Pamac and dark themes

Support Xfce
1

Hi - I’ve not seen anything about this issue except where it pertains to KDE, so I hope you don’t mind me posting.

I am using a dark theme in XFCE - Zukitre-dark - and in recent weeks I’ve found that Pamac is not fully following it. In particular, the background for application entries through the main interface is not switching to compensate, and clashes with the font as a result. I’ve tried reinstalling the application but it hasn’t made any difference. It works if I switch away from a dark theme, but I don’t particuarly like them and have not found a problem with any other application. It means I sort of have to squint when installing software. Can anyone help?

2

XFCE is gtk3 and pamac is built using gtk4.

The problem with themes is not that Pamac is not following it but the fact that the theme is not updated to match the properties supported by gnome.

Pamac is build using the latest gtk so if theming is inconsistent then it is caused by the theme - not the application.

In fact gnome is moving towards making adwaita the only fully supported theme and to change their theming engine - so it is difficult to know what the future brings in that regard.

There is a lot of talk on the internet regarding gnome and what they are trying to achieve and how theme developers do not always agree with gnome.

1 Like
3

OK… so what should I do? I’m not using anything particularly spectacular, just some themes that came with the XFCE version of Manjaro. Should I stop using XFCE, or Pamac?

Edit: Zukitre-dark was actually in the AUR (sorry), but I have the same issue using other themes from the Manjaro repository

4

Hi,

  1. Zukitre (or whatever it is called) is not part of manjaro theming.
  2. What are your Qt5-settings?
  3. For testing use adwaita-dark-theme or adwaita-maia-dark-theme.
    Install adwaita-qt for better integration of qt apps. When installed, you can choose adwaita/adwaita-dark in qt5-settings.
5

I can see packages in AUR for zuki-themes that provides theme zukitra

I suggest you try some themes from Manjaro repository.
These all appear to be working without problems on Xfce:

  • arc-gtk-theme
  • arch-themes-breath
  • gtk-theme-maia
  • matcha-gtk-themes
  • vertex-theme
6

My apologies - I had forgotten I had installed Zuki from AUR.

I’ve checked with Matcha and Arc though and I’m running into the same problem if I switch over. Nothing changes if I follow the instructions provided by banjo.

Happy to provide more information if it helps.

7

That should not be necessary :slight_smile:

There is so many themes created over the years for the various toolkit versions.

  • gtk2
  • gtk3
  • gtk4
  • qt
  • kvantum
  • plasma

And not all of them are actively maintained - so installing a theme - one can expect small issues.

It is also known that some theme can make the system go haywire - mostly seen with Plasma and Gnome. Also known that a small number of applications can go haywire if the theme is poorly constructed or unmaintained.

And theming is maintained as many different locations and config files. Finding those small annoyances can be a hairpulling experience.

8

Reboot ?

9

Actually pamac still relies on gtk3 (well, libhandy mostly, which in turn relies on gtk3):

https://gitlab.manjaro.org/packages/extra/pamac/-/blob/master/PKGBUILD#L15
https://archlinux.org/packages/extra/x86_64/libhandy/

but yeah, there are certainly some issues with various themes and libhandy.

1 Like
10

Oh - I thought latest changes to Pamac was spurred by the changes to the toolkit.

I guess there is transition phase …

11

10.x is built using Gtk3 and Libhandy, 11.x is built using Gtk4 and Libadwaita. 11 hasn’t been released yet. :wink:

Report the issue to the theme maintainer.

12

It might not be obvious, but with XFCE you can apply a theme in the Window Manager settings and also in the Appearance settings.

If you have neofetch installed you’ll see what is set where.

13

Thank you