Improving Access to Themes etc.

[Jordon Bedwell]

On Fri, Jan 18, 2013 at 4:02 PM, Vesa Paatero <vpaatero at lavabit.com> wrote:
>    By using the normal settings programs to configure the desktop, I could
> only see four themes to select from, two of which were high-contrast themes
> and the other two being Ubuntu themes with orange activation colors. So, the
> choices we narrow, there were not really
> any different styles to select from.

Do you make the same complaints to Apple and Microsoft?

>    As I couldn't find a better solution then, I went to tamper with the
> color settings of GTK and, after some late evenings' work, managed to
> eradicate the oranges and bring about a satisfying look & feel.
>
> It seems that crux of the matter is not so much a lack of themes because
> there are some themes available in the repositories (using e.g. Synaptic)
> and a lot more on some GTK or Gnome-related web pages. It is more about how
> to make the themes accessible to Ubuntu users, especially
> new users some of which might just go away if they can't change the default
> color scheme reasonably soon.
>
> What I suggest is adding some theme packs to Ubuntu Software Centre.
> It already has a category called something like "Themes and Customizations",
> but it seems not to contain any packages with desktop themes.
>         Another possibility would be to add some sort of "Welcome to Ubuntu"
> window when you first boot Ubuntu, giving helpful links to some basic things
> such as setting your default browser, finding the applications you want and
> changing your desktop theme.

There are already tons of themes in the repository here is a quick grep:

murrine-themes
gtk-clearlooks-gperfection2-theme
gtk-smooth-themes

Not to mention http://browse.deviantart.com/?q=unity+themes

It's simple to install a theme on Linux, open up your home folder,
create a .theme folder and start adding themes and then select them
from the theme selector.