicvideo4545]

hahaha real life absurdities. Choice is one thing. Consent is another!

[@Hid4ri]

hahaha, I cant stop laughing at this comment. something my wife would do too. :)

[@JeremySoller]

Thanks for taking the time to fully investigate all sides of this issue

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks, Jeremy :)

[@thecloudrazor]

@Fernando Figueredo Jeremy didn't curse anyone on Twitter. You too could have been a little bit more respectful towards KDE users and KDE crew in your other comments and not fanatically defend GNOME like it's a matter of life and death. First they should learn how to respect users' customisation choices and different preferences. If you want to create a single, fixed ecosystem and design, go work with any other company and don't meddle with FOSS nor with its community. Simple as that.

[@JeremySoller]

@Fernando Figueredo I did not curse.

[@deepakshivraj4881]

@Fernando Figueredo KDE has no goal u say. KDE is not just like other DE where it just gives u a "DE" like gnome. It gives u ur DE. Get ur facts straight u simpleton.

[@davidm7640]

Jeremy, please, tell your team when working on a Rust based Cosmic make it look traditional or add an option with such a layout. If Cosmic will use custom settings panel please make it to have necessary options, not like Gnome where we have to use a tool like Tweaks.

[@ok-Luis]

So far nobody have been able to explain this whole GNOME theming thing better than this video. Thanks! ❤

[@giomjava]

Yes, Nick has given it a great shot! I'm still not down with this, but the video is really great and convincing!

[@Dar-ng7pb]

Not really, he didn't give any opposite feedback from developers with short cherry picked article for Solus dev. This video was bad.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

I did mention Solus point of view, and no one else was willing to even answer questions on the topic. I asked Jeremy Soller, which was the only other critic and he declined. Disagreeing with the facts and what people say isn’t the same as the video being bad ;)

[@Dar-ng7pb]

@@TheLinuxEXP Video show mainly positive not neutral, you can find on Solus forums more about it for example Josh quote: The argument time and time again by these libadwaita developers is that this enables GTK4 to be more generic. Except nobody wanted that to begin with. They just didn't want GNOME ripping out the carpet from underneath folks. Now everybody has to either choose to use libadwaita (which then forces adwaita) or build out their own widget libraries, which further fractures the use of graphical applications across multiple desktop environments. You have to implement your own recoloring & theming APIs because one of the lead GTK developers opted to just close their patch rather than fight with designers from GNOME and elementary. His words, not mine. You have to implement your own support for various new freedesktop standards, rather than that being part of the toolkit. You have to implement your own widgets for basic functionality that should have been in GTK4 now, like "Avatar" image, Carousels (fancy GtkStacks), "Flaps", all the programmatic preference window bits, and more.

[@mner9826]

@@Dar-ng7pb So, if I understood correctly, Gnome Devs made a decision not just for Gnome, as advertised, but for GTK4 as a whole and, basically, stripped the framework from any widget library. Well, I can understand the reason behind libadwaita for Gnome. But, making, in the process, a framework (GTK4) not having its own widget implementation, is beyond me. Possibly, it has to do with the Gnome approach for development where a developer must cut off as many user choices as possible from an application, reducing complexity and bugs, which means time and, generally, resources consumed by the project. I'll say, it's efficient but also it probably contradicts the main reason open source exists in the first place: choice and freedom.

[@dontmindme8709]

13:45 I think you really summed up the fundamental change that is happening: This splits up Linux by desktop environments, not just by distros (where packaging options are already fragmented). I think this is controversial, because when you force a developer to choose one "platform", they won't have the time or interest to pay attention to any other. It's also not a philosophy that everyone agrees on. Smaller desktop environments or window managers will be disadvantaged and will have to accept that nothing will ever look coherent. Previously they could have applied a theme, but now that alternative disappears. It seems like basically only Gnome and some of its core variants are supporting this. Maybe they feel comfortable knowing that enough developers will choose their style, so that things will look okay anyways? I know that they don't intend it, but it does feel kinda hostile to everyone else. I agree with the problem of poorly applied theming, but I can't see the solution as being "let's make theming more difficult". Wouldn't it make more sense to make theming more standardized and straightforward instead? It feels like such a waste to fragment the graphical side of applications. Will there now be platform specific forks of programs just because they look too different otherwise? Linux is such a mess as it is. There was no need to make it worse...

[@altermetax]

I entirely agree, this is one of the main reasons why I oppose this change. I can't believe my eyes seeing everyone is okay with it.

[@white-bunny]

Because building an entire theming API framework is incredibly difficult. Though, it would be nice to know, that building a Theming API on top of Libadwaita is a plan they have, as a long-term goal. So theming is not going away, yet. :)

[@galactustales]

No one is forcing developers to choose the GNOME platform.. And yes the platforms exist so that developers dont waste their time on the ui.

[@thetapheonix]

This is a good thing. If enough people split off from Gnome then Gnome will be forced to actually listen to other people and adapt or die. Either outcome is fine. It's been 10+yrs since Gnome 3 has come out and they still refuse to listen to feedback and they STILL have a my way or the highway mentality.

[@jesuszamora6949]

Making theming easier would require GNOME developers to be less paternalistic toward the end user.

[@Blueeeeeee]

*About GTK theming on being a "hack"* In previous versions of GTK 3, Adwaita used to live in the /usr/share/themes folder, along with all other GTK themes installed on your system. Then, one day, Adwaita was baked directly into GTK, and all of a sudden people started pretending the theming was never intended to be supported in GNOME and GTK, and that GTK themes were actually a "hack" that shouldn't be used. This behaviour is really sad to see, in my opinion. At least I'm glad GNOME is separating Adwaita from the main GTK framework.

[@fuseteam]

adwaita taking advantage of the hack doesn't mean it wasn't a hack ;) not only is GNOME separating adwaita from GTK it's also separating GNOME conventions from GTK xD

[@jonnyso1]

@@fuseteam And that's great, my greatest concern here was GTK tied to Gnome, its the right thing to separate the two.

[@fuseteam]

@@jonnyso1 exactly gnome is separating concerns. and making gtk more neutral. tbh the fact that elementary and gnome, two very different platforms, are __collaborating closely__ just show how good this move really is

[@giomjava]

I remember those days

[@wallyhackenslacker]

I guess that Adwaita being a theme like all other was a holdover from the GTK 2/Gnome 2 days. It wouldn't surprise me at all if the initial idea for Gnome 3 had been to support themes just like Gnome 2 did, but eventually that forced the devs to choose between a fixed theming API or the more flexible-for-widget-designers CSS styling system we have today and of course they went with the latter.

[@SamuelSarette]

Mostly, I just want a single "bring up the native file open/save" API for all apps so I never have to see a strange file manager that knows nothing about my bookmarks or is weird to navigate. That's the consistency I crave.

[@giomjava]

yes please. Functional, not visual

[@alex15095]

This already exists, but KZbin's draconian comment system will automatically delete my comment when I mention the name. It's used for Flatpak but works with non-Flatpak apps as well.

[@gobi817]

@@alex15095 add some comma and spaces and say the name please 😆

[@alex15095]

@@gobi817 XDG Portal

[@XanthinZarda]

You'll be happy to know that this has been a problem with Gnome/GTK for over a decade, while they happily kicked the can down the road though multiple GTK versions instead of doing a freeze to fix this, and many other boneheaded, vexing, & lethal bugs. (Heck, this problem existed over multiple bugtrackers.)

[@KhaelenmoreThaaLRus]

For me coloring is not as important as element sizing. Most GTK3 apps have obnoxiously oversized buttons and headers by default. Currently I use nextwaita theme to make elements more compact. If this will no longer be possible in future, I will either switch to apps that I am more comfortable with or continue using these old versions that fit my screen.

[@llothar68]

WinUI3 has specialized themes for dense and sparse spacing. Unless Microsoft decides again to remove this feature before release. But at least the engineers and some Chief of somethings realized that this is important for professionals and business apps.

[@WyvernDotRed]

For this I'm currently using a modified version of LibAdwaita on my laptop. I like using it as a sort of more precise tablet with a screenless drawing tablet placed over the keyboard. GNOME generally works better with only touch input, but with the more precise pen smaller buttons are nicer. Though some things like the dock and application overview work well in the current extreme this way For this input either very compact or extremely large work (moving with the wrist or entire arm). The default is in the middleground where neither work but after tweaks it's an unique but good interface. (this entire comment was written with a very compact on screen keyboard)

[@web3wizard381]

XFCE exists

[@NotteShock]

Nah it's influenced by GNOME now and it's still hideously ugly. Theming also does not change how a desktop environment works. They need a new leader or the project will die. They need to learn something from Cinnamon

[@softwarelivre2389]

Hey, Nick! I'm sure this video required a lot of work to be done, and I just wanna thank you for doing it. I saw some mean comments over here and I'd like to tell you that they're a minority. The majority if us appreciate the content you create and are glad you're here. Thanks, man!

[@archetype6351]

Completely unrelated to the topic, but I just wanted to say that I love your content. Really polished, well explained and researched, unbiased. It's great, honestly.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :)

[@giomjava]

Agreed! Good job Nick!

[@Fenrasulfr]

I don't know if it is a good idea but at the very least Gnome has a specific goal in mind and they are working towards it. I rather have that than them floundering around with no future plans. For anyone that wants to customize their desktop they will always have KDE.

[@rautamiekka]

Agree. With GNOME's problems and the devs' indecisiveness track record, it's at least 1 problem less.

[@АлексейШилин-д1ф]

It's a misconception that theming works better on other desktop environments. Take KDE for example. In order to create a widgets theme one needs to create a library which implements a QStyle-inherited class. And even then it's not all rainbows and unicorns; in fact, your own video "How I customize my KDE Plasma Desktop" ( kzbin.info/www/bejne/d2GvmnmrZsqUg9U ) shows some bits being obviously broken after applying a custom widgets theme (3:00 - the "Get new…" button, 3:05 - "Configure…" buttons at the bottom, 3:20 - vertical alignment of the "GTK theme:" label and the combobox, 7:30 - the lock icon is not properly vertically aligned (but it's fine when using the default theme), 9:08 - the checkbox in the highlighted entry is barely visible, …). Theming is HARD.

[@XanthinZarda]

If it's so hard, then why do Windowmaker and CDE make it look so easy? I want a textured titlebar? By gosh I can set it to whatever I dang well please.

[@АлексейШилин-д1ф]

​@@XanthinZarda Correct me if I'm wrong, but they both don't allow changing widgets shape, feedback or size, and you're only limited to recolouring, setting background fill image and so on. In this case they are pretty limited by todays standards. Textured titlebar is trivial BTW as it doesn't really change much apart from widget's background. And yet it still may cause readability issues if not done properly.

[@gabrielgian8988]

Excellent answer to a problem that boils down to people breaking complete things to feel like the unique snowflakes they are. An infantile disorder.

[@igorrodriguez9942]

Although I like Adwaita and stick to default settings often, imo it seems that GNOME devs are failing to understand their product. They are thinking like Apple or Microsoft, but they are not a full fledged operating system. The need for distros to choose them is crystal clear and if they are too strict with their design philosophies, distro devs will be forced to part ways with them...

[@nikkehtine]

maybe I missed something, but why can't GNOME devs develop official theming API for distro vendors and theme makers to utilize? surely it's a better way of handling things and more in line with the FOSS philosophy than cutting off what little remains of theming support altogether...

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Because it’s extremely complex, and no one wants to work on it, not even distributions :)

[@fuseteam]

@@TheLinuxEXP i thought that's what the "recoloring api" will be :P

[@talkysassis]

Some crazy dev will make this for sure. And probably, it will be an Arch user

[@SankoshSaha_01]

@@fuseteam recolouring API will allow colour change for buttons window icons/buttons, etc.. Distro wants full control over the buttons looks, titlebar widths, every small stuff, which making API for it quite a complicated development

[@afborro]

Well, I'd say it's possible to have made it much more flexible, it's as much question of resources and the awkwardness of still using C as a core language which makes it a lot of work. Qt is working on this also for the future. I expect it will be more flexible, but we will have to see. They do have to support multi platform after all, they do have more developers. It's also as much a question of software abstraction. The fact that GNOME hard codes things in early (in a manner of speaking), makes it much harder to support certain features, hence, the whole thing is in part of their own making, a deliberate choice, for better or worse, to make things easier, but in inverted commas I'd say. They just don't have enough developers for a start. Attracting new devs is also hard, because it's hard to get C developers wanting to do that sort of thing on very modest salaries. Most would argue it is the wrong language for the task. It's a kind of task that requires strong type checking and OO features,. C offers none of that, hence they offer bindings for app developers, but that doesn't change the fact they still use C for the core. Except for GNOME I can't think of any project that would hang onto such stone age building blocks, but they are stuck with what they build in the nineties. There is no way they could start again with the resources they have. Personally, I'd say libadwaita was a bad decision on their part, but that's another story open to debate.

[@perdomot]

As a Gnome user. I am totally against limiting the ability to customize a persons system. I remember very well the headaches of trying to customize Windows XP & 7 so Linux's freedom to set things up the way I like is very important to me. Most people don't like the Adwaita theme and being stuck with it feels insulting somehow. If I try a theme and don't like how it looks or it causes a problem, I can always remove it so responsibility is on the user, not on the Gnome creators. We seem to be losing many choices in life these days and this would be one I would not accept. I would rather go back to XFCE especially now with great distros like the new MX Linux 21 that just came out.

[@wtfisgoingon535]

Im with you on this one.And yeah XFCE is a good choice :)

[@richardchantlerrico]

Agreed with you, Gnome is acting more like Microsoft or Apple with their "our way or the highway" mindset, they can get stuffed. I however recommend KDE, better looking more modern and does not support GTK / Gnome like XFCE does.

[@perdomot]

@@richardchantlerrico I've tried KDE but there is something about it that I don't quite like. Maybe because it has too many choices and how they are arranged in the settings manager doesn't make sense to me. Not sure but I used XFCE when I first started using Linux and it still works great for me. Might try KDE again though. We'll see.

[@wtfisgoingon535]

@@perdomot I use mint XFCE on my laptop and KDE on my main rig. KDE its pretty good for sure, give it a try :) If you like ubuntu flavor, may i suggest KDE neon. I use it for a long time and i think you will like it ! Keep in mind that like XFCE, KDE settings have lots of choice haha. The first setting panel give you all you need for a fast theming and you can always tinker later. Maybe check out Linux Scoop video of kde customization. Sorry for my english , its not my native language :)

[@perdomot]

@@wtfisgoingon535 Thanks for the info and your English is excellent. I tried KDE Neon when it first came out and thought it was OK. Wish I knew what it is about KDE that just doesn't click with me. I remember not liking their start menu designs even though I use a dock 99% of the time. I use Manjaro so I'll give their KDE another try. Thanks again.

[@KuruGDI]

I can see the benefit of the change and I really like that at least one DE tries to provide a more consistent experience for users and a better base for developers. However, this move takes away the Bam Margera _whatever the f*** I want_ style of Linux that makes it possible to crank the nob for possible customisations to the max. If I want to have a fixed UI where I can barely change anything I go for Mac or Windows (and even on Windows you have eg. the Classic Shell/Open Shell that I would consider _light thememing_ ). You can still be hacky and configure and include your own themes in GNOME, but since they are even more hacky than before, they are less likely to work. One thing I really don't like is that you would not write _Linux apps_ , but _GNOME apps_ , _KDE apps_ and _elementary apps_ because what Linux desperately needs the most is more fragmentation into even tinier parts.

[@DianaCHewitt]

Its nice that GNOME and KDE take such different approaches. I've grown tired of throwing time at theming and a good enough default is now all I need.

[@enigmaster84]

The fact is that they will be different defaults, so any app developed for the other desktop will look completely out of place

[@guss77]

As a Plasma user, what I see is GNOME making it harder to mix and match applications between DEs - KDE makes *a lot* of effort to have GTK apps behave as Plasma users expect on the Plasma desktop, and have KDE apps behave as GNOME users expect on the GNOME desktop, while GNOME devs are basically poopooing on the whole idea of interoperability - this latest change makes it even harder for GNOME apps to adhere to non-GNOME HIG when on a non-GNOME desktop, after making it already hard with header bars and other shit. I expect the next thing to happen is that mutter will stop showing server side decorations, making KDE apps unusable on GNOME - their purpose isn't just making GNOME its own platform, but more than that - precluding other systems from interoperating. In GNOME devs group-think, there are only two sides to the software game: users, and their DE/platform of choice - they don't care about distros and they don't care about other DEs. It has been shown by how they are actively hostile towards wayland protocols suggested by KDE people.

[@AbteilungsleiterinBeiAntifaEV]

They have also been arrogant pricks in the conversations about theming that kde devs had with them.

[@soham7510]

The only two of my friends that started using linux is because of themes and how well they are supported, even tho those are just hacks, they still work.

[@diegocaples5602]

I was able to convince my friends to use Linux for the themes too, and am really sad gnome is taking them away.

[@teddyfrozevelt]

@@diegocaples5602 way to announce to everyone that you didn't watch the video

[@diegocaples5602]

@@teddyfrozevelt what do you mean? I watched the whole video. The recoloring api will not have the same customizability as gtk themes. Also, no need to be rude. At the end of the day we are all Linux fans, and even if I don't agree with you about theming, we probably agree about more things than we disagree about :)

[@diegocaples5602]

@Lightning Hydra I use that theme too ;)

[@Cyanwasserstoff]

@@teddyfrozevelt Theming will still be possible, but it will be way less supported and app developer can enforce their style without the option to customize it.

[@enkiimuto1041]

Gnome: Well themes have always been a hack, so this will prevent it people from modifying it too much Theme makers and distros: Make another hack Gnome devs: Pikachu face

[@mks-h]

15:36: I'd put it the other way around - we will actually *gain* coherence and consistency. GNOME, KDE, elementary platforms' apps will look as they were designed to look, everywhere. Yes, they will not look the same, but they never really did. KDE tries to mask the difference between GTK and Qt apps by using similar stylesheets, but they still look different - the layouts can't be changed by themes, same as widget's features. And they have different UX designs - you can't change that either. So, in an effort to make apps more coherent, we'd better make new FreeDesktop standards for UI/UX that different platforms will agree on.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Only issue is that a lot of people can’t work with apps from one platform exclusively

[@mks-h]

@@TheLinuxEXP sure, what I meant is that we will use apps with their default themes. So, if I use Kdenlive on GNOME - I'll use it with KDE's theme. The Kdenlive is already different enough in UI/UX, so theming will not really help to make it coherent with GNOME apps anyway (but can break things). And thanks to FreeDesktop we will still be able to, comfortably enough, use applications from one platform on the other one.

[@JahidulIslam]

Ardour, zrythm etc use GTK and look completely different than other normal GTK apps.

[@alexunderbluesky]

as a designer I see one major flow that may stagnate gnome with this approach where stylelization ends and customization begins, Linux biggest advantage is that you can customize your work flow to the most optimal degree, gnome fighting customization would make it a weird middle between traditional Linux and windows/mac

[@fuseteam]

gnome isn't fighting customization, if you think that you've missed the point of what they are doing

[@jonnyso1]

Eeh, use something that allows you to customize, why expect Gnome to suport it if they don't want to ? This "Linux is about this so therefore every project should be like this too" narrative is wrong.

[@guss77]

@@fuseteam I may have also missed the point. It used to be that I could change the theme of my GNOME desktop. I don't like Adwaita and would like my GNOME apps to use Arc (as an example). As much as I understood, in the near future (or now?), this will no longer be the case - apps will be built with libadwaita and there will be no option for the user to select a different themes for apps. What is incorrect about this description?

[@fuseteam]

@@guss77 libadwaita will enable devs to __not__ hardcode colors and be confident that their app won't break. the arc theme. in the future there could be a libArc that simply replaces or overwrites the colors of libadwaita or there could be a way for you to set the colors of the arc theme consistently across all gnome apps

[@guss77]

@@fuseteam theming is not only about colours - plasma themes, or Arc,, for example, sets sizes and includes graphical assets to implement things like glow and transparency. Basically what you and GNOME devs are saying is "you want themes? Here - in the future you could change the colors! Isn't it great?" When what we want is what e had before - the power of CSS to actually change the look and feel, maybe plug in some C code to do more dynamic behaviour stuff. If you don't want to support that, it's fine - I'm a developer and I know how hard these things can get and how it is often impossible to move forward without removing the old stuff - but please stop pretending that it's anything other than removing functionality that people want, another step in the long road GNOME devs have been traveling for years of removing functionality and customization features.

[@Amike]

I believe it's a big mistake to separate DE as if they where a different platform and not all parts of Linux. That makes is confusing for new users, harder to switch from one DE to another, limits the number of programs that you have available and also makes it harder for developers as they need to choose a platform.

[@softwarelivre2389]

It does not limit the number of programs you have, as you can run all of them. The thing is that they will each follow their own stylesheets, so they won't break because of weird themeing.

[@fuseteam]

DE is in fact a platform, switching DE is essentially switching platforms. this will actually make it easier to switch platforms without breaking things ;)

[@Dreiven171]

The DEs are very different from the start of linux anyway. Google Drive is baked in Gnome, KDE only displays your gmail account (I know...Its just an example). And you can have gtk and qt apps in the same DE anyway, it's not like they have different kernels.

[@MohanRam]

Time for Ubuntu to start using KDE Plasma as their desktop, they can make it looks and feel like Unity did.

[@dermond]

I hope ubuntu take that step 😔👊

[@johncate9541]

Isn't that what Kubuntu is for?

[@MohanRam]

@@johncate9541 Yes, but I was more referring to it being main. Similar to how GNOME is now after Unity was dropped.

[@citywitt3202]

One lib for UI means we might finally get decent accessibility for the blind on gnome, and that *will* increase user adoption. Right now there’s 0 consistency in apps providing info to screen reader software, meaning it’s guess work what is going to be useable in terms of software. This will be a giant improvement if it comes to fruition.

[@SriHarshaChilakapati]

I like how Android handles theming in general. It mandates some common variables to be present in Themes which cover most of the common use cases, and themes are allowed to add extra variables too. I don't know much about GTK, but I don't think there will be much hurdles that way.

[@SriHarshaChilakapati]

@F99 Crafter Hey sorry, missed the reply. It makes sense. System theme is kinda fixed in Android and changes from OS to OS. To iron out these things, there is a Google provided library called as AppCompat (for compatibility between OS versions). Design libraries (themes) will be based on this AppCompat, so each app can totally customize the appearance. However, most apps use Google's Material Design system, and just changes a few colours like the colour palatte, where there are named colours like primaryLight, primaryDark, secondaryLight, secondaryDark, primaryLightVariant and so on. So it's kinda that Google already does all the heavy lifting. Even if some one like Xiomi or Oppo changes system theme, it will be cleared to the app by this AppCompat library.

[@TheDeathmail]

You know... I feel like everything is being more Mac-like... Macs were this stable but not the most customizable OS... Windows was more customizable but still had some level of stability... and then there was Linux, where the advantage was that you could do what you want.... But more and more Linux distributions are trying to stabilize and make consistent their OS and Windows is doing that too with Windows 11.... And then there was Android vs iPhone. One offered freedom, the other consistency. But now? Android is being a bit less customizable and looking more consistent.

[@anthonyreikai]

Excellent video. I prefer to lose a bit of consistency, but allow me to modify my desktop to work as I want. I would never use gnome if it weren't for the extensions. In the end, i think i will only use kde plasma in the future to come.

[@giomjava]

Same. Just moved to KDE Plasma and I'm pretty happy.

[@TIENNOU44800]

+1. I'm waiting for Ubuntu 22.04 to move to KDE Plasma.

[@TIENNOU44800]

@sk Yes, I wanted to talk about Kubuntu 22.04 ... but you understood ;-)

[@diegocaples5602]

Theming is literally the reason I switched to Linux. It's really sad to see how gnome, over the years, has consistently been taking control away from the user. I'm not a fan of how kde looks, so I don't really want to switch to it, but maybe I'll try budgie.

[@Watchandlearn91]

KDE can be made to look like literally anything with enough time and patience so if you want customization, that's your go-to. BUT it really is a pain to customize and get exactly how you want it and can literally take days to get perfect.

[@diegocaples5602]

@@Watchandlearn91 I agree that it's possible to make the desktop ui look amazing, but the applications always look a little cluttered to me. Maybe I'll try writing some simple qt applications that are similar to the gnome ones, cause I really like the amount of content presented in them.

[@Watchandlearn91]

@@diegocaples5602 Some are better than others but overall, yes, much more cluttered than the gnome apps. I think the only app I like better on kde than the gnome counterpart would be the files app because it is simple and yet has lots of hidden capabilities.

[@XanthinZarda]

Don't forget that there's more than KDE. There's Mate, Windowmaker, TWM, Sway, and about as many WMs as there are shrimp recipes in Forrest Gump.

[@MyReviews_karkan]

Man, I'm gonna say one thing, Thank god for KDE plasma.

[@mr.anirbangoswami]

First of all, thank you for making such an amazing video, it didn't feel like 17 minutes until you said so. Also, Nick evolving his opinion and talking to a lot of people who are directly involved, shows how humans should be open to new ideas, and always be willing to observe and listen. You gained my respect dude.

[@RedBlueProductions1]

i will forever say that anything that takes control away from the user at any point is anti-linux, no matter what anyone else wants. the _point_ of using linux in the first place is having control. your entire software stack is allowed to be controlled by you and you alone. your desktop environment. your browser. your file manager. your terminal emulator. your shell. your very kernel can be controlled by you. it doesn't even have to be linux. it doesn't even have to ship with GNU software if you don't want it. if DEs start thinking of themselves as platforms people are gonna start going back to window managers real quick. hell, in small numbers, they already are! think about how popular i3 has gotten. so much so that it's been ported to wayland, in sway. linux is the platform. no DE could ever hope to change that, and trying to do so is flying too close to the sun.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Unfortunately, moving to a window manager won’t make GNOME apps more themeable

[@genblob]

I find this very disappointing but budgie planning to move to EFL sounds awesome. It's about time enlightenment gets some attention and I really hope they go though with it.

[@ikeahloe]

yes and I hope they make it look less like dogshit, because besides that there's a whole lot to like

[@jashaswimalyaacharjee9585]

"Just compile from The damn Sources CJ!!!"

[@kycrush8657]

Some Video Suggestions: Rate how easy to setup common distros are; Different methods of download authentication (sha256 vs keys); Trying out small distros (Linux lite, porteus, Q4OS); On to watch the video.

[@deepkhamaru]

If we consider the Linux way to be open and enriched with freedom, then we need to consider every possibility. The opposing view on theming is just another way. Opposing that would be against the philosophy that is Linux. Now for fellow tweakers out there, the utter control isn't going anywhere. We still have Arch and Gentoo. We still have KDE. Every one of us has the possibility of our own distro. Limiting theming in one platform doesn't limit the Linux way of life. It just adds a new possibility. I think we should welcome this change.

[@GroudFrank]

Both the content and quality of videos are easily top 3 in the Linux community - top notch overall too. Keep the videos coming! 🙌🏿 I personally was a huge fan of theming but I find myself doing none of it anymore, besides changing icons. I've been using less and less extensions too. I think Gnome should strive to at least give the option of adjusting accent colors but I personally don't think being able to style my DE to look like a MacOS clone or something else is a priority for me.

[@fuseteam]

that's basically what is still in the works from the sound of it

[@talkysassis]

A compiled theme format, and a compiler for them can solve most of these problems. This way, you can make sure the theme will have 100% support, as the compiler will need it to work. Then you can just load the settings to the DE. This way all the themes will work fine. The major problem in my view is that most users do not like the default theme at all. Adwaita is very robotic, grey, and lacks personality. Even Plasma default style has these problems, but KDE at least looks more sofisticated.

[@white-bunny]

Adwaita is having a rework being done, right now, with the Adwaita-Borderless Project. You can check it out :)

[@AleksandarStefanovic]

This is a solution that could fix the majority of the current problems. Standardize the theme requirements, and then provide a type-safe API for creating custom themes. Type-safe in a sense that it has strict requirements that must be met, that are clearly laid out for the developer creating the theme, and that it fails to compile (or fails to load, in a case of markup languages) if the requirements aren't met.

[@igorgiuseppe1862]

one of the reasons why i start using linux was to have more freedom, theme customization was part of this feeling of having freedom. i can understand that they want to create an coherent experience, i hope once they fix the coherence "bug", they add the option to "break" stuff again, and to quickly go back to an stable theme if the user regreat the consequences of his own decisions. in other words, an theme picker that allow you to chose from a few presets, and go back to then at any moment, but also allow you to try to customize then even if you create some inconsistency in the process.

[@Lyunpaw]

I really enjoyed your coverage of this issue. Thank you for bringing the words of the Developers, Distro Maintainers, & Community Members together without drama.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks! Glad I could reach that goal, I wanted to be as objective as possible!

[@learningbird9940]

Thanks Nick for this summary on "The state of Gnome and GTK4" in 2021.

[@jonnyso1]

Great video, very different from what I've seen anyone doing on the Linux community. It really helped me wrap my head around this whole situation. But really, isn't the case basically: Gnome is there doing their own thing > Some distro hacks it to look the way they wanted > But it sucks and they complain everytime Gnome changes anything upstream like its Gnome's obligation to worry about other peoples hacks that they never agreed to suport.

[@fuseteam]

yes it is, that's why this video is a good one. distros should be working with gnome for solutions rather than hacking solutions in

[@mariozenarju6461]

Is there any mention on how will it affect GTK theming inside of KDE? Or will it be affected at all?

[@alex15095]

From my understanding, libadwaita apps will just ignore your theme and might stick out like a sore thumb

[@WildVoltorb]

You'll be stuck with the adwaita theme

[@JahidulIslam]

Normal gtk 3 and 4 apps will workjs as usual. So, libreoffice, handdbrake etc will work just fine.

[@jarnobot]

You've made a typo at 11:22 ;) Great video btw, I really appreciate that you took the effort to gather information directly from the different dev teams. Your video's are getting better and more professional every time :)

[@__viperML]

8:33 couldn't agree more. I myself discovered Linux for not being satisfied with Windows' theming options (and stayed for many other reasons). As I understand this, all gnome-based distros will be basically visually identical. 13:19 this is BS, look at the Android world. Many of the most know android apps don't follow Google's material design guidelines, not to mention vendor ROM's like Xiami's, which completly change the OS design. 14:50 So in the end, people will theme libadwaita itself, making it even harder (and maybe riskier) for new users who want to theme their pc I hope KDE and QT don't follow this route, at least not to this extent

[@fuseteam]

they will yes, that is what is called being a platform. but at the same time they are working on theming for distributors, did you miss the parts of the anonymous yaru developer? yaru is the theme ubuntu uses and we all know ubuntu's version of gnome looks "nothing" like vanilla gnome ;) did you also miss the part of the elementaryos developers? elementary os looks absolutely nothing like gnome, and they too are open to using libadwaita it is also good to think of what "theming" really, that what does theming do: change the various colors of the various components? libadwaita can enable various it's colors to be changed and enforce which colors have to exist and have to be tested to not break apps. QT already have a robust theming API. gnome is just finally cleaning up their mess. the final take here is important tho. if application developers don't want to follow the system theme, they can do that. it's up them to support that or not ;)

[@jonnyso1]

KDE was made with customization in mind, that's what it is about. It will keep following its philosophy just like Gnome is doing with its own, but different, philosophy. But you have to wonder, if distro developers want to customize so much, why so many still go for Gnome instead of their "KDE Default".

[@prettysheddy]

@@jonnyso1 If you said this a few years ago I would agree. But from what I am seeing the new up and coming distros prefer to use KDE not GNOME.

[@IGqy]

This is not really related to this issue, but one thing that gnome(-based) distributions like pop and others have going in my opinion is that its very easy to pick up due to the lack of things you are presented with as a new user. I had set up a laptop for a family member with kde styled to look and act like windows. It was rarely used, as it was too different as soon as you opened anything. I then installed pop on it, amd even though the workflow was very different, the simplicity (in settings panels, number of options, presentation etc) made the user just dive in, and they understood how to use the system and configure it to their liking. Again, not directly related to this, but it seems that there is a thing to coherence and simplicity - at least from a non thechie's perspective. Thanks for a good and informative video!

[@joschafinger126]

On the user side, it would seem that this project will make GNOME more newbie-friendly while alienating more experienced users. This has long been a tendency in the DE -in fact, it's part of the reason why I myself switched to KDE. To each their own, but configurability is one of my top criteria when picking a DE, and playing around with every single aspect of it is the one thing about reinstalling, distro-hopping etc that I actually really enjoy. However, consistency is aesthetically important, and it should help noobs a lot. And, apparently, it may improve stability. On the whole, I guess making this change will have an impact on who uses GNOME. I don't know if it's wise, though. Good luck, GNOME team. But this change makes it even less likely that I, personally, will come back to GNOME, and I'll wager I'm not alone.

[@asmityadav.09]

I'm happy with Plasma 5.23.1

[@ymnargue]

Je suis belge et je suis subjugué par ton accent anglais et encore plus subjugué par l'immense qualité de ton contenu. Merci pour toutes ces merveilleuses vidéos.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Merci beaucoup ☺️

[@cultureclashmusicvideo4545]

As Gnome and Linux get older, but not necessarily wiser, it is saddening to see something like theming being described as a problem. Time rolls on, but the real evolution of Open Source and Linux is an amazing story, especially in terms of people and creative collaboration. That is the core of the whole project, and it deserves more attention than it is usually given. Collaboration is an art that is also dependent on a critical level of unity and purpose. In my view, the necessary survival of this project depends on whether the essential purpose can still be grasped by new and different generations. I hope so.

[@ehhwhatevericantthinkofago8903]

12:53 as someone who does not use a mainline DE this is horrifying. All my apps looking different from each other as each DE becomes its own distro and all the little DEs being squeezed out of existence is not a Linux future I want to see. I mean its already bad enough that when you want to install a mainline app from a different DE you need to pull down half the desktop environment in dependencies.

[@foss_sound]

I am looking forward ro a finally consitent ux. I got used to adwaita dark (compact) somehow about a year ago, so it does not have a big impact for me. And I think theming will still be available. So it is for Win and macOS, its just harder, but IMO more users gain better ux than users loose ux without easy and fluttered theming.

[@1945ramirez1]

Theming my desktop is one of the main reasons I left windows and Mac the freedom of choice to make your desktop whatever you want! If this happens and passes on to KDE, I see a decline in the number of Linux users down the road!

[@nerdon2]

KDE will never do something like that, the whole point of plasma is user customisation

[@fuseteam]

there is nothing in the new direction that prevents a new more robust way to theme your desktop ;)

[@intotheshred]

This channel has the best Linux journalism on KZbin, if not the whole Internet.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot!

[@yuryzhuravlev2312]

It's why I am on the KDE side, even common Qt apps can be designed in your style.

[@AnzanHoshinRoshi]

Thank you, Nick. Good job. As for myself, I hope that this will help Pop!_OS and other distros to move to Xfce as a base instead.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

I’d be surprised. They probably would use Cinnamon instead, if they decide to switch to something else.

[@nofate0007]

Or KDE

[@jesuszamora6949]

@@TheLinuxEXP Cinnamon and KDE will likely benefit as Gnome becomes more of a closed environment.

[@nuclearbomb9483]

I heard pop os are making their own de

[@AnzanHoshinRoshi]

@@nuclearbomb9483 Yes, COSMIC DE written Rust with GTK and the usual GNOME apps. Basically just replacing GNOME Shell instead of trying to maintain extensions that GNOME breaks when they futz with the shell.

[@kuhluhOG]

About the blog post from the Solus developer: I think his complains about GTK4 and GTK5-plans are also pretty interesting.

[@mohammadfouzan5137]

I read through the blog, seems like there's going to no way to implement custom widgets as subclasses. I really would like to know their reasoning behind dropping this

[@kuhluhOG]

@F99 Crafter on the other hand, this WILL essentially mean that some programs could be forced to reimplement/redesign huge parts of their applications now this either means that some programs (even small ones) are going to take years to port it, just won't bother, or go to a different toolkit/framework (because in such a case it's quite often nearly equal in work) the GTK devs could have ported to the new (in their opinion) more modular structure without breaking the old way especially because if you only want to do something slightly different than an existing widget, subclassing it is A LOT less work than doing this

[@XanthinZarda]

GTK4 hasn't even rolled out fully, who would be trying to crystal ball GTK5? Unless the reception of GTK4 has already soured.

[@kuhluhOG]

@@XanthinZarda because the work on GTK5 already started (look at the blog post if you want to know what exactly; it is in the video description)

[@Keyshooter]

in my humble opinion, this will be better in the long run, like, a lot of people get discouraged from keep using linux because they don't understand the layers of this front end components, there will be always other options people can take too, like Plasma, or Xfce, or go the hardcore way and use sway, i3 or dwm, the wonderful thing of linux is that we can work out a way to solve things, in this case, we are seeing the possible solution to a "normie" issue "normie" people have

[@akza0729]

KDE is always there. But if I can make my App look whatever I want without users bug reporting how UI is broken on X distro then I'm all in. GTK being neutral is good.

[@YuraJayRJay]

If only Linux desktop had one refined and unified UI/UX standard and design language which GTK, Qt, Enlightment app developers strived for.

[@AleksandarStefanovic]

If only... but it is hard to agree on a standard, when everyone has different opinions and requirements, and isn't ready to compromise on their platform. I would love an unified experience across different Linux ecosystems, but I think it will never happen, at least not by evolution, but maybe by revolution.

[@claudiusraphael9423]

Libadwaita - is or will it be monolithic in the end? What i am hoping for is being able to build sub-/super-sets of libadwaita or using it as a template to create own widget libraries that still are compatible to Gnome. Or the other way around using it as a reference for the minimal set of widgets and behaviours Gnome expects, to ensure a custom desktop based on the Gnome Infrastructure can be easily maintained. The overall aim is modularization - is libadwaita a centerpiece i will be able to rely on?

[@LucasSantos98]

Must have this option in settings : "enable legacy theming ". It will disable the libadwaita and use the actual way of personalize the desktop.

[@arxaaron]

Thanks for producing such well researched journalism! My view on the theme issue is that any means of achieving more consistency in the core user interface of Linux distros will greatly facilitate broader adoption of Linux platforms. I think the trade off of giving up some of the user tweaking and developer customization abilities will be small losses compared to the advantages of providing a consistent and predictable user experience. While I like the philosophy of user control and flexibility, I find the rigid interface style guidelines of Mac make my use of applications there a more productive and accessible experience.

[@marufbepary100]

I respect the fact that Gnome wants to create a developer platform; it will improve their experience and the users'. But I think that Gnome should also provide guidelines for themes so that they work smoothly and not just underpower them. There should be a structure for app developers and theme developers to that they are intercompatible with each other. I think there should be some way to change the shapes as long as it is within boundaries. I don't want Linux to descend into an inconsistent mess like Windows.

[@alterego157]

Gnome breaks extensions on every update and they almost have no documentations so it's super painful to debug and fix things when they break them. That's doesn't look like a project that wants to create a developer platform. As far as I ca tell al styling is done with css so I see no reason why would they hide and lock that css somewhere and prevent users from making changes.

[@AleksandarStefanovic]

Excellent video! I like that you actually talked to the people involved, that is much more engaging than just deriving information from the publications and the source code. So far, I see this issue as a consequence of the Linux distribution fragmentation, which has both merits and drawbacks. On the one hand, it encourages exploration and uniqueness, and gives liberty to the developers to create their own thing, but on the other hand, it complicates adoption from third-party developers, both indie developers of individual Linux-only apps, as well as bigger developers, such as those creating video games or professional software - with so much fragmentation, they need to either choose the distribution that they develop for, or spend developer hours making the software platform-agnostic enough to be available on multiple distributions. Also, with so many distributions, there is so much of wheel-reinventing, which makes me sad that developers of separate distributions aren't working on the same things together. However, I don't see how this issue could be resolved, without stifling all the benefits of the fragmentation.

[@primistandem6781]

Very informative video! Highly appreciate it! Really enjoy this channel, it has become my main video source for Linux news.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thank you very much!

[@Michi-go5xi]

Welp, I personally use yaru-colors and I like vanilla adwaita a lot, and I guess Gnome is going to let us change the accent colour (Which is the only reason why I use Yaru)... But right as you said, privative software doesn't care about theming, and I use plenty of propiteary applications who don't care about theme you selected, I like it to be easier for developers, that may give Linux a chance to have even more native software as developers see it is easier to develop their applications here...

[@hammer86_]

8:44 Budgie moving to EFL?? Aw hell no.

[@andrewstombaugh9318]

Good solid info. Thank you for doing the research on this. 1st nail consistency... THEN we can work on options. Nice coverage of a controversial topic.

[@MrVoidfull]

Thank you for the effort in research and interviewing people who actually know where this is going. It's interesting. I'm on of the few more experienced Linux users who actually loves GNOME, and I find these changes interesting. Feels like devs want to make GNOME much more cohesive, make it feel consistent and premium when it comes to it's own apps. On the other hand, I also like that they won't be hunting ultimate consistency, by trying to force KDE apps into looking GNOME - like. I'm excited to see where this is going, I like seeing the GNOME vision maturing.

[@mrbladestone]

This video was informative on this change and I am hopeful about it. But we have to wait at least one year to see where is this heading.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Yep, it’s not ready by any means

[@dragoshnicolaie4538]

One of the reason i like linux based OS more than windows or mac is obviously the freedom to do what you whant when you want. Theming is indeed one way to make your computer feel yours. Maybe this decision would make distros using gnome be more coherent in design but the look and feel will fade away. Maybe it's a good thing for newer users, having a stable design language but once you get used you tend to feel boored, i know i am and this is the reason i like linux, i can change the look and feel whenever i want. You had that video abut the linux jank, and i think it is true, the way i feel about linux is that is more like a "DIY" project. True is janky but in the end it is tour computer, your desktop, your look, and once it is finished you can keep it forever, change it, save it and so on.. i donkt now, i like this tinkering part of linux , beside that , there are a lot of distros out there that can be used daily as a stable OS. in the end... isn't there a solution to have both ? Theming and coherence ?

[@marvinmokua]

I spent hours finding productivity apps that adapt to my Orchis Green theme I have no clue what I'm going to do if I lost that level of customisation for native apps

[@Inspector_Rex]

I hope that users and distributions will have decent customization options. I have to use Vivaldi for work purposes and one of the reasons I enjoy it is the ability to customize it's colours the way you want. You have four colours (Background, Foreground, Highlight and Accent) and you can alter their specific hex codes to achieve the look that you enjoy (or the one that matches your desktop theme). Obviously, I have little to no clue as to how platforms, apps and desktop environments are created, but I do wonder if it's possible to implement something similar to the GNOME theming capabilities. That would give users quite a few customization options (e.g. not limiting to only dark and light themes) while still being a little "concrete" so to speak. But again, I might be completely wrong about this. I just love customization in Linux!

[@andromydous]

If I was to be honest and fair, as a primary Windows user and a part time Linux user, theming hasn't really been available since Windows 7. So, not having those options might not bug me too much. Then again, one of the reasons I love Linux is the vast amount of choices and freedoms you have to make your DE look the way you want and not some way that somebody else thinks it ought to look like. I had heard that System76 is seriously contemplating breaking away from Gnome. Maybe this is why.

[@KezzBracey]

Another aspect of the importance of colour control is for people doing graphic work. The colour of applications directly influences visual perception of the colours in images / videos. I use David Revoy's artist specific colour theme on KDE for that reason, and a carefully chosen GTK theme. Not being able to change colour theme would be potentially problematic for graphic work on Linux.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

True, I had not seen that angle!

[@andrewfournier8817]

I've tended to prefer other desktops since Gnome 3, so I'm probably biased here. I can see how this might have a set institutional use cases, but non customizable Linux desktops sounds really, really appalling. This is personal motivation for me to avoid Gnome- no loss to anyone: I'm usually on KDE anyway. Nice review, thanks.

[@WhatzHappeningNow9]

If you are going to be subbed to just one Linux channel, this is it! I am so happy to see Nick growing as fast as he does, deserves everything.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :)

[@oalfodr]

Great time to look into using more of CLI apps

[@perdomot]

On the topic of dark themes, it should be noted that some of them are not that good or pleasing. If you like Apple themes, you have dark options for Catalina, Cupertino, Mojave, Bir Sur and White Sur. I like the Mojave one best myself but being able to choose is very important aspect of Linux to me and developer trying to take it away/limit it is wrong. What's next, limiting fonts, icons?? I think Elementary started this trend of trying to make users do things THEIR way which is against what Linux stands for.

[@AleksandarStefanovic]

Linux stands for using whatever you like, and I specifically prefer distributions that do not offer customization (like elementary OS), and I've never felt the need to change anything in my system to accommodate me better. Why should I be able to change the font, when the font implementation used in elementary OS is better than every other Linux distribution? Why would I want to rearrange things, when they are already perfectly laid out? Why should I want to change the theme of the applications, when the current theme is adequate and has no styling issues? Why is it an expectation of a Linux distribution that one should waste their time on changing something that the developers put a lot of effort into researching, designing and developing? I would rather have developers work on meaningful things than spend time covering edge-cases of customization. As stated in the video, the move to less theming (or different theming than the present one) is mostly because it makes it easier for developers to focus on their apps, instead of covering weird issues that might pop-up when the underlying platform is shifting underneath their feet.

[@perdomot]

@@AleksandarStefanovic Sounds like you should be using Windows or MacOS rather than Linux. Main reason I switched from Windows was because Linux offered me the chance to modify things to my preference. Not just the look of the system but how it works. I tried MacOS for 3 months this year and went back to Linux for the same reason. Linux is something that lets the user be in control, not the creators and that's the main difference from business products like Windows.

[@alterego157]

@@AleksandarStefanovic You ca use the default and be happy. You don't have to change anything. Nobody is forcing you. But you want to force others to limit themselves to your preferences and what you like. There is ZERO reason to prevent users to change and adapt the system to what they want. Linux is not Apple or Microsoft. That's the very reason Gnome has a system it can run on. Thousands of people contributing, changing, sharing in the spirit of freedom and openness created that. They are building on top of that. And they want to close and impose their choices. It's arrogant, close, minded, and goes against everything Linux stands for.

[@7th_project]

Dream come true!!!! reminds me of the XBMC days before kodi @ 1:04 to 4:10 so finally they are making it easier for users to create their own custom themes without compromising GTK i just want Adwaita Dark theme with adwaita sized, yellow green an red buttons instead of the dark ones.

[@spankroy]

I think the PopOS dev's stated that they are now working on their own homegrown Desktop Environment in Rust due to this. (Was in a reddit comment I believe) Seems like a lot of work, but more power to them.

[@Pixel_jones]

Wow thanks for the info. I really love what Pop Os and Elementary have done with the Gnome environment and probably the only reason I use Gnome instead of KDE.

[@QueeeeenZ]

I use GNOME as my primary desktop. But I would never use it if I wasn't able to change the theme.

[@CFalcon030]

I am an Atari user. I expect applications to look however they like. But I think Gnome is moving at a direction that limits user choice and thus user experience. I am using Mint / Cinnamon after many years of absence from desktop linux (ever since Canonical dropped Unity) and I've made only minor tweaks (less than ten minutes spent) but I want the choice because I know that the more I use it, the more I am going to need to improve things to help with my workflow. As for what other operating systems are doing, Windows 10 allows a lot of theming. HP even suggests themes on their website, one of which is ubuntu like. It's actually more Ubuntu like than Ubuntu itself.

[@chrisl4676]

Thanks for the update! GNOME is an awesome desktop, but themes always seem to have been an add on, between settings, tweaks, extensions, and searching git-hub, so I can see them cleaning it up. But take away my 'minwaita' window control buttons? Nooooooooooooooooo!!!!!. :)

[@enigmaster84]

*IF* theming were implemented in a more coherent way to do it -even only by guidelines or how-tos- it wouldn't have to go this way. I like how there are at least some tools to let GTK, Qt and other libraries seen as "foreign" by your desktop to integrate graphically, so that even though they behave a bit differently they won't look as completely out of place. From what I gather here is that this will be now be much less possible. As you said, you no longer develop a GTK or Qt app: now you develop a Gnome, KDE, or anyting else app, and that's quite a shame as personally I'd prefer programs to be as much as desktop neutral as possible, and that's the mindset I feel apps should be developed in. In this way Gnome apps will feel foreign on any other desktop

[@Luke29121999]

I currently use materia-theme for GTK and materia-kde for Qt. This gives me a very consistent and nice desktop look across nearly all applications. If GTK applications start looking completely out of place because of libadwaita, not to talk about the wasted space because of the oversize titlebar and buttons, i will simply replace them with non libadwaita or just non GTK alternatives. Having distro maintainers ship a modified version of libadwaita for theming seems like an absolutely lunacy of a nightmare to maintain. And not having a timeline for a colouring/stable theming API is an absolute joke from the gnome developers. You cant start taking away the current ways of theming things, and then saying "yeah we might maybe at some point add something" I absolutely hate the idea of closing everything off to be their own ecosystem, this will do absolutely no good and only hurt the linux desktop ecosystem as a whole :/

[@MysteryMan159]

So essentially themes will be still possible but they will be harder? Also elementary os will fundamentally be more flexible than gnome officially ... Also I wonder if this affects icon themes. I actually like adwaita theme but, it’s still nice being able to change your shell. Hope I don’t have to go to KDE 🥲

[@TheLinuxEXP]

This shouldn’t affect icon theme

[@russellbrooks3622]

Other than some of the Gnome apps that are used on all desktops, I don't Gnome. I don't KDE, either. I Cinnamon, or I XFCE.

[@monkyyy0]

>we can't have theming because css style sheets may grow exponentially complicity Then impliment a non dynamic typed config file, why was it css anyway?

[@fuseteam]

that's what they are doing, css was just a hack. did you know gnome and gtk was originally set up to rival kde and qt? they had to be fast and a lot of hacks were done to quickly rise to the challenge

[@mohammadfouzan5137]

Glad that Ubuntu is working upstream for their theme to be offered

[@Harikrishnanxlrb]

i'll stick with plasma.

[@atemoc]

To each their own DEs! And now, the contrast between Gnome and Plasma is even greater

[@durianpeople]

Android, iOS, Windows and Mac can afford having apps not cohesive between environments because they have the market share The *combined* market share for Linux is already so low... we're just praying *some* companies develop their apps for Linux, let alone creating separate builds for each distros with their own native tooling Looking at my Spotify window on Linux makes me envy Windows and Mac

[@durianpeople]

I'd say, for once, let's try to force one standard, and see if we can gain the marketshare and then third party proprietary developers support

[@laurinneff4304]

I like Adwaita (specifically the dark variant), so I don't mind the change

[@youtubeoneverything4581]

very detailed information. enjoyed it

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@CodingHaribo]

Loved this video, really good to understand the aspects from the distro and gnome devs. I wholeheartedly agree that giving less controls around theming is a good thing, it will ultimately make things way more consistent, and most importantly more reliable (which is Linux biggest weakness for desktop apps) PS: Gnome 41 is my most loved desktop

[@epzapp]

I have to say one of my main reasons for using a Gnome theme is that I really don't like Adwita.. So if it was awesome maybe I wouldn't care. 🙂

[@alterego157]

@Random NPC Yeah, close minded and tyrannical. Antithetical to everything Linux stand for.

[@vishalkumar040393]

Welcome changes. The new Yaru theme looks really nice.