(RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

jjanderson5 · 2021-04-29 15:38:50

I have recently installed the Lithium release and things are running
pretty well, but I have a problem with the window coloring for
some windows. So far, I have seen the problem in three cases.
I expect more cases will appear as I use the PC more because
the problem is likely due to an environment setting or a
system setting.

Additionally, I have started to install Lithium on a 2nd PC and
the same problems described as cases 1 and 2 appear there also. I
don't run Eclipse on the 2nd PC, but I suspect I would get the
same result.

When I run 'uname -a', I get the following:

Linux cimoli 4.19.0-13-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 4.19.160-2 (2020-11-28) x86_64 GNU/Linux

I am running:
Firefox 78.10.0esr (64-bit)

and

and Eclipse Version: Oxygen.1a Release (4.7.1a)

The problems:

case 1) When I bring up DuckDuckGo.com in firefox the background
is dark and the text is white. Traditionally, this web page
has shown up near white, with dark text and it still shows
up like that on other PCs. Interestingly, if I bring up google.com,
the background is white and the text is dark as it normally
is.

case 2) When I bring up a blank screen in firefox, the new screen
is black. In the past, the blank screen has come up white.

case 3) When I run the Eclipse java IDE, the background is dark, not
light. This is a fairly serious problem. In the source code
window the text appears as varying dark colors and because the
background is also dark, the text is difficult to read.

I looked at the following with no success:

- On my desktop: Right click --> Preferences --> Openbox -->
WM Preferences --> Theme

I tried 'BL-Lithium-light' and 'Breeze-ob' with no change.

- In firefox: preferences --> General --> Language and Appearance --> Colors

The text is set to black and the background is set to white, which is
what I want, but opposite of what I am seeing.

- Looked at 'about:config' in firefox and found:

browser.active_color: #EE0000
'EE0000' is red

browser.anchor_color: #0000EE
'0000EE' is blue

browser.display.background_color: #FFFFFF
'FFFFFF' is white

- I run 'tcsh' as my default shell in terminal windows. I have a large .cshrc
file so I reduced it to a bare minimum and restarted the PC to verify
that my customization of the environment is not
setting some environment variable by accident. With the 'benign'
.cshrc file, the problems persist. I doubt this file is the
root cause of the problem, but I can make it available on request.

Any suggestions on how to fix the background and text coloring is most welcome!

Jim A.

Last edited by jjanderson5 (2021-05-01 20:08:08)

rbh · 2021-04-29 19:09:17

If you want to change theme in BL, you must uset both:
lxappearance: Menu -> Preferences -> Appearance
and
obconf: Menu -> Preferences -> Openbox -> WM Preferences
See Introduction to the Bunsenlabs Lithium Desktop

You can change theme in Firefox: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/themes/

Here a thread about thems in Eclipse: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/693 … ipse-theme

Last edited by rbh (2021-04-29 19:16:06)

nobody · 2021-04-29 21:13:09

Interesting. It might be because the GTK3 and/or website(s) heed to one or other degree the "system theme". There is a possible, new setting prefer-dark-theme in the GTK3 settings. It will autoselect colors from the dark theme variant, if any. Do the colors in the dark windows look something like Adwaita:Dark instead of Adwaita (light)?

jjanderson5 · 2021-04-30 14:59:05

@rbh

To be honest, I my current theme in Firefox is one that I like and I will only change it as a last resort. I will experiment some with firefox themes after I explore other possibilities.

Regard the Eclipse theme, setting the theme to light does not change the background color from dark to light. I would expect that it would, but it does not.

Thanks for the suggestions.

Jim A.

jjanderson5 · 2021-04-30 15:23:28

@nobody

I'm not a GUI guy and not very knowledgeable about GUIs, so please pardon my being slow on this issue.

There is a possible, new setting prefer-dark-theme in the GTK3 settings.

I found the GTK-3 settings in $HOME/.config/gtk-3.0 directory. I looked at the settings.ini file but I don't see a likely candidate to change. I followed up with a net search on 'prefer-dark-theme' and found some literature on it, but I have no idea if this setting has been set on my system. It is not set in the 'settings.ini' file. Is there a system settings.ini or equivalent for GTK-3?

I find it interesting that there is a 'prefer-dark-theme' setting, but not a 'prefer-light-theme', but maybe a light theme is the default.

Do the colors in the dark windows look something like Adwaita:Dark instead of Adwaita (light)?

I don't know what 'Adwaita' is. I assume it is a theme, but it does not show up as a theme in the Openbox Configuration Manager in the Lithium release. Can you point me to where I can view Adwaita?

rbh · 2021-04-30 16:19:11

jjanderson5 wrote:

I don't know what 'Adwaita' is. I assume it is a theme, but it does not show up as a theme in the Openbox Configuration Manager in the Lithium release. Can you point me to where I can view Adwaita?

You should use both:
lxappearance: Menu -> Preferences -> Appearance
and
obconf: Menu -> Preferences -> Openbox -> WM Preferences

(I prefer start them with Alt+F2 and text the command)

In lxappearance, under tab Widget, Icontheme and Mousepointer, can you choose Adwaita.

brontosaurusrex · 2021-04-30 19:50:32

Also, remember to restart eclipse after applying new theme (lxapperance), it appears it follows it

You can also force specific apps to use their own theme

GTK_THEME=Adwaita ./eclipse

Some reading https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/GTK

Last edited by brontosaurusrex (2021-04-30 19:59:41)

rbh · 2021-04-30 22:17:10

brontosaurusrex wrote:

You can also force specific apps to use their own theme
GTK_THEME=Adwaita ./eclipse

Ah, that can be very handy sometimes. Thanks!

ohnonot · 2021-05-01 13:24:18

jjanderson5 wrote:

I found the GTK-3 settings in $HOME/.config/gtk-3.0 directory. I looked at the settings.ini file but I don't see a likely candidate to change. I followed up with a net search on 'prefer-dark-theme' and found some literature on it, but I have no idea if this setting has been set on my system. It is not set in the 'settings.ini' file. Is there a system settings.ini or equivalent for GTK-3?
I find it interesting that there is a 'prefer-dark-theme' setting, but not a 'prefer-light-theme', but maybe a light theme is the default.

That's the arrogance of GNOME/GTK3: they like to develop themes, and then add dark variants to these themes, then assume that everybody should be doing it like that.
There's no option to develop a dark theme and then have a light variant.
But it doesn't matter as long as you use themes that don't have variants.

About your first problem:
there's a hidden Firefox setting to use a different UI theme - maybe that has been set? Unfortunately I don't remember it atm but I'm sure others will.

BTW, Adwaita is GTK3's default, builtin theme. It should show up in lxappearance. It's a sort of standard black-text-on-white-background-with-blue-highlights theme.

Last edited by ohnonot (2021-05-01 13:25:15)

jjanderson5 · 2021-05-01 20:14:04

@rbh and @nobody

Looking back on the comments made on this issue, your initial comment was the resolution. I did not understand and explore enough. @nobody's suggestion about using Adwaita, combined with rbh's comment was the exact solution.

I'm sure you guys are going to say, "That's what I said to do" when I document my steps below, but I'm going to try to be as explicit as possible, and hopefully make it even more obvious if someone else looks at this thread.

The solution:

1) Set the openbox theme with the following:
- menu --> Preferences --> Openbox --> WM Preferences
- The 'Openbox Configuration Manager' window pops up and I selected 'BL-Lithium-light'
- close the window
2) Set the appearance with the following:
- menu --> Preferences --> Appearance --> Widget(tab)
- The 'Customize Look and Feel' window pops up and I selected 'Adwaita'
- hit the 'Apply' button and then the 'Close' button
3) I rebooted at this point (I'm not sure, but logoff/logon may have been sufficient).

On reboot, the firefox windows and Eclipse windows were light with a dark font.

Thanks a bunch to both of you and for the others that added there comments.

Jim A.

Last edited by jjanderson5 (2021-05-01 20:23:20)

ohnonot · 2021-05-02 04:36:31

jjanderson5 wrote:

3) I rebooted at this point (I'm not sure, but logoff/logon may have been sufficient).
On reboot, the firefox windows and Eclipse windows were light with a dark font.

I'm pretty sure neither log off/on nor reboot would have been necessary; just restart the affected applications.

#1 2021-04-29 15:38:50

(RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

#2 2021-04-29 19:09:17

Re: (RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

#3 2021-04-29 21:13:09

Re: (RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

#4 2021-04-30 14:59:05

Re: (RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

#5 2021-04-30 15:23:28

Re: (RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

#6 2021-04-30 16:19:11

Re: (RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

#7 2021-04-30 19:50:32

Re: (RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

#8 2021-04-30 22:17:10

Re: (RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

#9 2021-05-01 13:24:18

Re: (RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

#10 2021-05-01 20:14:04

Re: (RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

#11 2021-05-02 04:36:31

Re: (RESLOVED) Firefox and Eclipse background colors are dark, not light

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