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Xfce is a lightweight desktop environment, it’s default for Xubuntu

Color UI – An Elegant Simple Theme for XFCE Desktop

Last updated: March 17, 2015

xfce theme

Color UI is a new simple and good looking theme project includes support for Xfwm4, Unity, Cinnamon, GTK3, GTK2, Metaciy, Mutter, Openbox.

Color UI was made with maximum usability in mind, from the window borders to the color scheme, Color UI was made for the user who wants an elegant simple theme that does not look broken. If any part of Color UI has any problems in any of the things I listed as this theme supporting, please notify me in the comments and I will try to fix it ASAP! Feedback is always appreciated, if it was not for feedback how else would Color UI improve.

Below is the screenshot of Color UI theme in Xfce Desktop, along with Numix-icon-light and Pen Tool Wallpaper.

Xfce Desktop with color UI theme

Wanna try this theme? Do the steps below:

1. Download the theme from right pane of the project page.

2. Unpack the theme package, copy & paste Color UI folder to /usr/share/themes. You may do the copy and paste thing by running below command in terminal:

cd ~/Downloads/Color-UI-* && sudo cp -r Color-UI /usr/share/themes

themes-folder

3. Change the theme folder permission:

sudo chmod -R 755 /usr/share/themes/Color-UI

4. For XFCE, apply the theme at Settings Manager -> Appearance -> Style, and Icons tab. Also change the window border by going to Settings Manager -> Window Manager -> Style.

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How to Display Network Manager Icon in Ubuntu XFCE4 Panel

Last updated: November 26, 2014

xfce panel

Xfce desktop session in Ubuntu 14.04 /14.10 does not display Network Manager, Messaging Menu, Keyboard Input, and Power icons on the panel out-of-the-box.

Thanks to Mark Trompell, it’s quite easy to add those icons back to Xfce panel by a small plugin called xfce4-indicator-plugin.

Xfce4 Indicator Plugins

1. To install the plugin, open Ubuntu Software Center, search for and install the package xfce4-indicator-plugin.

2. Once you have the plugin installed, right-click on Xfce panel and navigate to “Panel -> Panel Preferences ….

Under Items tab, add new item “Indicator Plugin” and put it right after the “Notification Area” plugin.

Xfce4 Indicator Plugin

While the plugin includes the time and session menu, you can remove the “Clock” and “Action Buttons” from the list.

3. The xfce4-indicator-plugin includes the Global Menu indicator, which displays application menus on panel.

If you don’t like this feature, right-click on the Network Manager icon and select Properties. When it opens, tick the box after “Application Menus (Global Menu)” to hide the applet.

Disable Global Menu

Log out and back in to apply the changes.

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How to Remove Desktop Shortcut Icons in (X)Ubuntu XFCE4

Last updated: November 12, 2014

Remove Xfce Desktop Icons

Quick tutorial that shows beginners how to remove the shortcut icons from Xfce4 Desktop in (X)Ubuntu 14.10, (X)Ubuntu 14.04.

Xfce4 shows Home, Devices, Trash icons on desktop out-of-the-box. You can’t simply remove them from the right-click context menu. But it’s easy to hide or disable them via the Desktop Settings utility.

1. Open Desktop Settings from the Application Menu. Or right-click on desktop and select it from the pop-up context menu.

Xfce Desktop Settings

2. When the utility opens, navigate to Icons tab. Un-check all the boxes under Desktop Icons.

Note that you might need to re-size the window so that you can see the checkboxes.

Disable Desktop Icons

This should remove user’s Home, Trash, and Devices icons.

If you want to hide all desktop icons besides removing application shortcuts from ~/Desktops folder, just set Icon Type to None. Note that this also changes the desktop right-click menu.

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Get Maximized Window Titlebar & Buttons on Panel in Xfce4

Last updated: September 8, 2014

xfce4 window titlebar & buttons on panel

This simple tutorial shows Xubuntu or Xfce4 users how to get the titlebar & control buttons of maximized window on the panel using Windowck plugin.

First take a look at the result (Ubuntu 14.04 with Xfce 4.10). You’ll see the title of current Firefox tab on top panel and the window control buttons on the top-right.

xfce4-titlebar-on-panel

To get started:

1. Install the xfce4-windowck-plugin, written by Alessio Piccoli and Cédric Leporcq.

Download the binary from the link below that matches your OS type:

  1. 64-bit system – xfce4-windowck-plugin_xxx~trusty_amd64.deb
  2. 32-bit system – xfce4-windowck-plugin_xxx~trusty_i386.deb

Download Xfce4-windowck-plugin

Then double-click the package to open with Software Center and click the install button to install it.

2. Add the ‘Window Header – Title’ and ‘Window Header – Buttons’ to panel.

Now right-click on panel and navigate to panel -> panel preferences. Add the two panel items ‘Window Header – Title’ & ‘Window Header – Buttons’ and move them to appropriate locations:

xfce-add-panel-items

After that, maximize a window and you’ll see the window title and buttons on the panel.

3. To get better appearances, do:

  • Use Window Menu instead of Window Buttons in panel, see above picture
  • Hide the original titlebar when the window is maximized.

    To do so, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open the terminal. When it opens, run the commands below one by one:

    sudo apt-get install maximus

gconftool-2 --set /apps/maximus/no_maximize --type=bool true

    Log out and back in to get it work.

4.(Optional) Uninstall.

Just remove the two panel items from the above picture and run below command to restore maximized window decorations:

gconftool-2 --set /apps/maximus/no_maximize --type=bool false

via: xfce.org

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How to Launch Xfce4 Terminal in Quake-style Drop-down Mode

Last updated: February 13, 2014

xfce4 drop-down terminal

As you may know, Xfce4 terminal supports the Quake style drop-down mode since version 0.6. Just a parameter --drop-down will start xfce4-terminal just like quake, yakuake, or tilda.

Xfce4 Terminal Quake Style

It is advised to bind this feature to a shortcut in the keyboard preferences. Below steps will teach you how:

1. Open xfce4-setting-manager from Application menu or Alt+F2 Application Finder box.

2. Click on the Keyboard icon under Hardware section.

3. Under Application Shortcuts tab, click on the Add button and type in the command box xfce4-terminal --drop-down

Xfce terminal Quake style

4. Click on OK and set a keyboard shortcut in next window.

Now you’re able to press the keyboard shortcut to launch a drop-down Xfce4 terminal. Click the button at right-bottom to open the preferences dialog and edit the width, height, opacity, duration and more!

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