Puppy 2.15CE Look and Feel: Taking it to the next level...

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WhoDo
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#16 Post by WhoDo »

jason.b.c wrote:In that picture in the first post that WhoDo posted - The icons look great..! , I mean awesome.! , But when i downloaded and extracted them - And tried to use them to replace some of my current icons - they look absolutely Horrible..!
Not negative, just disappointed I'd say. Here are a couple of screenshots I put together to show how the icons will look in their real life application. I know exactly what you're talking about, and I too was disappointed in some of the icons.

Image

Image

The icons here are 48x48, so they're not really small. Screen resolution is 1024x768 - not really very high - and the two backgrounds are in Beta1 by default.

Any other comments?

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Pizzasgood
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#17 Post by Pizzasgood »

Use the other gnumeric icon (the one without the blue thing in the grid) for the calender, it fits the part more. Also, make sure you load up Gimp and edit out the "PCLinux" bits from the "Computer" and "Console" icons.

Otherwise, it looks great. Even better than the fast job I did a couple minutes ago when trying them out.

BTW, is that just a personal WhoDo setting where you have the window-decorations enabled on Xmms? As in the release version won't have it enabled? I know the beta didn't.
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WhoDo
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#18 Post by WhoDo »

Pizzasgood wrote:BTW, is that just a personal WhoDo setting where you have the window-decorations enabled on Xmms? As in the release version won't have it enabled? I know the beta didn't.
On a different machine to the one where I prepared the beta. This machine is shared with someone else, and I guess he fiddles with settings or something. Frankly, I just didn't notice.

Thanks for the heads up anyway, mate.

Cheers

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puppyfan12
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#19 Post by puppyfan12 »

Very very impressive look to those screenshots WhoDo! Kudos for putting them together.

If going with the white icons, please read this post re: firefox / thunderbird licensing and the logo usage.

What if we took the firefox source and compiled our own build called "puppy browser" and kept the version numbers in sync with the official firefox binary releases, just like ice weasel? We could also do the same with Thunderbird or Pupmail or whatever we wanted to call it...
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Lobster
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#20 Post by Lobster »

These icons represent something central to the Puppy ideology. That is quite subtle. They have cut out the 'eye candy' of colour. Yet they are still eye candy.

Most of the existing icons are a bit from here a bit from there. These are a set.

A black white and grey theme is possible. Tweaking a design is easy for end users and is likely the first thing to try after or whilst testing programs. As far as I am concerned PCLinuxOS is the best looking Linux and as these came from there I feel confident.

I would suggest far greater priorities (after an alpha and beta release) are which WM and browser are being used? The windows or Firefox icons are easy to resolve once we have a stable feature set.

It is up to Warren based on advisement and prevailing preferences and his best judgement to decide on the direction and Vizion Viz is implementing :)

Is that possible?
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WhoDo
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Another desktop vision...

#21 Post by WhoDo »

Hi gang,

Here is another look at the Puppy 2.15CE default desktop after some suggestions from Pizzasgood. Any comments?

Image

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jason.b.c
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#22 Post by jason.b.c »

I have a question , Where did you get that XMMS skin , It looks cool...
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WhoDo
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#23 Post by WhoDo »

jason.b.c wrote:I have a question , Where did you get that XMMS skin , It looks cool...
I uploaded here for similar enquirers when the project first got underway.

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 82&start=4

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Pizzasgood
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#24 Post by Pizzasgood »

Nice. I do think the whole lot looks better with green or blue though, due to the GTK theme. Even like that it's pretty good.

EDIT: Wait, was that screenshot green to begin with? I could have sworn it was red when I made this post. Meh, whatever. Like I said, the green looks better :)
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#25 Post by TonshA »

Looking really nice....

DaveA

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#26 Post by Lobster »

Puppy Viz
Green and tan

Sounds just about right . . .
What are your plans for the icon set (which I notice you are modifying) Warren?
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WhoDo
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#27 Post by WhoDo »

Lobster wrote:What are your plans for the icon set (which I notice you are modifying) Warren?
Still under consideration. I have downloaded a complimentary set to Gryphen's Glass-icons, and I'll see what I can make out of the two without destroying the consistency of the set.

Yes, at Pizzasgood's urging I have replaced PCLinuxOS logos with Puppy logos in the appropriate icons. I'm also trying to bring them out further by lifting their brightness a notch or two.

When I have something I am truly happy with, I'll post another screenshot. I think we should go with the unique set, IF they can be made to look a tad better and that's an issue of background choice as well as icon tweaking.

Clear as mud, eh Lob?

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WhoDo
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#28 Post by WhoDo »

Lobster wrote:What are your plans for the icon set (which I notice you are modifying) Warren?
Ready to settle on a choice with the community's approval. Here are a couple of screenshots that show the various icon/background options that could go in as standard.

Option 1 - Glass icons - Vista Black theme
Image

Option 2 - Crystal icons - Vista Black theme
Image

Option 3 - Crystal icons - emerald background - Velvet theme
Image

Option 4 - Crystal icons - Puppy 2.14 background - IcebergX theme
Image

Any comments?

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headfound
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#29 Post by headfound »

I think option 4, but with one of pizzasgood's shining backgrounds still looks the best - nice, clean and modern. I think the glass icons (while nice) look a bit bland.
Image
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Springer
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#30 Post by Springer »

Definitely the Shining Blue Pawprint background, almost regardless of theme.

I like the Velvet theme in general, especially the way the window banner come close to matching the OS toolbar, but the window banner buttons need work. In particular, the minimize button is effectively invisible on my ThinkPad. Oddly, it's even harder to see the controls in the green-bannered active window than in the non-active charcoal banners.

Here are my suggestions (I could help with the graphics, but I'm not familiar with how to hack themes): Start with the Velvet Green (Baise/Baize) theme, but change the active color of the banner to exactly match the OS Toolbar - almost a sky-blue highlight rather than green. Add color to the window controls in the banner in their normal state (as they show in rollover now). Also, there should be a rollup control button like the one in the Vista Black theme. (Vista is clearly the best theme functionally, but we shouldn't copy. Infringement aside, we need our own clean and distinctive look.)

As for icons, I'm torn - we've got two good choices here and I don't think we can go wrong with either, except that the frosted ones won't work against a light background, so we'd need two sets.

This is shaping up nicely, overall.

One final note: The root menu needs work both organizationally and icon-wise. There are too many choices, and it's sometimes very hard to find things - it took me several minutes to find where to set the clock this afternoon. Consolidating a bunch of the stuff under "Control Panels" or the like would help this a lot. I'll see if I can take a swag at rearranging the menus this weekend...

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richard.a
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#31 Post by richard.a »

A good job all round, folks, thankyou for a sterling job, well done.

Just a thought though. Those of us who do not have as good eyesight as some others, need far better contrast than is provided on the default theme menu and task-bar/panel. Thje text all but vanishes in its readability, looking at the live CD I've been running for some hours.

Would really think that ought to have something done if you can, thanks :)


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puppyfan12
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#32 Post by puppyfan12 »

Image

Vista Black Theme
Likes
-black/purpe/blue menu background
-start button colour & design (maybe with a paw or change start to launch or menu)
-icon to rollup the window (next to minimize)
-black/blue/white gradient taskbar icons for programs
-the highlight colors over the window control buttons (red=close, green=maximize, yellow=minimize, blue=rollup)

dislikes
-big X before program name in taskbar
-pink, yellow and orange gradient taskbar icons (all the non-black/blue/white ones are too much contrast and way too far off the rest of the color scheme...adjusting the hue in gimp to something not so far off might improve that)
-grey system tray hide icons button and grey backgrounds on icons next to it and non gradient backgrounds next to it in system tray

Image

IceBurgX Theme
Likes
-start button shape and colour and gradients
-box imprint on window titles (text is hard to read in the screenshots since I resized image smaller than original ones)
-window button icons

Dislikes
-big X before program name in taskbar
-black backgrounds for icons in system tray
-the word 'start' on the menu system


Image

Background
I like the dark one that's shown in my screenshots
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lvds
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#33 Post by lvds »

Hi,

I really like the frozen icons, by the way does anyone know how to change the icons coming in the ROX file manager and where are they anyway ? I 've been looking everywhere but found nothing ; i think it is perhaps time to change this icon set to something more accurate no ?

I have found rox-show-hidden.png (the eye) rox-select.png rox-show-detail.png etc...
but where the "change to home/parentdirectory", "bookmarks menu" icons etc. ?

Best regards,
Laurent.

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Springer
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#34 Post by Springer »

After reflection, I think I like the colored icons quite a bit better. I especially like these, the OpenOffice icons shown in some of the shots above:
Image

The "2-pointed lozenge" shape would be good for the OpenOffice icons, and perhaps the same size with either the top left corner pointed or all four rounded (which is iPhone trendy now) would be good for the standard icons. (Perhaps the lower right corner should be pointed to kind of "point down" for icons (like setup/config) that will bring up another menu. This would make it clearer which are for apps and which are for further selections.)

BTW, I miss the USB drive mounter on the desktop... I know, it's a balance between clean and convenient, but I use the "Connect" icon once or twice, then only very rarely after that. The Mount USB icon gets used all the time. Beside that, the "Connect" icon duplicates a subset of what the "Configuration" icon offers, which is not the best design. Breaking the configuration up into topic panels would be better, IMO. (Also, is there some way to keep double clicks from launching twice on the desktop? This is VERY frustrating to new users or users that also use Windows frequently.)

I'm willing to help with the look and feel, but only after we've decided on a Window Manager.

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