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jasonmclose
Asked: 2012-05-12 07:19:03 +0800 CST

how to change Alt+Tab window highlight color in Unity 2D

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i have Ubuntu 12.04, and i run unity 2D (so i can run all of my monitors with xinerama).

a problem that i have is when i hit alt+tab, it highlights the new [active] window with a white border. well, if the window i want is behind another window that has a lot of white (like a web browser that is opened to a page with a white background (i.e. 80% of the web)), i can't tell which window i've alt-tab'd to.

where can i change the color and thickness of the window when it has been highlighted via alt+tab? i'd like a nice, thick orange or red background.

is this a CCSM thing? or do i need to alter via the metacity files?

thanks in advance.

compiz themes colors workspaces unity-2d

1 Answers

  1. Based on the answer found here: How I turn off backlight around switcher icons

    Short Answer

    You need to edit the file /usr/share/unity/5/launcher_icon_glow_200.png. I used GIMPs Colors -> Map -> Color Exchange to edit the color to my liking.

    Long Answer (had inline images, but my rep is too low)

    I first used the referenced answer to delete the background PNG as described and then was able to locate the file(s) you want to edit. In my case, I found that just changing the glow was not enough.

    First make a back up of the two files, launcher_icon_selected_back_150.png and launcher_icon_glow_200.png.

    cd /usr/shar/unity/5
sudo cp launcher_icon_selected_back_150.png launcher_icon_selected_back_150.png.bak
sudo cp launcher_icon_glow_200.png launcher_icon_glow_200.png.bak

    You can edit the two files however you like. To keep it simple, I edited just the background color:

    sudo gimp launcher_icon_selected_back_150.png

    I personally made the selected background darker. If some Gimp effect isn't working, make sure you change the color mode to RGB.

    Here's what it looks like when I alt + tab looks now:

    enter image description here

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