Xfce Forum

mostafa

Member

Registered: 2026-06-19

Posts: 5

why doesnt xfce have a gui for adding new themes

the application for themes in xfce is called appearance
when I use it I find an "+ Add"  button strangely this button seems to accept a file instead a directory
which is strange because gtk3 themes are usually directories
my question is what file format does it accept and my suggestion is to add an "+ Add" button that accepts directories and moves them to the local .themes directory

eriefisher

Wanderer

From: ON, Canada

Registered: 2008-10-25

Posts: 985

Re: why doesnt xfce have a gui for adding new themes

I've never tried it but I'd imagine it wants a compressed archive like theme.tar.gz or theme.zip. It would unpack it and "install" the theme. Like I said, never tried it. I just normally unpack the theme to /home/user/.theme directory. It will show up automatically in Appearance.

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But it's all right, when you're all in pain and you feel the rain come down
It's alright, when you find your way, then you see it disappear
It's alright....
Chris Cornell

mostafa

Member

Registered: 2026-06-19

Posts: 5

Re: why doesnt xfce have a gui for adding new themes

I think I tried that with archives and it didnt work
generally Im suggesting adding an add button that adds it to the .themes directory not because I need it but more so that it seems to be a simple change that would make importing themes alot more user freindly

eriefisher

Wanderer

From: ON, Canada

Registered: 2008-10-25

Posts: 985

Re: why doesnt xfce have a gui for adding new themes

Here is a post about what were discussing. I just tested it as mention in the post but it doesn't seem to be working. I would suggest a bug report.
https://forum.xfce.org/viewtopic.php?id=16161

Added later 26 min 22 s:
Ok, I just retested and it worked fine. the theme folder was packed inside of another folder so I unpacked the whole thing, pulled out the theme folder and recreated the archive. I used the Add(+) button, navigated to the archive and it shows up fine. I select it and it works.

If your downloading random themes they must have a specific format for everything to work correctly using the Settings>Appearance>Add button. This is explained in the link I posted above. The system works but the archive must be correct.

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But it's all right, when you're all in pain and you feel the rain come down
It's alright, when you find your way, then you see it disappear
It's alright....
Chris Cornell