493517 - Gtk arrows have a very inconsistent visual size, impacting the Firefox theme's level of polish

Status: NEW

(Firefox :: Theme, defect)

Description

[Alex Faaborg [:faaborg] (Firefox UX)]

Attachment: Example of gtk arrow variability

One of the few remaining polish problems with Firefox on linux is the somewhat odd use of arrows in the main window.  Specifically I'm referring to:

-Back/forward drop down
-location bar drop down
-search engine drop down
-bookmarks bar folders drop down
-tab strip left
-tab strip right
-all tabs

The overall problem is that each GTK theme provides arrow glyphs that are wildly different in size (visually, not literally) so that things like padding and visual weight end up looking really off, depending on the theme that the user has selected.

Since this is fundamentally a problem with the source artwork in various gtk themes, it isn't readily obvious how we can address the issue in Firefox.  Some options include:

1) Work with gnome to solve the problem in future releases
2) Attempt to resize the source material ourselves at runtime (problematic since we don't necessarily know the visual size, and we can't really upscale)
3) No longer use uplifted gtk icons for arrow glyphs that have such a variability in visual size, or at least until the problem is solved.

Comment 1

[Michael Ventnor]

The problems mentioned in your image with each theme might be among the reasons why the user enjoys the theme. In other words, we should respect the user's choice of theme.

I think you're still in the Mac/Windows mindset of the program deciding what's best. That doesn't apply in our world :)

Comment 2

[Alex Faaborg [:faaborg] (Firefox UX)]

>I think you're still in the Mac/Windows mindset of the program deciding what's
>best. That doesn't apply in our world :)

Right, I totally get that really the OS theme should dictate the general aesthetics.

I wasn't expecting much buy in for option 3.  But in terms of option 1, I think we might want to get in touch with the gnome team, and point out that images like the one attached don't necessarily capture the theme author's vision of creating something that well, looks good.  Some possible solutions on their end could be to:

-try to be stricter about visual size vs. literal size
-have theme authors focus more on the intended padding for each image
-have each theme expose more sizes of these types of rasterized glyphs so apps have more options (knowing what the specific context is)
-expose vectors so apps have more control over layout

Comment 3

[Alex Faaborg [:faaborg] (Firefox UX)]

Attachment: Theme author's intended context?

Here the same images look fine, so it is entirely possible that this was the intended context for the images (a taller toolbar, wide menu).

I think the overall problem here isn't that Firefox and the OS theme author disagree on what looks good, but that the OS theme isn't yet providing enough of a vocabulary, while Firefox is also taking some stuff out of context.  The resulting visual appearance is subsequently a little lost in translation.

Comment 4

[Alex Faaborg [:faaborg] (Firefox UX)]

This bug's priority relative to the set of other polish bugs is:
P1 - Polish issue that appears in the main window, or is something that the user may encounter several times a day.

This issue appears in multiple locations in the main window.

Comment 5

[hannes.janetzek]

Not sure if I should open a new report for this: GtkArrow::arrow-scaling is not used. This clips arrows that are larger than factor 0.7 (the default) of menu items and buttons.

Comment 6

[hannes.janetzek]

Attachment: arrow-scaling: arrows larger than factor 0.7 of items are clipped