Do you hate the IaOra theme for KDE applications ?

[dglent]

No, the wallpaper, the text, as you mentioned albeit ironically, the kmenu icon, it is nt the same example, you can compare e.g. changing the default one clic of KDE to double clic because someone decided that it is better for the others too.

And why personalize by default the windows decoration while does nt has any sens in a fresh install, when you want a non personalized configuration with default settings.
It imposes a first look style to new users, and the fact that this poll results are mostly against the current choice, confirms my previous: "because someone decided that it is better for the others too.", and that finally it is n't so cute.
After the question of look and feel, a window decorator it has nt the same value as other eye candies. Is more affected by graphics system settings and capabilities.

The choice of laora, in my personal point of view, may be was taken to familiarize new windows XP coming users to mandriva.

[ahmad]

Yep, totally agree with that. I'm also against changing the upstream wallpaper. Or at least remove the "Mageia" text and replacing it with "Some KDE distro".

(But, what are the maintenance costs for a custom wallpaper? zero; you get an artist to do it, and that's it, it'll never have bugs :)).

[dubigrasu]

it'll never have bugs

Oh, yeeeaaah?
Debug this then!

[wobo]

Actually I'd say - what a discussion about such non-issue!

But obviously people seem to judge a distribution like some people judge a car: not the mileage, the horsepowers, the gearshift system - they are looking for the color of the carpet. "Oh, I'd never buy a Ford, they have such ugly carpets!". So, how would such users be able to differ between Ubuntu and Mandriva if it were not by the color of the wallpaper?

And here we have the only reason why distributions are forced to create their own theme, which of course has to "have a meaning and show the identity and values of the distribution"! [add very large irony smiley here]. Maybe, if they stick with Linux for a while they will realize that they can have a Mageia looking like Ubuntu and Ubuntu looking like Windows.

You can see the birthday present only after you tear off the wrapping (don't get me started on make-up! )

[dubigrasu]

But obviously people seem to judge a distribution like some people judge a car: not the mileage, the horsepowers, the gearshift system - they are looking for the color of the carpet.

Yes, is exactly like that, the first impression speak volumes. The attention to little details (that apparently don't matter) is telling a lot about the attention given to essential parts. We are talking about a fine (hopefully) distinct product here, not some stock parts cobbled together and a crappy label slapped in a hurry to save money and time.

A personalized theme adds a lot to the distro's identity.
I personally loved the old Ia_ora theme used by Mandy (not this new ugly-fied version). It was something that only Mandy had/used. It gave a certain Mandriva (and only Mandriva) feeling.
Mandriva 2008.1 (for example) was the best looking and distinct one, I never changed the theme or the wallpaper.
One of a kind.
Why not something like that for Mageia?

You can see the birthday present only after you tear off the wrapping (don't get me started on make-up!

The wrapper still matters, a fine gift deserves a fine wrapper...I hope you're not using newspapers to wrap your gifts to others

[wobo]

The wrapper still matters, a fine gift deserves a fine wrapper...I hope you're not using newspapers to wrap your gifts to others

No, but I do spend the main part of time and cost and searching energy on the gift, not on the wrapping.
(Just recently I actually wrapped a birthday gift into a newspaper! It was a copy of a daily newspaper of the man's date of birth, 50 years ago!)

[dubigrasu]

Just recently I actually wrapped a birthday gift into a newspaper

Ahaa, I knew it!

It was a copy of a daily newspaper of the man's date of birth, 50 years ago!)

Wow, this is quite a good/original idea!

[ahmad]

it'll never have bugs

Oh, yeeeaaah?
Debug this then!

The sight of beetles doesn't scare me (unless it's John Lennon's ghost in a rainy night... :p).

Yes, of course a custom theme gives identity, but the cost is high; and as probably many of us saw, all themes (other than Oxygen) have to play catch up all the time; Oxygen upstream is being improved/worked on all the time (just join #oxygen on IRC and see for yourself :)). So I think the widget style should be kept the upstream one, and change the other less-time-exhaustive stuff, wallpapers, custom login screens, splash screens, GRUB gfxboot themes, icons... etc, as usually these are make-them-and-forget-them.

[dubigrasu]

Still, as someone standing outside the "kitchen" where you guys are baking goodies for us I'm still unconvinced somehow...
I mean you guys are dealing with thousands of packages ...what is it with a theme (which is also a package) so hard to catch up as you say ?
I think that a lot of non essential (or let's say extremely rarely used) packages are actively maintained (I'm not gonna name one, but sure you can think of some) without problems...so why a Mageia theme package (a rather important one) would pose so much problems?
What's one more rpm next to thousands?
Suppose someone will create a Mageia theme, and uploaded to you. Why would it be hard to use it? Yes, at one point in time it will have some bugs that you'll need to fix (as opposed with Oxygen), but isn't that true also for hundreds of packages?
Or as a practical example, this current theme "Ia-ora" is also hard to maintain?

Wow, that's a lot of questions

(ahmad rolling eyes exasperated: what is it with this guy?!)

[ahmad]

When I was talking about "catching up" I mainly meant code-wise; IIRC at some point changing mouse preference to KDE to single click would only work with Oxygen but not with Plastique or any other theme (maybe around 4.2 or 4.3)...

So it all depends on having developers working on the code of whatever theme is the default. And as long as no one theme is hardcoded, that should work for all users as everyone can pick his/her favourite.

(Packagers can be sorted into two groups:
a) packagers who are developers and can fix whatever code upstream throws at them, they work on upstream code directly sometimes; and
b) packagers who aren't developers; you can be a packager who doesn't know how to write <insert your favourite programming language here> code, but who at the same time is a good packager; you can contact upstream when needed, know your way around rpm .spec files, know how to apply patches from upstream or from other distros... etc.

This applies to all distros who have community contributors i.e. it's not a prerequisite to be a developer who knows how to write code to be a community contributor contributing in the packaging team).

:)

[isadora]

No single-click would be a show-stopper for me.

[wobo]

No single-click would be a show-stopper for me.

So, you are bound to use the theme which supports single-click. Or to find somebody who implements it in your favorite theme.

[ahmad]

No single-click would be a show-stopper for me.

So, you are bound to use the theme which supports single-click. Or to find somebody who implements it in your favorite theme.

Just to clarify, that issue/bug was probably fixed a long time ago, just I remember it happened at some point.

[wobo]

Ah, ok, I thought it was a current issue. I'm a KDE user but I know next to nothing about all this theme stuff.

[Max]

I just want to bump this thread.
Mageia 1 is out and people have had nearly a month to play around with it.
What is your preference? How many people switched to Oxygen? It pays to reopen this discussion again, now that work has begun on Mageia 2.

[Ineteq]

If I saw it right, there is a ticket in mageia 2 specifications to create a new system theme. Hopefully they will change the IaOra theme.

[ruel24]

IMO, I think Mageia needs to distance itself, somewhat, from Mandriva. It needs to be a "better Mandriva", so to say. I think that means dumping La Ora and either going with vanilla KDE with Air/Oxygen or something of their own that actually looks good. I think Mint is a beautiful distro. I like the dark theme. Maybe a dark one for Mageia?

[almusalimalmusalimah]

i love ia_ora looks spicially on its color_scheme

but as for the window decoration i suggest that we need to improve its looks

like remove the flat window looks and make it like oxygen this is just an example

say how about this looks which i design it by collecting these things

ROSA task + plasma-desktoptheme-bigblue + ROSA-icons + ia_ora color-schemes + air-oxygen (( as window aurorae theme )) + oxygen-kde4-style



so how about it

[isadora]

Yeah hmm well almusalimalmusalimah, looks nice and fresh. But as always, it's about personal choices.

For me it's oxygen or one of it's derivatives. And for icons and other goodies i like the things made by MIB (Mandriva International Backports), Ossigeno Ultimate V4:
http://mib.pianetalinux.org/mib/news/mi ... inux-theme

[dglent]

i vote for oxygen too

[almusalimalmusalimah]

Yeah hmm well ................

yah i am with you isadora

but the problem here there is no any colors at MIB icons except (( blue / green / black / brown / gray / magenta ))

it sad to see there is no any color there as the blue color at ia_ora color scheme

but in our situation if we will still using ia_ora color scheme and if we will use MIB ossigeno icons

then i suggest that we must choose the gray color

because its nearly looks like the blue color of ia_ora color scheme

or maybe one of us need to talk to NicCo there and his team about

make a new color for ossigeno and make it looks like the blue color of ia_ora color scheme

so how about it

[isadora]

I'll suggest you do a bug-report for that ("New RPM Package Request").

https://bugs.mageia.org/enter_bug.cgi?p ... mat=guided

[almusalimalmusalimah]

ahhhh ...... isadora

before doing something like that

we need here to make a total agree for the request

we are talking about the whole community , not just me

there is whole community we need to discussing with them about it

and then we will make that request there

[isadora]

I am so sorry, of course you are totally right.

i'm a liitle to ambitious i'm afraid.

[wobo]

This should be done in a new thread.

Of course it's a matter of individual taste as Isadora already pointed out. I am sure there are people who like it. But IMHO it is not suited for a default set.