This is a new release of the compact theme, based on the original Ubuntu 8.10 (Intrepid) theme. It was created by Jan Suhr almost a month ago, based on my little howto.

I have now two versions of the theme: one with normal icon sizes, and one with the smaller 16×16 icons for even more compactness. Here is a comparison animation of the standard Human theme vs. the compact theme:

You can download the themes here:

Download and Installation

Save the theme to your computer.
Open the gnome’s appearence dialog with System > Preferences > Appearance.
Drag and drop the downloaded file into the Theme tab of the appearance dialog. If you get an error message “Can’t move directory over directory”, you have already installed a theme with the same name. To be able to reinstall it, remove the directory ~/.themes/Human Compact or ~/.themes/Human Compact Small Icons.
Choose “Apply new theme” in the popup dialog.

Most changes will occur immediately, but for e.g. the icon sizes it is best to log out and log in again. When you change the theme, you can get the Human Compact theme back by clicking on Customize, and then selecting Human Compact.

Any question, praise or flames? please post them!

Install for root (e.g. Synaptic)

Some readers asked how to get this to work for applications that run as root (e.g. synaptic), so here it is: simply copy the copy the theme file into the root’s home directory, like this (exchange username with your own name):

sudo cp /home/username/.themes/Human Compact/gtk-2.0/gtkrc /root/.gtkrc-2.0

Afterwards synaptic uses the human compact theme.

Older Themes

Here is some information about the original compact themes I have created:

Pingback: Martin Ankerl » Blog Archive » Human Compact Gnome Theme (for Ubuntu 8.04)
Pingback: Martin Ankerl » Blog Archive » Clearlooks Compact Gnome Theme
Pingback: Martin Ankerl » Blog Archive » How to Make a Compact Gnome Theme
Pingback: Temas de colores compactos! | Reylimo.net
Pingback: Breves « Ubuntu Life
http://bizrants.com Ed

Works great – thanks! Much better on my notebook
Max

Thanks… Finally found a solution to that way-too-big-stuff-theme problem.
Mark

Thanks a lot, this is extremely useful on my netbook. I really wish this will be part of Ubuntu 9.04.
http://fladd.de fladd

Nice.
Is it also possible to get the panel size lower than 24 pixels (I am talking about the above one, the bottom one works)?
http://andrearatto.homeunix.org Andrea Ratto

Good work, but it needs some polishing.

1. The package contains backup files.

2. There are a couple of warnings (here from oowriter):
(soffice:18702): Gtk-WARNING **: GtkSpinButton: setting an adjustment with non-zero page size is deprecated
Gtk-Message: (for origin information, set GTK_DEBUG): failed to retrieve property `GtkOptionMenu::indicator-size’ of type `GtkRequisition’ from rc file value “0″ of type `glong’
Gtk-Message: (for origin information, set GTK_DEBUG): failed to retrieve property `GtkOptionMenu::indicator-spacing’ of type `GtkBorder’ from rc file value “0″ of type `glong’
3. The firefox URL bar could be made look a little better.

4. The window border can be made a couple of pixels narrower, and probably the panel too.

I hope to see some more improvements and the inclusion of this theme in the standard ubuntu install or at least in the netbook remix project.
Tim Robertson

You can get rid of the button icons by adding gtk-button-images=0 to the top of the gtkrc-2.0 file. Just thought I’d let you know. Great theme, I’m using it now on my Dell mini 9.
me

better add the folder to /usr/share/themes
M. Junker

Big THX for your great work.
Nice and functionell for netbooks.
jsteph

Hello I have problem to install it on jaunty? any solution?
http://martin.ankerl.com/ Martin Ankerl

Hi, sorry I have not switched to jaunty yet so I have not tried it yet.
Pingback: How to get maximum screen space on a netbook | Computer Tips And Tricks, Gadgets, How-To, Life - 2.0 Style
http://www.johannes-eva.net/ Johannes Eva

Works perfectly under Ubuntu 9.04 “Jauty”
Martin, thanks a lot for this compact theme!
http://www.pigsflew.com adrian

This is great! Any plans for compactifying the “New Wave” theme that will ship with Jaunty?

By the way, this theme works fine with Jaunty, except for a few instances of “highlight_ratio” and “lightborder_ratio” can be replaced by “highlight_shade” and “lightborder_shade”, and the option “style” on line 117 can be safely commented out to prevent some warnings.

Thanks!
http://martin.ankerl.com/ Martin Ankerl

Thanks, adrian! I will make a new version when Jaunty is released.
http://www.johannes-eva.net/index.php?page=2009_04_useful_ubuntu_guide_jaunty Johannes

Hello Martin!
I linked your Compact Theme on my new Ubuntu Jaunty guide. I hope it is ok. I’ll update the link when the new version comes out!
All the best,
Johannes
http://martin.ankerl.com/ Martin Ankerl

Hi Johannes, thanks for linking, of course thats ok!
Pepe

Hi there!

Great theme, at all. It goes with me, since I bought my Medion Akoya Mini E1210, and installed 8.04.

Now, with 9.04 recently fresh installed, is again with me.

I encourage somebody to make more compact themes!

Netbooks forever! ;-P

Rgds and thanks for the great job!
Pepe
maathieu

@Mark
It also works on ubuntu 9.04: tested here all right .
Chris

Hi Martin,
I just noticed some warnings when I’m opening gedit from commandline on Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty. I installed the theme for root as described above. Here the warnings:

chris@netbook:~$ sudo gedit /etc/default/acpi-support
/root/.gtkrc-2.0:100: Murrine configuration option “highlight_ratio” will be deprecated in future releases. Please use “highlight_shade” instead.
/root/.gtkrc-2.0:101: Murrine configuration option “lightborder_ratio” will be deprecated in future releases. Please use “lightborder_shade” instead.
/root/.gtkrc-2.0:116: Murrine configuration option “style” is not supported and will be ignored.
/root/.gtkrc-2.0:156: Murrine configuration option “highlight_ratio” will be deprecated in future releases. Please use “highlight_shade” instead.
/root/.gtkrc-2.0:229: Murrine configuration option “highlight_ratio” will be deprecated in future releases. Please use “highlight_shade” instead.

Chris
z(u_U)egg

Thank you very much for the great job! Finally my Eclipse looks good! (tested in 9.04)

Thanks again, Zuegg.
Elias

Hello!

Nice theme! And I’m waiting the new release, hope it will be released soon.
maathieu

Looking forward for the update for Ubuntu 9.04
Sarah Kho

Your theme looks very good in my laptop but now I am moving to Ubuntu 9.10.
Can you please create a compact theme for Ubuntu 9.10?
Thank you
http://www.johannes-eva.net/ Johannes

Looking forward to see a 9.10 update. Would be great
Smitlik

Lot of thanks, I was for 3 years looking for something like this!

What about promoting to include this theme choice to Ubuntu on http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com ?
Pingback: Theming your OpenERP desktop client « Olivier Dony
Jesper

Just wanted to drop by and say that I’ve been using this on some of my lower resolution pc’s for a while now and that I absolutely love it!

So yea, thanks a bunch for taking the time out and making these compact themes
Pingback: Save Space on Your Ubuntu Desktop
Pingback: Ubuntu 8.10 on Medion Akoya 1210 « Frank Rehberger
http://www.pristytools.com/ filip007

Any tips or download for Ubuntu 9.10 Human default theme, Ubuntu 10.04 they don’t use Human theme any more.
http://www.pristytools.com/ filip007

http://packages.ubuntu.com/lucid/all/human-theme/download
Hendronicus

I’m using this on Gutsy and it works just fine.

Martin Ankerl

Chunky bacon!!

Human Compact Themes (for Ubuntu 8.10)

Download and Installation

Install for root (e.g. Synaptic)

Older Themes

Download and Installation

Install for root (e.g. Synaptic)

Older Themes

Related posts