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INTRODUCTION
============
First, a word about Fahrenheit. The theme, like its namesake, is
not meant to be the final word in practicality or usability. Think about
it: why hasn't the US switched to Celcius, a much more practical and
usable temperature scale? It makes much more sense to base a temperature
scale around water (since so much of life literally revolves around
water). Just what is 0�F and 100�F anyways? It makes no sense at all,
other than the inertia of tradition.
Fahrenheit the theme is much the same way, except that it lacks
the temperture scale's inertia, but it also looks (in the author's
opinion) more visually interesting than the standard square box. Be it
the lickable OSX or the crayola WinXP, the fact remains that even by
rounding out the corners, most window decorations are hopelessly mired in
squareville. Now, there are good reasons for square. Square is usable.
Square is practical. Square is comforting and familiar, like a teddy
bear that's gotten the stuffing squeezed out of it. But square is also
boring, overdone, and, like week-old leftovers, there's only so much you
can do with it before you get sick of turkey sandwiches and turkey
quiche and turkey omlettes and cream of turkey soup.
To relieve my boredom, there's Fahrenheit. That's right, this is
about _me_. If you like it, you're more than welcome to use it. If you
don't, then forget about it. It's not for you. Go back to squaredom. I
don't care. Yes, this violates Fitt's law in obscene and unthinkable
ways. The buttons may be too small, but then, I have fine motor control
and don't find it a problem in the least. I find it usable; therefore,
it is usable for me. It wastes space with all the funky curves and bars.
Well, my monitor is 1400x1050, so I've got space to waste.
COMPILING
=========
A straight-forward affair; read the INSTALL file for more details, but
the following ought to be enough:
1) make -f Makefile.cvs
2) ./configure
(Depending on your system, you may need to add '--prefix=/usr'
and if it can't find the location of the Qt libs and includes, those as
well. './configure --help' will tell you what you need to know.)
3) make
4) (as root) make install
If you have problems compiling, make sure that you have the necessary
KDE development files installed. And before complaining that you can't
compile, read through the discussions for other KDE 3.2 borders. There
is a 99.9% chance that your problem already has a long and glorious
precedent set by others.
COLORS
======
There are six color settings that you will want to play with
in the Control Panel:Appearances & Themes:Colors dialog. These are:
- Active Title Bar
- Inactive Title Bar
- Active Window Frame
- Inactive Window Frame
- Active Window Handle
- Inactive Window Handle
The title bar and window frame colors should be self-evident.
Less obviously, however, are the window handle settings. This changes
the color of the grip lines in the upper-right hand corner of the frame.
THANKS
======
Inspiration: Fahrenheit was inspired by the mock-up screenshots
of a hypothetical future BeOS window border, GonX. See the screenshots
at http://cotito.free.fr/projects/.
David Johnson on the kwin mailing list was of great help to me
while writing this decoration. His Example decoration
(http://www.kde-look.org/content/show.php?content=6332) is also a great
framework for creating new decorations as well.
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