changes to the defaults

[jos poortvliet]

 all,

i have a few small change-proposals for kubuntu's default settings, mostly 
look&feel related.

but first - i think kerry (is it included by default?) needs a better default 
shortcut to show itself, to make it more salient. F12 or F11? F11 is 
full-screen in konqi so i'd say F12.

then to the style.

i just had a look at the default look, and its mostly the same from the 
previous release, exept for the windowdecoration (nice work on the buttons!). 
but i think we need a new style. Ubuntu/gnome went with a more 'glassy' 
style, and i think we could do the same.

there are 2 themes that support that more modern, glassy look: QtCurve and 
Polyester. personally, i prefer polyester. based on plastic, it is a bit more 
rounded here and there and a bit less pronounced. but the default settings 
need some work, as it really should hide the toolbar seperators and the 
statusbar frame.
to match the current look, we need a custom text input highlight color, and a 
custom mouseover highlight color, like in lipstik. that's easy. also, i'd 
love to see the animated buttons default, tough that might be less fun on a 
older system (not sure about the impact, tough).
uncheck also the colored scrollbars, and animate progressbars! highlight 
focused text input fields would be nice, too, and the button-like menuitems 
are something KDE should've had years earlier.

then about crystal, i'd round the top corners. looks much better...

anyway, with these changes, Kubuntu looks more or less like in the attached 
screenshot. you can compare it to the 'old' kubuntu.

the difference isn't that big, but it's there. the new style looks a bit 
lighter (tough maybe we can make the colorscheme a bit darker to correct for 
this) and it looks - well, glassy.

the last screenshot is how MY desktop looks like. i don't have a color 
seperation from windowdecoration and windowcontents, so i can round all 4 
corners of the windowdecoration (would look silly with the blue line around 
it, as it is now). i did this by using the same color for both window 
background and windowdecoration. and yes, i like blue.

now there are several arguments we could use in this discussion. 
unfortunately, much of this depends on taste. i can say i like it 
better, others won't. well, that won't help. so i'd like to try to give some 
less taste-dependend arguments:

- it doesn't look that different, as both lipstik and polyester are based on 
plastik, all widgets are the same size etc. so most likely, we won't 
introduce problems when going for polyester.
- polyester looks a bit more like the style ubuntu now uses, which also sports 
glassy buttons
- also, vista seems to be going this way (tough vista is horribly 
inconsistent, theme-wise, and not final). like it or not, it seems that it is 
considered a more 'modern' look.
- finally, we won't hear comments like 'Kubuntu didn't change their look' ;-)
so Kubuntu dapper will have a visuall distinction from the previous release.

any thoughts?



grtz

superstoned


the current look:
http://img168.imageshack.us/my.php?image=kerryold5hm.png
my proposal:
http://img166.imageshack.us/my.php?image=kerry0sf.png

and for the record, this is how it looks in my setup...
http://img189.imageshack.us/my.php?image=kerrymine9tg.png
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