mentioned in issue #5 (closed)

Milestone changed to 1.0.0-beta2

Situation? cc @CenturionDan

I attach my questions here, because it seems most appropriate. If i'm failing, sorry in advance and feel free to move:

As pointed, we (irrwahn & me) are trying to put together the stuff to build a jwm based desktop environment for devuan. For sure, we'd like to stay inline with devuan's corporate styling. And to that goal, i gathered some infos regarding fonts and colours from goliniux and hellekin.

Now, there are some problems:

• where do i get Source Code Pro mono (i do not find it in the repositories (??)
• Open Sans i found in texlive-fonts-extra (which makes necessary a HUGE download; isn't there an easier way, in line with devuan/debian)?
• we'd need a Clearlooks-Phenix-purpy gtk theme if it becomes THE devuan theme
• as for themes: I'd like to use rather a dark theme: If that would be ok (for the devuan styling), someone could point out which basic guidelines would have to be respected?
• Since JWM looks way better when set to flat, i'd also like to have a flat icon theme. At a first glance i don't see any in the debian repositories. Any ideas in regard.

Thanks a lot for you patience!

PS. Especially to @golinux : The colours you (recently in irc) suggested to change in the outline for the lxdm login manager depends on the gtk theme chosen in /etc/lxdm/lxdm.conf - so the gtk theme would be urgently needed. Although,i'm reflecting how to overwrite this from inside the greeter theme ... )

I have never heard mention of Source Code Pro mono ever in relation to devuan or anywhere. Why are you needing that?

I copied the opens sans fonts from the website source on git. But as I said to you earlier, that is the website font. The theme should use the system default font . . .

There is already a Clearlooks-Phenix-purpy theme and has been for maybe 6 months. It themes gtk2, gtk3, xfwm and openbox. It already is the default theme for Jessie. That was decided a long time ago.

The default icons are DMZ for the pointer (in the repos) and these gnome icons for the folders etc.

Use the purpy theme colors as default then prepare an alternate dark theme if that scratches your itch.

Source Code Pro was mentioned by hellekin!!! As for Open Sans, i got it from hellekin as well and seemed to me, it was considered the default font. Ok ...

For the dark theme i'll try to go that way ...

But could you make it a bit clearer:

Which font would be the default for the desktop

• proportional
• mono spaced

So at least i can configure .Xresourses (.Xdefault), themes and jwm consequentely ...

I have no idea how WM are configured but most desktop themes just use the default system font. I think that a proportional font would be better for a DE.

• The differences - colourwise - between /etc/alternatives/desktop-background (respectively desktop-splash) and the background files in /usr/share/images/ are intenional, i presume (?)

• I've absolutely no idea which would be the devuan system default font. (Ubuntu prefers the Ubuntu font family, which is nice btw. But Debian/Devuan????)

• So, Open Sans is only for Websites (but git.devuan.org does not use it?); and Source Code Pro is not mandatory as well?

• Sure that DE generally needs and uses proportional, mostly also sans serif. Monospaced only in terminals, and for special purposes. I use them also for email, eg.

Sorry, but that's a bit a mess (small footnote: I know americans, generally tend to prefer fonts which are a bit larger (and lower), europeans otoh prefer slimmer and taller: i would go for Cantarell, if possible but ok, i will stick with guidelines, but i'd need some!). I need a guideline - or at least an authoritative "definition"!

Color differences? I'm not seeing any. The purpy BGs use the same colors. Grub splash is minus the logo though.

Just use a generic san serif and be done with it if FWM requires that you do so. Otherwise let the debian default be default. Users can change it if they like.

Discourse uses open sans and so does git afaik. But again users have the option to change that in their browsers. I would prefer a generic san serif but have it set to open sans for devuan related sites.

Thanks a lot golinux, that's a word! And a starting point :) :)

Only for the different colours: I didn't realize there are neutral ones (which i set as desktop background, while for the loginmanager i used a purpy one). But now my question: which is the purpose of the neutral background (which is there by default after a clean installation).

(Btw, me, in the browsers, i let decide the websites about the fonts ... )

I didn't read the whole issue, just wanted to clarify the fonts: since we decided against using the poorly packaged Fira Sans and Fira Mono, we use Open Sans as the sans-serif font, and Source Code Pro as the monospace font. (We don't use serif.)

@emninger Good grief . . . there are no "different colors" for jessie. The default for jessie is PURPY and only PURPY. The other colors in /usr/share/images/desktop-base/ are not to be used as default for jessie in JWM or any other desktop/wm. Period. Other colors will be default in future releases but not to be used as default at this time.

@hellekin . . . should I delete all but the purpy wallpapers in /usr/share/images/desktop-base/ to eliminate emninger's confusion? Or are those 'neutral' options there for a purpose I don't know about?

@golinux : definitely. This is a bug againstdesktop-basethat shouldn't ship non-purpy images, especially not a Debian 8 background :]

Replying to @emninger 's early questions:

where do i get Source Code Pro mono (i do not find it in the repositories (??)

Source Code Pro is not packaged yet. See #12 .

Open Sans i found in texlive-fonts-extra (which makes necessary a HUGE download; isn't there an easier way, in line with devuan/debian)?

Same same, see #12 .

we'd need a Clearlooks-Phenix-purpy gtk theme if it becomes THE devuan theme

It is THE Devuan JESSIE theme. Please follow @golinux 's lead for colors, it's always much harder to figure out color combinations in real use-cases than theoretically.

as for themes: I'd like to use rather a dark theme: If that would be ok (for the devuan styling), someone could point out which basic guidelines would have to be respected?

We have the pending task to write down the Devuan Design Guide . Until now it was just @golinux and me, so the incentive wasn't so great in the middle of the beta rush. But now I think we must get to it.

Since JWM looks way better when set to flat, i'd also like to have a flat icon theme. At a first glance i don't see any in the debian repositories. Any ideas in regard.

Sorry no.

FWIW I posted a how-to guide to preview Purpy theme before 1.0.0-beta2

Here are colors for purpy:

From gtk-2.0/gtkrc:

gtk-color-scheme = "base_color:#ffffff\ fg_color:#140F1B\ tooltip_fg_color:#140F1B\ selected_bg_color:#b5b0bf\ selected_fg_color:#ffffff\ text_color: #1 (closed) a1a1a\ bg_color:#edeceb\ tooltip_bg_color:#f4f8ea\ link_color:#0000ee\ visited_link_color:#551a8b"

And from gtk-3.0/gtk,css

@define-color theme_base_color #ffffff;

@define-color theme_bg_color #edeceb;

@define-color theme_fg_color #140F1B;

@define-color theme_selected_bg_color #b5b0bf;

@define-color theme_selected_fg_color #ffffff;

@define-color theme_tooltip_bg_color #f4f8ea;

@define-color theme_tooltip_fg_color #140F1B;

@define-color theme_text_color #1 (closed) a1a1a;

@define-color link_color #0000ee;

@define-color visited_link_color #551a8b;

Anyone wanting to theme needs a good colorpicker. I prefer gcolor2. IIRC I had to get it from wheezy - not in the jessie repos.

@hellekin So, the fonts you mention are not only for use on websites but also offline? For me, that's fine, it's all about to KNOW ...

For me, on a fresh - virtual - installation, the texfonts-extra package did not install well the Opensans ttf . ASlthough i tried hard to get it to work, using all tricks a know in fontconfig. I got ot from a third party side - and there it works out of the box.

Source Code Pro i do not succeed to install it. Please be so kind and point me to a source wherefrom to get it. TIA

But as you pointed out, for what i understand: If this fonts are in some way default for devuan they have to be packaged like others (Liberation e.g.) and to be installed by ANY task of the installer (?)

@golinux Thanks for that precisation; very useful!

And finally a wish: Could someone capable made a devuan package of the sharpdot xcursor theme. It would be really nice to have it there, by default :) :)

Open Sans is used everywhere. We started with Fira Sans, but this font's packaging is nightmarish, so we (reluctantly) abandoned it.

For font installation instructions, see https://talk.devuan.org/t/how-do-i-change-my-desktop-and-cursor-theme/354

Ok. Then, we should package OpenSans and Source Code Pro for Devuan - ready for the installation in an DE (?)

A technical question: Open Sans is relatively heavvy in weight (if this is the technically correct term; what i mean is: 10pt Open Sans is considerably larger than Liberations Sans or Verdana, and also slightly "fatter"), so, i think Open Sans 11:weight=light would be a good default. (E.g. in the taskline of JWM an Open Sans regular has nearly the same value as a Cantarell demibold). May be even in the theme configurator (like lxappearance).

Btw, the Clearlooks-Phenix-purpy i got from the link, where you me pointed to, uses Sans (and not Open Sans). Why that?