Layout broken in some dialogs / some pull-down controls. [Unity-specific]

[Cal-linux]

See screen capture below (as I posted to the KiCAD forum):

https://kicad-info.s3.dualstack.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/original/2X/b/b08ec313f4cfa2c1a48d47ad3158189846374c24.png

OS is Ubuntu 18.04 with Unity desktop.

KiCAD is 5.1:

Application: kicad
Version: 5.1.0-060a0da~80~ubuntu18.04.1, release build
Libraries:
    wxWidgets 3.0.4
    libcurl/7.58.0 OpenSSL/1.1.0g zlib/1.2.11 libidn2/2.0.4 libpsl/0.19.1 (+libidn2/2.0.4) nghttp2/1.30.0 librtmp/2.3
Platform: Linux 4.15.0-46-generic x86_64, 64 bit, Little endian, wxGTK
Build Info:
    wxWidgets: 3.0.4 (wchar_t,wx containers,compatible with 2.8) GTK+ 3.22
    Boost: 1.65.1
    OpenCASCADE Community Edition: 6.9.1
    Curl: 7.58.0
    Compiler: GCC 7.3.0 with C++ ABI 1011

Build settings:
    USE_WX_GRAPHICS_CONTEXT=OFF
    USE_WX_OVERLAY=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_MODULES=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_PYTHON3=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_WXPYTHON=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_WXPYTHON_PHOENIX=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_ACTION_MENU=ON
    BUILD_GITHUB_PLUGIN=ON
    KICAD_USE_OCE=ON
    KICAD_USE_OCC=OFF
    KICAD_SPICE=ON

[David Pearce (halzia)]

What is your monitor resolution? I have a 2560x1440 that does this

[Cal-linux (cal-linux)]

It is 2560x1440 (the screenshot is taken at that resolution)

[Anton (antonpupkov)]

Maybe something with the KDE GUI library. Something was not drawn in the way the KiCAD developers had planned. Collect kicad directly from the git repository and build.

[Wayne Stambaugh (stambaughw)]

I cannot duplicate this using 5.1.2-53-g0403437ad on Linux. I do not have a high dpi monitor and/or ubuntu unity which may be the issue. Would one of our Linux devs with a high dpi monitor please take a look at this to see if this a high dpi issue or an ubuntu unity issue. Thanks.

[Seth Hillbrand (sethh)]

Here's the dialog from xfce (3840x2160). Might be a Unity issue? The GTK3 preferences can change this. I use Breeze and have the following line in my gtk.css file:

* { outline-color: currentColor; outline-style: dashed; outline-offset: -2px; outline-width: 1px; -gtk-outline-radius: 4px; }

The OP might try using different themes to see if there's an impact.

Application: Pcbnew
Version: (5.1.2-50-g72794f141), release build
Libraries:
    wxWidgets 3.0.4
    libcurl/7.64.0 OpenSSL/1.1.1b zlib/1.2.11 libidn2/2.0.5 libpsl/0.20.2 (+libidn2/2.0.5) libssh2/1.8.0 nghttp2/1.36.0 librtmp/2.3
Platform: Linux 4.19.0-4-amd64 x86_64, 64 bit, Little endian, wxGTK
Build Info:
    wxWidgets: 3.0.4 (wchar_t,wx containers,compatible with 2.8) GTK+ 3.24
    Boost: 1.67.0
    OpenCASCADE Community Edition: 6.9.1
    Curl: 7.64.0
    Compiler: GCC 8.3.0 with C++ ABI 1013

Build settings:
    USE_WX_GRAPHICS_CONTEXT=OFF
    USE_WX_OVERLAY=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING=OFF
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_MODULES=OFF
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_PYTHON3=OFF
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_WXPYTHON=OFF
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_WXPYTHON_PHOENIX=OFF
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_ACTION_MENU=OFF
    BUILD_GITHUB_PLUGIN=ON
    KICAD_USE_OCE=ON
    KICAD_USE_OCC=OFF
    KICAD_SPICE=ON

[Cal-linux (cal-linux)]

OP here --- the "bug" seems to be affected by the "Large Fonts" settings under "Universal Access", and some other setting:

In GNOME (logging in as a different user): with all settings default, the dialog looks fine. If I go to Settings, Universal Access, and enable "Large Fonts", then the bug manifests (i.e., the text inside the pull-down control for the layer shows essentially the same as the image in my original bug report and forum post). If I change back the setting (i.e., go to Settings --> Universal Access and set Large fonts = OFF, the dialog shows ok again).

In Unity, logging in as a different (just-created) user, the behaviour is exactly as with GNOME.

However, on my account, using Unity, regardless of the setting (Large Fonts or not), the display is broken. At this point in time, I'm not using the "Scale for menu and title bars" under System Settings --> Screen Display.

One extra detail, that may or may not be related to the bug. Even when the dialog is showing ok, it is not 100% ok --- look at the attached image; the color square and the text are not centre-aligned vertically; the color square seems to be centered, but the text seems to be squeezed against the bottom.

My system info is currently:

Application: kicad
Version: 5.1.2-f72e74a~84~ubuntu18.04.1, release build
Libraries:
    wxWidgets 3.0.4
    libcurl/7.58.0 OpenSSL/1.1.0g zlib/1.2.11 libidn2/2.0.4 libpsl/0.19.1 (+libidn2/2.0.4) nghttp2/1.30.0 librtmp/2.3
Platform: Linux 4.15.0-47-generic x86_64, 64 bit, Little endian, wxGTK
Build Info:
    wxWidgets: 3.0.4 (wchar_t,wx containers,compatible with 2.8) GTK+ 3.22
    Boost: 1.65.1
    OpenCASCADE Community Edition: 6.9.1
    Curl: 7.58.0
    Compiler: GCC 7.3.0 with C++ ABI 1011

Build settings:
    USE_WX_GRAPHICS_CONTEXT=OFF
    USE_WX_OVERLAY=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_MODULES=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_PYTHON3=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_WXPYTHON=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_WXPYTHON_PHOENIX=ON
    KICAD_SCRIPTING_ACTION_MENU=ON
    BUILD_GITHUB_PLUGIN=ON
    KICAD_USE_OCE=ON
    KICAD_USE_OCC=OFF
    KICAD_SPICE=ON

[Seth Hillbrand (sethh)]

@Cal-linux Does it also look bad when you select properties on a track instead of text?

[Cal-linux (cal-linux)]

No, the dialog for Trace (track) properties shows perfectly ok (I just tried on my account, on Unity, which has been the problematic one --- I didn't test on GNOME or with the newly-created user, but I see no reason to expect any problems there).

[Cal-linux (cal-linux)]

In fact, it shows *perfectly* ok --- the color square and the text are perfectly aligned vertically (i.e., both centered).

I also just tried in GNOME --- as expected, it does work perfectly (including this latest comment: color-square and text are also perfectly aligned)

[Seth Hillbrand (sethh)]

I dug around on this some more and the only difference between the drop downs in the two dialogs is that the one that Unity displays correctly is in a sizer by itself and the one that unity doesn't display correctly shares a sizer with other elements.

This appears to be a Unity-specific limitation with how the drowdowns are placed when interpreting GTK

[Wayne Stambaugh (stambaughw)]

@Seth, do we fix this by adding another sizer for the control or do we punt because the issue is clearly with Unity?

[Wayne Stambaugh (stambaughw)]

@Seth, can you still duplicate this? If so, would it be possible for you to test this without drawing the color swatch? The combobox in question is in it's own cell of the flexible grid sizer so it may not be a sizer issue but rather an issue of how we report the size of the color swatch.

[Seth Hillbrand (sethh)]

@Wayne- Good thought. I'll give it a go this weekend.

[KiCad Janitor (kicad-janitor)]

KiCad bug tracker has moved to Gitlab. This report is now available here: https://gitlab.com/kicad/code/kicad/-/issues/1886