Inkscape

changing skin color

Asked by jrwygant

The Inkscape skin color (the background for all of the menu items) is dark gray, making some of the icons difficult to see. How do I change the skin color to something like light gray?

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Brynn
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jrwygant (jrwygant) said : 		#1

I may have answered my own question. I had installed the 64-bit version because I figured it would be faster. It seemed to work fine, except menus were nearly impossible to read. I uninstalled it and installed the 32-bit version instead, and everything looks fine. I think I'll stick with the 32-bit. The desktop icon was also missing for the 64-bit version (a blank generic was substituted). Too many indications that 64-bit may not be ready for prime time...

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Best Brynn (brynn4inks-deactivatedaccount) said : 		#2

The 64-bit version may not be considered "official" but it is literally identical to the stable 32-bit version (except for 64 vs 32).

It's my understanding that dark gray "skin" color is sort of a trademark of the guy who made Inkscape ready to work on a 64-bit system. I guess he also puts out GIMP in the same way, although I haven't seen it.

I also find it nearly impossible to see most of the icons, and it drives me crazy. So I end up working on my 32-bit stable stable version, up until my image gets so large that I start having performance issues. Then I switch to the 64-bit version, to finish the image.

For me, with 4 gb RAM, I usually don't have any problems with performance, until my image approaches 1mb in size. And I also use layers *extensively*! Then I can hide things I'm not working on, at the moment. And that helps a lot.

I have thought about making a new icon set for it. I might not be very hard to do. I wouldn't have to really change anything about the structure of the icons -- just change colors. And there's a pretty easy way to do that, too. Then it would be a simple matter to replace the existing icon file (whatever it's called, I can't remember at the moment).

Also, on Linux based systems, I think there's a fairly easy way to change the theme/skin, but I don't know exactly how (I'm on Windows).

As far as the desktop icon.....well, at least on Windows, there's an easy way to make one. Just go to wherever you installed it (64-bit Windows would be C:/Program Files/). Click on it to highlight, the right-click > Send to > Desktop (create shortcut). Sorry, I don't know how to do it on Linux based systems.

I hope that helps :-)

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jrwygant (jrwygant) said : 		#3

Interesting explanation of how the color got that way. At least I know it's not some strange incompatibility with my video driver. Thanks for the help. I think I'll just stick with the 32-bit version. My projects are seldom so big that they overwhelm it.