MX Linux Forum

I've just worked out a solution to make MX-19 look more "Redmondesque". It will probably work with MX-18.3 too. It only involves theming. A few people have been asking for something like this, so...

Download the following to a folder in Home (best to create a new one):

Grub Theme: https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1112066/ (follow the link in the comments on the Files page)*
GTK Theme: https://www.xfce-look.org/content/show. ... ent=106601
Icon Theme: https://www.xfce-look.org/p/1215836/
Plymouth theme: https://www.pling.com/p/1000041 (follow the link in the comments on the Files page)*
Wallpaper: https://www.deviantart.com/mucksponge/a ... -160313476
Xfwm theme: https://www.xfce-look.org/p/1013537/
*(Gnome-look and pling no longer have those two files available but the authors of them have elected to host them elsewhere and gave the new links within a comment down below on those two web pages. Copy them and paste and go in a browser tab.)

Right-click on all file archives and select Extract Here

Perform the following actions:

MX Tools/MX Tweak: move panel to bottom, change compositor to Compton, change to double-click in Thunar and on desktop.

Open a root Thunar and copy/paste grub theme "Aero" to /boot/grub/themes and to /usr/share/themes, paste plymouth theme "7" to /usr/share/plymouth/themes, paste GTK theme "Win7.basic.01" and Xfwm theme "Royale" to /usr/share/themes, paste icon theme "Windows-XP" to /usr/share/icons, paste wallpaper "windows_7_logoless_wallpaper_by_mucksponge_d2ng2o4-pre.jpg" to /usr/share/backgrounds.

MX Tools/MX Package Installer: install mx-icons-start and oxygencursors from Stable repo tab. Uninstall desktop-defaults-xfce-mx-desktop to prevent the default desktop in /etc/skel (for new user accounts) from being overwritten with the MX-19 defaults.

Set the above as your defaults (MX Tools/MX Boot Options for grub/plymouth themes (Aero and 7 respectively), Settings/Appearance for GTK and icon themes (Win7.basic.01 and Windows-XP), Settings/Mouse and Touchpad for Oxygen Steel mouse cursor theme, Settings/Window Manager for the Royale theme.)

Whisker Menu: right-click, select Properties. Click on the black MX icon then browse to /usr/local/share/icons/start-menu and select mx-icons-start-LogoBlue2, Click on Behavior and select "Postion search entry next to panel button" and "Position commands next to search entry". Optional: on Appearance tab select "Show generic application names" so instead of Thunar it shows File Manager, etc. Probably more helpful for people migrating from Windows 7 to help them find some things easier as the application names are closer to those in Windows.

Edit /etc/lightdm/lightdm-gtk-greeter.conf as root. Change background to /usr/share/backgrounds/windows_7_logoless_wallpaper_by_mucksponge_d2ng2o4-pre.jpg, change theme-name to Win7.basic.01, change icon-theme-name to Windows-XP.

Edit /usr/share/icons/default/index.theme, change Inherits= from DMZ Black to oxy-steel to set your mouse cursor globally in the system.

Panel Preferences: remove Orage clock and add Clock instead (due to background transparency issue with Orage), add Show Desktop, change Workspace Switcher properties to use two rows, change Windows Updater icons from Wireframe to Classic.

Disable MX USB Unmounter in Session and Startup/Autostart Applications as its icon doesn't display in this theme (users can unmount USBs in Thunar.)

(Optional, for laptops/notebooks/netbooks): Run Accessories/Touchpad Indicator, right-click on its tray icon and go to preferences, set it to autostart, disable touchpad when typing and when mouse is plugged in, and change its theme to the darker one of the two so its icon is visible.

Right-click on Power Manager in notification area and disable System Tray Icon as it's not visible with this theme. Access it in Settings/Power Manager instead.

Restart and enjoy your Windows-looking MX! Screenshots here.

Why stop at Win 7? It is after all the 25th anniversary year of Win95...

Bceause no one's asked how to make MX look like Windows 95.

We have a few newbies coming to MX from Windows 7 now that it's at end of life. No one's coming from a Win95 system that I know of as it's been obsolete and unsupported for years.

Thank you, it will be useful, especially for attracting newbies

I made a respin using these themes etc.: viewtopic.php?f=100&p=552511#p552511

Great!

I tried a few weeks ago to make MX look like Win10 (for a guest account in case I lent my laptop), with a theme by "Boomerang", but the result was so so.

Respect!

Coming from Windows 7 I liked the look and feel of MX spontaneously but nevertheless this hits the beginners nerve.
BTW: my wife is coming from MacOS and Thunar looked familiar to her at first go.

I've tried to change the look. The feel is still going to be MX-19/Xfce though. So there will still be a learning curve, but having MX at least look a little bit more familiar to them may help soothe people's nerves a bit while they're struggling with learning a new OS. That was my goal.

Cristobal wrote: Sat Jan 11, 2020 4:08 am Great!

I tried a few weeks ago to make MX look like Win10 (for a guest account in case I lent my laptop), with a theme by "Boomerang", but the result was so so.

Kali Linux, which uses Xfce now, has a theme which looks like W10 and a script to change to and from that.
Run a live ISO and swipe the theme, script and configs to use on MX. It is based directly on Debian so should be easy.

Kali might be based on Debian Testing, though. Not sure if the gtk theme it uses is compatible with Buster, so that will need to be checked.

But yes, it might be possible to crib the icons and theme set for W10.


However, I find the idea of the script a little too dramatic, to be honest. **Mission Impossible or James Bond music starts playing**

"Say you are working in a public place, hacking away, and you might not want the distinctive Kali dragon for everyone to see and wonder what it is you are doing. So, we made a little script that will change your Kali theme to look like a default Windows installation. That way, you can work a bit more incognito. After you are done and in a more private place, run the script again and you switch back to your Kali theme. Like magic!"

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/s ... indows-10/


Right.

I'm sure that if Cristobal wanted to use Kali Linux instead of MX he'd already be doing so.

jeffreyC wrote: Sat Jan 11, 2020 6:26 am

Cristobal wrote: Sat Jan 11, 2020 4:08 am Great!

I tried a few weeks ago to make MX look like Win10 (for a guest account in case I lent my laptop), with a theme by "Boomerang", but the result was so so.

Kali Linux, which uses Xfce now, has a theme which looks like W10 and a script to change to and from that.
Run a live ISO and swipe the theme, script and configs to use on MX. It is based directly on Debian so should be easy.

Indeed, I read it on some website, unfortunately I don't know how to do it (swipe theme, script and config). However, the other day I copied the latest Mint Y theme from Mint 19.3 xfce (icons and theme put MX usr/share folder) and the result was pretty good actually, except the style in the window manager (I have to use another dark greyish style).

asqwerth wrote: Sat Jan 11, 2020 6:42 am
However, I find the idea of the script a little too dramatic, to be honest. **Mission Impossible or James Bond music starts playing**

"Say you are working in a public place, hacking away, and you might not want the distinctive Kali dragon for everyone to see and wonder what it is you are doing. So, we made a little script that will change your Kali theme to look like a default Windows installation. That way, you can work a bit more incognito. After you are done and in a more private place, run the script again and you switch back to your Kali theme. Like magic!"

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/s ... indows-10/


Right.

If I remember correctly, I saw the creepy hacker (Rami Malek) in Mr Robot TV series using Mint in season 2 (yet in the later seasons he uses Kali I believe).

... Interesting this easy mode (Windows10 look) via the terminal ... A MX-undercover or antiX-undercover mode would be a good idea too.

(With Icewm I already have a kind of Windows7 / VistaBlack look theme)

That would be kind of cool if MX had something like that, an app that could let you assemble your own personal "themes" from choices of installed GTK and window manager themes, mouse cursor themes and even wallpapers and save them as theme profiles then let you switch between them semi-on the fly (after logging out/in.) It could have a launcher that you could auto-start so it would be available to switch between your themes with a couple of mouse clicks.

Dolphin will say, "has no one explored MX-tweak properly?"



It only saves icon set, gtk theme and WM theme, but perhaps in time that can be extended to WP and panel orientation....

I thought I'd seen that in MX before, but I wasn't sure. Maybe that's what gave me the idea?

Please look at the screenshot: I need some advice on how to enlarge symbols and fonts in Thunar, start menu and Quick Lauch bar.

$ inxi -Fbz
System: Host: mx1 Kernel: 4.19.0-6-amd64 x86_64 bits: 64 Desktop: Xfce 4.14.1
Distro: MX-19_x64 patito feo October 21 2019
Machine: Type: Laptop System: Microsoft product: Surface Pro 6 v: D:0B:13F:5C:10P:38S:01E:0
serial: <filter>
Mobo: Microsoft model: Surface Pro 6 serial: <filter> UEFI: Microsoft v: 234.2706.768
date: 04/18/2019
CPU: Topology: Quad Core model: Intel Core i5-8250U bits: 64 type: MT MCP
L2 cache: 6144 KiB
Speed: 800 MHz min/max: 400/3400 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 800 2: 800 3: 800 4: 800
5: 800 6: 800 7: 800 8: 800
Graphics: Device-1: Intel UHD Graphics 620 driver: i915 v: kernel
Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.4 driver: modesetting unloaded: fbdev,vesa
resolution: 2736x1824~60Hz
OpenGL: renderer: Mesa DRI Intel UHD Graphics 620 (Kabylake GT2) v: 4.5 Mesa 18.3.6
Audio: Device-1: Intel Skylake Imaging Unit driver: N/A
Device-2: Intel driver: N/A
Device-3: Intel Sunrise Point-LP HD Audio driver: snd_hda_intel
Sound Server: ALSA v: k4.19.0-6-amd64
Network: Device-1: Marvell 88W8897 [AVASTAR] 802.11ac Wireless driver: mwifiex_pcie
IF: mlan0 state: up mac: <filter>
Drives: Local Storage: total: 267.63 GiB used: 5.15 GiB (1.9%)
ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Samsung model: KUS030202M-B000 size: 238.47 GiB
ID-2: /dev/sda type: USB vendor: Generic model: SD MMC size: 14.84 GiB
ID-3: /dev/sdb type: USB vendor: SanDisk model: Ultra Fit size: 14.32 GiB
Partition: ID-1: / size: 6.11 GiB used: 5.8 MiB (0.1%) fs: overlay source: ERR-102
Sensors: System Temperatures: cpu: 35.0 C mobo: N/A
Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A
Info: Processes: 226 Uptime: 30m Memory: 7.72 GiB used: 601.6 MiB (7.6%) Shell: bash
inxi: 3.0.36

Same screenshot with somewhat better resolution.

I have not yet followed tutorial in this thread (I will for sure). Meantime I have managed to transform MX look to more like Windows 10.

I've used Kali Undercover .deb file (more info can be found here: https://www.linuxuprising.com/2019/12/h ... de-on.html). So, that's an alternative for Windows 7

Short video (quick look for theme) can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHIuKk8G6Sk

I installed this in 18.3, clicked on it, and it definitely seemed to work to convert theming to Windows style.
However when I clicked on it again to switch back, things seemed to freeze. I did an an altctrlbackspace and logged back in, and the old theme I had before seems to be intact, but thought I would post this as warning to be careful. I hope others will test and report.

nathan2423 wrote: Sat Jan 11, 2020 3:41 pm I installed this in 18.3, clicked on it, and it definitely seemed to work to convert theming to Windows style.
However when I clicked on it again to switch back, things seemed to freeze. I did an an altctrlbackspace and logged back in, and the old theme I had before seems to be intact, but thought I would post this as warning to be careful. I hope others will test and report.

I was testing it on MX 19 64 bit. Yes, there is a problem with coming back to original theme (after second use $ kali-undercover in terminal), but for me it was not freezing, just there was no change (actually only little changes - some details). So I had to do it manually with MX Tweak and panel backup. Also wallpaper must be restored manually.

I think the reason is that Xfce for MX is adjusted and modified (in comparison to pure Xfce). I didn't test it with pure Xfce, but I saw on some video, that on Manajaro Kali Undercover script works both ways. Probably I'll try it some day on antiX with Xfce.

I suppose that some modifications in script could be done (adjusting paths or something, I haven't yet time to look closer) and kali-undercover script could work fully in MX as well (at the moment it works only one-way).

It's interesting then that my experience was that the theme I was working with before executng the kali-undercover launcher came back exactly as before when I logged out. Maybe something wasn't yet saved at the time I exited.

I'll admit that some aspects (like what it does with Whisker) really are impressive, but I don't care for the overall look myself. However my wife regularly reminds me that she does not share my passion for discovery in linux, so I'll definitely use this on her computer to make it seem more familiar. :-)

nathan2423 wrote: Sat Jan 11, 2020 4:06 pm It's interesting then that my experience was that the theme I was working with before executng the kali-undercover launcher came back exactly as before when I logged out. Maybe something wasn't yet saved at the time I exited.

I don't really care for this look myself, but my wife regularly nags at me for twisting her arm to use MX, so I'll definitely use this on her computer. :-)

I was testing it on Live USB - not installed system. I don't know if it is a difference.

Mine was 18.3 installed, so definitely a possible difference there. I certainly would prefer to find a way to switch back and forth seamlessly and not lose the customizations, even though it may be only four or five settings. This definitely looks more modern than the older XP look.

I should add in my case I came out with a "lighter" variety of windows 10 rather than the darker whisker and panel shown in the link at linuxuprising. Not sure if that is changeable but would prefer the darker one.

Also: I see the video at linuxuprising launches the script from terminal. I launched it by clicking in the whisker menu, so maybe that would be a difference too.

nathan2423 wrote: Sat Jan 11, 2020 4:09 pm I should add in my case I came out with a "lighter" variety of windows 10 rather than the darker whisker and panel shown in the link at linuxuprising. Not sure if that is changeable but would prefer the darker one.

Also: I see the video at linuxuprising launches the script from terminal. I launched it by clicking in the whisker menu, so maybe that would be a difference too.

I suppose everything is changable, one must know how to do it

I think launcher in menu and typing script in terminal work the same.

If I find the way to 'fix' the switching - I will share. Anyway, it is cool feature to show someone. One click - Windows look, another click - MX (It would be the same 'coolness' like turning on and off transparency in MX Fluxbox - just with shortcut).

Just go to the
MX Tools - Baby Wheels (I'm new from Windows)
button.

I came to Linux several years ago - to get away from Windows. The last thing I would welcome is changing MX to make it seem like
the old plague.

True Gordon, although Mepis was a unique system with a certain flavor.
I have sometimes missed certain file manager ergonomics and options but am otherwise very happy with Xfce, having explored a few options like flat drag and drop windows buttons on the panel and reversing the Whisker menu as horizontal.

Sorry about all the smoke and dirty glaciers cobber.
Mick

Hi Mick,
Very little smoke here on NI east coast. Bottom of the South Island has copped most of it.
We are approaching drought conditions but nowhere near the problems you are having
across the ditch.

I have not modified MX at all but do find MX19 a bit less friendly than its predecessor.

Happy New Year,
Gordon

Guys, this is a HOWTO thread in Tips&Tricks about how to do an install of certain particular themes to get a Windowsish look. It's not a general chat topic, it's not a topic about someone else's Windows 10 theme, it's not about Kali Linux stealth mode, and it's not for help requests (those belong in new topics under General/Desktop Environment, or in MX Modified if you're using my respin instead of manually installing these themes as per my instructions here.) If you have comments or suggestions that are on topic, post away, otherwise they probably belong elsewhere. Please respect my topic. Thanks.

You are right JayM and I apologize for my role in that. The look and feel of the Kali-undercover alternative is substantially different than your version, and I might prefer both in different circumstances. I wonder if the moderators could split off these kali posts into a separate thread?

Sorry about that.

@ JayM. Sorry to have given offence in my comment to 'your' topic. However your very first line did suggest that you had a method of making MX 19 and possibly MX 18.3 look more like Windows. This is an anathema to me. Do not worry, I will be careful and not join in any of your posts in the near or distant future, regardless of the topic.

Gordon Cooper wrote: Sun Jan 12, 2020 11:40 pm @ JayM. Sorry to have given offence in my comment to 'your' topic. However your very first line did suggest that you had a method of making MX 19 and possibly MX 18.3 look more like Windows. This is an anathema to me. Do not worry, I will be careful and not join in any of your posts in the near or distant future, regardless of the topic.

I meant no offense, it's just that I saw there were four pages of mostly off-topic posts: about Kali linux, someone else's Windows 10 theme (which could be posted in it's own Tips&Tricks topic as it looks interesting) and then it started devolving into general chatting. I just wanted to steer things back on topic before there was a big red message from one of the moderators warning everyone or perhaps even locking the topic. I was trying to save you all from that.

I can still lock it if you want to, to avoid further clutter.. just say the word :)

Nah, not yet. People may be able to contribute suggestions on how to improve the instructions or something. Thanks anyway though.

The best way for me is to split these subjects, both are interesting.

Not really for me, as I have to start cherry picking posts

If you do want to continue the discussion I suggest starting a new topic.

The trouble with making MX (or ANY) Linux...LOOK...like Win7, is like "straightening the deck chairs on the Titanic", because it will never...BEHAVE...like Win7.

From my limited perspective, a simultaneously constructive project to ease the transition from Win7 to MX would be a detailed (perhaps included in the manual--just a thought) walk-thru on how to set up a Win7 system to dual boot MX, from a newbie point of view?

azrielle wrote: Mon Jan 13, 2020 3:13 pm The trouble with making MX (or ANY) Linux...LOOK...like Win7, is like "straightening the deck chairs on the Titanic", because it will never...BEHAVE...like Win7.
...

... But here it is only/mostly for a cosmetic aspect.

Why make it look like the most commonly used OS?
Keeping shoulder surfers from interrupting you with questions can be enough of a reason by itself.

Because a few people asked how to make MX look more like Windows 7, and because MX Linux newbies who are coming from a Win7 background may find this lookalike theming more comfortable to them while they're learning their way around in Xfce and MX vs. using something that's totally different-looking, even though it's really still a standard MX-19 installation under the hood: Xfce4/Xfwm, MX Tools, the standard preinstalled applications and menu structure, etc.