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Old 12-20-2019, 08:44 AM   #1
Peevy
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Default Lets Get the Linux Version out of the Expermintal Stage (UI Features)

I have a few proposals to add in order to get The Linux version out of the very long experimental stage. I think the main thing holding Reaper back on linux is the control over the UI, I know you can do this via the libswell colortheme & it's great to have so much control over the colour of menus & reaper plugins compared to windows. But would it not be possible to bring the integration & control over the UI more in line with macos?

There are so many great dark gtk3 based themes for Linux & it would be a real nice feature to have Reapers menus & plugins to follow whatever theme is used on the Desktop Environment, following font size, colour & DPI just like other gtk based applications.

If this isn't at all possible right now (or ever) then at least having some form of integration in the preferences for switching hidpi UI scaling on or of & control over the UI_scale in the reaper.ini & libswell. I don't mind too much having to customise the libswell-user.colortheme or the reaper.ini but not everyone using Linux is prepared to do this. So some stripped down libswell colour tweaking via the preferences or theme options in Reaper would definitely be much more ideal. There is a scaling option in the preferences but this only scales the UI & not the menu fonts, which is usually done within the OS itself so unless Reaper can be setup to follow gtk theming, along with the OS DPI settings, I think it's important that these options are available in Reaper rather than editing scripts.

I know hidpi scaling on Linux is a bit of a mess right now & this isn't helped with the many different DE's there are. I've tested xfce, Gnome & KDE & Reaper does scale well with xfce & Gnome but unfortunately they only scale to 200% & they don't have fractional scaling like windows. KDE has fractional scaling but for some reason Reaper wouldn't auto scale in KDE. There is an experimental fractional scaling option in some Linux OS's for Gnome but it uses xrandr which kind of works but it renders the cursor tools in the arrange view & also plugins extremely small. I'm currently using i3wm which is a tiling window manager with no scaling features & for this reason I'm setting the scaling in Reaper manually via the reaper.ini but it would be nice to have this feature built into Reapers preferences.

It would also be nice to be able to use the many great lv2 plugins there are natively in Reaper but I understand that this might be a big ask. So better UI scaling gtk integration & or libswell customisation within Reaper itself would bring the Linux version of Reaper more in line with Windows & macos & out of the shadows.
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Old 12-22-2019, 04:23 PM   #2
azslow3
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SWELL on Linux is not GTK based, it is GDK based. So you can not apply GTK themes to it.

It is already too much in Linux in attempt to bring it "in line with macos". And I hate every single thing that comes from this "line" (systemd, cups, gnome3 behavior and wayland... all come from there and all are crap, not only in current implementation but also in design).

Not even scaling by OS does not look good. OS independent. The simplest solution is to not use super high resolution tiny monitors or super high resolution TVs to look at them from many meters. At least till 4K is as "standard" as FHD now, so all applications adopt.

BTW that was again Apple who told people "hey! look at my 9" tablet with more then FHD resolution!"...
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Old 12-22-2019, 04:56 PM   #3
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Quote:
Originally Posted by azslow3 View Post
SWELL on Linux is not GTK based, it is GDK based. So you can not apply GTK themes to it.

It is already too much in Linux in attempt to bring it "in line with macos". And I hate every single thing that comes from this "line" (systemd, cups, gnome3 behavior and wayland... all come from there and all are crap, not only in current implementation but also in design).

Not even scaling by OS does not look good. OS independent. The simplest solution is to not use super high resolution tiny monitors or super high resolution TVs to look at them from many meters. At least till 4K is as "standard" as FHD now, so all applications adopt.

BTW that was again Apple who told people "hey! look at my 9" tablet with more then FHD resolution!"...

Yes I always get gtk/gdk mixed up & I did think that this might not be possible. This is why I think the libswell colortheme customisation along with the scaling from the Reaper.ini should be somehow integrated into Reaper itself for the Linux version rather than having to manually edit files. IMO as long as something like this has to be done manually outside of Reaper it will always be in the experimental stage (as stated on the official download page).


But don't get me wrong I'd rather have this feature than not have it, I spent a bit of time lastnight customising my libswell.colortheme to look more like my desktop theme & it looks so much better now than the generic grey coloured reaper menus & reaplugs.



When I say more inline with the windows & macos version I'm talking about Reaper itself not Linux as an OS. But I'm in no way a Linux purist either & have no problem with systemd, cups, gnome3 etc.. If you don't like it you don't have to use it. I just don't like windows at all, have used & liked macos but Linux is where it's really at for me & I'm really glad to be back after spending a good few years on macos. I just love how much control I have over my system now.
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