Make XFCE look like a Chromebook

[richjack]

Hello all

I've not been here for a long time, but I wanted to share a how-to that I have done on my website on how to theme XFCE to look like a Chromebook/ChromeOS. It's in 2 parts:
Part 1
Part 2

Although I worked it out in Xubuntu, it's still Debian at heart and of course works in any distro.

Here is the effect that you can achieve if you are that way inclined! Personally I like it, others may not, but if I do welcome all feedback.



Regards

[rivenathos]

This is quite interesting and looks like a fun project. I can tell you worked on this for a long while. When I have time, I shall experiment with Xfce and Debian 7. Thanks for sharing this with the forum.

[golinux]

Why would you want to do that? (Rhetorical question.)

[confuseling]

It's very *thorough*, you can admire it for that even if you don't have any strong feelings about the aesthetics.

Useful to find and identify a few tricks that other themers can use.

[dasein]

Why would you want to do that? (Rhetorical question.)

Same reason you like to dance.

Same reason that this thread exists.

It's art.

[richjack]

This is quite interesting and looks like a fun project. I can tell you worked on this for a long while. When I have time, I shall experiment with Xfce and Debian 7. Thanks for sharing this with the forum.

Thanks for your kind words rivenathos

It's very *thorough*, you can admire it for that even if you don't have any strong feelings about the aesthetics.

Useful to find and identify a few tricks that other themers can use.

Thank you. I do intend to provide thorough how-tos that anyone can follow so I'm glad you found it like that.

Why would you want to do that? (Rhetorical question.)

As it's a rhetorical question, by definition, it doesn't require an answer, so I'll be concise:

1. I am fascinated by the design of modern UIs
2. I can't afford to buy a Chromebook just to see if I can work in that way, but I can recreate the effect
3. I Just wanted to show how customizable XFCE is
4. I have an Android phone, so the shift to using Chrome apps on my laptop is fairly painless
5. Recreating ChromeOS on top of a regular Linux base gives the best of both worlds. The Google-orientated apps for online working and regular apps and real HDD space for offline and downloads.

[golinux]

Oh, I get the art of it. I just don't understand why anyone would want to be so entwined with Google. Different strokes, I guess . . .

[confuseling]

The look (and indeed largely the UI design) is only incidentally linked to Google.

It's kind of the same as Elementary OS (arguably to some degree Ubuntu too). I don't have any desire to reskin my OS so it looks like OSX, but that doesn't mean OSX doesn't have good ideas in it, some of which might be worth borrowing. It's surely a good thing if one day Pantheon and Unity end up in Debian (the more so if they're modular, allowing people to pick and choose the parts they like...)

Google and Apple only figure into it insofar as they've got near bottomless pockets, so you'd expect them to come up with things that are in the main attractive and usable.

[dasein]

I just don't understand why anyone would want to be so entwined with Google.

Because not everyone thinks of UI as something political? That'd be my guess.

(And if I just ended up repeating what confuseling said in the post immediately before this one, I apologize. I couldn't tell for sure.)

[confuseling]

It's perhaps another way of getting at the same point.

I was never famous for being succinct...

[golinux]

I'm not concerned about the UI. It's all those Google apps in the menu that give me the willies. But for the record that menu is pug ugly IMO even though it's masterfully executed. Screw those kiddie icons. Just give me a nice text list of apps.