gitk looks ugly / doesn't honor theme settings
gitk is implemented in tcl/tk. I've searched around but there doesn't seem to be much you can do; it is scolded as ugly on Linux everywhere. And apart from using a hideous toolkit, gitk has been growing worse for me as they put in more functions (mostly not used) the UI becomes even more confusing.
So I instead of a solution I recommend gitg, which is a similar tool, less mature, using GTK+.
tcl/tk 8.5 is actually themeable and looks rather native on Windows 7 and apparently on Mac. Less care seems to have been given to write theme engine bridges for it under linux, but you can do one of three things:
-
To get away from the "motif" look-and-feel to a slightly better one:
$echo '*TkTheme: clam' | xrdb -merge -
To have it persist between reboots add the line *TkTheme: clam to ~/.Xresources, but I'm not sure if that's read whether you launch your desktop environment with startx or not.
Alternative solution to the above, by the author of the same blog post, on this very page: https://superuser.com/a/428563/107881
To get tk to use qt themes, you'll need to checkout and build tile-qt from: git://tktable.git.sourceforge.net/gitroot/tktable/tile-qt
Under Ubuntu 11.04 it was pretty easy, adapt the tcl/tk library paths as needed (some people have reported that those instructions are outdated):
$./configure --with-tcl=/usr/lib/tcl8.5/ --with-tk=/usr/lib/tk8.5/
$make
$sudo checkinstall
checkinstall being for creating a quick .deb instead of installing directly, keeps the system tidy.
Then afterwards as above, get tk to use your qt themes:
$echo '*TkTheme: tileqt' | xrdb -merge -
- There's also a tile-gtk in the same sourceforge repo as tile-qt, but it's thouroughly out-of date. I did manage to build it and install it after much fiddling but the visual results were messy - not recommended.
To fix this the Debian (Ubuntu) way:
$ sudo apt-get install tk8.5
$ sudo update-alternatives --config wish
And then pick the wish8.5 alternative.
Gabriel Morin's post is good, but tile-qt doesn't build anymore with those instructions and, though the blog post he linked to (mine, by the way) still works, it's no longer the best solution I know.
For people who want something better than the "clam" theme, PySolFC includes a Clearlooks theme for Ttk and I wrote another blog post which explains how to install it.
Here are the relevant parts of it, adapted for a Lubuntu user (which I now am):
# Get the theme
sudo apt-get install pysolfc
# Copy it into your user profile to not rely on PySolFC's presence
mkdir -p ~/.local/share/tkthemes
cp -r /usr/share/games/pysolfc/themes/clearlooks ~/.local/share/tkthemes/
# (optional) Remove PySolFC now
sudo apt-get remove pysolfc
sudo apt-get autoremove
# Add it to Ttk's search path
echo "export TCLLIBPATH=~/.local/share/tkthemes" >> ~/.xsessionrc
# Set the theme
echo "*TkTheme: clearlooks" >> ~/.Xresources
# Test it in this specific terminal window
export TCLLIBPATH=~/.local/share/tkthemes
xrdb -merge ~/.Xresources
git gui # gitk's "this isn't a repo" dialog is always ugly
# ...and then log out and back in to apply .xsessionrc for the whole desktop
There are some widgets which are still ugly (the menu bar and the SHA1 ID: text, which needs to be patched in gitk to be themable) but I don't know enough Tcl/Tk to patch things.
(And I've heard rumors that the menu bar wasn't made themable because it's delegated to the OS to draw on Windows and MacOS)