[Solved] Icon settings not being saved in Openbox.

[Randicus Draco Albus]

I have a funny problem. I am running Openbox in Stable. I originally installed Debian with XFCE, and afterwards installed a few Gnome themes. I am using lxpanel and the preferences tab has two appearance options: one is Appearance and the other is Appearance Settings. I choose Gelb style and NuoveXT2.2 icons in both. However, Appearance Settings does not save the configuration. After closing the application, it reverts to Clearlooks and Gnome icons. When I log in, I have Gnome icons. Sometimes, after a while the icons switch to NuoveXT, usually after I have used the web browser, but sometimes it does not switch.

This is what I usually have.


And this is what it occasionally switches to.


The problem is apparently related to Appearance Settings. Does anyone have any ideas how to either 1) get XFCE's Appearance Settings to work with Openbox, or 2) set Openbox to only use Appearance?

[bmc5311]

try lxappearance, also are you using ObConf to set your theme, etc?

[huggybear]

Please, whoever suggested obconf to set gtk themes, the tool does not do that. It only sets Openbox's theme and everything related to window management.

The appearance settings you were using were designed to change the theme for LXDE, and it will only be applied if LXDE's session manager is running. The default gtk theme for your user is

Code: Select all

~/.gtkrc-2.0

but the appearance settings you used change another gtkrc somewhere in ~/.config/lxde or such.

So, to change this behaviour you could

1. Make a symlink from lxde's gtkrc (the one in .config) to ~/.gtkrc-2.0
2. Run lxappearance from a run dialogue (I prefer gmrun) or the command line, and not from the panel.
3. Just set your gtkrc manually

[Randicus Draco Albus]

Yes, I use ObConf.
By the looks of it, "Appearance Settings" is from XFCE-4 Settings. "Appearance" is Openbox.
Is it possible to disable the XFCE component? Since XFCE is fairly small, I am leery of removing any of its packages, lest I screw things up.
Both replies refer to LXDE. I installed with XFCE. I have GTK+ 2.0 Theme Switch, ObConf and the XFCE stuff.

@huggybear
I shall try your suggestion, but shall not report if it is successful or not until next week. I just made a spur of the moment decision to do some travelling, so I'll be away from home for a few days.

[huggybear]

Oh, I thought you used the thing from LXDE, not Xfce. Well, Xfce's appearance settings won't work unless you are running Xfce's session manager. Just use lxappearance.

[bmc5311]

Please, whoever suggested obconf to set gtk themes, the tool does not do that. It only sets Openbox's theme and everything related to window management.

The appearance settings you were using were designed to change the theme for LXDE, and it will only be applied if LXDE's session manager is running.

Agree on your comments about obconf - all I asked is if he was using it to set his openbox theme.
lxde session manger isn't required to use lxappearance, it works with gdm too.

[huggybear]

lxde session manger isn't required to use lxappearance

It isn't, but when you are using it inside LXDE, it knows that the session manager is running and saves the settings somewhere in ~/.config/lxde or something like that. Whereas, when you are using it without LXDE's session manager, it just writes a ~/.gtkrc-2.0

[Randicus Draco Albus]

I was up early enough to play with the computer before leaving on my trip.
huggybear is correct about GTK themes being stored in .gtkrc. /home also has a file named .gtkrcmine. Both save the current settings, but are not working very well.
This is the .gtkrc file:

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# DO NOT EDIT!  This file will be overwritten by LXAppearance.
# Any customization should be done in ~/.gtkrc-2.0.mine

gtk-theme-name="Gelb"
gtk-icon-theme-name="nuoveXT2"
gtk-font-name="Sans 10"
gtk-toolbar-style=3
include "/home/randicus/.gtkrc-2.0.mine"

I tried editing .gtkrcmine, but it had no effect.
Openbox with an XFCE install has a dog's breakfast of appearance settings.
Debian: Appearance
XFCE: Appearance Settings and QtConf
Openbox: ObConf

I thought there was probably a conflict between two of them, but it seems Openbox ignores the XFCE settings. Strangely enough, I fiddled around with QtConf, but did not change any of the settings. When I closed Qt it asked if I wanted to save. I chose yes and it had a small effect. Now when I log in, the panel icons are Nuove until the clock and GKrellM load. Then the icons revert to Gnome. One solution appears to be with QtConf, but I need to wait until I return before I can play around with it some more.

[Randicus Draco Albus]

After returning home from a wonderful trip, I played around some more and posted on LinuxQuestions.org. Someone suggested that perhaps the problem was QtConfig. I seem to have been correct about it being the key, but in the wrong way. Supposedly Qt does not work with Openbox, but Compiz does. I do not remember installing Qt4, so I thought it was part of XFCE. I removed it and installed Compiz. I still do not have permanent nuove icons, but my Cairo-Clock now has transparency. The ugly black square around the clock is gone.
Half-way there. Now for those damn icons.

[Randicus Draco Albus]

I may have stumbled upon something. I opened lxappearance with the terminal. The settings dialogue opened as it should and let me change the settings. There appears to be no problem. However, the terminal reported this error message:

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(lxappearance:27676): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: g_object_unref: assertion `G_IS_OBJECT (object)' failed

I know nothing about this sort of thing. It is much too technical for me. So I am posting this for opinions from those who know. Could this have something to do with the lxappearance settings not loading with log-in and often loading when the web browser is opened? Or is it one of those "critical error" messages that are sometimes generated by the terminal that have no effect on actual use?
The only thing I understand about the message is that it is related a library (GLib), but I have no idea what G object is.