Install gtk3-classic and force Xwayland by setting WAYLAND_DISPLAY= if you want server side decorations. If you want theming, install libadwaita-without-adwaita-git
Whilst you shouldn’t need a hack like this, it seems to be the best way to resolve blinding white applications in the middle of the night.
is this flamebait? we really don’t need this stale-ass debate revived for the millionth time. everything that had to be said has been said and no one is going to budge from their positions. there is nothing to be gained from reposting some old controversial 2021 blog post about this outside of more flaming. it’s time to move on. this is a waste of everyone’s time.
if you’re a developer, support themes if you want to support them, don’t support them if you don’t. if you’re a user, use the apps you want to use. if you care about theming, use the apps that support it. if you don’t, good for you. there doesn’t need to be anything more to it.
To make it clear, I would still use Linux with GNOME/libadwaita over Windows any day. Yes, some themes are ridiculous and will be a nightmare for any developer to work around. That said, I can’t help but be concerned about the coming demise of theming with the way GTK is going.
What first pushed me to start exploring Linux was when Windows 8 forced the Metro theme down our throats. My time with Linux would have started three years later if M$ had kept Windows 7 theming options - that’s how important a customizable, sensible theme is to me.
I’m glad that I don’t have to do that again since there are DE options that do insist on keeping theming alive.
You can still theme gtk though, whether it's simply by editing /.config/gtk-4.0/gtk.css or by using a more in depth app like gradience, everyone using the same defaults actually makes it easier to further tweak.
As much as I sympathise with developers over headaches caused by themeing, I believe users (myself included) would be less up-in-arms about it if applications were less ugly by default. And boy howdy is libadwaita ugly as sin.
I’d be perfectly willing to tolerate a mismatched system, if the individual components looked at least okay. Like I’m not going to get e.g. steam or discord to match an e.g. Windows 9x theme, and I’m mostly okay with that because they aren’t horrible to look at. But, say, File Roller? Absolutely not. Horribly ugly.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and though I'm not a fan of GNOME since 2008 (I guess you can check my recent comments...) I concede you can see the (visual) direction they're trying to follow with Adwaita UI and trying to make it cohesive and coherent. Something I wish other DEs did that religiously, like Xfce, Enlightenment, even KDE itself, LXQt or you-name-it.
Still I think the problem with Adwaita is not that it's ugly or something (I'd say more that it is highly opinionated, as it has become the full GNOME experience - either you like it as it is and it fits you like a glove, or you have to use something else because there's no point in between), but a couple things even worse than that - (1) the serious issues it has brought to accessibility, i.e. not being able to tell with full certainty what is a button and what it is not in a toolbar, and (2) doing awful things in usability and UX for the sake of "convergence". Like putting the primary action ("open" or "save" buttons) of dialogs in the exact same spot where you'd find the close button in every else window. Why is that? Yes, because "convergence". On desktop.
All in all the hate towards Adwaita could be that it's allegedly a visible symptom of how GNOME has so much power over GTK that Xfce and co are doing black magic trying to get rid of it for their development. I've just read rumors so don't quote me on this, but I'd believe it can be true.
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