Please don’t theme our apps
stopthemingmy.app
Please don’t theme our apps
1–10 of 206 posts
Re: Please don’t theme our apps
#2> GTK Stylesheets can make applications look broken, and even unusable.
Bugs are bad, yes.
> Icon Themes can change icon metaphors, leading to interfaces with icons that don’t express what the developer intended.
That is not a problem if you use icons for the purpose they are intended for.
> Changing an app’s icon denies the developer the possibility to control their brand.
Good. My computer is not your billboard. Consistency is more important than your "brand".
> Appstream Screenshots (the screenshots used in GNOME Software or Flathub) are not very useful if they look nothing like the real app does once you install it.
> User Help and Documentation are similarly useless if UI elements on your system are different from the ones described in the documentation.
Nonsense. Theming doesn't affect the layout of a program. If people were that bad at abstraction, then how do they recognize they can sit on a metal chair if they are familiar with wooden ones?
> They are built and tested for the upstream GNOME stylesheet, icons, and fonts, so that’s what they should look like on peoples’ systems.
No. They should look like the user chooses them to look. One way for the user to express their choice is to choose a distribution whose theme they like.
> Changing third-party apps without any QA is reckless, and would be unacceptable on any other platform.
∀x. x without any QA is reckless.
Re: Please don’t theme our apps
#3I feel like an "open letter" is a pretty odd way to ask something of the maintainers of distributions that do not install GNOME with its stock Adwaita theme. Indeed, despite being created some two weeks ago, the (small) notice at the top that this particular open letter is aimed only at distribution maintainers was only added yesterday[1].
How many do so, anyway? I know Ubuntu has the Yaru[2] theme by default.
I'll add that I personally find the stock Adwaita theme to be total garbage. I've been using the Vimix dark themes[3] for as long as I can remember because they don't make the title bar of windows 30 storeys tall and they don't use beige.
1. https://github.com/do-not-theme/do-not-theme.github.io/commi...
Re: Please don’t theme our apps
#4> GTK Stylesheets can make applications look broken, and even unusable. Bugs are bad, yes. > Icon Themes can change icon metaphors, leading to interfaces with icons that don’t express what the developer intended. That is not a problem if you use icons for the purpose they are intended for. > Changing an app’s icon denies the developer the possibility to control their brand. Good. My computer is not your billboard. Co…
Did we read the same letter? This letter was aimed at distributions and theme developers not end users.
Hell there’s even a paragraph aim directly at end users.
> If you like to tinker with your own system, that’s fine with us.
You’ve completely dismissed all of their concerns out of hand, in an entirely unhelpful and hostile manner.
Why did you even bother writing a comment?
Re: Please don’t theme our apps
#5> GTK Stylesheets can make applications look broken, and even unusable. Bugs are bad, yes. > Icon Themes can change icon metaphors, leading to interfaces with icons that don’t express what the developer intended. That is not a problem if you use icons for the purpose they are intended for. > Changing an app’s icon denies the developer the possibility to control their brand. Good. My computer is not your billboard. Co…
Did we read the same letter? This letter was aimed at distributions and theme developers not end users. Hell there’s even a paragraph aim directly at end users. > If you like to tinker with your own system, that’s fine with us. You’ve completely dismissed all of their concerns out of hand, in an entirely unhelpful and hostile manner. Why did you even bother writing a comment?
> Why did you even bother writing a comment?
Good question. Why did I write things like the following if you don't read it anyway?
> One way for the user to express their choice is to choose a distribution whose theme they like.
Re: Please don’t theme our apps
#6> GTK Stylesheets can make applications look broken, and even unusable. Bugs are bad, yes. > Icon Themes can change icon metaphors, leading to interfaces with icons that don’t express what the developer intended. That is not a problem if you use icons for the purpose they are intended for. > Changing an app’s icon denies the developer the possibility to control their brand. Good. My computer is not your billboard. Co…
The article had pretty clear examples of where theming went wrong.
Themes are imposing a real cost on developers who let's be honest are doing the Linux platform a massive favour by even bothering to write apps for it. I hope the audience of that article are a little more sympathetic than yourself.
Re: Please don’t theme our apps
#7> GTK Stylesheets can make applications look broken, and even unusable. Bugs are bad, yes. > Icon Themes can change icon metaphors, leading to interfaces with icons that don’t express what the developer intended. That is not a problem if you use icons for the purpose they are intended for. > Changing an app’s icon denies the developer the possibility to control their brand. Good. My computer is not your billboard. Co…
I'm using System76's Pop_OS icon theme in Gnome Shell, and like the clean look of it. It changes the icons for a good number of popular applications too, which results in everything looking neat and coherent.
> Good. My computer is not your billboard.
Yes, seriously. If a user runs a free software desktop, chances are the ability to change things according to their wishes is part of why they use it.
> Changing third-party apps without any QA is reckless, and would be unacceptable on any other platform.
Which is why I use a platform that does grant me that freedom as a user.
Re: Please don’t theme our apps
#8This is more of an indictment of the way GTK3+ handles theming (or lack of it). GNOME/GTK devs, as usual, got confused and implemented something no one wants. Either you provide a proper and defined way to theme like KDE does or take the windows/mac route and tell developers to recreate any custom themed control from scratch.
Instead, they go around saying that there is only one GTK theme and then leave a convenient backdoor open for hacks with a nudge and a wink. Either open the front door and roll out a carpet or close all the doors and windows.
Re: Please don’t theme our apps
#9Icon themes - should be more standardized, that's true.
GTK stylesheets - mostly a problem of different GTK versions they're made for, because GTK versioning is a mess.
App Icons - so what? I think most people like consistency - look at Windows 10 and its ~4years of development, it's still a mess and if I had an option I'd switch right away
All in all I think the choice should be left on the user after distro install, use default gnome look by default and have an option to switch to another with a warning. I agree that devs shouldn't have to deal with someones custom stylesheet issues.
Re: Please don’t theme our apps
#10> GTK Stylesheets can make applications look broken, and even unusable. Bugs are bad, yes. > Icon Themes can change icon metaphors, leading to interfaces with icons that don’t express what the developer intended. That is not a problem if you use icons for the purpose they are intended for. > Changing an app’s icon denies the developer the possibility to control their brand. Good. My computer is not your billboard. Co…
The article had pretty clear examples of where theming went wrong. Themes are imposing a real cost on developers who let's be honest are doing the Linux platform a massive favour by even bothering to write apps for it. I hope the audience of that article are a little more sympathetic than yourself.
The article has one valid example of a bug. If it's a bug in the application, writing an open letter about it is not helpful. If it's a bug in the theme, the application developer is just not responsible for it.