change Mint-X gtk colors

[giupeppo]

Hi guys! I'm a new mint user, I'm running Mint 14 64bit Mate and I'm really enthusiastic
I love mate, I've tried kde, xfce, gnome-shell but nothing is immediate and easy to use like gnome2.. I also love the default gtk theme Mint-X but I would like to change the green with a more comfortable blue. I changed the section "colors" in Apparence preference but some elements are still green even changing the gtkrc. I've attached a screenshot to explain what I mean, look at the selection around "Documents" Can you help me? This theme is well integrated and really nice I don't want to change. I think it happen because it's a gtk2 and gtk3 theme..
Thanks

Schermata.png (692.57 KiB) Viewed 415 times

[caribriz]

Hi, giupeppo - and welcome to the Linux Mint forums

I have also tried to do this - only change Mint-X green "highlights" to blue.
As you say, you can change some elements (in mate) by customising the Mint-X theme in Appearance Preferences, and try to change some elements
in gtkrc files. Yet some things still remain green.

I found that I had to actually change the color of the actual images in the theme folders using gimp. So I don't think it's a quick/easy fix.
For example, to change the "selection around "Documents"" as you want to change - you have to change the picture "row-selected.png" in the
Mint-X theme folder > gtk-2.0 > Apps > Caja to blue. This is just one of many images throughout the folders I ended up changing like buttons and
checkboxes, as well as editing the gtkrc file and others.

I copied the original Mint-X folder from /usr/share/themes to /home/username/.themes, renamed the folder to Mint-blue and edited it there.
This ensures that the original Mint-X theme remains untouched and you can easily switch back if you don't like the results

I only set out to change those highlights but in the end, I suppose I have created a "new" theme with this result:



If you'd like to try it, you can download it. Maybe you can take it and tweak it further :
http://www.mediafire.com/file/w46axa4kufn2q6j/Mint-blue.tar.gz

Edit: Just looked a couple of posts down in the forum
unheeding has also created a Mint-X based blue theme - you could try this as well.
http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=211&t=126192

[giupeppo]

Thank you caribriz, it's perfect now . I already tried the Mint-X colors theme but it has some issues with the panel for me..
Your work is awesome anyway, you should consider to share it on deviantart or gnome-look. Thanks again!

[caribriz]

I'm happy it worked out ok for you
I'm just trying to learn about themes - having lots of fun experimenting!

cheers -

Edit: I forgot to mention - if some apps look "ugly" (like Windows 95 ) - for example, Update Manager -
I learned that if you move the theme from /home/user/.themes to /usr/share/themes (as root), then the apps run as Administrator should display properly.
This should apply to any theme.
Hope this helps anyone who comes across this problem.

[unheeding]

Thank you caribriz, it's perfect now . I already tried the Mint-X colors theme but it has some issues with the panel for me..
Your work is awesome anyway, you should consider to share it on deviantart or gnome-look. Thanks again!

What kind of issues are you experiencing with the panel? I've only tested it with Cinnamon.