📅 March 25, 2015
Gedit, as well as xed, is an excellent text editor. Not only does it sport a variety of features that facilitate typing, programming, and file organization, but gedit also supports…get ready…wait for it…THEMES!
Yes, themes. Are you dissatisfied with the plain black-on-white color scheme? Maybe you prefer a darker theme with bold neon colors for keywords while programming? Or perhaps you simply want to look at pretty, new colors?
Gedit supports theme files that change the colors of various parts of text. This is especially valuable for highlighting specific programming languages. You can create gedit theme files yourself, or you can download existing themes from others.
Theme files seem to be one of gedit’s best-kept secrets. A few web sites have lists of themes available, but few previews. What does a theme look like before downloading?
This article aims to provide screenshots for a number of gedit themes for preview purposes and to show what is possible with gedit.
Where To Download Gedit Themes
The following three sites will provide a starting point, and it is from these sites the themes were obtained:
- https://github.com/mig/gedit-themes
- https://github.com/gmate/gmate/tree/master/styles
- https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/GtkSourceView/StyleSchemes
Downloading Themes
Find a theme you like, and download it as an xml file. This often means right-clicking the RAW download link and choosing the Save Link As option from the browser’s context menu. Some themes can be downloaded all at once in a single ZIP file.
How to Install New Themes
There are two ways to do this.
One Theme At A Time Method
If you have a few themes, then this method is probably the best. Open gedit, and go to Edit > Preferences > Font & Colors tab. Next, click the small “+” button to add a theme. Navigate to the xml theme file and open it. The theme will be added to gedit, ready for immediate use.
Multiple Copy Method
Themes are stored in the $HOME/.local/share/gedit/styles directory. This is a hidden directory in your home. Simply copy all theme xml files to this directory. However, you must restart gedit in order to detect and use the themes.
To use a theme, select it from the Color Scheme list box. Gedit instantly changes.
A list of gedit themes ready for use. Select a theme and see the difference!
Update, July 29, 2016: In Linux Mint 18, you can copy all theme .xml files to /usr/share/gtksourceview-3.0 instead of $HOME/.local/share/gedit/styles.
Assume you are in a gedit theme directory containing all downloaded theme .xml files:
sudo cp *.xml /usr/share/gtksourceview-3.0
Themes will work with both gedit and the xed text editor — included as the default text editor in Linux Mint 18. Both editors check the same location for themes.
gedit 3.18.3 now displays theme previews for all themes found. The themes shown here were manually copied to /usr/share/gtksourceview-3.0 in Linux Mint 18.
Gedit Themes
So, what do the themes look like? Here are a number of gedit themes organized by web site. For the file example, I took screenshots of the /etc/init.d/acpid file in Linux Mint 17.1. Plain text does not reveal a theme’s potential, so I used a script file to show how colors change when different themes are applied.
Each theme is named according to its name as seen per web site. Go to the web sites to download themes.
Default Themes
What does gedit provide by default?
Classic
Cobalt
Kate
Oblivion
Tango
MIG Themes
https://github.com/mig/gedit-themes
Not certain what to name this set, but these are the themes found at the web site https://github.com/mig/gedit-themes.
autumn
darkermate
darkmacs
darkmate
desert
dusk
fluffy
fruity
github
idle
ironman
native
neon
railscasts
railscasts2
twilight
warm_grey
rainbow_neon
slush_and_poppies
tinge
vibrant_fun
vibrantink
vibrant_ink (Name contains an underscore)
vibrant_nerd
wombat
womvamp
zenburn
Gmate Themes
https://github.com/gmate/gmate/tree/master/styles
Here are many more themes compatible with gedit, though not advertised as such.
Active4D
Airkitek (MacMoose)
All Hallow’s Eve
Ambiance
AmbianceDark
Amy
Argonaut
BBEdit
Bespin
Blackboard
Black Pearl II
blue_dream
BoysAndGirls01
Brilliance Black
Brilliance Dull
build
chela_light
Choco
Classic Modified
CodeZone
Cool Glow
Daltonism
Dawn
Django
Django (Smoothy)
dreamweaver
eclips3.media (ECLM)
Eiffel
emacs_mod
Emacs Strict
Espresso Libre
Fade to Grey
Frill
ForLaTeX
Flarp
Frill
IR_White
IR_Black
iPlastic
iLife 05
idleFingers
IDLE
GmateLight
Gmate
GlitterBomb
Github
jellybeans
LAZY
Monokai
Mono Industrial
minimal_Theme
Midnight
Merbivore Soft
Merbivore
Matrix
MagicWB (Amiga)
MacMoose
Mac Classic
Lowlight
mustang
Pythonic
Plum Dumb
PlasticCodeWrap
PhilGeek (Overcast)
Pastels on Dark
Notepad2
Neopro
ryan-light
RubyRobot
rubycius-mod (function underlined)
Rubycius
Ruby Blue
RDark
Railscasts improved
Railscasts black (Railscasts Modified)
Railscasts black improved
Railscasts
Conclusion
Is a particular theme close but not quite to your liking? Then, you can open the theme in a text editor and edit it. These previews should provide a glimpse into what is possible in the world of gedit themes and help inspire your creativity. Happy theming!
Delightly Linux 