terminator separator is transparent

[Brian Murray]

I'm quite certain the separator between terminal used to be white, however it is now transparent so I end up seeing part of my wallpaper or whatever window is behind terminator. This ends up being quite strange and has become a distraction as it is something I can never unsee.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 18.04
Package: terminator 1.91-1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.15.0-20.21-generic 4.15.17
Uname: Linux 4.15.0-20-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia_modeset nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.20.9-0ubuntu7
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME
Date: Tue May 1 07:32:26 2018
EcryptfsInUse: Yes
InstallationDate: Installed on 2013-01-16 (1930 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 13.04 "Raring Ringtail" - Alpha amd64 (20130116)
PackageArchitecture: all
SourcePackage: terminator
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Egmont Koblinger (egmont-gmail)]

I can confirm this with Ubuntu's default Ambiance theme. (Not with GTK+'s default Adwaita, though.)

[Stephen Boddy (stephen-j-boddy)]

This is typically because of how the theme is drawn.

If you look here: https://bazaar.launchpad.net/~gnome-terminator/terminator/gtk3/files/head:/terminatorlib/themes/

You can see the overrides in place to make Terminator play nice with some themes that do funky things.

But your particular problem /should/ have been fixed by:
https://bazaar.launchpad.net/~gnome-terminator/terminator/gtk3/view/head:/terminatorlib/terminator.py#L454

That should select the background color of your theme, and ensure that the pane handle is drawn with it.

Try attaching a screenshot and let me know what gtk3 theme you use. That might give me more of a clue.

[Stephen Boddy (stephen-j-boddy)]

Ah. I didn't see Egmont's follow up comment. More info from you Brian would still be useful.

@Egmont: I assume you too are already on 18.04 LTS like Brian?

[Egmont Koblinger (egmont-gmail)]

Yup, I'm on 18.04 too.

I haven't noticed this bug before, although I use Ambiance, and I fire up terminator every once in a while. So probably it's a regression in 18.04, probably it looked okay in 17.10.

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

I'm also using Ambiance and I've attached a screenshot but don't think it represents what I actually see in the separator.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

I see this as well on 18.04 when using Ambiance or Radiance themes.

I found these bug reports which seem roughly similar for different software:

https://github.com/gnunn1/tilix/issues/319
https://github.com/gnunn1/tilix/issues/303

[Matteo Natalicchio (luponata)]

Got this bug after upgrading from 16.04 LTS to 18.04 LTS

[David Nikoloski (davidnikoloski)]

Same problem here on 18.04. Tried most things on the config side, but without success.

[Laurent Dumont (baconpackets)]

Experiencing the same issue as everyone else with:
Ubuntu : 18.04.1
Terminator : 1.91-1

[Rodrigo Yoshida (rodrigoymy)]

Same here, Ubuntu 18.4 with Terminator 1.91
This bug is actually quite annoying depending on the window you have behind Terminator.

[Chris Bainbridge (chris-bainbridge)]

This bug is present in a fresh install of Ubuntu 18.04.2. As a workaround I changed line 446 in terminator.py to:

        css = """
            .terminator-terminal-window {
                background-color: white}

Which seems to work. Changing .pane-separator didn't work. In fact, changing the pane separator size in settings didn't work at all - it is always fixed at 1 pixel and transparent.

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

Confirmed that the suggested css workaround does indeed fix the problem. Test case:

$ cat > /tmp/config <<EOF
[layouts]
  [[test]]
    [[[window0]]]
      parent = ""
      type = Window
    [[[child0]]]
      parent = window0
      type = HPaned
    [[[child1]]]
      parent = child0
      type = Terminal
    [[[child2]]]
      parent = child0
      type = Terminal
EOF
### Broken behavior:
$ terminator --no-dbus --config /tmp/config --layout test

### Fixed behavior:
$ sed -i 's/background-color: alpha(@theme_bg_color,0); }/background-color: white; }/' /usr/share/terminator/terminatorlib/terminator.py
$ terminator --no-dbus --config /tmp/config --layout test

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

The line in question was introduced by rev1672, or probably 1637.1.4 more specifically. "Fix the colours to use public ones, and make Adwaita hover fix consistent." from 2016-12-08.

             .terminator-terminal-window {
- background-color: rgba(0,0,0,0); }
+ background-color: alpha(@theme_bg_color,0); }

I'm curious why it added alpha(...) when the patch didn't do that for other window elements, e.g.:

             .pane-separator {
- background-color: @bg_color; }
+ background-color: @theme_bg_color; }

I notice if instead of changing it to white, I just change it to the theme_bg_color it looks great. I.e., change the sed line from the test case in my previous comment to:

$ sed -i 's/background-color: alpha(@theme_bg_color,0); }/background-color: @theme_bg_color; }/' /usr/share/terminator/terminatorlib/terminator.py

I think removing the "alpha(...)" is the right fix for this bug, unless anyone knows different?

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

Looks like a better fix has already been suggested here:

https://code.launchpad.net/~tobias-klevenz/terminator/fix-transparent-seprators/+merge/337512