[SOLVED] Default Font Color for Mint 17.2

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jackerbes

[SOLVED] Default Font Color for Mint 17.2

Post by jackerbes »

I am using 17.2 with the default desktop and default font colors. I am seeing white founts on a light grey background and the definition is not very good.

I googled and searched and found a bewildering number of ways to do that with other themes and by editing *.css files of various names and at various paths.

I think I learned that the default colors for the Mint 17.2 desktop icons is set by one of the three files here: /usr/share/themes/Mint-X/gtk-3.0/apps

The files there are:

cinnamon-applications.css
gnome-applications.css
ubiquity.css

And as I understand it the default white color is coded as #ffffff or maybe #fff. I want to change that to a shade of blue that is coded #0051ff but I cannot find any mention of fonts in any of those files.

Is there one best place to go to change the color of the font that is used by 17.2?

Jack
Last edited by LockBot on Wed Dec 28, 2022 7:16 am, edited 2 times in total.
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GeneBenson
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Posts: 357
Joined: Fri Sep 17, 2010 9:55 pm

Re: Default Font Color for Mint 17.2

Post by GeneBenson »

Hi jackerbes,

The file you want is .gtkrc-2.0 in your Home folder. You can do one of three things here:
Change the values, if present, like this:

Code: Select all

    fg[NORMAL] = "#0051FF"
    fg[SELECTED] = "#0051FF"
    fg[ACTIVE] = "#0051FF"
Or add the following to the file.

Code: Select all

style "xfdesktop-icon-view" {

    XfdesktopIconView::label-alpha = 0

    fg[NORMAL] = "#0051FF"
    fg[SELECTED] = "#0051FF"
    fg[ACTIVE] = "#0051FF"

}
widget_class "*XfdesktopIconView*" style "xfdesktop-icon-view"
Or you could add this one line:

Code: Select all

include ".gtkrc-blue"
Then create the file .gtkrc-blue and add the above code to it. The advantage of this second method is that you can create any number of files with different colors. If you change your theme you can easily change the desktop text color.
Logout and back in to see the effect.
jackerbes

Re: Default Font Color for Mint 17.2

Post by jackerbes »

Thank you!

I'll follow up and let all know how it goes...

I don't know why that file was not mentioned in any of the search hits.

Jack
jackerbes

Re: Default Font Color for Mint 17.2

Post by jackerbes »

I hope I am not dumb....

I just spent a couple of hours searching for that file and cannot find it.

The time included my also trying to learn more about finding files from the terminal (I am a newbie) and if I understand it the following search should have turned it up:

Code: Select all

find / -name '.gtkrc-2.0'
I searched for shorter versions and similar names like 'gtkrc*' and those did not produce a single file either.

Jack
GeneBenson
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Posts: 357
Joined: Fri Sep 17, 2010 9:55 pm

Re: Default Font Color for Mint 17.2

Post by GeneBenson »

Hi jackerbes,

.gtkrc-2.0 is a hidden file so you need to make sure you can see hidden files in your file manager.
jackerbes

Re: Default Font Color for Mint 17.2

Post by jackerbes »

I have nemo set to show hidden files as the default, it is that way all the time.

I tried with the terminal first and then I checked with Nemo also and could not see it in either root, home or home/jack (my user folder) and I'm the only user on the system. And when I couldn't find it from the terminal I tried all three logged in as the superuser too.

And I had tried ls -a on those folders too...

Jack
GeneBenson
Level 4
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Posts: 357
Joined: Fri Sep 17, 2010 9:55 pm

Re: Default Font Color for Mint 17.2

Post by GeneBenson »

Hi jackerbes,

If it's not in your home folder then perhaps it got deleted somehow. So just create the file in you home folder and edit it as you like. Then logout/in to see the effect.
jackerbes

Re: Default Font Color for Mint 17.2

Post by jackerbes »

I finally gave up on changing the color of the desktop font, it was just too mysterious and hard to find where to do that.

To get some better contrast and visibility for the icon titles on the desktop I changed to a darker background as follows:

System Settings > Appearance > > Backgrounds > Retro > Linux Mint 2560x1600

That gave me the darker background, then I increased the font size:

System Settings > Appearance > > Fonts > Noto Sans Bold 12

That gives the white icon labels good visibility on the dark background and solves the issues...

Jack
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