How to change color of akonotes plasmoid?

[Duncan]

Thorsten Schnebeck posted on Thu, 05 Jan 2012 01:49:02 +0100 as excerpted:

> How to change colors (text and/or background) of akonotes plasmoid?
> IMHO white text on yellow background is not that good readable ;-)

akonotes?  Took me a bit, but I realized that must be an akonadi thing, 
and switched from kmail and akregator to claws-mail due to akonadi, and 
now wouldn't touch anything kdepim or akonadi related with a 10-foot pole 
(~3-meter, it's an idiom meaning I'm not getting anywhere CLOSE to it!) 
-- they're uninstalled here and STAYING that way!  Google confirms my 
guess. =:^)

Since that plasmoid appears to be a part of mainline kdepim and thus kde, 
it should follow at least to some extent the plasma/workspace theme.  
However, I've had problems previously with various plasmoids following 
part of a theme but hard-coding other bits, with assumptions about the 
theme colors that don't always hold.

Thus, the first thing I'd recommend is changing your plasma theme (kde 
settings, workspace appearance and behavior, workspace appearance, 
desktop theme).  Try both a dark and a light theme, trying to use builtin 
kde themes like air, aya, and oxygen.  See how those affect the colors.

* Note that at least last time I played with this some versions ago, MOST 
effects would take effect right away, but some of them would only take 
effect after a plasma restart -- either from krunner or a konsole window, 
kquitapp plasma-desktop (or plasma-netbook or whatever if appropriate), 
then restart it, plasma-desktop (again or netbook...).

If you find a theme that works for that plasmoid but that you don't like 
in general, you can select a theme that you like, then use the details 
tab to switch just single components to a different theme, if you'd like.

Second.  I believe there's problems in some cases because the plasma 
theme isn't properly coordinated with whatever general window color theme 
you're using (kde settings common appearance and behavior, application 
appearance, colors)... in particular, text-colors, check view text and 
window text especially, but it might be one of the other settings, too.  
What seems to occur is that various plasmoids will use the general kde 
text-colors but match it with the plasma theme backgrounds.  If the 
plasma theme assumes light text on a dark background and kde's colors are 
set for dark text on a light background... or the reverse, you'll have 
issues.  So you can try experimenting with that a bit as well.

Third, for more variety, you can checkout some of the themes on kdelook.  
I've been running one that I downloaded from there, called professional, 
for quite some time.  (I really ought to check and see if there's an 
update for it one of these days.)  It's more transparent than some, with 
light text, so it works best with dark backgrounds.  But do note that the 
kdelook themes vary a lot in quality, and that naturally, kde built-in 
plasmoids are going to be better tested with built-in themes, tho that's 
still no guarantee.

Fourth and rather more advanced, as I already mentioned, I run the 
professional theme from kdelook, which has a lot more transparency than 
most themes.  I like it quite a lot, but there was one bit of it that 
just didn't work very well.  I ended up having to open the theme config 
files in a text editor and experiment a bit with switching the bits of 
one theme for the bits of another, until I figured out which specific 
setting controlled the bit I was having problems with (it wasn't as 
obvious as I could have wished it to be), then switch back to my 
preferred theme, except that I edited one specific line in the config to 
match a different theme that worked better for that one thing.  But I 
eventually did get it working exactly as I wanted.  (That's actually one 
reason why I've not checked back to see if there's an update, as I'd have 
to make sure I saved my current theme safely away with a different name, 
then do the update, and if my fix wasn't in it, I'd have to find and fix 
it once again.  Tho of course the second time would be far easier, 
especially using tools like diff to compare the themes.)

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman

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