1236370 - quick filter bar color is missing

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Thunderbird :: Mail Window Front End, defect)

Description

[Greta]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Fedora; Linux x86_64; rv:43.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/43.0
Build ID: 20151229124331

Steps to reproduce:

Open Thunderbird


Actual results:

The filter pane (unread, starred, contact, ...) has a line above the list of messages which contains subject, from, recipient, etc..  That line now has a white background, which is what the messages have.  It is too easy to select something on that line instead of selecting a message to view.  The result is the sort order gets messed up.


Expected results:

There should have been a non-white background color.

In Thunderbird 37, the colors are picked up from the Fedora system.  In Thunderbird 38, no longer is that done, but there is no background color on the header line that contains the subject, recipient, etc., and that also sets the sort order.

Comment 1

[Richard Marti (:Paenglab)]

Greta, please can you add a screenshot with the issue and maybe how it should look?

Comment 2

[Greta]

Attached is a screenshot of what should happen, which is from Thunderbird 37 (Fedora 19).  I can't yet provide a screenshot of the wrong coloration, as my screenshot button doesn't seem to work in Fedora 23.  When I get that issue figured out, I'll attach a screenshot from Thunderbird 38.

The issue is this:  in Thunderbird 37, you can see that the line that says subject, from, and date does not have a white background.  Its background matches that of the filter line above it, and makes for a clear deliniation between the header and the list of messages.

In Thunderbird 38, the background of the "subject, from, date ..." is white, which makes it blend in with the messages below it.  That makes it much too easy to select that line, which alters the sort order, depending on which field you have clicked.

On another note, I would like Thunderbird 38 to act like Thunderbird 37, and pick up the colors I have selected for various fields.  Instead, Thunderbird 38 chooses its own colors and I haven't found a way to alter that.  Also, what happened to the background coloration of the list of messages, where every other message had a very light non-white background?  It made it easier to read all the parts of a single message.  Those of us who are getting older appreciate anything that makes reading easier.

Comment 3

[Greta]

Attachment: fedora31.7.0.thunderbird.png

Comment 4

[Richard Marti (:Paenglab)]

Is TB from your distribution or downloaded from Mozilla? For me, it looks like Fedora changed some behaviors. TB should use the system appearance for the treeheaders. Also the zebra striping of the trees was long time ago removed.

When you are using the distribution version, could you try to download TB 38 from Mozilla? Where is no installation needed, only unpack the tar.bz2 file and start thunderbird. TB 38 should work on Fedora 19 and 23.

Comment 5

[Greta]

Attachment: Thunderbird 38.5 downloaded from Mozilla

Problem persists:  white background.

Comment 6

[Greta]

Sorry about the quality of the attachment.  I could not do a printscreen, so had to take a picture of the screen, download it to the computer, crop it and then attach it.  The background on the header line is not the same as the rest of the header.  It is white, like the message list, so same problem as the fedora version.

Comment 7

[Richard Marti (:Paenglab)]

(In reply to Greta from comment #5)
> Created attachment 8704272 [details]
> Thunderbird 38.5 downloaded from Mozilla
> 
> Problem persists:  white background.

Thank you, this screenshot is from Fedora 23? If it's possible to check, how does it look on Fedora 19?

What color has a tree header from a native Fedora 23 program like the file manager (not sure if its Nautilus on Fedora)?

Comment 8

[Greta]

What I've tried:
Fedora 19 running distribution version of Thunderbird 37:  shown in first screenshot.
Fedora 23 running distribution version of Thunderbird 38:  shown in second attachment.
Fedora 23 running Mozilla version of Thunderbird 38:  looks the same as second attachment.
Fedora 23 running Mozilla version of Thunderbird 37:  looks the same as second attachment.
Fedora 19 running Mozilla version of Thunderbird 38:  looks the same as first attachment.

So, it looks like custom header colors worked in Fedora 19 and not in Fedora 23.  And, Fedora 23 seems to not allow color for the header line that Fedora 19 allows.  Perhaps there is something in my settings that is making a difference.  I will do some more investigating, such as copying my Fedora settings from my computer running Fedora 17 to my computer running Fedora 23 to see what happens.

Comment 9

[Greta]

I tried taking all the settings from my computer running Fedora 19 and putting them on my computer running Fedora 23.  It didn't change anything.  Thus, it does seem like Fedora did something in Fedora 19 that has not been propagated to Fedora 23.  Mozilla has been consistent in its versions of Thunderbird.

Perhaps this could be changed to a request for enhancement to have the line that says subject, from, date, etc. be considered part of the header and thus gain a non-white background.

Sorry to have not done enough research to come to this conclusion earlier.

Comment 10

[Richard Marti (:Paenglab)]

Again, how does the treeheader in Nautilus on Fedora 23 look. Is the Background white or gray? How does the treeheader in Firefox History window look? If the same as TB but different than Nautilus it's a core bug and could be fixed there.

TB does no special styling here and should use the appearance from system.

Comment 11

[Greta]

I'm not familiar with Nautilus.  I use Dolphin.  Also, I use KDE rather than Gnome.

The tree header in Firefox History is the same as TB, both in Fedora 23 (white) and in Fedora 19 (colored).  The line in Dolphin which gives the location of what's in the pane is colored in both Fedora 19 and Fedora 23.

I downloaded Nautilus in Fedora 23 and didn't see any tree header.  However, when I clicked on the search button, the background was colored in the remainder of the header line that was just created.  

So, Firefox and Thunderbird seem to be treated differently from Nautilus and Dolphin in Fedora 23.  I will submit a bug in Fedora.

Comment 12

[Richard Marti (:Paenglab)]

(In reply to Greta from comment #11)
> I'm not familiar with Nautilus.  I use Dolphin.  Also, I use KDE rather than
> Gnome.

This was the missing info. KDE 5 changed the default theme for GTK applications. Go to System Settings/Application Style/GNOME Application Style. With changing the GTK2 and/or the GTK3 theme (best you change one and apply it then start TB to check if it's the correct) you can choose your desired appearance. Also installing other themes is possible.

Comment 13

[Greta]

Thank-you for the info.  I will remember it when Fedora 23 starts using KDE 5.  And, thank-you for asking the questions that got me to better understand what is happening.

At this point, my desktop is running KDE 4.14, and there is at least one bug report against KDE4 stating that Oxygen theme does not do colors properly for GTK2 applications such as Firefox and Thunderbird.

In KDE4, when I go to System Settings -> Application Style, there is no GNOME Application Style option.  I have had trouble finding any reference to GTK applications in any of the system settings.

For the time being, I have figured out a work-around for my issue.  I installed a Thunderbird add-on called Account Colors 9.2.  I configured it to give a pale blue background to the message list, which makes it easy to differentiate the message list from the Subject/From/Date header line.

Comment 14

[:aceman]

I can confirm this too, on Slackware with KDE 3. It also exists on Firefox nightly.

Comment 15

[Richard Marti (:Paenglab)]

Attachment: Screenshot of File on Fedora 25

As you can see the built-in File (file browser) has also white tree headers. TB is consistent on this system with white tree headers.