Carbon post-install tweaks

johnraff · 2025-09-28 08:14:18

Maybe later we can tidy it up into something that new users can refer to, but for now let's just throw in suggestions so they don't get forgotten.

One from me:
If the desktop seems a bit sluggish, and you can live without drop shadows and round corners, try switching off picom:
menu > User Settings > Compositor > Disable compositing

If you like it that way, make it permanent by commenting out compositing from your startup file.

johnraff · 2025-09-28 08:17:13

Alternative if picom is causing trouble:

PackRat wrote:

Changing:
backend = "glx"
to
backend = "xrender"
fixed the non-working picom issue.

PackRat · 2025-09-28 16:28:20

Carbon uses xfce4-panel now. As per ~/.config/picom.conf file:

# xfce4-panel round corners are set in ~/.config/gtk-3.0/gtk.css

so, if a user wants to change or remove rounded corners from the panel, that is the file to edit. Pretty straight forward:

default:

/* xfce4-panel settings */

.xfce4-panel.panel-1#XfcePanelWindow {
   border-radius: 10px;
}

Edit to remove rounding:

/* xfce4-panel settings */

/*
.xfce4-panel.panel-1#XfcePanelWindow {
   border-radius: 10px;
}
*/

I commented out the entire stanza with the /* ... */ pair so I have no rounding of the panel.

If you just want to decrease/increase the rounding adjust the 10px to suit.

marens · 2025-09-29 00:28:50

PackRat wrote:

default:

/* xfce4-panel settings */

.xfce4-panel.panel-1#XfcePanelWindow {
   border-radius: 10px;
}

To me, that seems like a good place to change the background color of the panel:

/* xfce4-panel settings */

.xfce4-panel.panel-1#XfcePanelWindow {
   /* border-radius: 10px; */
   background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.5);  /* semi-transparent black panel */
}

EDIT
Of course, it's much better to do this in the gtk.css file of the theme you're using.

Last edited by marens (2025-09-29 00:40:00)

hhh · 2025-09-29 13:05:26

marens wrote:

EDIT
Of course, it's much better to do this in the gtk.css file of the theme you're using.

Much better to do it in the Appearance tab of xfce4-panel-settings (set Background Style to 'Solid color').

Set the notification theme to match your GTK theme (for the carbon default use bunsen-yaru-bark-dark).

Set the systray icon size to 20px.

marens · 2025-09-29 18:34:20

hhh wrote:

Much better to do it in the Appearance tab of xfce4-panel-settings (set Background Style to 'Solid color').

Does this mean that the panel will always have the same background color regardless of the gtk theme (dark/light)?
If the answer is YES, then it is as bad a solution as the setting in ~/.config/gtk-3.0/gtk.css.

I still believe that it is best to edit the gtk themes that you use most often.
GTK Inspector is a great and powerful tool for such things.

johnraff · 2025-09-30 02:40:05

PackRat wrote:

Carbon uses xfce4-panel now. As per ~/.config/picom.conf file:
# xfce4-panel round corners are set in ~/.config/gtk-3.0/gtk.css
default:
/* xfce4-panel settings */

.xfce4-panel.panel-1#XfcePanelWindow {
   border-radius: 10px;
}

I'm seriously starting to wonder if we should drop trying to make xfce4-panel's round corners with GTK, and go back to Picom. Without compositing running, there always seem to be black triangles at the corners. It looks as if there's a black rectangle underneath the panel. Run Picom and it becomes transparent and the round corners look OK, but in that case you might as well just use picom to make the corners round and keep all the config in one place. (Although css via GTK does offer more fine-grained control, eg only rounding some corners.)

Unless we can discover the css identity of that black rectangle, and round its corners too.

EDIT: I asked an AI oracle, and for whatever it's worth, the reply included:

Perplexity wrote:

It is not currently possible to directly theme or round the corners of the black rectangle that appears under the panel in XFCE when the compositor is disabled, as its origin is outside of what GTK CSS can access.
There is no CSS selector or identity in XFCE that can be used to round the actual window corners or affect the black rectangle under the panel without a compositor running. This is a limitation of how X11 and GTK interact in non-composited environments, and any true solution would require changes in XFCE's codebase or using a compositor.

Last edited by johnraff (2025-09-30 06:34:41)

marens · 2025-10-01 01:04:20

Very interesting post from @Zetta1_Reid0 about xfce4-panel with CSS inside the image:
https://gitlab.xfce.org/xfce/xfce4-pane … note_85847

Maybe it will help someone.

johnraff · 2025-10-01 01:15:19

^Thanks, I've read that topic. It's quite possible to select individual panels now, as in 'xfce4-panel.panel-1' in the above code.
But composition is required for the round corners to look nice.

marens · 2025-10-01 02:36:20

^ I think the mystery is solved.

The default window manager for the Xfce desktop environment is xfwm4 and that's the problem.
Xfwm4 includes a built-in compositor.

AI wrote:

To achieve rounded corners on the XFCE panel without a compositor, you must use a GTK theme or edit the xfwm4 theme files directly to alter the panel's borders, as CSS alone does not work for this purpose.
...
Editing the Window Manager Theme
This method involves modifying the images of your current or a downloaded theme to create the rounded effect, which is part of the window manager's responsibility.
1) Identify your theme:
Go to Settings Manager > Window Manager to see the name of your currently active theme.

2) Locate the theme files:
For a system-wide theme, it might be in /usr/share/themes/.
For a user-installed theme, it will be in ~/.themes/ or ~/.local/share/themes/.

3) Copy the theme:
Copy the theme directory into your user's theme folder (e.g., ~/.themes/YourCustomTheme) to avoid modifying system files directly.
4) Edit XFWM images:
Navigate into the copied theme's xfwm4 folder. You will find files such as top-left-active.png, top-left-inactive.png, top-right-active.png, and top-right-inactive.png.
5) Modify the images:
Use an image editor like GIMP to modify these image files, changing the shape to create rounded corners where the panel should extend beyond them.
6) Apply the theme:
Switch to your newly copied and modified theme in the Window Manager settings, and then switch back out and in again to test your changes.

johnraff · 2025-10-01 03:01:37

There's not really a mystery about why round corners work on xfce (but not with composition turned off).
Composition - from somewhere - is needed for round corners on xfce4-panel, because of that black rectangle. That is indeed mysterious, and without it round corners would have been possible without composition.

Even so, using GTK gives you a bit more flexibility, but for four round corners picom is enough.

Last edited by johnraff (2025-10-01 04:37:36)

marens · 2025-10-01 03:28:50

^ Sorry I can't test, but have you tried any of the XFCE gtk themes (Greybird)?

johnraff · 2025-10-01 04:42:33

For me the mystery is solved and the search is over. Round corners on xfce4-panel are not possible without composition, either from xfwm4 or picom.

GTK3 allows round corners without composition, but the black rectangle breaks it, and...

It is not currently possible to directly theme or round the corners of the black rectangle that appears under the panel in XFCE when the compositor is disabled, as its origin is outside of what GTK CSS can access.

johnraff · 2025-10-01 04:50:50

marens wrote:

...have you tried any of the XFCE gtk themes (Greybird)?

Just to confirm, I installed greybird-gtk-theme and set Greybird-dark but it made no difference to the corners.

johnraff · 2025-10-01 05:55:59

The disadvantage of using GTK to round the corners is that they look ugly when picom is switched off, while if you use picom, they just revert to clean square corners.

marens · 2025-10-02 01:24:20

johnraff wrote:

marens wrote:
...have you tried any of the XFCE gtk themes (Greybird)?
Just to confirm, I installed greybird-gtk-theme and set Greybird-dark but it made no difference to the corners.

Yes.
I see that greybird-gtk-theme uses a background image (instead of a background color) for the corners, but the same problem with the black rectangle remains.

Perhaps the problem can be solved by digging deeper into the xfce4-panel source code, but that's probably too difficult.

Anyway, here are the CSS elements if you need them:
https://docs.xfce.org/xfce/xfce4-panel/theming

hhh · 2025-10-02 02:36:28

Some apps like pavucontrol (libadwaita apps, I'm guessing) are not themed properly. Install dconf-editor and, for the default theme (bunsen-yaru-bark-dark) set org>gnome>desktop>interface>color-scheme to 'prefer-dark" and interface>gtk-theme to 'bunsen-yaru-bark-dark' and Apply.

darknetmatrix · 2025-10-02 12:44:09

^ great tip @hhh, now my transmission app is also dark, which I prefer

darknetmatrix · 2025-10-03 07:35:06

The eid-software problem that already existed in the Boron release (https://forums.bunsenlabs.org/viewtopic … 47#p131247) remains in the Carbon release. With the following commands:
sudo apt purge bunsen-os-release
sudo apt purge eid-mw
sudo apt purge eid-archive
sudo apt update
and reinstalling the eid software, everything is working again.

hhh · 2025-10-09 22:42:00

Am I the only one who has a blank (transparent when opened in an image editor) file named Solid_Color.svg in their Pictures/wallpapers folder for no reason after installing?

#1 2025-09-28 08:14:18

Carbon post-install tweaks

#2 2025-09-28 08:17:13

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#3 2025-09-28 16:28:20

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#4 2025-09-29 00:28:50

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#5 2025-09-29 13:05:26

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#6 2025-09-29 18:34:20

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#7 2025-09-30 02:40:05

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#8 2025-10-01 01:04:20

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#9 2025-10-01 01:15:19

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#10 2025-10-01 02:36:20

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#11 2025-10-01 03:01:37

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#12 2025-10-01 03:28:50

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#13 2025-10-01 04:42:33

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#14 2025-10-01 04:50:50

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#15 2025-10-01 05:55:59

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#16 2025-10-02 01:24:20

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#17 2025-10-02 02:36:28

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#18 2025-10-02 12:44:09

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#19 2025-10-03 07:35:06

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

#20 2025-10-09 22:42:00

Re: Carbon post-install tweaks

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