The last few Alpha releases of Ubuntu 8.10 have been a bit controversial because of the dark brown theme, called NewHuman, that it was shipping by default. Good news for those of you who weren’t too fond of that theme… it’s no longer default in Alpha 4! The NewHuman theme is still included as an option, but a new one called Human-Murrine has taken over the default spot.
I downloaded and installed the new Ubuntu 8.10 Alpha 4 theme so that I can see what it was like first-hand, but after installing the latest Alpha build there was a slight error with the theme. Human-Murrine is supposed to be shipping as the default theme, but for one reason or another it’s not completely enabled after setting up the operating system. It’s a known bug, but in the meantime you can manually select the Human-Murrine theme from System -> Preferences -> Appearance. After that it should look fine.
So what’s up with the new theme? It doesn’t look all that different from the Ubuntu 8.04 theme, but things like the progress bars are a bit more fancy. Here’s a screenshot gallery showing off the new theme:
Human-Murrine Theme on Ubuntu 8.10 Alpha 4 (Click to Enlarge)
You’ll notice that the first two screenshots have a messed up title bar because I hadn’t enabled the Human-Murrine theme yet. The remaining six screenshots are all using Human-Murrine. Take note of the redesigned progress bars shown in a few of the screenshots.
What do you think? Are you happy with the new theme or were you expecting something a bit more fancy like what we showed off last time?
This theme is also in Ubuntu Hardy and I have used it there. I think this is a better alternative to Human than NewHuman. I also noticed that the networkmanager has been redesigned
and by the way, the link redirects to Hardy’s alpha 4…
Yep, the network manager was redesigned a bit which is why I made sure to include it in a screenshot. Thanks for pointing out that the link was wrong… I fixed it.
Still as ugly as ever.
Yeah wish they wouldn’t make it so 1980s blocky.
All Ubuntu default themes look the same to me. And who the hell picked that kakka color anyways?? Completely changing they way Ubuntu looks is the first thing I do after every install.
What ever happened to those nice themes like [cybernetnews.com] The shiny glossy designs are out there, but the person who decides what looks good and what does not doesn’t have a good taste.
The theme is still BAD! If Ubuntu wants to uphold their commitment to make a better desktop and compete head on with Apple, then this is a great starting point. Ubuntu – drop the ball here and you will fail in your commitment.
well from what I heard, the new theme should be in Alpha 5/Beta 1.
It would be nice to see something like that, but the problem they’re saying is that it hasn’t been developed into a theme yet. From what I gather they’re looking to grab a theme that someone has already made, and just include it in the next release.
I sure hope so. I don’t know why they would have made Human-Murrine the default right now though? Naturally I’d think they’d re-enable the old Human theme instead of switching between themes so much. It’s almost like they can’t make up their mind.
Much nicer than the one you linked, too dark, bad yellow plus black combination, and it was quite an incomplete shot.
Btw, you should avoid using words like ’space’ for captcha, I was actually typing ‘ ‘ (without quotes)
Damn, they really gotta ditch the orange, and get Black or some other color. i really dont see the difference between 8.04 and 8.10
Huh, never thought about that. Good point.
That’s not the new theme. If you check the ubuntu alpha site, it tells you that a bug in the current alpha is that it loads the wrong default theme. You can load the new theme out of the appearance menu. It isn’t supposed to be that classic brown that has always been there.
You’re right, there is a bug. The bug is that Human Murrine was supposed to ship as the default, but it wasn’t completely enabled. I mentioned that in the article.
The theme is NOT drastically different from the current Ubuntu theme.
It is still ugly as usual !
It is even uglier
arghhh. the ubuntu team must be a bunch of old men that still use atari.
ubuntu has always looked crap and always will. end of story. I use to be an ubuntu/gnome fan, now Im so put off by the way they think, that i’ve switched to kde. KDE 4.2 is gonna be da bomb! kudos to the KDE team.
Gnome/ubuntu…get with the damn times! get rid of that 1980’s Look! for the love of god!
I take issue with this comment. I’m 61 and can be considered by many as an old man; however I use very modern software, hardware, and gadgets. I’ve seen computers owned by people much younger than myself with very old software.
I think age is state of mind, and has nothing to do with years. Just ask George Burns if he was an old man. A good question would be: How old is old?
lol well Omar…
maybe we can just say that you are young at heart
and the “majority” of the gnome team or grandpa’s still using their amiga’s that love the blocky old style gui’s. lol. I dunno… I just can’t understand why gnome looks the way it does, it works well, but the design is horrible.
Overall, I like gnome for its stability and how everything just works…. and i like kde for their way of thinking and always wanting to have the latest and the greatest when it comes to looks/funtionality and tweaks.
if only kde and gnome can merge together…? hmmm. lol, not gonna happen.