New window controls are needed

[Christopher Kyle Horton]

New window control buttons should be made for Salience to replace the ones that Selene uses. They should be closer to those used by Ubuntu's Light themes, but with some differences.

[Christopher Kyle Horton (christhehorton)]

Here is my initial proposal for the style of the new window controls. To test, extract into Salience/unity/ , overwriting the previous icons. So far these will only replace the icons used when a window is maximized in Unity until a way to get them to also be used for regular windows is found. Please provide feedback.

[Christopher Kyle Horton (christhehorton)]

These buttons are now being used for maximixed Unity windows in trunk (rev 3).

[George Karavasilev (kokoto-java)]

Err? Any logical reason why "Minimize" is pointing to the left and not the bottom? :P

[Christopher Kyle Horton (christhehorton)]

@George: To me, it makes more sense to have Minimize pointing to the left, because that's where the Unity launcher is located (windows go there when minimized). This could be changed later if the Unity devs decide to allow the launcher to be repositioned, or if we make versions of the theme meant to go better with other desktop environments.

[George Karavasilev (kokoto-java)]

Ehh, whilst the theme is bound to have Unity support it should work just fine in ALL desktop environment and minimizing pointing to the left is just bizarre call (might be confused with snapping the window to the left). Either a "minus" button OR an arrow pointing to the bottom. Just my 2 cents :)

[Christopher Kyle Horton (christhehorton)]

On second thought, you might be right. I'll change the minimize button's icon from an arrow to a minus sign.

[Rafael Cunha (rafaelscunha)]

I've made some modifications in Adwaita-X-Light theme. Windows control look like in the attachment. It might be a good choice for Unity too, if you guys agree.

[Rafael Cunha (rafaelscunha)]

Just for not making confuse about this. This is not what I propose for windows theme, it's just an example. What you guys think about that? It would be very useful have colors because for final users it makes more sense when they associate colors with some actions.

Besides that, I'm not very sure if this theme should be totally dark. I think we have to focus on our goal that is making the icons fit in the theme.

[Rafael Cunha (rafaelscunha)]

I made some changes. Take a look and see if this is good. What do you think?

P.S.: I use window control on the right.

[Christopher Kyle Horton (christhehorton)]

I agree that different colors for each button might be helpful, though I'd be more inclined to try instead of red, green and yellow the following color scheme instead, with the buttons listed from left to right:
* Close button = red
* Minimize button = aubergine
* Maximize button = light gray
That way it fits in better with the Ubuntu color scheme.

Also, the theme currently is totally dark because that's how Selene is, and very few changes have been made so far. We will have an all-dark variation because I know some people (myself included) would want that, but the "standard" Salience theme will be closer in appearance to Ambiance.

[Christopher Kyle Horton (christhehorton)]

I am also thinking the buttons from my proposal should also be slightly smaller...I'll change the colors and the size in the next iteration of the buttons work.

[Rafael Cunha (rafaelscunha)]

I've noticed that, the buttons are bigger than usual. Also, I think that the arrows are not so intuitive than the default ones.

What did you think about the Adwaita-X-Light? windows control? I think they are pretty simple and intuitive and fit in almost any theme. Can I attach the modifications I've been making in the theme? I'm gonna try to make with the color you said.

[Christopher Kyle Horton (christhehorton)]

I'm still thinking that the window controls should have the appearance of buttons versus just the icons themselves. If you can create a button that goes around those icons and implement the changed colors, I'll take another look at it.

[Christopher Kyle Horton (christhehorton)]

Here's how my latest version of the window controls look.

[Christopher Kyle Horton (christhehorton)]

I'd like to do a trough behind the buttons too like Ambiance does, but I don't know how I would go about doing that in the theme files.

[Christopher Kyle Horton (christhehorton)]

The window controls are now in, but are not quite perfect yet ( see https://plus.google.com/109509247327281928543/posts/CHYqGJi8W2z ). I'll file new bugs for the remaining issues that need to be polished.